Whisper of Evil (11 page)

"However it happens, some places remember some things. Some emotions. Some events. The energy remains trapped in a place, unseen and unheard until someone with an inborn sensitivity to that particular kind of energy is able to tap into it."

"Someone like you."

"Exactly. There's nothing magical about what I do, nothing dark or evil—or inhuman. It's just an ability, as natural to me as your instincts about horses are to you. A perfectly normal talent, if you will, that not everyone has. Maybe it's genetic, like the color of our eyes or whether we're right- or left-handed; in my family it certainly seems to be, at least partly. On the other hand, there's every possibility that every human being has the capacity for some form of psychic ability, that everyone has an unused area of the brain that could perform seemingly amazing things if we only knew how to… turn it on."

Nell shook her head and frowned slightly as she looked down at her coffee. "We're pretty sure that some people are born with the potential to develop some kind of psychic ability, that in them the area of the brain controlling that function is at least partly or intermittently active, even if it's entirely on an unconscious level; we call them latents. They usually aren't aware of it, though another psychic often is."

Max frowned, but all he said was, "But latent abilities do sometimes become active on a conscious level?"

"They have been known to. As far as we can tell, turning a latent into a conscious, functioning psychic requires some sort of trigger. A physical or emotional trauma, usually. Like a shock to the brain, literally or figuratively. Something happens to them, an accident or an emotional jolt—and they find themselves coping with strange new abilities. Which would explain why people with head injuries or who develop certain kinds of seizures often report psychic experiences afterward."

"I had no idea," Max said.

"Not many people do. I didn't, until I joined the unit and began to learn." She shook her head again. "Anyway, in my particular case, my brain is hardwired for a sensitivity to the sort of electrical energy produced by… emotional or psychologically intense events. Those events leave electrical impressions behind, energy that's absorbed by the place where the events occur, and I have the knack of sensing and interpreting that electrical energy."

Max spoke carefully. "Isn't sensing electrical energy a long way from envisioning an image of a dead man?"

"Is it? The mind interprets the information it's given and translates that into some form we recognize and understand. What happened in this room had a form, a face, a voice—and all that survived as energy. As a memory. Just the way you recall a memory of your own, I can recall the memory of a place. Sometimes quite vividly, and sometimes only bits and pieces, images, feelings, scattered and unclear."

"Okay. Assuming I can accept all that, explain to me why that particular scene—your father walking through a kitchen he must have walked through a million times—is what this room retained. Why that? Out of everything that must have happened here in decades, all the emotional scenes and crises so common in every kitchen everywhere, why was that very normal scene important enough to retain?"

"Because it wasn't normal. What my father was feeling when he walked through this kitchen then was… incredibly intense. He was emotionally devastated."

Max frowned. "You felt that?"

"Sensed it—some of it, at least. It was difficult to get a fix on his emotions, simply because he was overwhelmed by them himself. But I know he was distraught, in shock, that he'd just discovered something he could hardly believe was true."

"Something she should have told him, isn't that what you heard him say?"

"Yes. Given the calendar I saw, that must have been when he found out whatever it was that made him disinherit Hailey. He died in late May, and he'd changed his will just a few weeks before that, not long after she left."

Still frowning, Max said, "So why do you believe he was murdered? No one suspected it was anything other than a heart attack."

"Yes, but there was no one here to suspect, no one to question. All the rest of the family was gone, not on the scene to wonder. He had no close friends. It looked like a heart attack; he was the right age for one and had been warned by his doctor that his habits and temperament put him into the high-risk category. And with no other unexplained deaths before then to put anyone on guard…"

"I understand why no one here would have suspected a murder, but how can you

be so sure he was killed? Did he think he was going to be, fearing for his life in that scene you envisioned?"

For the first time, realizing, Nell felt a chill. "No, he had no idea," she said slowly. "No fear or worry. His mind was entirely focused on the shock he'd had, but he wasn't in the least afraid or concerned for himself. It was… I must have picked up on something else. Sensed something else."

"Like maybe the killer?"

She drew a breath. "Like maybe the killer."

Nate McCJurry was scared.

He hadn't been at first. Hell, he'd barely paid attention when Peter Lynch had died, and as for Luke Ferrier, well, Nate had always expected something bad to happen to him.

But when Randal Patterson's death had exposed his S&M leanings, Nate had started to get nervous. Because he had something in common with Randal. And, he was beginning to think, with the others as well.

Not that Nate had any big secret, not like those other guys. He hadn't broken the law, and he didn't have any whips or chains in his basement or skeletons in his closet. But sometimes a man had things he wanted to keep to himself; that was perfectly natural. Perfectly normal.

Unless there was a madman running around punishing men for their sins, that is.

He was nervous enough to install a security system in his house, paying double to have it done quickly when, the installation guy had told him, the company was backed up on work because so many orders had come in.

So he wasn't the only nervous man in Silence.

And at least he could claim it was just good business to protect oneself. After all, he sold insurance. And everybody knew insurance companies were very big on reducing risk.

That's what Nate was doing, reducing risk.

But he was still scared.

It didn't help that he lived alone. Creepy to be alone when you were scared. He kept the television on for background noise, because every rattle of a tree branch or sudden hoot of an owl out there made him jump. But even with the background noise, he found himself going from window to window and door to door, checking the locks. Making sure.

Watching the night creep slowly along.

He didn't sleep.

He had stopped sleeping days ago.

"Nell, are we talking about the same killer? Are you saying your father was his first victim?"

She hesitated, then shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe. Maybe that was the start of his little execution plan."

"And he was here in this house."

Again, she hesitated. "There's no way for me to be sure, Max. But it makes sense. My father was found here in the house, right?"

"Yeah."

"Nobody suspected the body had been moved."

"Not that I ever heard. But since it looked like a heart attack, I doubt anyone even considered the idea."

That was true enough, and Nell nodded.

Max watched her broodingly. "Even if he was moved, what you picked up was right here, in this room—so the killer was probably here at some point."

Perfectly aware of what was bothering him about that, Nell tried to avoid discussing it. "It would be nice if I could peek back into that scene and try to get a better fix on the killer, but it doesn't seem to work that way. Or it never has. I never see the same scene twice."

"Do you ever see a second scene in the same place?"

"So far, no. It's as if, once I've tapped into the energy of a place, I've drained some of it away, eased the pressure somehow. Like the way you can be shocked by static electricity when you first touch something but not when you touch it a second time."

"The same thing can shock you a second time if you go away for a while and then touch it again later," Max pointed out. "Once the static has a chance to build back up."

"Yes, but so far I haven't figured out the time frame, if there is one, for this kind of energy. Maybe I could go back a week or a month or a year later and see something, but I haven't been able to yet. Different places may have different time frames depending on the intensity of the energies absorbed. Or this particular type of energy may dissipate completely once someone is able to tap into it. I just don't know."

"Nobody in this unit of yours has figured it out yet?"

Nell smiled slightly. "Well, aside from a pretty full load of cases to occupy most of our time, between us we also have a very wide range of paranormal abilities to deal with and try to understand. We're learning, slowly and mostly through bitter experience as we live each day and investigate cases, what our ranges and limits are, but that's an individual thing."

"And no help from science."

"No. As far as today's science goes, psychic abilities can't be validated in any acceptable sense. Oh, there are still people scattered around trying to do research, but our feeling is that today's technology and scientific methodology just isn't capable of effectively measuring or analyzing the paranormal. Not yet."

It was Max's turn to smile, albeit briefly. "That sounds just a bit like the company line."

"It is, more or less. One of the reasons I wanted to join the SCU was because I thought Bishop and his people had a very reasonable way of looking at the paranormal. They don't discount anything just because science can't explain it yet. And I have never heard any member of the team use the word impossible when referring to any aspect of the paranormal."

"Sounds like a pretty good way to live."

A little surprised, Nell said, "Corning from a hard-headed rancher, that's unexpected."

Max dropped his gaze to his mostly empty coffee cup and said slowly, "Maybe once you're touched by the paranormal, it changes your thinking about a lot of things."

Nell was very tempted to follow that path and find out where it would lead them but shied away. Not now. Not yet. The slightly sick feeling in the pit of her stomach told her she wasn't yet ready to face the truth of how badly she had messed up Max's life. So she reached for professionalism, for the safety net of why she was supposed to be here. She reminded herself that there was a dangerous killer on the loose. Which was more than enough reason to concentrate on her job and push everything else aside.

At least for now.

So all she said was, "One thing it doesn't change, in essence, is how a murder or series of murders is investigated. The next step for me is to try to gain access to the crime scenes. All of them. And I can't do that by openly waving my badge."

Max's smile twisted faintly, showing his recognition of a path not taken, but he didn't protest. "I think we're finally coming to the real reason why you and the mayor took me into your confidence. You need me, don't you, Nell?"

The statement sent an odd little shock through her, and Nell had to remind herself that he meant she needed him professionally. Of course he meant that.

She chose her words carefully. "The information we've been able to gather pointed to you as the insider most likely to be helpful to me. You knew all the victims fairly well. The people here are entirely aware of the sheriff's dislike and distrust of you and so wouldn't be surprised if you were found to be… investigating things on your own in order to clear yourself. Owning your own ranch makes it possible for you to arrange flexible working hours without arousing any undue suspicion. And you have the habit of riding around the countryside, beyond the bounds of your ranch, making use of back trails and old dirt roads, so you have a strong familiarity with the area, and the sort of mobility I could find useful."

"And," he finished, "nobody would be surprised or suspicious to see us together."

"And that."

"Was it your idea, Nell?"

She almost denied it, wanted to, but finally said, "It made… a certain amount of sense. With everything added together and my certainty that you weren't the killer—"

"Was it your idea?"

She waited a beat, too conscious of things left unsaid and unanswered. This was even harder than she had expected it to be. "It was my suggestion."

He drew a breath. "I'm not so sure I like being used."

Nell made sure she didn't sound angry or defensive when she said, "It's to your advantage to do what you can to help uncover the truth, we both know that. Left to his own devices, the sheriff is more likely to arrest you than clear you. At least by helping me— us—you're assured of an impartial investigation completely focused on finding the real killer. And we don't intend to stop working until we do find him."

"And you consider it your duty to… suffer my company for the duration?"

Again, Nell replied carefully, uneasily aware of the ironic truth that Max was the one person here in Silence capable of seeing through her pretense. And it was liable to be sooner rather than later. "We're both adults, Max. And twelve years is a long time. The past is done, over. Right now, in this time and place, what we both want is to find the truth of what's happening here in Silence. That's all. That's enough."

But even as the careful lies were spoken, she knew that she was doing nothing more than postponing the inevitable. Sooner or later, Max would demand the truth.

She only hoped she was strong enough to give it to him.

"Is it enough?" he asked.

"It's my job. It's why I'm here."

Max nodded slowly, his dark gaze fixed on her face with an intensity she could feel under her skin. "And it's the only reason you're here. That's what I'm supposed to believe."