Black On Black (Quentin Black Mystery #3) (20 page)

At the same time, it held more than that, too. I’d expected disbelief. I’d expected him to be looking at me with wary eyes, trying to decide if I’d gone nuts. And yes, watching him now, I could see glimmers of both things.

But I also saw something else.

I saw him thinking, his cop brain going over things, assessing things he remembered. I saw him connecting dots somewhere in the back part of his mind.

When I realized what it meant, I stared at him.

“You believe me?” I said.

I think my voice held more disbelief than Angel’s had.

Nick didn’t answer me, not outright.

Instead, he jerked a chin towards me, his cop voice back in full force.

“How psychic, doc?” he said. “You said ‘for real.’ What does that mean?”

Angel was staring between the two of us, that disbelief now etched in her face. Even so, I could see her trying to get on board, to be open-minded about this, probably following Nick’s lead. “Are you saying your dreams come true, doc? Or like––”

“No.” I cut her off before she could repeat all the tired New Age crap to me. I gave her a level stare. “I’m saying I can actually read minds. I’m saying I can hear what people are actually thinking. Right now...
 
whenever I want, really. I don’t get vague feelings. I don’t speak to angels, or channel spirit guides, or play with tarot cards. I hear actual words...
 
as if the person is saying those things to me aloud. Sometimes I see pictures, but they’re specific. I see them because that’s how a lot of people think. I mean I can
actually
read minds.” Swallowing, I felt that pit in my stomach deepen, right before I looked at Nick. “...So can Black.”

Angel and Nick exchanged a look.

They’d known each other since they were kids, so those exchanged looks probably held a lot more nuance than I could see with my eyes alone.

Even so, I got the idea.

“You read people’s minds?” Angel said, looking back at me. “Like...
 
all the time?”

Feeling my face heat, I exhaled.

“I can control it,” I said, still watching them both warily, almost defensively. “I don’t do it to my friends. I mean...” I amended, making a small gesture with my fingers holding the shot glass. “...I
do
hear things, but just the louder things, and only on accident. I don’t go poking around in my friend’s heads. I don’t do it to boyfriends, either. That’s how I missed the thing with Ian...”

I glanced at Nick as I said the last.

Pausing on his expression, I found myself growing nervous as I studied his face, still not sure how he was reacting to this. That panic rose in my chest, making it hard to breathe when I couldn’t decide if he was thinking about calling the men in white suits or if he was actually considering this.

I added, “...I really don’t like invading people’s privacy. I have it blocked...
 
or shut off maybe is more accurate...
 
most of the time. I use it on the job.” I glanced at Nick again, looking for comprehension. “...Profiling. It’s how I knew a lot of the things I knew. I had to come up with an evidence trail after the fact at times. I had to make it seem like I found out the information in some other, more legitimate way...”

Trailing, I went back to studying Nick’s face.

When his expression didn’t move, I forced my eyes back to the shot glass I balanced between my fingers.

“...It’s how I knew about that serial rapist in the Mission,” I said. “And the guy who killed his family in the Sunset last summer. Most of the profile jobs you’ve had me do, I used that, to lesser and greater degrees.” I continued to watch Nick, still unable to read the expression in his dark eyes. “It’s why the interview with Black was so weird. Remember how you said there were those odd silences? That’s why. That’s what those were.”

“You talking to him?” Nick said, blunt.

The words came out hard, like an accusation.

When I didn’t answer, his voice grew colder.

“Are you telling me you were talking to that fucker in your mind?” he said. “That very first day you met? You and he were
talking
like this?”

Hesitating only the barest breath, I nodded. “Yes.”

“So what am I thinking now, doc?” Angel said, looking from Nick to me. Her mouth was pursed. I didn’t need to read her to know she was skeptical. More skeptical than Nick, which surprised me. “...What am I thinking about right now? Can you tell me that?”

I sighed a little internally.

Still, I’d expected this.

I knew my friends. I knew they’d want proof.

Concentrating briefly, I began to speak without pulling out of that space.

“You’re thinking Black’s maybe done something to gaslight me,” I said, frowning a little. “Maybe even rope me into some fantasy world of his. You’re thinking this all has something to do with what happened in Bangkok...
 
that I’m suffering from PTSD, and maybe grasping onto this psychic thing to give it all meaning...”

I paused, still reading her.

“...And just now you were thinking that it reminded you of your cousin Talia in Louisiana who got all into Voodoo. The one with the ex-con boyfriend who was mainlining heroin and had her doing blood sacrifices. Something to do with clay pots...
 
and eww...” I wrinkled my nose, opening my eyes. “...That goat thing was nasty.”

When I glanced up, Angel had noticeably paled.

I held up a hand, feeling her alarm.

“You asked me,” I said, my voice warning. “I don’t do that normally. I promise you, I don’t normally look at your minds at all.” I looked at Nick. “Either of you.”

“What am I thinking, doc?” Nick said.

He said it casually, but I heard the edge there.

I met his gaze somewhat more reluctantly.

Even so, I did what he asked.

... explains fucking everything actually...
 
that weird shit in the interrogation room, how she knew where to find me in Afghanistan...
 
those poor fucking kids, which I never understood how she knew about. That exact basement in that exact house in those abandoned tenants...
 
she led us right there. I never bought that b.s. about him telling her where he had them...
 
about the interrogation room recordings being “missing” for just that part of their interview. I knew there was something...
 
there was always something with her...

“You’re thinking it explains a lot,” I said, meeting his gaze. “Afghanistan. The interview with me and Black. How I found the kids in South San Francisco. The warehouse murders. That lie I told about the recordings being missing...
 
and just me in general.” I felt my face warm a little as I shrugged. “How I seemed to know things that I shouldn’t know. That it couldn’t all be ‘intelligence’ or ‘insight,’ like I pretended...
 
and you’re right. It wasn’t.”

He stared at me.

His dark eyes reflected shock, in spite of everything he’d been thinking.

... God, has she been reading my mind all this time? Did she know I was in love with her? And here I thought I was doing some big confession...
 

“No, Nick...
 
no...”

He flinched violently and I flushed.

Holding his gaze, I shook my head, my voice adamant.

“I swear to you, I didn’t know...
 
I had no idea.” Feeling that fear in my belly sharpen as I saw the alarm grow on his face, I looked between the two of them. “I told you...
 
I can control it. And I don’t use this to invade other people’s privacy. Not for any reason. Most of the time, it’s more or less shut off. I only use it when I really need it.”

Seeing both of them staring at me in open disbelief, I swallowed, shaking my head.

“...I don’t want either of you to worry about that. I haven’t been invading your minds like that. I never have. Not even when you arrested me last year.”

I looked directly at Angel, who was gaping at me now, wide-eyed.

“You’re my friends,” I added, my throat closing as my own words sank in. I hoped to God I wasn’t risking that friendship, even now. “...I love you both. I would
never
do that. I promise you. You guys were always strictly off-limits. All my friends are. I used it on the job. And when I thought I might be in danger. I used it when it seemed
ethical
to me...”

Trailing, I looked back at Nick.

He averted his gaze, but I saw his jaw tighten.

I saw a denser understanding reach his eyes as he stared at the table.

“Black’s like you?” Nick said, still staring at the table.

Reluctantly, I nodded. “Yes.”

“How much like you, doc?”

“More so,” I admitted. “A lot more so.”

“So why are you telling us this now?” Nick said, raising his eyes back to mine. “I’m assuming this isn’t some random confession. There’s more to this, right?” His jaw hardened. “Something to do with Black?”

Sighing, I nodded, combing my fingers through my hair and feeling that pain in my chest worsen. “I’m telling you this now because Black’s in danger.”

Hearing Nick’s snort, I glanced up. He scowled at me.

Sighing, I leaned back in the booth. “I’m telling you, you’ve got him wrong, Nick. About a lot of things, but especially about why he left. He didn’t leave because he wanted to leave.” Pausing, I leaned my forehead into my palm, a little dizzy from the drinks. “There are people who know what he is. People who want to use that part of him...
 
to weaponize it, I guess you could say.” I met Nick’s gaze. “Bad people, Nick.”

“Bad people?” he said, frowning.

I ignored the faint thread of sarcasm I heard, nodding.

“The worst kind. Traffickers. Crime lords. Murderers. Sadists. But it’s more than that...
 
a lot more. It’s going to take awhile to explain everything...” I glanced at Angel, saw from her eyes that she was listening again, that she’d gotten past some of her initial shock. “...It has to do with what happened to me in Bangkok.”

I exhaled another deep breath, then took a sip of the margarita.

The next time I started to talk, they didn’t interrupt me.

Neither of them spoke at all actually, not for a very long time.

Nine

IN MOTION

MIRI...
 
HIS PRESENCE washes over me. It brings a dense flush of heat I feel over every inch of my skin. His pain echoes. It grows louder, softer...
 
an intensity of longing I can’t think through, can barely stand. Some of that feels like it’s about me.

Some feels like it’s solely about him.

Both things hurt me.

Miri...
 
please. Please...
 
don’t be angry with me...

He’s asleep. It’s cold where he is, inside his dream. It’s cold, even though he’s sweating through the down comforter smothering his bed. It’s cold, and I hope to God I’m still seeing his future, and not his present.

I know he’s alone.

I know they are pulling him into more and more of their operation––more and more of their twisted rituals and the culture that surrounds their whole business...
 
or cult...
 
or whatever it is. I know some of that is to immerse him in it, not to indoctrinate him directly so much as to soak him inside the specific vibration. I don’t fully understand that part, but I know it has something to do with what he is, the way people like him absorb information.