Niklosi's Nightmare (First Wave Book 10) (17 page)

“You want us to stay? And see if
these things come?” Kyle asked, wanting to make sure he understood her
correctly.

“Hell, yeah,” BJ said, then pressed
her advantage. “You’re already here. You got supplies for the night, and the
diner really doesn’t serve road kill. We were trying to scare you off, but now
you know the truth. You could help us. Help me figure out what it is.”

Kyle looked over at Greg and could
tell the captain wanted nothing more than investigate the odd things happening
around there, but Kyle saw another benefit to the situation.

“Where is all the videos?” he
asked.

“Everything since Mojo installed
them last week is on the drive you’re watching now,” BJ stated.

“You have nothing before that?” he
asked.

“There’s no lying that we’re a
small, poor community. It took a while to raise the money for what we have, and
the only reason we have that is because I pushed the issue,” BJ lied, although
she was telling the truth about when the cameras were installed. “I have the
receipt for when we bought the cameras if you don’t believe me.”

Kyle nodded his head. He wasn’t
going to believe anything she said again without proof.

BJ looked around her desk at the
mess the major’s men had left behind and sighed in relief when she saw the
camera receipt. She’d set it aside to send to Irwin and was glad she’d
forgotten about it. She handed it to the major.

“Don’t lose it, Irwin needs it for
the city taxes,” BJ warned as Kyle took it from her.

He scanned through the receipt and
was a little surprised she was telling the truth. Still, he wasn’t convinced it
wasn’t a set up or another ruse even though the pictures he’d seen were pretty
compelling, and there were stacks more.

“Why haven’t you called someone in
by now?” he asked.

BJ laughed loudly and looked at him
like he’d lost his mind.

“Who would I call that wouldn’t
hang up on me immediately? You had your camp destroyed, you’re holding
photographic proof something is going on here, and you still don’t believe me!
So who am I supposed to call?” BJ asked as she stomped over to the phone and
picked up the handset. “Give me a number, and I’ll dial it while you’re
standing right there.”

“So then what was the point of
trying to get rid of us if you wanted our help?” Kyle shot back.

He was irritated that his position
was wavering the longer BJ was steadfast in her own. The pictures helped her
case a lot. She couldn’t fake the decades-old proof provided by someone else,
and something
had
torn up their camp the first night they were there.   

BJ shook her head and set the phone
back in its cradle with a heavy sigh.

“Mostly habit. We figured you guys
didn’t need to be in danger if your prisoners had already escaped, and when you
insisted on staying, we tried to protect you. That’s why Dennis and Irwin
stayed in town. In case you needed back up,” BJ lied convincingly.

“How did you capture them?” Kyle
asked, wondering what she’d lied about.

“I may think I’m crazy half the
time, but I know my duty. Everything I told you about your prisoners was the
truth. I really was out there at Jepson’s place trying to figure out what was
stalking him. That’s when I saw the first guy. What did these guys do? Rob a
bank? Kill a government official?” BJ countered.

“That’s classified,” Kyle replied
with a glare. “So what happened in here? What caused the escape?”

“I told you,” BJ said with a sigh
as she pointed at the video she’d shown them. “You saw it for yourself. They
were here, then the bright flash and they were gone. I have no idea if the . .
. things around here took them or if that third guy was an accomplice.”

Kyle recalled the third set of boot
prints he’d seen outside and the flash of light that had knocked out the video
before the prisoners had disappeared.

“What makes you think that these
things, creatures, or whatever could have taken them?” Kyle asked.

He watched curiously as BJ went
back to the safe and dug out another weathered folder. She handed it to Kyle.

“I’ve been blessed that I haven’t
had to add any to that file since I came back, but I planned on putting your
prisoners in there,” BJ said.

Kyle opened the folder and pulled
out a stack of missing person reports, newspaper clippings, and flyers. Like
the photographs, the dates varied dramatically.

“Are you implying that all these
people were taken by these things you believe are terrorizing your town?” Kyle
asked incredulously as he quickly scanned through the missing person reports
and flyers in his hand.

BJ shrugged her shoulders and sat
back down in the chair.

“I have no idea. I wasn’t around
for most of what’s in that file, but I have no other explanation for what’s
happening around here either,” BJ said evenly.

Greg tried peering over Kyle’s
shoulder to get a look at the information when Kyle randomly divided the stack
and shoved a bunch into his hands.

“None of these are from Baker’s
Creek,” Greg said, disappointment clear in his voice.

“They are all from a hundred-mile
radius around Baker’s Creek in the last 120 years,” BJ explained and watched
their eyes widen.

“How many?” Kyle asked in surprise.

“Over 52 last count. Last one was
in 2007, 28 miles north of where we’re sitting,” BJ told them as she stood and
moved back to the safe.

“Yeah, that’s not that surprising
though,” Kyle said with a shake of his head. “This is a really big area you’re
talking about. I imagine hikers and campers get lost all the time. That doesn’t
mean it’s unexplainable.”

“Those are just the ones who never
came back,” BJ countered as she threw another folder onto the desk in front of
Kyle and Greg. “These are the ones who went missing and came back. But when
they did, they weren’t the same. Some were found months later, just wandering
lost. None of them showed any effects of being lost for so long; in fact, they
were clean and healthy. None remembered where they had been, only that they
knew they had to change their ways and become better people.”

“You’re fucking with us again,”
Kyle said with a snort as he picked up the new folder and flipped through it.

“Call one of them,” BJ dared him.
“I’m not kidding, call one of them. Hell, call all of them and ask them about
it. You of all people should realize that there can’t be a conspiracy of that
magnitude going on around here. Those people are from all over the country and
all walks of life.”

Kyle stopped flipping through the
pages and news clippings and began to read a few of them when Greg held up a
news article.

“I remember this! The guy was
scouting out a new location for his next mining project when he disappeared. He
was found four days later muttering to himself that the angels were going to
send him to hell if he didn’t change,” Greg said as he held the article out to
Kyle.

Kyle was vaguely remembering the
story when he saw the man’s picture, and it came rushing back to him.

“I remember it too,” Kyle admitted.
“Didn’t he shut down all his mines and start a company creating economical ways
for third world countries to get clean water or something?”

“I lost track, but I think it was
something like that,” BJ said, knowing for a fact that’s what the man did. “He
was found 53 miles northwest of this spot.”

Greg looked at Kyle with a raised
eyebrow, convinced that something weird was going on around Baker’s Creek.

Kyle was still having a hard time
swallowing it. Aliens were one thing to believe in, but he drew the line at
children’s storybook creatures.

“Come on, Greg! Fairies for fuck’s
sake?” Kyle asked, exasperated that his captain was falling for this.

“Hey, I didn’t say they were
fairies; I said that’s what people have seen. I had the cameras installed to
try and figure out what the hell they are,” BJ said.

“I think you’re looking at this
wrong, sir,” Greg said as he pulled Kyle aside and lowered his voice to a bare
whisper. “What if they aren’t going missing? What if they’re being abducted and
programmed by the aliens? The flashes of light, the disappearances . . . it
makes sense.”

Kyle ran a hand over his face,
determined not to look the fool by falling for another one of the clever cop’s
ruses.

“Fairies?” Kyle muttered.

“The light could easily be
disorienting the witnesses. It wouldn’t hurt to call a few of them and see what
they have to say,” Greg added, trying to convince the major to do a little more
investigating.

He loved every one of the ghost hunting
and paranormal shows on TV and had a DVR full of episodes to watch when he was
off base or had down time. Greg couldn’t think of anything more fun than doing
their own paranormal investigation of the area. 

Kyle closed his eyes for a moment,
trying to think of any reason to avoid going down what he expected to be
another rabbit hole dug by the devious, and lying cop. The alien trail was now
beyond cold, and his only hope of discovering anything would be to stay and see
if they really were in the area somewhere. He turned to BJ.

“Fine. We’ll give you one night of
our time, but you’re staying here. And if Dennis and Irwin can stay in town,
then so can your mother and your brother. I want to know exactly where all of
you are at every point during the evening,” Kyle said, crossing his arms over
his chest.

BJ knew he would refuse to back
down, and that was OK with her.

“I’ll call them now,” she offered,
heading to the phone and dialing her mother.

“Momma, I need you, Mojo, Dennis,
and Irwin to come stay in town tonight. Yes, I told him, and he’s willing to
stay and help if you guys come into town too,” BJ spoke into the phone, keeping
up her side of the conversation although there was no one on the other end.

BJ knew her family already heard
everything from the mercantile where Mojo was playing the live video feed from
the station to them. She nodded her head a few times as if her mom was speaking
to her and hung up the phone.

“They’ll be in town shortly. Mom
would like you to join us for dinner at the diner later this evening,” BJ
offered and held up her hands at the look of horror that crossed their faces.
“Whoa, no road kill, I swear! We don’t eat that crap either. You’re more than
welcome to inspect the kitchen and fridge before deciding to eat there.”

Kyle just couldn’t get over the
image of the dead possum from the road or the bullet ridden raccoon, and he
tamped down his urge to gag.

“No, I think it’s best to eat with
the men tonight so we can plan . . . how we’re going to help you. Please, give
my apologies to your mother. Maybe she can stop by after dinner for a . . .
pre-packaged cupcake,” Kyle suggested.

BJ looked at him in surprise for a
moment before she burst out laughing.
“Pre-packaged cupcakes for dessert will be fine, I’m sure. I’ll let her know
when she gets into town. If you don’t mind, I’ll eat at the diner though,” BJ
stated, not expecting it to be a problem.

“No, you’re staying where I can see
you at all times. You’ve lied to us and played us for fools once. When I said
you’re not leaving my sight, I was serious. We have plenty of food to feed you
here,” Kyle ordered, his tone of voice telling BJ he wasn’t going to budge.

BJ just grinned and leaned back in
the chair.

“I’m all yours.”

Chapter
Sixteen

Niklosi watched the video from the
station and clenched his fists in anger. Not only did he never get out of the
transport and back on the ground the previous evening, but now he’d been denied
a chance to convince BJ to see him for dinner.

He tried his best to ignore the
jealous rage building inside of him at the thought of BJ being alone all day
and night with the soldiers before Traze interrupted his thoughts.

“I still don’t get it!” Traze
complained behind Nik. “These bastards in this unit have killed, captured, and
tortured countless numbers of our people. Now we’ve found soul demigods! So why
can’t we kill them all and let the gods sort them out?”

Grai just shook his head. He was
exhausted, shaken from his meeting with the soul reapers, and definitely not in
the mood for his unenlightened brother.

“You can ask all the questions you
want when you meet Bess and Mojo for dessert at the mercantile later,” Grai
told his brother.

“Wait . . . what? Why the hell
would I do that? And why would you agree to it when you know the military is
going to be all over the place!” Traze was livid that his brother would make
him go back down there knowing what Bess was and what she could do to him.

“Dennis is going to glimmer you,”
Grai said then thought about it and shook his head. “Glamour you or . . .
change your appearance. No one will know it’s you. You’ll appear as a regular
person from town.”

Traze sputtered in fury before he
turned on his heel and stormed back to the sleeping area and sealed himself in
a privacy shield.

Nik watched the kid storm off,
refusing to look at Grai. He knew there would be no invitation to dinner for
him, and it bothered him more than he wanted to admit.

“You have to have some questions
about what happened after you left. Want to talk about it?” Grai offered as he
sat next to Nik.

Nik just shook his head.

“No, I think I heard it all when
you were trying to explain it to Traze,” Nik replied.

He memorized everything they’d said
about BJ and her people, wanting to understand just what BJ really was and why
he would be mated to such an extraordinary individual.

“Is she still blocking you?” Grai
asked, sitting beside Nik.

Nik just nodded his head and
crossed his arms over his chest, letting Grai know he didn’t want to talk about
it.

“You know, there are ways around a
block,” Grai added, drawing Nik’s immediate attention.

“How?” Nik asked.

Grai laughed and turned to the
Valendran.

“Let me show you a little trick I
learned from Lara when she evolved Death for me,” Grai said with a mischievous
grin as he slapped Nik on the back.   

*****

BJ tried her best not to react when
she heard Nik’s voice whisper through her mind, but she was stunned that he’d
broken through her barriers.

“I’m sorry. I know you don’t
believe me, and you have no reason to, but I really am sorry,” Nik whispered
and cringed when he saw the grimace cross her face on the video.

“How did you break past my
barriers?” BJ demanded.

She was trying to be angry at him
and struggled to tamp down the thrill that ran through her at his determination
to talk to her. When she heard his laugh in her mind, she smothered the smile
that threatened to cross her face.

“I think I’ll keep that a secret in
case you try to block me again. Especially when I’m trying my level best to
apologize. I didn’t mean to hurt you. This is all just . . . a bit much for one
weekend, and I’ve reacted badly,” Nik admitted.

BJ watched the major and his
captain continue to go through the information in the files she pulled from the
safe, and she sighed.

“It’s been a heck of a weekend for
all of us,” she agreed.

“Are you doing OK?” Nik asked,
noting the dark circles still smudged under her eyes.

“Just a little tired. We’ve had a
lot going on,” BJ said with a small smile.

Nik couldn’t contain the grin that
spread across his face when he saw her smile and heard the teasing in her
voice. His hope rose that he could repair the damage he’d caused and at least start
over with her.

“Yeah,” he agreed with a laugh.
“It’s a whole lot busier around a small town than I ever imagined.”

BJ laughed out loud and quickly
closed her mouth when she drew the immediate attention of Kyle and Greg.

“Sorry, guys, I was reading across
the desk and remember that particular picture and the day it was taken,” BJ
lied, scrambling for a reason for her sudden outburst.

“This one?” Kyle asked, holding up
a picture from long before she’d been born.

“No,” BJ quickly amended. “The one
under it.”

Kyle looked at the next photo
labelled 1994 and the predominant glowing eyes that peered back from the dark
woods.

“Where was it taken?” Kyle asked.

“That was in front of this station,
back when it was still a gas station,” BJ explained. “The jail used to be an
old ice cooler in the mercantile until we needed to bring it up to code in
order to keep it open.”

Kyle just nodded his head and put
the picture back in the stack with the others he’d already looked at.

“You think pretty damn quick on
your feet,” Nik told her, impressed with the way she’d been handling the
military unit.

“The major is a lot smarter than he
lets on, and there’s something . . . off about him,” BJ said, trying to figure
out what it was that she felt in his energy.

That got Nik’s attention, and he
leaned forward to study Kyle on the video.

“What do you sense?” Nik asked.

BJ sent out another wave of energy
to sift the major’s and again felt a strange reverberation as if the major was
blocking her questioning probe.

She mentally shook her head before
she sent a message to her mother then turned her attention back to Nik.

“I’m not sure what I’m sensing to
be honest. I asked my mom to come and do a deeper probe. She’s the only one I
know who can do it without him being aware,” BJ admitted.

“He’s a human; how would he know if
you probed him?” Nik asked.

“That’s just it, I don’t know what it
is. He could just have more psychic abilities than most humans and a natural
shielding. I’m probably just being paranoid about probing him too hard,” BJ
said, not believing herself even as she said it.

No
, she
thought to herself,
there’s something wrong about this guy.

“I’ve not encountered a human that
couldn’t be sifted without their knowledge,” Nik said, prodding her to explain
further.

“Mom will figure it out when she
gets here,” BJ assured him, hoping to drop the subject.

The last thing she wanted to do was
make tensions even worse by accusing the major of something and finding out she
was wrong.

Besides,
she
thought,
if anything were wrong with him, mom and Dennis would have figured
it out long before I did. I’m just being an idiot.

“Tell me what you’re thinking. Even
if you’re wrong, it’s still worth talking through. You may figure out something
that can help us in our dealings with the major in the future,” Nik prodded,
wanting to hear her thoughts.

BJ sighed and allowed herself to go
into what she called her “cop mode.”

“When he first got here he was
surrounded by such a thick aura of arrogance, anger, and disdain that it was
hard to notice that the normally sufficient energy wave wasn’t bouncing back
properly when I tried to sift him,” BJ admitted as she observed the major with
hooded eyes.

“Yesterday, I was really tired and
didn’t pay much attention, but I did notice that when I tried to sift him
again, the energy came back quicker, as if he repelled it easier. The same
thing just happened,” BJ added. 

“BJ, the next time you try to sift
him, watch his expressions carefully to see if he’s showing any signs of
knowing that you’re doing it,” Nik suggested then almost kicked himself for it.

“Wait! Never mind! Don’t do it, BJ!”
he added quickly. “If he can detect it, he’ll know it’s you, and you can’t take
that chance when you’re trying to get him to leave. Wait for your mom.”

BJ almost smiled at the panic in
his voice but kept her face a mask of boredom.

“Trust me, I’m waiting on my mom
for this one,” BJ agreed, wanting the major and his men gone.

“Wouldn’t she have noticed
something earlier?” Nik asked, hoping whatever BJ was feeling was nothing to be
concerned about.

“That depends. The way the energy
is bouncing back appears like it’s returning as it would with a normal human.
At least at first. It changes when he’s angry and losing control or when he’s
heavy in thought. Like now,” she admitted.

“So when he loses control, whatever
barrier he may have slips,” Nik said aloud, getting Grai’s attention.

He shook his head to appease Grai
for a moment while he reposed the thought to BJ privately.

“Yeah, that’s what it seems like.
I’ve done it four times now when he’s been all pissy or deep in thought, and
his energy stutters,” BJ explained, hoping Nik might have encountered the
phenomena before.

“You know your mom is coming,
right?” Nik asked as he watched the determined woman walk down the road on the
video. “How is she going to probe him and find out what’s going on?”

BJ almost laughed out loud at Nik’s
last question.

“Trust me, whatever she does, it’ll
be entertaining.”

She waited, pretending like she
didn’t know her mom was coming. When they all heard the commotion outside, she
stood with Kyle and Greg to see who was coming. When her mother came in, BJ
looked suitably surprised.

“Momma? What are you doing here?”
she asked as she walked to her mom.

“It’s early, and you’ve not had breakfast,
so I thought we could go to the diner and get something to eat,” Bess said with
a grin as she kissed BJ’s cheek.

“Not this morning, Momma. The major
wants me to stay with him today while we go over the evidence and plan for the
evening,” BJ said with a shrug.

Kyle and Greg looked sick to their
stomachs at the thought of the diner, causing Bess to wave her hand at them.

“You can’t tell me you men aren’t
brave enough to try it! BJ told you the truth, didn’t she?” Bess asked, looking
at BJ as if to ask if she had.

“I did,” BJ admitted. “But you
can’t blame them for being a little hesitant.”

Bess raised a disapproving brow at
Kyle and Greg, causing both men to squirm and look away.

“Not even a cup of coffee? Really?
Even though your best witnesses to the events around here are in that diner?”
Bess teased the information, hoping to lure the men there willingly so she
wouldn’t have to compel them.

Kyle and Greg exchanged a few
intense looks before Kyle cleared his throat and nodded his head.

“Do you know what they’ve
witnessed?” Kyle asked.

“Between them all? Probably every
kind of craziness this place can conjure,” Bess told him, seeing his resolve to
avoid the diner wavering.

“Maybe a bottled water then,” Kyle
said with a nod as he glared at Greg, who was shaking his head rapidly.

“I’m starving,” BJ admitted as she
led them to the door and down the sidewalk to the diner.

Kyle and Greg looked around in
amazement at the suddenly clean townsfolk who now had teeth. Unlike their
previous interactions with the people, this time they received waves and smiles
instead of suspicious looks and stony silence.

The outside of the diner was devoid
of the crowd of men who’d been there all day long for the last two days, and
Greg and Kyle sighed in relief that the smelly group was gone. The next
surprise came when they went inside.

Gone was the grime and dirt that
had previously occupied every corner of the restaurant. The only thing that
looked cleaner than the floors, counters, and tables were the glasses and
dishes filled with delicious smelling food.

Kyle was almost disappointed when
they were approached by the toothless old woman he’d met the first day and was
shocked to note that not only were her teeth in her mouth, but she was an
attractive older woman when not pretending to be otherwise.

“We saved a table for you,” she
said softly as she gestured to a table near the back of the room.

Kyle nodded to her as he moved
through the room of quietly conversing people to the table and sat with his
back to the wall, facing the door. Greg took the other seat that kept his back
to the wall, and BJ and Bess sat across from them.

The table gave Kyle and Greg a
perfect view of the grill and kitchen behind the counter, and they were
surprised to note that it gleamed and sparkled with cleanliness. Even the cook
was perfectly groomed and his apron clean as he cracked a few eggs onto a grill
before flipping over some perfectly golden brown pancakes. Kyle’s mouth
salivated at the sight.