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Present Day-three days later,
I sat faithfully beside Lydia’s bed as I read a book on possible complications from comas when Dean brought Mackey in the room to me. My brother walked in with Mackey in his arms and Cassie at his side.
“Hey, how are you holding up?”
“I’m good. Thank you two for watching out for my little girl,” I said as Dean came over to put my daughter in my arms.
She seemed sleepy as she held on to me. I didn’t realize there were tears in my eyes until I felt them on my cheeks.
“Sam, what is it?” Cassie asked as she came to stand beside me.
“I just don’t know what to do anymore. The doctor says she could be paralyzed now, but she really needs to wake up so they can see how she is mentally and physically.”
Cassie bit her lip as she tried to put on a brave face.
“But it could just be temporary if at all.”
“Come on Sam you know Lydia is strong. She is still here after being thrown thru a window at forty miles an hour. That in itself is a good sign,” Dean encouraged.
“He is right, she is fighting in there. You need to just have hope, okay,” Cassie added as she rubbed my shoulder. I told them about having seen Mom and Dean wasn’t surprised.
“Hey if Mom said she will be okay then we need to hold on to that. There was a time when she came to me when Cassie was sick remember?”
I did remember at the time I believed that Dean had been seeing things though I knew he wasn’t the type to reach for straws. Maybe he had a point.
They visited for a time before they took off since Kara was to come later to pick up my daughter who sat sleep in my arms. I looked down at her and she seemed so peaceful. Her long lashes lay against her rounded cheeks. Innocence. Dean had said she seemed to be looking for her brother from time to time, once she had tried to say his name as she toddled around their house, Oh, was what she called him. How do you tell a one year old her brother is not coming home?
Then I heard a voice beside me.
“Sam.”
I turned to see that Lydia had finally awakened. She smiled at me though I figured it had to be painful to speak with the tube in her mouth. I pushed the nurse’s button before I spoke.
“Sweetie, oh my God, you finally woke up. Don’t try to talk okay,” I said as I moved out of the way so the nurse could check her vital signs.
I put Mackey on my shoulder as I watched while another nurse came into help situate Lydia more comfortably. It seemed forever that the asked her questions about how she felt, took the tube from her mouth, readjusted the levels in her medicine, wrote on her chart and told me she looked good for her condition.
“She shouldn’t try to talk much but she is breathing on her own and that is good,” they informed me as they left.
When they were gone, I sat down after I put the baby in her stroller so she could rest. I held on to my wife’s hand with tears in my eyes again.
“The pain isn’t too bad?”
“No not at all,” she said as she watched me.
I felt shy suddenly with so many questions in my mind. Part of me wanted to just look in her eyes; it had been so long she had lain there without being awake. I stroked her long elegant fingers.
“Are you okay?” she asked with concern.
“I’m fine, I was worried for you I love you so much,” I said quietly.
I got up to kiss her soft lips gently and I ran my hand over her hair. She squeezed my hand as I sat down again. She still had a long way to go but her being awake had lifted a weight from my heart. Though I had no idea how I was going to tell her about Logan. She seemed to hesitate before she finally asked.
“Where is Logan?”
I shook my head as the tears flowed full force, while she reached to touch my face.
“I’m sorry, Baby, we lost our little boy.”
Her tears fell silently as she sighed. I could only imagine she felt guilty to be alive while our son was not.
“Tell me he didn’t suffer, please,” she said pleaded more with her eyes.
“He didn’t,” I said though we were both silent another moment with thoughts of our sweet boy in her minds.
“I wish….,” she began.
“It doesn’t help,” I said.
She closed her eyes and I was quiet as I watched as she tried not to lose what little composure she had. I knew Lydia was strong. She also had strong spiritual beliefs so I understood she would believe Logan was in a better place. A place where there was no pain or suffering. No evil that needed to be hunted down or killed. He was safe with her God. The God I had to admit that had brought her through the mess.
“I know you don’t totally believe in God, Sam. I get that you try to have faith, I appreciate that. There were times when we would kill something that I felt like God that I was the one in charge of getting rid of the things that go bump in the night.”
She stopped for a breath.
“Please Baby, don’t try to talk anymore,” I said as I caressed her arm.
“But, Sam as much as I felt I helped God I know He is in charge. Though there was never a moment in my life that I desired to wake up one day and have anyone tell me my son was dead. Even though I am convinced he is with God I wish he were here with us,” she whispered.
“I know, but you should rest don’t worry about me,” I said it was all I could say.
Religion had been the only stalemate in our marriage. However, it was never an issue that we fought about and it was not something I would argue over when I only wanted my wife to be okay. I needed her to be alive and healthy. I needed her with Mackey and me. We could face anything together.
Five years before-the first hunt
We stayed up that entire night doing research. Lydia fell asleep on the empty bed and allowed her to sleep. Of course, it was selfish since it gave me a chance to observe her without her knowledge. She lay in the fetal position with her head on a pillow; she seemed peaceful as she slept. Her long lashes lay against her cheeks and her lips were gently parted. I longed to stroke her hair to kiss her full lips, but decided against it. My body responded to the stray thoughts of making love to her that floated through my mind. I would have been mortified if she had woken up to see obvious arousal become my pants had tightened uncomfortably in the crotch. I covered her with a blanket when she was still asleep after an hour. I set the alarm so I could wake her for work, before I went to sleep myself. It was three thirty in the morning by then.
I woke up to the sound of the alarm three hours later to find she had gone while I slept. She left a note saying she would like me to pick her up after work and she gave me her cell number. I smiled to myself as I turned over to go back to sleep again. The second time I woke up it was from a vision. I could hardly breathe when I opened my eyes. I looked around the room to find I was alone. Though in the vision I had seen Lydia in the car with a little boy, somehow I knew it was my son. There was a car wreck in the vision and the little boy died. I could not stop crying. But maybe I was wrong and the little boy was Lydia’s child now. I had to tell her either way.
While I waited for her to come to the car that evening, I considered my options. She and I did not know one another well enough for me to demand to know her life story. On the other hand, I figured I could just explain about my gift. She smiled as she got in the car.
“Good day at work?” I asked for something to say.
“Just like every other day,” she said.
I smiled again as I tried not to stare. She had changed into jeans with a dark blue blouse that showed a bit of cleavage. I cleared my throat.
“So when did you leave this morning?”
“Oh I think about six, I didn’t want to be late.”
“Okay, I had set the alarm just in case.”
“Thanks that is good to know, I am sorry I fell asleep on you,” she apologized.
“No,” I said as I reached to touch her hand, just a friendly gesture.
I was out of my element; I had no idea how to tell her about the vision. Then I decided honesty would be best.
“Lydia I had a strange dream sometime this morning, it was about you and a little boy.”
She raised her eyebrow at me; I could see her confusion out of my peripheral vision.
“Just a dream, right?”
“Well in this dream there was a car accident and the little boy died.”
“That is sad, Sam,” she said as she bit her lip before we turned into the hotel parking lot.
I turned to face her after I parked the car.
“Lydia sometimes my dreams come true.”
“Oh.”
I told her about my visions and the many times they had turned into real life incidents.
“Kind of nice to know what could happen, right?” she said with a question in her voice.
I could tell she was thinking about the dream.
“I’m not trying to freak you out, I just wanted you to know.”
“Yeah, thanks for telling me. We should go in to get back to work,” she said with a small smile.
I did not reveal that I believed the little boy belonged to both of us. I hoped I wouldn’t regret that decision.
We had been surfing the internet for more than hour as we looked for clues to what could be killing the cows when it hit me.
“I cannot believe I didn’t think of this,” I said as I hit myself in the head.
“What,” she said as she got up out of the chair to stretch. For a moment I was distracted again as I looked her up and down.
“Um, yeah I think this is the work of Satanist.”
“Now that is possible, I have heard of a local group but never any incidents have been connected to them.”
“Well I do not think this is supernatural related. What I see is that perhaps the wolf thing we saw may be taking advantage of the cows that are dumped in the woods.”
She smiled that does make the most sense.
“So this wasn’t a real hunt,” is said a bit sad only because I had hoped we could work together.
“No, but we should go see what the Satanist are up just to make sure before we turn them in for the cow killings.”
“Oh absolutely I am glad we found out about the guy we fell over.”
We had determined he was a runaway that had been killed and dumped in the woods, it was nothing to do with the cows whatsoever. Just a coincidence. The police had blocked off all sides of the wooded area temporarily to keep people out.
That night we visited the local satanic place of worship to find all the lights on. It looked as though they were meeting. There were people about as they got out of their cars to go inside. We parked a little ways away to watch what was going on.
“Looks like a regular service, like a church,” Lydia said.
“Yeah it does, I wonder how out of place we will look if we just went in to sit at the back,” I suggested.
She shrugged, “Guess it depends if they know all the members.”
“I think this group will fairly familiar with the entire group, I think we should wait.”
She agreed so we stayed in the car in our spot that was hidden from view.
It was a couple of hours before we saw the people come out again. They came outside but went in small groups back behind the building. Then they seem to disappear from site. We decided this would be the time to check out the lay up of the church. We were surprised to see there were still a few worshipers still inside. One of them approached us. A young woman with blonde hair and green eyes. She couldn’t have been more than twenty.
“Can I help you?”
“Um we were supposed to meet Jen here, looks like we messed the service,” I said as though it was the most natural thing in the world for me to be at a satanic church.
“Oh, well I do not know anyone by that name, but everyone else is gone down to the after service meeting. It’s out back, you can’t miss the entrance to the underground area once you walk a few hundred feet out there.”
“We will just go find her, thanks,” Lydia said with a smile.
“No problem,” the girl said as she walked away without a second glance.
We found what looked like a shed when we were behind the church it was the only thing with an opening so we went in the open door and heard noises as soon as we got inside. Both of us had our weapons so we weren’t as frightened as we probably should have been. There were stairs just inside the door and we followed them as quietly as we could. Before we were two steps down, we heard chanting. The steps were made of sandstone or something similar and were a bit noisy so we were on tiptoe because did not want them to hear us. The noise was loud the more we went down in to what could be called a cavern. The room was huge, at least the size of a football field and several people were gathered around the altar that took up most of the middle of the room. On the altar was a cow, its body cut down the middle. The high priest or at least a guy in a hooded robe stood with the heart of the animal over its head. His hands were bloody and for a moment I felt a bit sick. We had seen what we needed to see. Now we just needed to get out without being caught. Lydia touched my arm when she realized that someone was looking at us. Uh oh.
An older man with in jeans and a tee shirt came toward us with a frown on his face. He stepped in front of us but had a smile by the time he spoke to us.
“Are you the new comers?”
“Um, I think we may have gotten the wrong place,” Lydia said.
“We were looking for Jen and the girl upstairs was not certain if anyone by that name was in the group.”
“Jen? “ he said as he scrunched up his face as he tried to think.
Whatever ritual they were working on continued as we talked to the man, though it seemed surreal in my mind. The cow. The blood, the chanting.. I really wanted to get out and the sooner the better.
“No, I cannot think of a Jen, except my ten year old granddaughter,” the man said.
“It is obviously not the right place, we must have screwed up on the directions,” Lydia said with a smile.
“Yeah, I think so. Let me help you get back out of here,” he said as he indicated for us to follow him.
He took us up the stairs and to the parking lot, then stayed to watch as we walked back to the car. The entire time I was apprehensive that someone would want to tie us up somewhere for a later meal. I know it was stupid but just because they had a cow on the altar did not mean that a human sacrifice would be frowned upon.
By the time we were back in the car, both of us were sweating. Lydia seemed speechless. I cranked up the Mustang and drove out to the road to go back to the motel.
“Okay I have seen some strange things but I have to say Satanists are creepy,” she said.
“I agree with you there,” I said as a chill ran up my spine.
Human’s that were notoriously evil always sadden me almost more than the supernatural evil we dealt with. The Benders came to mind, they were a crazy bunch of human’s that Dean and I had run into years ago. They actually hunted and killed humans for sport. I needed a drink suddenly. Lydia and I decided to stop for one a piece.
TBC