by Kay Hooper
“Why can’t he cut through the red tape and get the SCU here—officially?”
Miranda said, “We don’t want to use his influence unless we have to. Especially since he and the new Director don’t exactly see eye to eye politically. If the Director bowed to pressure, as he surely would given the country’s sympathies for Senator LeMott, then he’d resent it. And sooner or later, the price demanded for that would be high.”
“Jesus, I hate politics,” Marc said under his breath. And before anyone could remind him that he was himself an elected official, he added, “Okay, so officially the SCU can’t help me, and anything from the FBI itself is probably going to be too little too late.”
“That’s about the size of it.”
“Which, I gather, explains what Mr. Garrett is doing here.”
“John,” Garrett said. “And, yes, it does. Senator LeMott has hired the services of Haven, for the duration. He wants this killer stopped, obviously. He doesn’t particularly care how that’s accomplished. In fact—” John looked at Miranda, his slanted brows rising in a silent question.
She sighed. “Marc, there’s a very real concern that if we don’t make some progress in stopping this killer, LeMott will…take matters into his own hands. Right now he’s a ticking time bomb and doesn’t feel he has much to lose, especially since his wife’s suicide a couple of months ago. Annie was barely in the ground before her mother swallowed a handful of pills. LeMott’s career has been important to him, but since he lost his daughter and wife he’s kept working, we believe, only because his is a position of power and he intends to use that power eventually. All he has left is his…crusade to find the killer who destroyed his family.
“He’s a former prosecutor. He’s also a former marine. He could do serious damage, and a lot of people could be hurt needlessly. Right now he’s in D.C., and we need to keep him there. Which means we need to make some tangible progress in this investigation, ASAP.”
“With all due respect to the senator and his grief,” Marc said politely, “I want to catch this bastard as soon as possible because he’s butchering young women.” His hard gaze shifted to John Garrett. “And I don’t care who’s picking up the tab, just as long as we all have the same goal in sight.”
“We do,” John said immediately.
Dani spoke for the first time in a long time to say rather tightly, “But the SCU isn’t part of this. Miranda isn’t staying. Are you, Miranda?”
So that’s part of it. She’s worried about Miranda. Something must have happened to her in the vision dream. He had wondered if these last years had taught Dani at least that she could no more control fate than anyone else could, despite her glimpses into an often grim future. Now he had his answer; she was still fighting that inescapable truth.
The federal agent looked at Dani with, Marc thought, an oddly compassionate little smile, and said, “It might not make a difference, Dani. Whether I go or stay. You know that.”
Miranda knows it too. That fate does what it will, despite everything we do to try to change it.
“I know you need to go. Back to Boston, or to Quantico, or somewhere. Anywhere but here. Because if he’s here—you can’t be.”
“What am I missing?” Marc demanded, intent on confirming his suspicions.
Paris stirred and also spoke up for the first time in a while. “It’s about Dani’s dream, Marc. The one she told you about earlier this afternoon.”
Marc turned his gaze to Dani and waited until she finally looked back at him. “What about the dream?” he asked.
Dani drew a deep breath, let it out slowly.
And told him.
Marie Goode wasn’t a fanciful girl. Never had been. She wasn’t the type to jump at shadows or thrill to ghost stories, and if she heard a strange sound in her apartment late at night, she’d grab a can of pepper spray and go see what, if anything, was there.
Usually nothing was, though once she had discovered a raccoon on her deck, raiding her bird feeder. The pepper spray hadn’t been necessary on that occasion, since the creature had been as wary of her as she was of it, and fled.
Her father kept saying he didn’t like it that her apartment was on the ground floor of the complex, and Marie was on the waiting list for a larger apartment on an upper floor, but she’d never felt particularly vulnerable where she was. There were good locks on the doors, and while the complex was on the outskirts of town, it was still a safe, well-lit area.
Which was doubly a good thing right now, since her old car was in the shop, hopefully being fixed, and she had to walk from her job at the small restaurant several blocks away. If she couldn’t get a ride, at least.
On Wednesday night, no ride was available. And a private party celebrating an upcoming wedding had stayed late, which meant it was later than usual when Marie helped close up and set off on foot toward home.
She wasn’t nervous.
At first.
It hadn’t really cooled off much in early October, but the summer had been brutally hot and too dry, so, in defeat, a lot of the trees had simply dropped dead brown leaves without the customary colorful show first. During the daytime, the dead leaves everywhere were a depressing sight; at night, with a fitful breeze, it was a bit creepy.
The leaves rustled and whispered as the air currents caught them and slid them along the sidewalk and against the buildings Marie walked past. It was as though a small crowd of people followed her, just out of sight, and whispered among themselves, keeping their secrets.
Now that was a fanciful thought, Marie decided. And why was she thinking such absurd things?
She realized her hand had crept up to the nape of her neck, and she could literally feel the fine hairs there standing straight out.
Her common sense gave her obviously overactive imagination a stern talking-to, and Marie stopped on the sidewalk, turning slowly to study her surroundings. Nothing at all unusual met her gaze.
The breeze died down just then, so the whispering leaves were stilled and silenced. The sidewalk was well lit, as it was all the way to her apartment complex.
A car passed her, then another going in the opposite direction.
An ordinary night in Venture.
See? There’s nothing wrong. Just your imagina—
In the moment of absolute silence, after the car passed and before the breeze stirred up again, Marie heard something. A very distinctive sound she recognized.
The click and whir of a camera.
Not the digital cameras so prevalent these days, but the old-fashioned kind that used film and different shutter speeds according to the light, and—
She heard it again. Her mouth went dry, and she could feel her heart begin to thud against her ribs.
Without wasting another second, Marie continued on her way home, one hand diving into her shoulder bag and closing around the slightly reassuring can of pepper spray, while the other fumbled with the keys she was already holding to find the big whistle on the key chain. She walked briskly, head up, just the way her father had taught her.
“Don’t look like a victim, Marie. Walk like you’re going somewhere, but make sure your eyes keep moving, keep scanning the area. And listen to your instincts. If they tell you to run, you run like hell. If they tell you to yell, then you yell your head off. Use the whistle. Don’t be afraid of being embarrassed if it turns out to be nothing. Embarrassment isn’t permanent. Being dead is.”
A truth he, as a doctor, certainly knew.
Marie brought the whistle halfway up to her lips but no farther. Because as suddenly as the fear had gripped her, it let her go. She felt no sense of menace, no threat, no anxiety. Still, she didn’t slow her brisk pace or cease scanning her surroundings continually.
And she didn’t relax even a bit until she was inside her apartment, the timer-activated lights welcoming and the door triple-locked behind her.
She didn’t truly relax until she had gone methodically through her apartment, checking every window and door, every
closet. Even under her bed and inside the bathtub and shower.
Only then did she sink down on the foot of her bed with a shaky sigh, relaxing her death grip on the pepper spray and whistle.
That’s when she saw the necklace lying on her dresser.
It was the nightmare brought to life, Dani thought.
The vision.
The smell of blood turned her stomach, the thick, acrid smoke burned her eyes, and what had been for so long a wispy, dreamlike memory now was jarring, throat-clogging reality. For just an instant she was paralyzed.
It was all coming true.
Despite everything she had done, everything she had tried to do, despite all the warnings, once again it was all—
Wait. This isn’t—
“Dani?” Hollis appeared at her side, seemingly out of the smoke, gun drawn, blue eyes sharp even squinted against the stench. “Where is it?”
“I—I can’t. I mean, I don’t think I can—” Why do I feel so confused? I’ve been here before. I’ve done this before. So why does it all feel…different?
“Dani, you’re all we’ve got. You’re all they’ve got. Do you understand that?”
Dani said, “If somebody had just listened to me when it mattered—”
But they did listen. I know they did.
I remember that much.
Don’t I?
“Stop looking back. There’s no sense in it. Now is all that counts. Which way, Dani?”
Impossible as it was, Dani had to force herself to concentrate on the stench of blood she knew none of the others could smell. A blood trail that was all they had to guide them. She nearly gagged, then pointed. “That way. Toward the back. But…”
“But what?”
“Down. Lower. There’s a basement level.”
“It isn’t on the blueprints.”
“I know.”
I told you all this before. Didn’t I?
Didn’t I?
“Bad place to get trapped in a burning building,” Hollis noted. “The roof could fall in on us. Easily.”
Bishop appeared out of the smoke as suddenly as Hollis had, weapon in hand, his face stone, eyes haunted. “We have to hurry.”
“Yeah,” Hollis replied, “we get that. Burning building. Maniacal killer. Good seriously outnumbered by evil. Bad situation.” Her words and tone were flippant, but her gaze on his face was anything but, intent and measuring.
“You forgot potential victim in maniacal killer’s hands,” her boss said, not even trying to match her tone.
“Never. Dani, did you see the basement, or are you feeling it?”
Feeling? Wait. That’s not the way my abilities work. I just dream things. I’m not clairvoyant.
Paris is.
Paris…
“Stairs. I saw them.” The weight on her shoulders felt like the world, so maybe that was what was pressing her down. Or…“And what I feel now…He’s lower. He’s underneath us.”
“Then we look for stairs.”
Dani coughed. She was trying to think, trying to remember. But dreams recalled were such dim, insubstantial things, even vision dreams sometimes, and there was no way for her to be sure she was remembering clearly.
But this is the vision dream. I know it is. It’s the vision dream, and for the first time I know that’s what it is even while I’m in the middle of it.
While I’m dreaming.
Because I am dreaming.
I have to be dreaming.
She was overwhelmingly conscious of precious time passing and looked at her wrist, at the shiny Rolex watch that told her it was 1:34 P.M. on Tuesday, October 28.
Wait. Why is the watch different? And why is the time different? More than an hour earlier. Why would it be earlier?
“Dani?”
She shook off the momentary confusion, or at least attempted to. “The stairs. Not where you’d expect them to be,” she managed finally, coughing again. “They’re in a closet or something like that. A small office. Room. Not a hallway. Hallways—”
“What?”
The instant of certainty was fleeting but absolute. “Shit. The basement is divided. By a solid wall. Two big rooms. And accessed from this main level by two different stairways, one at each side of the building, in the back.”
“What kind of crazy-ass design is that?” Hollis demanded.
“If we get out of this alive, you can ask the architect.” The smell of blood was almost overpowering, and Dani’s head was beginning to hurt. Badly. She had never before pushed herself for so long without a break, especially with this level of intensity.
Marc appeared out of the smoke as abruptly as the other two had and took her hand in his free one. In his other hand was a big automatic handgun.
Wait. The sheriff’s department personnel carry revolvers, don’t they?
“Where to now?” he asked. “I can’t see shit for all this smoke.”
And why is that bugging me when Marc shouldn’t even be here?
What the hell is Marc doing here?
Hollis replied to his question. “Dani is guiding us.”
He looked down at her, his expression totally professional but his eyes worried and gentle. “I always knew the beautiful assistant was the real magician,” he said. “Like the man behind the wizard’s curtain. Where to, Dani?”
She felt a wave of dizziness, of almost wild uncertainty. This was wrong, so wrong in so many ways.
This isn’t the way it’s supposed to happen!
It was Bishop who said, “You don’t know which side they’re in.”
“No. I’m sorry.” She felt as if she’d been apologizing to this man since she met him. Hell, she had been.
Hollis was scowling. To Bishop, she said, “Great. That’s just great. You’re psychically blind, the storm has all my senses scrambled, and we’re in a huge burning building without a freakin’ map.”
“Which is why Dani is here.” Those pale sentry eyes were fixed on her face.
Dani felt wholly inadequate and terribly confused. “I—I don’t—All I know is that he’s down there somewhere.”
“And Miranda?”
The name caused her a queer little shock, and for no more than a heartbeat, Dani had the dizzy sense of something out of place, out of sync somehow.
How could it be Miranda? I warned her. I warned her, and she went back to Boston to be with Bishop. But he’s here, he was always part of this. Only she shouldn’t be.
And…where is Paris?
Where is Paris, and why do I have her abilities?
“Dani?” Bishop’s face was even more strained.
Miranda. He asked about Miranda.
And she had an answer for him. Of sorts. “She isn’t—dead. Yet. She’s bait, you know that. She was always bait, to lure you.”
“And you,” Bishop said.
Dani didn’t want to think about that. Couldn’t, for some reason she was unable to explain, think about that.
Why can’t I think about it? What did I do to change so much—and all the wrong things?
“We have to go, now,” she heard herself say urgently. “He won’t wait, not this time.” And he’s not the only one.
The conversation had taken only brief minutes, but even so the smoke was thicker, the crackling roar of the fire louder, and the heat growing ever more intense.
“We’re running out of time on every level,” Marc said, his fingers tightening around Dani’s. “It’s been dry as hell for weeks, and this place is going up like a match. I’ve called it in.”
Bishop swore under his breath. “Marc—”
“Don’t worry, they know it’s a hostage situation, and they won’t come in. But they can damn well aim their hoses outside and try to save the nearby buildings.” He paused, then added, “Am I the only one who suspects this bastard planned out every last detail, including this place being a tinderbox?”
Bitterly, Hollis said, “No, you aren’t the only one. We’re on his timetable, just like before, lik
e always, doing everything he expects us to do like good little soldiers.”
Did she say that before? I don’t think she said that before.
Bishop turned and started toward the rear of the building and the south corner. “I’ll go down on this side. You three head for the east corner.”
Dani wondered if instinct was guiding him as well, but all she said, to Hollis, was, “He doesn’t care whose timetable we’re on, does he?”
“If fighting it means a minute lost in getting to Miranda? No way in hell. That alone would be enough, but on top of that he blames himself for this mess.”
It’s not his fault.
Oh, God, I think it’s mine.
“He couldn’t have known—”
“Yes. He could have. Maybe he even did. That’s why he believes it’s his fault. Come on, let’s go.”
Dani and Marc followed, but she had to ask, “Do you believe it’s his fault?”
Hollis paused for only an instant, looking back over her shoulder, and there was something hard and bright in her eyes. “Yes. I do. He played God one time too many. And we’re paying the price for his arrogance.”
But it’s not his fault. I’m almost sure…
Dani held on to Marc’s hand even tighter as they followed the other woman. She could hardly breathe, her throat tighter despite the fact that, as they reached the rear half of the building, the smoke wasn’t nearly as thick. They very quickly discovered, in the back of what might once have been a small office, a door that opened smoothly and silently to reveal a stairwell.
The stairwell was already lighted.
“Bingo,” Hollis breathed.
But it’s a trap. We all know it’s a trap. Why are we just walking into it?
This doesn’t make any sense!
Paris…where’s Paris?
Dani wanted to suggest that they wait, at least long enough for Bishop to check out the other side of the building, but every instinct as well as the waves of heat at her back told her there simply wasn’t time to wait.
It’s a trap and none of us cares.
Why not?
Hollis shifted her weapon to a steady two-handed grip and sent Dani and Marc a quick look. “Ready?”
