Chapter 11

Mac was barely hanging on to human form. D had already changed over. He pulled out his phone, calling into work.

“Any news?” he demanded as soon as someone answered.

“Nothing yet,” his boss said. “Your end?”

“They’re both gone. There’s sign of a struggle, blood in a few different spots. Human.”

“What do you mean both?”

“D and his mate live with his mate’s best friend. Who happens to be my unclaimed mate.”

“You’re telling me this woman has two of my demons’ mates?” Lucifer asked, coldly furious.

“Yes, sir. We believe it’s the mate of the Shadow I recently brought in. I knew he had an accomplice, but could never find proof of who it was,” Mac admitted. He had failed. He had failed his friend and his mate.

“I’m going to go question this Shadow myself. I’ll try to get you some answers, at least some clues to where she might have taken them. If D claimed his mate, he may be able to portal to them if it’s not warded. Try to calm down and scent the area. See what kind of nonhuman we’re dealing with,” he ordered.

“Yes, sir.” Mac stood there holding his phone. Lucifer had hung up on him. He would not want to be that Shadow.

“D. Snap out of it. We need to see if we can tell what kind of nonhuman was here. Lucifer is going to question the Shadow. Come on. We need to find something to help them.”

Mac watched as D took a deep breath, his eyes showing the flames of the Netherworld in his fury. “I smell blood. Thomas and Viv. No nonhuman blood.”

“Try again. Sniff everything,” Mac ordered. He walked to the front door, leaving the pizza outside. There was a note saying the pizza had been dropped off but no one had answered the door. Since it had been paid for, they were leaving it. It had a time too, 5:50 pm. Okay, so it had to have happened before then or the delivery driver would have heard the noise. Viv left work at 5:00 pm. He had rushed out because he had sensed something in the parking lot, but there had been nothing there when he arrived. He had followed her home, no one close by that set off his alarms. But that didn’t mean that the Shadow’s mate couldn’t have had someone watching it. Why didn’t he think of that sooner? He leaned forward to smell the door. There were so many scents here it made it hard to pull out an individual smell. He went back inside where there was less to sort through.

He pressed his nose near the door, blocking out Viv, D, and Thomas. There it was, a faint smell of the Netherworld.

“D. I think we’re dealing with another demon. Block out your guys’ scents, close your eyes, concentrate. What do you smell?”

“The Netherworld,” he said, confused. “But I smell like that too.”

Mac counted to three. D hadn’t been trained like he had, so it wouldn’t seem different at first sniff. “Smell yourself. Block it all out and smell yourself. It’s hard, but really concentrate.”

“Okay. I think I have it.”

“Now compare it to the other scent.”

It took several minutes, but D’s eyes finally flew open. “You’re right. There’s a difference. So we know it’s a demon. How does that help us?”

“We’ll be able to identify her for one. Two, since she’s a demon and interfered with a demon mating, we can dispense justice and not have to involve any other nonhuman groups.”

“Good, good. What are we going to do about Thomas’ and Viv’s jobs? Best-case scenario, we find them in a day or two. It looks like they’re going to be injured. Work is going to want an explanation,” D pointed out. If they didn’t show to work, their bosses may also call the police and as the roommate/boyfriend, D would be their first suspect. If D was held up by the normal police, he wouldn’t be able to help search for them.

And if they didn’t find them within a day or two, how would they explain it to their bosses so that they wouldn’t get fired. Mac listened when Viv talked in the library. She thought she was next in line for promotion to take over the entire library when her boss retired. If she suddenly no-showed, it could cost her everything she wanted.

“Let me call a detective I know. He’s a nonhuman and will be able to help. I’ve worked with him on cases before,” Mac said, pulling out his phone.

“Liam. It’s Mac. I need you ASAP at the address I’m going to text you. Full uniform, but it’s a mixed case. Thanks.”

“What good is calling a detective going to do?” D asked when Mac hung up.

“We can create the paper trail that Thomas and Viv’s house was broken into, and they are believed missing. If nothing else, it gets their picture out to other authorities and maybe someone will see them while they’re patrolling. I’ll see if Liam can’t contact the school and the library and let them know. It should save their jobs; after all it was police documented that they were abducted, not their fault. Liam also has a great nose, he may be able to pick up other scents we missed.” Plus, he wasn’t close to this case, so he wouldn’t be overwhelmed by the scent of Viv’s or Thomas’ blood. “If the regular human police aren’t involved, then it should free up your time to help locate them as well since we know you’re not a suspect.”

There was a knock on the door a few minutes later. D peeked out the peep hole to see a large German Shepherd dog and a female police officer.

“Is Liam a dog?” D asked.

“He’s a shifter,” Mac responded, walking over to the door. He could smell him on the other side and opened the door, letting them in.

“Hey Gina, Liam. I said full uniform. What made him change?” Mac asked.

“He caught scent of something in the parking lot and realized it was leading to the apartments. He figured he’d have better luck this way.”

“Gotcha. You can check everything out and I’ll tell Gina the background,” Mac offered.

Liam woofed and got to work, his nose going everywhere.

“Tell me,” Gina said, pulling out her notebook.

“I got called onto a case. There was a Shadow causing issues. By the time I got it, he was bound for punishment. He started many years ago, small things: harassing people, stealing things. It moved to assault, no theft. He was starting to enjoy hurting people. It finally escalated into him killing. He killed four people before he was caught. And then he escaped. He lay low for a couple of months before resurfacing and killing again. This is when I came in. We finally got him; D was the one in charge of processing and punishment. The Shadow got the deepest pit, no escape option. I had a feeling he had an accomplice but couldn’t find any proof. We got a call tonight saying someone had turned himself in as his accomplice. D and I both went to process and interrogate the guy. He was a decoy. He had been sent by a female, who turned out to be the Shadow’s mate. A mate for a mate, is what he said. We couldn’t reach Viv and Thomas on their phones and raced back here. We found it like this. She left work at five o’clock, the note on the pizza says they attempted to deliver it at five fifty. There was no answer, but since it was paid for, they left it. My best guess is it happened before the pizza guy arrived or he would have heard something. There’s no way this was quiet.”

“Next question. Who are Viv and Thomas?”

“Thomas is my mate,” D said, his tail twitching in agitation. “Both he and Viv are human. Viv is his best friend, they grew up together and share this apartment. I moved in when we bonded. Thomas didn’t want to miss any time with his friend since she would grow old and die much sooner than he would now. She’s a great person. My only guess is that the demoness didn’t know which one of them was my mate and she took them both.”

“Do you think she’ll let Viv go if she realizes she doesn’t have a mate mark?”

Mac shook his head. “I think she enjoys pain. If she finds out that Viv is my mate, she won’t let her go.”

“So they both have a mate mark. It would still say Mate Of in a language she could read, right?”

“I haven’t claimed Viv,” Mac admitted quietly. Gina looked at him sharply but didn’t say anything.

Liam stood on two feet, completely bare-assed. “It’s definitely a demoness. I swear I’ve scented her before. Remember the club a couple of weeks ago?” he asked Gina, who swore.

“We got called to a nightclub. It was more of a play club for nonhumans. A demoness showed up, seemed like she was okay to let in. They checked her ID, no issues, no warrants or arrests, no red flags from other clubs. They did their due diligence; she was just better at conning the system. They let her in, and she finds two people willing to play with her. They thought they were there to have a fun threesome. The club has video and audio in all the rooms to protect its regular members. The camera feed cuts out and they send security to check it out. By the time they get to the room, she had almost killed both of them. She cut them both, broke bones, raped them. The guy was small, he was a rabbit shifter. The girl about the same size, but she was a bobcat. Both of them fought back and even drew some blood, but they were no match for the woman when she took her demon form. They were in the hospital multiple days. We got a sketch from the victims and the video footage, but she managed to keep her face from a lot of the cameras. But the scent is the same as here. We never got far in the case. She’s not registered in any of the criminal databases, human or other.

“I know it’s not much, but there is physical evidence of her in the system now. I’ll put in a breaking and entering report, as well as the missing persons. I’ll contact both of their employers, so they won’t have issues there once we find them. I’ll plaster her description everywhere I can put wanted posters. If I hear anything, I’ll let you know.”

“Thanks. Lucifer is interrogating the Shadow to see if he can figure out where she might have gone. I’ll let you know if we get any leads as well. We might need backup,” Mac said.

Liam turned back into a German Shepherd and Gina opened the door.

“Thanks for coming out,” D said. “Now what?” he asked when the door closed.

“See if you can focus on your bond. I need you to quiet everything else. Focus on Thomas, what he looks like, what he smells like, find your link to him and follow it. Let’s see if we can’t find them that way.”

Mac watched as D focused. Mac closed his own eyes, bringing his mate to the forefront of his mind. They didn’t have the mate bond, but he was hoping that his tracking skills would be helpful in some way. It led him to the couch, where there was a small puddle of her blood on the floor. Then nothing. Absolutely nothing.

“I can tell he’s still alive, but I can’t follow the bond. It’s like something is blocking it,” D said, frustration and desperation in his voice.

“Same here. She must have warded where she’s keeping them.”

“What do we do now?”