Chapter 21

We went straight back to Missouri's from Tim's house. We didn't say anything to each other until we got there. She came right out and asked me if I was still angry with dad for leaving us in Lawrence. I didn't know what to say. I'd been so angry with him for so long, even knowing the truth, it was hard to let go of.

Laura told Missouri everything we'd learned that day. She wanted us to call dad and talk to him about it, but neither of us wanted to do that. Laura wanted him to tell us on his own. I just didn't want to talk to him at all. Somehow, being angry with him made it easier to deal with things. Specially since the second chance he had with us he'd left us again and he never even told Sam we existed.

We did agree however, not to tell Dean. Laura was pretty sure Dean knew all of this too, he just hadn't told us about it. I knew that he didn't, but kept my mouth shut. I knew he had a lot to deal with. Things were getting worse between dad and Sam. He didn't really need our problems added to it, even though he worried about us all the time anyway.

We spent the rest of the week getting ready for school. They were gonna do a trial thing with us. We were going to do 2 years worth of work done in 1. If we proved we could handle the load for the first month, then the school would let us continue at that pace. We had to keep our grades up and not crack under the pressure.

It was definitely harder doing it with the college work, but we managed to get it done. We even picked up side jobs and still managed to pull straight A's. Laura would take babysitting jobs and I worked in the garage for Mike 2 days a week. I wasn't really old enough to get a regular check so he paid me under the table. Worked out fine for me, I just wanted to do it to have a break from the schoolwork.

In the middle of April, we'd finished our schoolwork and were making our plans for the summer. Steve wanted us to go hunting with him. I was cool with it, but Laura thought we should try to convince Caleb to let us go out on our own. I took her a week to convince me. I knew she really wanted to shadow dad, show him what we could do.

We got home 5 days before Sam's birthday. To our immense surprise, Dad, Dean, and Sam were at the ranch. They'd been waiting for us to get there. Apparently, some kind of satanic cult was setting up shop in our own backyard. Caleb had called dad for help.

Caleb suspected that this cult was being led by an actual demon possessed girl. It was also growing extremely fast. Most of the members were from out of state and coming in groups of 5 a day. The members recognized each other by a tribal tattoo on the back of their right hands.

As my brother is so fond of saying "Demons I get, people are crazy." Mix 30 people with 1 demon and things could turn very ugly very fast. We needed more help than what we had. Caleb knew that and was waiting for a few other hunters to come in. He didn't want the other kids involved in this because he didn't think they were ready.

After waiting 1 more day for the others to show up, we decided to do a little recon. From what we could tell, they were building in 2 locations in outlying areas of town. There was one group settled on a dry river bed we called The Flats. The other group was settled in the canyon at a place we called The Hole in the Wall. They were actually coming through town to get back and forth between the 2 locations so we had an advantage. There was on old dirt road that connected the 2 locations that followed a gas pipeline. This road crossed Caleb's property, half way between the 2 locations.

Caleb, Dean and I headed for The Flats while dad and Laura went to The Hole. We left Sam at the ranch to wait for the other hunters. When Caleb, Dean, and I got to our destination, we knew there was something very wrong. There were a bunch of tents set up, but no one was there. The whole thing was a trap.

Caleb tried to call dad's cell phone, but got no answer. He had given Laura and me phones before we left for school last year so I tried to call her. She didn't answer either. We headed for their location as fast as we could. We were too late.

On our way there, Caleb called the cops. He was hoping that the police would get there in time to stop the cult from hurting dad and Laura. When we got there, we found dad unconscious and tied up on the top of a hill back in The Hole. Laura was no where to be found.

Dean and I decided we were gonna go find her. Caleb stayed with dad while we were gone. We walked out of The Hole and into the canyon. We headed toward the west side first. When we got to the end we found a set of skid marks on the road. They appeared to be headed toward the east end. There was also a spot in between the skids that could only be the start of a blood trail.