screamer.
“ We ll, I guess I ’ll continue,” he said with a chuckle , “I c hecked out the claims by Emily Vance who said she was also a ttacked by somebody from behind and made to inhale a substance causing her to fall asleep . Her story checks out ; we found trace evidence of it in her blood the morning of the murder.
Emily stated the victim , whom she doesn’t know, showed up at the cave where she lived . Upon her arrival, she was immediately knocked out from behind . W hen she woke up; she r ushed around the cave to see what had happened. That is when she witnessed the vampire group running out of the c ave. Emily s ai d she investigated the cave and found the victim in Dracul’s Den . The body was on the altar. Dead. ”
“ S omebody came into the cave , knocked them out, killing the victim but not Emily? ” I mused openly, taking a bite of my hamburger.
“It seems that way for now,” he added. “I also analyzed the stomach contents of the victim . S he consumed a meal an hour before she was murdered . We analyzed the contents and found pumpkin , fermented tofu , and noodles. We’re checking all restaurants in town to see if a nybody serves that combination. We didn’t find any of the ingredients in her trailer. In fact, the only thing we found in her trailer was a nearly empty bottle of ketchup and moldy unidentifiable food in a Styrofoam container in the fridge.”
“Sick! ” Lauren spoke through her teeth.
“Health hazard, I swear! ” Willow mocked, pushing up her suit jacket sleeves.
My phone vibrated in my pocket , and I grabbed it , a text message. My mother. Janice was getting worse and they were headed to the hospital —she warned she wouldn’t be home when I got there. Bowing my head in silence, I collected my thoughts , fighting a n impending wave of sadness.
M y world was crumbling down around me no matter what I did. I glanced at Agent Bronson for another reminder of the drama in my life. I swallowed , my throat constricting, and nodded at Detective Chase to continue.
“A few more things. We have bloody fingerprints on Damien Lee’s 1975 Buick Regal door handle. A match to Damien. We have made a match to the bloody shoe print in the marble tunnel of the cave , which matches Camber Johnson ’s pair of yellow Chuck Taylors, women’s size eight . The same shoe was placed via a partial print on the back seat carpet of the floor of Damien’s car. ”
My blood began to boil upon hearing Camber was officially placed at the crime scene with blood on her shoes . She had lied to Wolfe , and he had believed her. Her parents had fibbed to the police.
“ We found a fabric transfer of blood from a pair of jeans belonging to Victoria Newsted on Damien Lee’s passenger side door.”
“Well, how can they deny being in the cave , Detective ? ” Lauren hissed .
“Duh, Lauren . They were in the cave, obviously . They are liars,” Willow said sardonically, tossing a French fry into her mouth.
“ This proves they were in the cave at some point either during or immediately after the murder . If they are not guilty, maybe they’re just scared to admit they were there? Oh, and o ne more thing — t he graffiti on the side of the altar says the words — Cosmar Armata .”
“What the heck does that mean ? ” Maddie blurted.
“It is Romanian for Nightmare Army. This links th e cult to the altar and gives a very strong motive for the suspects as far as the circumstantial evidence is concerned,” Detective Chase noted before taking a swig of his water.
The little boy at the table behind us stood up again and turned around, a chewed-on chicken nugget in his hands. After about two seconds, he was pulled down abruptly by his father and a momentary fit of whining ensued.
“Do their little black vampire guideline books say anything about sacrificing people ? ” I asked curtly, still fuming in the recesses of my mind about Wolfe defending Camber .
“We’re looking into it. We’ve got
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