Page 84 of John’s Yearning

John was watching Savannah from a corner of the H lounge where the assembled men had withdrawn in order to not disturb the children, when the door opened and Donnelly entered. John waved to the detective to join him, Samson, and Amaury. He’d been relieved to see that Samson was in the room. It had given him an excuse to leave Savannah. Just in time, because ever since they’d started talking about blood, his need to bite her had grown by leaps and bounds. And he knew it was wrong in so many ways. She was a mother in fear for her child, and not in the right frame of mind to make any kind of decision, let alone the decision to allow a vampire to bite her. He was a bastard for even having these thoughts at a time like this.

Donnelly greeted them all and immediately reported his news. “I’ve got something. SFPD’s organized crime unit has been looking at an individual who’s suspected of money laundering. They haven’t been able to prove anything so far, and that’s why this case has been under the radar, and I hadn’t heard anything about it. But listen to this: the guy owns a string of dry cleaners under various business names. Incidentally, the IP addresses our hacker, Otto Watson, was able to trace from the emails he received, lead back to several of these dry cleaning shops.”

“Finally, something!” John let out.

“Not so fast, John. We have a name, but not much else. The organized crime unit doesn’t have a location for him. He moves around too much, and they don’t have the resources to surveil every single one of his business locations.”

“Who is he?” John asked.

“Name’s Sergei Viktorov, Russian national. Immigration has no information on him ever even entering the country. We assume that he’s here under a false name, but we’ve not been able to find anything further on that.”

“A Russian, that fits,” John said. “What else?”

“They sent over a photo, but as I said, since immigration has no record of him, and the DMV hasn’t got anything for a Sergei Viktorov either, we can’t even be sure it’s him.” He reached into the pocket and pulled out a photo. “I printed it out on your printer. But the colors are a bit off.”

“Let me see it,” John demanded and took the picture from Donnelly.

John perused the picture. Just like the children and the two kidnappers had said, the man was in his fifties and blond.

“My colleagues told me something else, too.”

John lifted his gaze back to Donnelly. “What’s that?”

“Rumor is that Viktorov has a preference for young meat, sisters, twins, mothers and daughters. According to Vice, some prostitutes in the Tenderloin reported that a man matching his description has offered to pay for women who would bring their virgin daughters with them so one would watch while he fucked the other.”

“Disgusting asshole!” Samson cursed.

“Fucking bastard,” John grunted. “It sounds like him.” And he’d set his sight on Savannah and Buffy. John’s blood started to boil at the thought of what Viktorov was planning.

“Are you okay if I show this picture to the girls?” Donnelly asked.

“Let’s compare it to what your sketch artist has come up with first,” John suggested.

Donnelly was already turning in the direction of the sketch artist, when John saw Savannah approaching them. Quickly he said to Donnelly, “Mike, not a word about Viktorov’s reputation to Savannah. It’ll only upset her, and it won’t serve any purpose.”

“Understood.”

Savannah made a beeline for Donnelly. “Do you have news?”

Donnelly cast a quick glance at John, then nodded. “We think we know who it is. A Russian named Sergei Viktorov. I was just about to compare the photo we got to what the sketch artist has drawn.”

“Let me see.” She took the photo from Donnelly’s hand and looked at it. Her mouth dropped open. “Oh, no! Oh God no!”

With one step, John was by her side and gripped her arm. “What’s wrong?”

She looked at him, eyes wide, while she lifted the photo higher. “This man, I know him. He came to my office. He shook my hand.” Her face distorted in disgust.

“Who is he?” John asked.

“Viktor Stricklund. He claimed to be from Sweden. Wanted a business meeting about cyber security for his company.” She choked out the words. “Oh, God, John, that’s how he knew about you. He said my assistant arranged the meeting, but I couldn’t check with Rachel, because she was out sick. He probably never had an appointment. He must have somehow found out that Rachel was out sick and then pretended that she set up the meeting, knowing I couldn’t verify it. And when Alexi told him that I had a family emergency, I told him that my daughter had disappeared.” She swallowed. “He pretended to be concerned. He offered his help, said he knew people who could search for her. To get rid of him, I told him that I’d already hired a private investigator.” Tears now ran down her cheeks. “He played me. And I didn’t see it.”

John nodded. “He’s brazen. He wanted to make sure he knew what steps you’d taken. I assume he showed up in your office before you received the ransom note?”

She nodded.

John exchanged a look with Donnelly. “Show the picture to the kids. Confirm that he’s the same guy who took Buffy.”

Donnelly nodded, took the picture back and walked to the sketch artist and the two kids she was working with. John pulled Savannah into his arms. “We’ll get him, darlin’, we’ll get him now.”