Snippet #2548243

"Of course Sophia comes first," Snow replied, "but keep your warnings to yourself. We're not the ones causing trouble here."

"Well, anything?" Julienne demanded, ever the impatient one.

Lights flickered across the second floor. "Patience...", said Bowen. Chandler went rigid then and the temperature dropped sharply, sharply enough that their breath trailed vapor. Chandler spoke but it was not his voice. His voice was haunting and had an underlying female tone as if he spoke with two voices. "The girl is in room 204 with the vampire you seek. She has been tortured with a knife and yet she is still among the living.", he said as claw marks raked his neck and cheeks, sending rivulets of blood to drip down his skin. "They sit awake."

"We'll need to get Sophia away from him before we try and take him out." Snow said, "The rooms can't be big. If things get messy, she needs to be safe."

A large red wolf moved out onto the street and approached the group before stopping several paces away. As its fur receded, Vanessa stood up from the ground where the wolf had been a moment ago.

"I can do that," Vanessa said. "She's my daughter."

She had been tailing Bowen two days now, and even slept in the alley outside the VINDEX building to catch him leaving today, always with an ear out for leads that she picked up from him talking to other members of the VINDEX.

Several she had arrived at ahead of Bowen, only to be disappointed. Impatience and frustration had driven her to abandoning both the police and the packs insistence that she remain at home, but her efforts had all come up empty.

Bowen took off his coat and held it so that Vanessa could slip into it. He then moved to the trunk of his car, opened it, and after rooting around he pulled out a small metal cylinder with holes, a spoon, and a pin. He tossed it in the air and caught it again after it did a single flip. It was a flash bang.

He pulled out a pistol and offered it to Vanessa before he pulled his own hand gun, checked it, chambered a round, and putting it back in his holster. "Let's go then.", he said and shut the trunk.