Kay Hooper - Sense Of Evil

“So would I,” Rafe said. “But it was Isabel and Hollis who realized what was going on and talked to Ginny about it, and Isabel and I both feel Ginny will be more comfortable if they’re along for the arrest.” He hesitated, then said, “Plus, I think Isabel has something else in mind.”

Hollis looked at him. “Do you, now? Like what?”

“Assuming he’s sober enough to listen, I think she intends to take him down a peg or two. Without laying a finger on him.”

“If anybody can,” Hollis said, “it’s Isabel. Guys look at that beautiful face and centerfold body, all that blond hair, big green eyes all wide and innocent, and think they know exactly what she is. Boy, do they get a surprise.”

“I certainly did,” Rafe murmured.

“Speaking of which,” Hollis said. “Are you?”

He didn’t have to ask what she meant. “Apparently.”

Hollis whistled. “Dunno whether to say congratulations or sorry about that.”

“I’ll let you know when I figure out how I feel about it.”

Mallory said, “Hello? What’s going on? Are you what?”

“Psychic.”

She blinked. “You’re psychic?”

“So I’m told.”

“How could you be and not know?”

“The short answer,” Hollis said, “is that he always was, but it was an inactive ability, so he wasn’t aware of it. I think we talked about latents when we first got here. Rafe, as it turns out, was a latent. Something happened to activate his abilities.”

“What?”

Hollis lifted her brows at Rafe.

“Damned if I know. She-I was told it could have been some kind of subconscious shock, which I suppose it had to be since I don’t recall any consciously shocking or traumatic events in my life recently. Other than this killer.”

“No bump on the head?” Hollis asked. “Concussion?”

“No,” he said. “Never, in fact.”

Mallory eyed him somewhat warily. “So what can you do?”

“Not a whole hell of a lot. Yet, anyway. The consensus seems to be I am-or will be-clairvoyant.”

“Like Isabel? Just knowing stuff?”

“More or less.”

“And that doesn’t scare the shit out of you?”

“Did you hear me say it didn’t?”

“No.”

“Well, then.”

Mallory leaned back in her chair, tipped her head back, and addressed the ceiling-and whatever lay beyond. “A few weeks ago, I led a perfectly ordinary existence. No killers. No spooky psychic abilities. Nothing on my mind more weighty than which kind of takeout I wanted for my supper. Those were the days. I’m sorry now I didn’t appreciate them.” She sighed and looked at the others. “I must be paying off karma for a really, really bad decision in a former life.”

“ You must be?” Rafe shook his head.

Isabel returned to the room before the discussion could continue, saying, “We have a slight change of plan. Hollis, we’re going to swing by Ginny’s on the way back to the inn and pick up her mother; both of them will be staying there tonight.”

“Hank’s out on the town?” Rafe guessed.

“Yeah. Seems he often spends Sunday afternoons and evenings drinking in an undisclosed location with others of… like temperament.”

Rafe sighed. “Yeah, we have a few basement bars in the county. Unlicensed, unregulated, and highly mobile. They tend to change location more often than they wash the glasses.”

“Well, apparently Mr. McBrayer has a semiregular habit of drinking all evening and passing out somewhere between the bar and home. Or at the bar, sometimes. In any case, he seldom makes it home on Sunday nights. But on the off chance that tonight would be one of those nights, I’ve persuaded Ginny to get her mother and come stay at the inn.”

“I’ll have all the patrols keep an eye out for him tonight,” Rafe said. “If they don’t spot him, we’ll catch up with him tomorrow.”

“Good, thanks.” Isabel frowned slightly.

“I’ve also arranged to have all single female officers escorted home and their places checked out before they lock up for the night,” Rafe said. “And each is under orders to wait for two male officers to meet them tomorrow morning, if they’re on duty, to be escorted back here.”

“You’re reaching through again,” Isabel said.

“I am?”

“I was just thinking about Mallory’s report that some of the female officers feel they’ve been watched or followed and wondering what we should do to help protect those most likely to be at risk if it’s our killer-the single ones in the right age range. Don’t tell me you read that on my face. I may not be subtle, but I’m not a damned billboard.”

Mallory looked at Hollis, who shrugged.

“They’ve got me, too, this time.”

Rafe hesitated, then shrugged. “You looked worried; I wondered why; I knew.”

Isabel frowned again. “Okay. Now I’m worried about something else.”

Peculiarly enough, Rafe found this answer coming as easily as the one before had, just knowledge in his mind. “Sorry. Since neither one of us knows who the killer is, I don’t have a solution for your worry.”

“It was,” Isabel said, “more fun being the clairvoyant one.”

“Yeah, I can see how it would have been.”

“You’re enjoying this.”

“Not all of it. Just… some of it.”

“I know gloating when I see it. I don’t need extra senses for that.”

“Good thing too. Since yours are all boxed up, I mean.”

Straightening her shoulders, Isabel said, “I’m leaving now. We’re going to borrow a patrol to go with us just in case Hank McBrayer shows up unexpectedly while Ginny and her mother are packing overnight bags. If that’s okay with you, of course.”

“Fine,” Rafe said, his tone as polite as hers.

“Great. We’ll see you guys bright and early in the morning. Hollis?”

Her partner rose obediently and followed her from the room. As she passed Rafe, Hollis murmured, “You’re a lot smarter than you look.”

“Christ, I hope so,” he responded, equally low.

When the two agents had gone, Mallory looked at Rafe. “Do you know what I’m worried about?”

He frowned at her. “No. Not a clue.”

“So it only works with Isabel?”

“Apparently. So far, anyway.”

“Um, then I’m worried about two things.”

“What’s the other thing?”

“We’ve now got an awful lot of people watching an awful lot of women while we try to anticipate this killer’s next move; what worries me is that he may have changed the rules.”

It was nearly midnight when Emily Brower’s bedside phone rang, and she was more than half asleep when she fumbled hastily to answer it before it could wake her parents.

“Yeah. Hello?” She listened for several minutes, then said sleepily, “Okay, but-now? Why now? Yeah, I understand that, but- Right. Right, okay. Give me ten minutes.”

She cradled the receiver, then pushed back her covers and sat up, muttering, “Shit, shit, shit.”

It didn’t take her more than a couple of minutes to exchange her sleep shirt for jeans and a T-shirt and slide her feet into a worn and comfortable pair of clogs.

Her parents slept like the dead, especially these days with the aid of various sedatives, so she didn’t hesitate to leave her bedroom and walk down the lamplit hall, down the stairs, and out the front door, snagging her car keys from the foyer table.

She wasn’t surprised not to see the customary patrol car parked across the street, since she’d heard it fire up its sirens and speed away sometime before her phone had rung. An accident somewhere, she assumed.

And, anyway, the reporters always left by dark or shortly after, so there was no good reason for the patrol car to stay out there all night. She’d meant to call the police station and ask the chief or one of the agents about it but kept forgetting.