Prey.

21.

It was a few days later. Still, nothing has been found on Neela. The investigators even checked the fingerprints of the potential kidnappers, the finger prints were almost non-human

Now, there is a whole investigation team on the case. The leader of the case is named Ronald Thomas; he was the sheriff of another county. He was one of the most brilliant investigators of missing persons cases. He travels the world doing cases like Neela's. One thing was special about Neela's case — he's never seen anything like it.

The second Ronald looked at the fingerprints, his knee this case would be very challenging. He had many theories for as to why the perpetrators would take Neela.

He was in the briefing room as the other investigators began to file in. He had a few pictures of Neela on the projector board and also a picture of the fingerprint. "Is everyone present?" He asked as he pulled the recorder out of his pocket. Ronald heard some murmurs, but no one said no.

Ronald shrugged to himself and pressed play. "Investigation of Neela Oh. Case number 226. Meeting one. 9 a.m on the morning of September 16th, 2007," Ronald sat the recording device down on the investigation table and everyone sat quietly.

"The girl we are looking for today is named Neela Oh. She was supposedly 16, her birthday just passed. There is absolutely no information on the girl. Just a birth certificate. Basically a Jane Doe case."

He then turned out the lights in the room so everyone would be focused on the projection board. "This," he pointed to the fingerprint, "is the only evidence we have of a kidnap. No known human has this type of fingerprint, shockingly enough." The rest of the investigation team looked at the design.

It seems as if someone had burned their own real fingerprints off and then had carved an 'X' right in the middle. "Right? Creepy stuff. Does anyone have any questions or ideas?" A few people raised their hand, but Ronald called on David Goldman. This was his fifth missing persons investigation, he's pretty good at what he does.

"Yes, I have an idea, but this is a long stretch." He crossed his legs as he read from his notes. "Back in Connecticut, we had a case like this in '95. These weren't the exact fingerprints, but there were weird ones like this. The case was solved and over 29 people were incarcerated for drug dealing, murder, rape and kidnap."

He took a deep breath, "out of those people were the cult leader and his loyal followers. Their fingerprints were their mark, it was their symbol."

"Do you think we should treat this as a cult kidnapping?" David shrugs, "this could be a cult. Or this could be a copycat wanting to cause mass panic."

"Let's keep it undecided until the forensics team finds more," Ronald declared. "Finished today. Before you exit, please snag one of these files so you can study the investigation at home."

~~

As Ronald was about to pack up to go home for the night, a woman came into the office. Lisa Thomas. She's working the investigation with Ronald. "So, Damien, how's the girl doing now that you have her locked in your fucking house?"

Damien then rolled his eyes. Yes, he goes by a different name when he works his side job. "Lisa, I want to get this girl home safe and sound, as do you. But, I can't work on the case and get her home if you're always breathing down my neck like this."

Yes. Damien works two different jobs. Some days, he's a CEO of a major company. Other days, he's a high-profile investigator.

He's going to be sure this case stays unsolved.

~~

Neela woke up early the next day. She was still in the hospital; her body was in pain. It felt like as if she was trapped in a vice grip while she was asleep. No one else was in the hospital with her. She rolled to her side and held her arm that had absolutely no feeling in it whatsoever. Neela slowly sat up in the bed after several minutes of just lying there.

As Neela got closer to the main part of the house, she began to smell food. She smelt bacon, sausage, and waffles. When Neela finally finished limping to the kitchen, everyone's eyes were on her. "Hey, Neela, how are you feeling?" Landon asked and went to Neela's side once he saw that she was in pain and limping.

"What happened?" Neela finally asked once she was assisted to her seat. She placed her face in her hands, her eyes were covered. Any amount of light made Neela's head throb excruciatingly. She heard a few sighs from the boys around her, "Neela, do you know why you're here?" Sean asked and sat next to her with a plate full of food. "Obviously no. No, I don't know why I'm here. I don't know why I was taken away from my home and kidnapped and I don't know why I'm now living with 4 men who are way older than me," she silently rolled her eyes during her statement.

"Well, we're going to tell you." Landon and Caleb sat in more seats around Neela, while Ryan sat on Neela's right-hand side. Sean was on her left-hand side. "You can obviously tell that none of us, nor any of the family you had met are at all normal," Neela slowly nodded and removed one of the hands from her eyes.

What? Are they gonna tell me they're sex traffickers and they're finally going to use me?

All of the men around her sighed once again, "Neela," Landon began speaking seriously. "We are not going to hurt you. We do not, have never, and will never do anything like that to anyone."

Neela was about to speak until she removed both hands from her face and suddenly noticed everyone had stood to his feet and were then staring at Neela. The men's eyes were all glowing in different hues of red. Neela's whole body then tensed as she slowly stood to her feet as well.

What are they?

The men had all blinked by this time and the redness would not go away whatsoever. Neela cringed and took one step back, but all the men had begun walking towards the girl. Neela had stumbled back in panic. Before she was about to turn away to run to her safe room, she had stumbled over her pant leg which made her fall down.

The rough carpet scrapped against her scabbing hands. Sean and Landon had then heard a sound they were all too familiar with.

Thump, thump, thump.

"Don't you all think you're going too far with all of this?" Neela was almost surprised to see Ryan standing right next to her. Sean immediately jumped into action and switched his eyes back to the normal brown color they always had been. "Stay away from her, Ryan, it's dangerous."

Ryan looked down at Neela's shaking form. She wasn't paying attention at all as to what was going on around her. She just stared at her feet. He was hesitating. He rolled his eyes and looked back at his brother, "I know, but father told us to not hurt her. There are contracts in place, you know this."

As Ryan said those words, everyone went back to his normal eye color. "Neela, we have some things to talk about. Let's go somewhere that you're comfortable, yes?" Landon held out his hand to Neela so she would get off the dirty floor.

After a few moments of hesitation, Landon spoke again, "everything's all right. I promise."  Neela then finally gathered the courage to take his hand.

"Are you vampires?" She asked once they were all placed in the living room. Sean shook his head, "it would be a lot easier to say we are, but we aren't."