by Kay Hooper
Grudgingly, she said, “Right. But you have seriously got to accept the fact that I can take care of myself.”
Okay, okay. But just move, will you? It’s nearly dawn.
Roxanne opened the old gate cautiously and was several steps along the broken-concrete walkway to the mill’s main doors when she stopped suddenly and turned to scan the darkness behind her.
What?
“That car, the one that passed a few minutes ago.”
What about it?
“I’ve been watching this neighborhood since midnight, and it’s the only vehicle I’ve seen moving.”
So?
“I didn’t see it turn into a driveway. Plus it was moving slowly and was awfully quiet.”
Looking for an address?
“At four in the morning? Do me a favor and sweep the area again, would you? I’ve got a bad feeling about that car.”
Gabriel didn’t argue.
Okay. Hang on a second.
Roxanne waited, her uneasiness growing as she visually scanned the area as well as she could in the darkness.
Leave, Rox. Now.
“Gabe—”
Get the hell out of there. Don’t stop to lock the gate, just go!
Roxanne moved immediately, smoothly drawing her weapon as she stepped through the gate. But as fast as she was, as careful as she was, she never saw or heard him coming, and never even got the chance to assume a defensive posture before powerful hands grabbed her gun arm.
Paris refilled Dani’s coffee cup and pushed it across the table to her. “Look, Marc’s right, especially about his mother. People get sick. The fact that you dreamed his mother would didn’t make it happen—but it may have given her more time, because he used the warning to make damn sure she got to a doctor, pronto.”
“That’s what he said.” Dani wrapped her fingers around the warm cup. “And I pretended to believe him.”
“And he pretended to believe that?” Paris shook her head. “He always did know you better than you thought, sweetie.”
Dani shrugged. “It was a moment, maybe…and then it wasn’t. I shut down, or he did. A deputy caught up with us to tell Marc that he was needed back at the station, and we went back. Bad timing, I guess.”
“Bad timing.” Paris was frowning. “Did you dream last night?”
“Not that I remember.” She hadn’t slept, too fearful of giving over control of her sleeping mind to the vision dream. Or to the voice that kept getting in.
The only upside, she had decided, was that she seemed better able to shield or cocoon her own mind, since even Paris seemed unaware of the struggle. For the first time, that realization caused Dani a twinge of worry.
It was odd, now that she thought about it, for something so profound happening to her to go unnoticed by her twin.
“So you didn’t try to take Marc in?”
Dani dragged her mind back to the conversation. “I told you, I have no intention of doing that. Look what happened the other night with you and Hollis—and both of you are psychic.”
“We’re both okay. More worried about you, since you were the one with the nosebleed.”
“Yeah, and that still bugs me. I don’t think it was from the strain of taking the two of you in.”
“Why not?”
“Because I didn’t feel any strain at all, not even an effort. I wanted you two with me—and you were. It wasn’t until we heard that ungodly scream that I felt…”
“What, scared? Because it sure scared the hell out of me.”
“No, it wasn’t fear. I mean, I was scared, but I was feeling something else.”
“Like?”
“I don’t know. Pressure? Something like that.” And the voice. The one you barely heard.
“You got the bends in a dream?”
“Funny. I don’t know what it was, obviously.”
“But it felt like something outside yourself?”
It was Dani’s turn to frown. “Maybe.”
“Please don’t tell me it was our psychic killer. I mean, I know we all heard his voice, or at least a voice, but he couldn’t have actually done anything to you, right? He couldn’t have caused the nosebleed?”
Dani’s frown deepened. “I don’t see how.”
“I guess there’s no way to know for sure.”
“Not unless I bump into him in the next dream.” Dani shivered. “I may take you and Hollis in again just for company.” Then she shook her head. “Scratch that. You two looked exhausted all day; going into my dream was clearly a bad idea.”
“It hasn’t hurt me so far.”
“And maybe you’ve just been lucky.”
“Too dumb to know better, when we were kids,” Paris agreed. “Thing is, we didn’t know better. We had a playground inside your head.”
“Okay, that sounds really creepy,” Dani told her.
“However it sounds, it has had its uses, especially since we signed on with Haven.”
“Barely. Twice I’ve managed to take you into a relevant vision dream. Twice. In more than a year.”
“And it was useful both times. I remembered a few details you couldn’t, and those details proved helpful to the investigations.”
“Didn’t change what I saw. It never changes what I see, the outcome.”
“How do you know?”
Dani stared at her sister.
“Seriously, how do you know? Dani, maybe what you see is…the lesser of two evils. It’s like what Miranda told us. Premonitions are tricky beasts: Do you see what happens if you don’t intervene, or what happens if you do?”
“That’s a hell of a possibility. I mean, that things could be worse than what I see. And you’re about as subtle as neon.”
Paris sighed. “Just trying to provide a little perspective, that’s all. You’ve gotta get over this idea that you’re a prophet—or prophetess—of doom, that your ability is entirely negative. It’s been dragging at you since we were kids.”
“I just…For once, I’d like to foresee something positive.”
“Maybe the universe doesn’t need help with positive. Isn’t there some kind of entropy theory about how the natural state of things is disintegration?”
Dani stared at her.
“Hey, I consider ideas too. Sometimes. Anyway, maybe what the universe needs help with is keeping everything from falling totally apart. Why show you the happily-ever-afters if what’s really needed is help getting there through all the dark stuff along the way?”
“Way to cheer me up, sis.”
“You’re not getting it.” Paris wore an unusually intent expression, and her hazel eyes had darkened almost to brown. “Look, at any given time I might pick up a few facts or bits of information, like the way I did with that bracelet—for all the good it did us. Anyway, those glimmers might or might not help me with an investigation or a problem or, hell, just help me get through the day. But people like you and Miranda and this Quentin we’ve heard so much about, the universe shows you guys signposts. Not hidden in the scenery the way they are for the rest of us, but lit up and glowing so you can’t miss them. And whether those signposts are things to avoid or paths to take, it still gives you a leg up on everybody else.
“Dani, we’re all wandering in the dark, and you guys have the lamps.” The distant look in her eyes vanished abruptly, and Paris chuckled. “My metaphor wandered, too, didn’t it?”
“Just a little bit.” Still, Dani felt better about an ability she had for so many years viewed as usually ugly and depressing. But then she shook her head and added, “Didn’t Miranda also say there’s a difference between a premonition and a prophecy? That a premonition is something you can influence, affect, and a prophecy is…written in stone? Inevitable no matter what you do to try to change it?”
“Pretty much.”
“So how do I know what it is I’m really seeing? A version of the future I help shape or one I can’t avoid?”
“I guess you can never really know. Unless you learn how to
be a lot more plugged in to the universe than either one of us is so far.” Paris eyed her twin, then said, “And we share that neon subtlety. Quit stalling and finish your coffee so we can get to the station.”
“I wasn’t—”
“Yeah, yeah. If you and Marc don’t get things between you sorted out soon, somebody’s going to have to knock your heads together. Bad timing or not, we need the two of you functional if we’re going to find and stop this killer.”
It was a blunt reminder but a welcome one; Dani had discovered since signing on with Haven that being able to use her abilities in positive ways had been slowly changing how she felt about those abilities, and she wanted that to continue.
Needed it to continue.
Especially now.
So she finished her coffee and prepared to return to the sheriff’s department with Paris. And it wasn’t until they were almost there that she wondered suddenly why Paris had not once, in all this time, asked the question she should have asked about Dani’s vision dream.
She had not asked where she was.
Because she didn’t want to know the answer?
Or because, like Dani, she was afraid she already did?
16
HOLLIS HADN’T EXPECTED to sleep well on Friday night, because the day had been too long and the previous night unusually active, if only on a subconscious level.
There was something amusing in that, she decided. That what had quite probably been a brief dream experience—because they mostly were brief, even if some felt interminable while they were actually happening—could take so much out of one physically.
But dragging her exhausted self around all day Friday had certainly proven the truth of that. It had also convinced Hollis to report in to Bishop before she got ready for bed. And, more important, to hold nothing back.
“You heard the voice too?” Bishop asked.
Sitting on the edge of the bed in her motel room, using the phone on the nightstand because her cell was charging, Hollis frowned at the ice bucket on the dresser. “Yeah, sort of. It was almost more a feeling than a sound.”
“What kind of feeling?”
“Pressure,” she replied, after thinking about it. “Like something pushing at me. At us. Probably mostly at Dani, since she’s the one who woke up with a nosebleed. Or was that from the effort to take Paris and me in?”
“It’s difficult for me to even guess,” he said slowly. “Her abilities have always been somewhat erratic, I gather, but Miranda felt she was considerably stronger than she seemed, even more than a year ago. I don’t recall a nosebleed being reported by her previously.”
“Not according to Paris. I have to say, though, that I’m a lot more worried about that voice. Dani seems certain it’s the voice—or thoughts, or energy, whatever—of our killer. And even if she hasn’t said a whole lot about it, or showed much of what she’s feeling, I think she’s scared.”
“Feeling threatened?”
“Yeah, probably. He told her she couldn’t run or hide and that nobody could protect her from him. And he told her from inside her head. And not just in her dreams, but when she was awake. Feeling threatened? She ought to be freakin’ terrified. I’m not so sure I wouldn’t be in bed with the covers pulled over my head if I were in her place.”
After a moment Bishop asked, “How are you doing?”
Hollis wanted to give him a flip answer, but she had learned the uselessness of that where Bishop was concerned. Just because she wasn’t a telepath didn’t mean he couldn’t read her, even across whatever distance lay between them. So she answered honestly.
“I’m tired and worried. And even though I suppose I should be happy about it, I’m also unnerved that the dead seem to be reaching me a lot easier than they did in the beginning.”
“It is a good thing,” he reminded her.
“It’s a scary thing. I don’t think I’m ever going to get used to it, just so you know.” She changed the subject abruptly. “Listen, is there any progress in revising that profile? Because we could sure as hell use it.”
“You’ve given me new information,” Bishop pointed out. “Wednesday’s crime scene, plus the open stalking of Marie Goode, if we assume that’s him—”
Hollis interrupted to say, “Trust me, this is hardly the sort of town to have more than one weirdo sneaking around taking pictures of women. That would be stretching coincidence to the snapping point.”
“You’re assuming the killer takes photos of the murders,” Bishop pointed out calmly.
She nodded, half consciously. “Because of the one crime scene we have. Struck me the first time I saw those overhead shots Marc’s forensics team got. It was carefully chosen, and not just because it was isolated. The area made a perfect composition for his…art. He left us a picture and took one himself, I’d bet on it.”
“Then I’d call it more than an assumption,” Bishop said. “So he’s photographing not only his kill sites but also his potential victims, as he stalks them. That, plus the necklace and bracelet left so conspicuously behind—all are radical departures from his previous M.O. He’s leaving traces of himself, possibly even a trail. Add in the virtual certainty now that we’re dealing with a psychic mind of unknown ability—”
“And we’re screwed?” she finished wryly.
“You need to be careful, Hollis. All of you, but especially you, Dani, and Paris. Because if the need to terrify is at the core of this bastard’s sickness—and what little we know about him points that way—then establishing contact with Dani may be teaching him that he has a new tool. A new weapon. It may not be all about a particular look for him, not anymore.”
“I’m no profiler, and even I know that’s a huge leap in the evolution of a serial killer.”
“It may not be an evolution,” Bishop said. “He may be…devolving. The established personality matrix could be disintegrating.”
“Jesus. I didn’t know that was possible.”
“With the right psychological trigger, almost anything is possible.”
“And the right psychological trigger in this case would be…?”
“I have no idea.”
Hollis sighed. “Never thought I’d say this, but I would have preferred one of your more enigmatic answers. At least then I could cherish the illusion that somebody knew what was going on.”
“Sorry to disappoint you.” Bishop sighed. “Just be careful, Hollis. I’ll get the revised profile to you ASAP. But, in the meantime, don’t be too quick to avoid whatever the dead have to tell you. Any trail he leaves, by accident or deliberation, could well take us anywhere—or nowhere; it’s almost always true of serials that their victims may be our best leads in finding the killer.”
After all that plus the day she’d had, Hollis really didn’t expect to sleep well. And she didn’t, tossing and turning, waking up at least twice to check the clock. And the locks on her door.
Somewhere around three A.M. she finally dropped into an exhausted sleep, the heavy kind that seemed to drag one deeper than dreams. And when she woke from that, it was so sudden that all she could feel at first was the runaway pounding of her heart.
Seconds later, she knew she wasn’t alone.
She had left a light burning behind the half-closed bathroom door, and it provided just enough illumination for her to make out a shape at the foot of her bed.
Her weapon was in the drawer of the nightstand, but instead of reaching for that, Hollis reached for the lamp, never taking her eyes off that faint, indistinct shape.
“He knows who you are.”
Hollis froze for an instant, her hand on the lamp’s switch, chills chasing one another up and down her spine. At least half-hoping she would see nothing, that the quiet statement had been only in her head, she turned the lamp on.
“He knows who you are,” Shirley Arledge repeated. Her face was still, eyes anxious. “He knows what you are.”
She was already fading.
“Wait,” Hollis said quickly, trying to cont
rol her voice, to keep it soft. “Who is he? How can we find him, stop him?”
Shirley Arledge shook her head, and her voice faded even as she did, as she might have replied, “He’s tricking you…”
Hollis slowly sat up in bed, staring at the place where the spirit of a young woman had stood. Then she turned her head slowly and examined the entire motel room: very ordinary, uninspiring, and a little depressing at—she looked at the clock—five in the morning.
Finally convinced that she was, indeed, alone in her room, she looked down at her bare arms, at the clearly visible gooseflesh.
“No,” she murmured. “I am never…ever…going to get used to this.”
Still no sign of Shirley Arledge,” Marc reported as he joined the others in the conference room. “And still no sign there was anything violent about her disappearance.”
“She’s dead,” Hollis said.
Everyone else in the room went still, staring at the federal agent, and Hollis offered them a weary smile. “I’m beginning to think there’s a trail of bread crumbs in the spirit world leading straight to me. First time a spirit’s pulled me out of a sound sleep, though.”
“Evolving abilities,” Paris said almost absently, frowning a little.
“Are you okay?” Dani asked Hollis.
“I’d love to sleep about twelve hours, but other than that, I’m fine. Frustrated by one more thing that doesn’t seem to lead us anywhere, though.”
Marc stirred, finally, going to fill up his coffee cup before returning to the table, his every move deliberate. He didn’t speak until he was seated at the head of the table. “I gather she didn’t tell you anything helpful?”
“She said he knew who I was, what I was. And then she said that he was tricking me—or us, I suppose. That he was tricking us. She didn’t stick around long enough for more than that.” Hollis opened a folder on the table beside her and pulled out a photograph of Shirley Arledge, studying it for a moment before laying it faceup on the table and sliding it toward the center of their group. “No question in my mind: This is the woman I saw around five o’clock this morning. I don’t get visitations like that from the living, so I can say with fair certainty that she’s dead.”
