They looked different in daylight. Less threatening. She circled until she found the signpost and looked around. There were half a dozen small farms in the immediate vicinity. The zombies must have come from one of them, because they’d been on her almost as soon as she’d sensed them. They could run fast, but not that fast.
She dipped her wing and drifted down to inspect the first farmhouse.
AN INSISTENT RINGING WOKE ETHAN. HE GLANCED AT HIS watch and cursed when he saw it was well after nine, then reached blindly for his cell phone on the nearby coffee table.
“Yeah?” His voice came out as little more than a gruff croak.
“Partner, you sound like shit.”
“Just tired, that’s all.” He rubbed a hand across his eyes and glanced around. Kat wasn’t in the cabin, though her lingering scent told him she hadn’t been gone long. Perhaps she was next door.
Mark grunted. “Aren’t we all. I went to the morgue like you asked. Seems like you weren’t as crazy as I thought you were.”
“Body gone to mush?”
“Completely. They managed to freeze a couple of fingers so we can get some prints, but other than that, it’s gone.”
“You searching through the database for a fingerprint match?”
“Yeah, but we both know it’s going to take a long time. And if the guy doesn’t have a record, hasn’t been in the military or had a government job, or didn’t volunteer his fingerprints when he got his driver’s license, we’ll be out of luck.”
Ethan had a suspicion they’d be out of luck anyway. “Anything else happening with the case?”
Mark hesitated. “Your brother has posted a reward for information that leads to Janie’s return.”
Ethan closed his eyes. “How’s he holding up?”
“Why don’t you find out yourself and call him?”
He really should call Luke, but he didn’t know what to say to him any more than he knew what to say to Kat. He wasn’t comfortable with intimacy of any kind. Hadn’t been for a long, long time. Luke understood his reasons, but he had a feeling Kat never would.
No, he wouldn’t call his brother. Not until he had something to say. “How’s Benton taking my being in Rogue River?”
“Badly. You’re dead meat if he catches up with you before he calms down.”
Then he’d just have to ensure he wasn’t caught. “The autopsy on the second kid come through yet?”
“Yeah. They’ve estimated the time of death to be between seven and eight yesterday evening.”
“So the kid had been kept alive five days before they killed him?” If that was the case, there was still hope for Janie.
“He was drugged and pretty much starved, though.”
“No indication of any other abuse?”
“Nothing, other than starvation. They found traces of dirt in his fingernails. They’re still analyzing that to see if they can discover anything unusual.”
He frowned and scratched his chin. Something about this case didn’t make sense, though he couldn’t exactly put his finger on what was bugging him. But if the beings behind these kidnapping were vampires of one sort or another, why were they snatching these kids and keeping them for nearly a week before killing them? Granted, he didn’t know much about vampires, let alone truly believe in them, but if they did exist, that just didn’t make sense. Unless they were taking the kids for something other than feeding …
“Look, just on a hunch, will yo
u check to see if there were other disappearances reported in the same area as each of these kids? Take it a few days either way.”
“You suspect this could be bigger than just the kids?”
“I don’t know what I suspect. I could be just reaching for straws.”
“Even so, given your record with straws, I’ll get it checked out immediately.”