Текст книги "The First Prophet"

Автор книги: Kay Hooper

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Leigh didn’t even look at her. “It’s vital. Sarah?”

Again, she nodded. “But just…one night. Last night. Before they got to him.”

“I wonder if that was by accident or design,” Leigh murmured.

Brodie was still looking at her. “Why’s it important?”

“It’s important because unless I miss my guess, there’s now an unbreakable link between Sarah and Tucker. Sarah, can you sense him right now?”

“Yes. Just faintly, on the edge of my awareness. He’s sleeping now, or unconscious. He woke up once, briefly. It was cold and dark, and somebody was watching him.” She shivered, remembering.

“Could you sense him like this before last night?”

“No. Though I did…hear…him thinking about me last night before we…before we became lovers.”

After a moment, Leigh looked at Brodie. “We don’t have a choice. If we want to save Sarah, we have to save Tucker as well.”

“Why?” He glanced at Sarah. “I don’t mean to sound cruel, but my job is to protect you—not Mackenzie.”

“He’s single-minded,” Cait murmured.

“I didn’t ask you to protect me,” Sarah reminded him. “If it comes to that, you haven’t been—Tucker has. So he’s been doing your job.”

“He’s been dragging your ass all over the country is what he’s been doing, bouncing around like a tennis ball. He should have sat tight in Richmond and made so much noise the other side wouldn’t have dared to move against you.”

“We didn’t know who we could trust,” Sarah snapped, not bothering to explain that their ultimate destination had been decided by her own budding but then inexplicable instincts. “And hindsight is twenty-twenty.”

“You two stop arguing.” Leigh’s voice was mild. “Brodie, we have to go after Tucker. If Sarah doesn’t take the bait and come after him, they’ll kill him, right?”

Brodie nodded. “Not much doubt about that. They don’t leave anybody alive who could testify to illegal acts such as kidnapping.”

Leigh glanced at Sarah, then looked back at Brodie. “If they kill him, they’ll sever the tie between him and Sarah. From what Sarah’s been telling us, I believe that the tie is deeper than you can imagine and now is absolutely vital to her existence.”

Brodie stared at her. “He dies…she dies. That’s what you’re saying.”

“That’s what I’m saying.”

It should have shocked Sarah, but instead she felt only a faintly unsettled but unquestioning certainty that Leigh was right. She had never thought much about the term soul mates, but she knew now that that was what she and Tucker were. They were connected, mated at the soul, and neither of them would be able to survive now without the other.

Whatever else destiny intended for them, it was clear they were meant to be together.

Somewhat grimly, Brodie said, “I’ve seen a lot of strange stuff since getting involved in this, but I’ve never seen two people bound together because of a psychic link. Not to the death.”

“If they kill Tucker,” Leigh said quietly, “there’ll be evidence enough to convince even you.”

After a moment, he leaned back in his chair and, morosely, said, “Shit.”

“There is a plus side to this,” Leigh told him.

“Oh, yeah? I’d love to hear it.”

“Sarah will have his strength as well as her own to draw on.”

Sarah frowned. “That makes me sound…like a parasite.”

Leigh shook her head. “Hardly that. The connection between you and Tucker runs both ways; eventually, he’ll be able to tap into your abilities as easily as you do.”

“A remote-controlled psychic,” Brodie muttered.

“More or less,” Leigh agreed. “Sarah, you two are a team. Two halves of a very powerful whole. And that might just give us an unexpected edge over the other side.”

It was Cait who said, “But if they used a psychic to control Tucker’s mind, won’t that person be aware of the connection?”

“I doubt it. I wasn’t aware of it, even after Sarah looked into my mind. It’s too deep to be seen or sensed, and so rare that no one would think to look for it.”

“What about when they use it?” Brodie asked, intent now and not so dour about the situation. “Won’t it be obvious then? To another psychic, I mean.”

“It might well be obvious even to a nonpsychic.” Leigh frowned and shook her head. “The problem is knowing how all that power will…manifest itself. Sarah isn’t the usual sort of precognitive psychic, and her ability to tap into that place she calls the crossroads makes her unique.”

“It does?” Sarah asked.

“It definitely does. Sarah, in all these years, I’ve never known another psychic able to do that. We’ve theorized that such a place exists, but to my knowledge, no one has ever found it. Besides which, psychics tend to…specialize. I’m a telepath, as unable to see the future as Brodie or Cait is. I read thoughts, period. A precognitive psychic sees the future. An empathic psychic senses emotions, often through physical contact or objects. A telekinetic psychic is able to move or influence objects. And so on. But you…”

“I’ve seen the future.”

“Yes. But you’re also a telepath, a strong one. I believe you’re able to send as easily as you receive. And if you are able to tap into this ‘crossroads’ you describe, then all of time is open to you. It may take you a lifetime to learn how to use the ability, but once you do…”

“Interesting possibilities,” Brodie drawled.

Sarah decided not to think about the possibilities. Not now. There was already too much to take in, to understand; she focused on the most important thing in her life, and held him before her like a lodestar.

“I don’t care about that. All I care about is getting Tucker away from those people.”

“Which opens up a whole new set of possibilities,” Brodie said, not drawling now. “Most of them unpleasant.”

“I’m not asking you to help me,” Sarah told him. “This is not your problem, so don’t worry about it. It’s not your fight.”

Brodie linked his fingers together over his middle and looked at her expressionlessly. “Not my fight. Why don’t you take a quick look inside me, psychic. Then say that again.”

Sarah didn’t intend to do it, but by now it really was like using another of her senses, like turning her head to listen or moving her eyes to watch: virtually automatic and without conscious effort.

What she saw was like scenes of a movie flickering past rapidly, scenes with abrupt cuts and odd angles, sometimes with sound and sometimes without—but always with tearing emotions. As she had with Leigh, she saw violence and danger and lost friends, but Brodie had lost much more than that. He had lost part of himself, and it had left him filled with rage and grief and a deadly, implacable determination to defeat the other side.

Sarah pulled herself out of the dark fury of his mind, more shaken than she had ever been before. She opened her eyes slowly and looked at him, at that handsome, expressionless face and those sentry eyes, and wondered how he could keep going when he was carrying around with him such a terrible burden of pain.

“Because I have to,” he said softly. Then he looked at Leigh, and added in a more normal voice, “You’re right. She’s damned powerful. And she can send. Her voice was so clear in my mind it was as if I heard it out loud.”

Sarah looked away from him, still shaken and conscious once more of what looking into another mind had taken out of her. She found Cait watching her and, even weary and not much interested, she saw a flicker of jealousy in the younger woman’s eyes.

She didn’t like me in Brodie’s mind. I wonder if he knows…

She kept those thoughts to herself, wondering for the first time whether it was even possible for her, now, to shut off that other sense.

“Sarah, you need to eat something. We all do.” Leigh looked at her watch. “It’s suppertime anyway. You stay here and rest a bit, and we’ll get something started in the kitchen. Then we’ll talk about what we’re going to do. All right?”

Sarah nodded. “Brodie?”

He looked at her as he rose to his feet. “Yeah?”

“I’m sorry.”

He smiled slightly. “Don’t worry about it.”

He and the others went into the kitchen and very soon were working together to prepare the meal. Brodie gathered the ingredients for a salad and began chopping vegetables, and when he spoke to Leigh, it was in a low voice.

“That took a lot out of her. And I was wide open, not fighting at all. What happens when somebody fights her?”

“I don’t know.”

“Is she strong enough for this?”

Leigh shook her head. “I just don’t know. If she can borrow some of Tucker’s strength…if she gets mad enough, or scared enough…if she finally believes that she can change the future she saw for herself…then maybe.”

Brodie grunted. “We’d better come up with a hell of a plan.”

“Is Murphy close by?”

“Close enough. Figure we’ll need her?”

“Her. And an army, if we can raise one.”

FIFTEEN

Cait felt very much like the new kid on the block. Brodie and Leigh had worked together before and were comfortable despite their differing beliefs on some topics; they didn’t consciously shut her out, it was just that they were long accustomed to discussing things between themselves.

And Cait was conscious of her own inexperience, her lack of history in this. She was a new recruit, actively involved for only the last six months; her brother had been one of those people who became psychic because of head injuries in the last year or so, and it had been Brodie who had contacted him and made sure the other side didn’t get their hands on him.

During those dangerous and exciting weeks, Cait had decided that she wanted to work with these people. Brodie had been reluctant, telling her she was too young and should finish college before deciding what to do with her life, but she had been determined—and he’d had to admit they could not afford to turn down anyone who wanted to help. Besides, there was someone else Brodie reported to, someone who made certain decisions, and that person had decided that Cait could be of use.

She didn’t know who that was. Truth to tell, she knew blessed little about how this loosely organized group of people operated. According to Brodie, the number of people who knew most of the details could be counted on the fingers of one hand. As for the rest, they knew what they needed to know, and not a single detail more than that.

Which was fine for Brodie; unless Cait missed her guess, he was one of those few who knew everything. And his history with the group went back several years, possibly as many as ten. Cait wasn’t sure about that, but she knew he’d been involved in this for a long time. And though he didn’t talk about it—to her, at least—she had guessed that he was in this because something bad had happened to somebody he’d loved.

Of course, Sarah knew all about that. She had looked into his mind minutes ago, accepting his open invitation to do so, and she had seen all his pain. It had been on her face when she was done, a reflection of great anguish, and in her peculiarly dark eyes had been sadness and compassion and understanding.

Cait wanted that understanding, and it really bugged her that Sarah had gotten it—on a silver platter, so to speak. Hard as she’d tried in the last months, Cait hadn’t been able to get past Brodie’s guards, and he had sure as hell never thrown himself open to her in any way. Not that she was in the least psychic, but still. He treated her rather like a baby sister—when he wasn’t coming down on her like a ton of bricks for carelessness or forgetting some rule or other—and as far as she could tell, that was exactly the way he saw her. As a troublesome kid.

It was very annoying. And annoying to be working her ass off in the kitchen while he and Leigh discussed other people she didn’t know and tried to decide between themselves who they could call on for help.

“We probably don’t have much time,” Leigh was saying as she checked on potatoes fast-baking in the microwave. “Sarah isn’t going to be willing to wait much longer.”

“I know,” Brodie said. “And that limits our options. If we figure tonight is a wash—and I sure as hell don’t like the idea of moving against them at night—and that we move early tomorrow, that gives us only a few hours to make whatever preparations we can. Murphy can get here by morning. Maybe Nick and Tim. Nobody else I can think of.”

Leigh said casually, “How about Josh? He could get here in time. He could raise an army in time.”

Brodie shook his head. “No way. Duran’s too close, and I don’t want him to get so much as a whiff of Josh. No, this time it’s just us. And that isn’t much of an army, Leigh.”

“No, it’s not. On the other hand, we don’t know what we’re facing. When Sarah’s rested and eaten, we’ll see if she can give us some idea of where they’re holding Tucker, and maybe even the number of people holding him. Surely Duran wouldn’t commit more than half a dozen of his people to this. He has other irons in the fire, and I would be very surprised if he really knows Sarah’s potential value to him.”

Brodie frowned. “Now that I think about it, it’s not really like Duran to use bait to get a psychic to come to him. He tends to favor sending his goons in the dead of night to quietly remove people. Or to arrange some kind of convenient accident for them.”

“Maybe he’s feeling the pressure.”

“Maybe.” Brodie shrugged. “But if the bastard is anything, he’s deliberate; I’ve never known him to rush into anything.”

“The steaks are almost done,” Cait announced.

“The plates are in that cabinet over there, Cait. Brodie, what about weapons?”

“Compared to the other side, we’re seriously underarmed. Always have been. And we’re hamstrung by the fact that we don’t have any kind of official status or authority. We can’t just rush in and start blasting, as good as that might feel to some of us. Plus, we don’t want the kind of violence that makes headlines any more than Duran does. The only defense we have if bodies start turning up is not going to be believed, and our credibility is shot once we start talking about some vast conspiracy we can’t prove exists.” He shook his head. “No, we have to be very, very careful. In any kind of a showdown with Duran and his goons, we are critically handicapped.”

Cait tuned them out, feeling even more frustrated. She had nothing to contribute, that was the problem. She was still learning how to handle weapons, and she didn’t have the first idea how to plan for some kind of dramatic confrontation with the bad guys.

In fact, she felt incredibly useless.

They wouldn’t let her help clean up after the meal, and since by then much of her energy and all of her anxiety had returned, Sarah found herself moving restlessly around the living room while they worked in the kitchen.

The need to find Tucker was nearly overpowering now, and with it came the niggling awareness of something else that was…wrong. She didn’t know what it was, but somewhere, sometime, she had missed something she should have paid attention to. Information or an observation…something. Whatever it was, it seemed to be out of reach now; whenever she tried to concentrate on it, all she got was increasing uneasiness and the urge to look back over her shoulder.

Watching. Somebody’s watching. But is it me, or Tucker? The uneasiness he felt about that went with him into his dreams…

That was part of her apprehension, she knew. That skin-crawling sensation of being watched had been uppermost in Tucker’s consciousness just before his keepers had knocked him out once again, and even now his sleeping mind was giving him nightmares with that theme. Eyes watching him. Creatures watching him.

Sarah wasn’t exactly caught up in the nightmares with Tucker; it was more like listening to the dim and distant sound of a television in the next room and being aware of what was going on there. She could push the faint sounds out of her conscious mind by concentrating on something else, but they were always there just under the surface, contributing to her uneasiness.

“Sarah?”

She turned to look at them as Brodie, Leigh, and Cait returned to the living room. “There isn’t much time.”

“Why not?” Leigh asked quietly. “The trap is baited and ready for you; won’t they just wait for you to come?”

“I…don’t know. I don’t think so. There’s a feeling of urgency.”

“Maybe that’s just you,” Brodie suggested. “Your need to get to Mackenzie.”

She shook her head. “No, this is something else. Somebody’s anxious, worried about time passing. I’m sure of it.”

Leigh looked at her for a moment, then said, “Let’s sit down. Sarah, do you think you can sense where Tucker is being kept?”

“If he was awake, I know I could. But he’s still asleep. Dreaming.”

Leigh waited until they were all sitting down before suggesting, “Try anyway. Try to concentrate on his physical sensations rather than his emotions. You may be able to shut out his dreams that way.”

Sarah was hesitant, wary of his nightmares, but she closed her eyes and tentatively reached out toward Tucker. Instantly, gooseflesh rose sharply along her arms and she shivered in a wave of coldness. It was very cold here, and very damp; there was water dripping somewhere. And another sound, very faint. Breathing. Someone’s breathing.

She was lying on her side on something not quite as hard as the floor, and it was dark when she opened her eyes. It should have been too dark to see, but she thought she could anyway, though more with another sense than with her eyes. She got up cautiously, vaguely aware of leaving something behind her and hating that, but intensely aware that she had to see what she could of this place.

She moved soundlessly several feet and then stopped, abruptly. Someone was right beside her. She couldn’t see him, but she felt him. She almost touched him.

Shadows.

Gooseflesh spread all over her now, and she found herself flinching to the side, drawing into herself. He hadn’t touched her, didn’t know she was there, and she had to make sure not to betray her presence. She didn’t know how she knew, but she was convinced that if he knew she was there, he would instantly kill Tucker.

Cautiously, moving with exquisite slowness, she eased past the shadow in the dark. There was a doorway she went through, and it puzzled her a bit because she was almost sure the door had been closed. And locked.

She had the overpowering sense of space around her, above her, cavernous and empty. No, she realized. Not empty.

Shadows.

They were all around, though not close. Watching, she realized. Waiting. Waiting for her to come. Whispering among themselves…

Sarah moved slowly through the darkness, listening intently and trying to get a sense of her surroundings—and avoid those lurking shadows. There were other doorways, and stone or concrete walls and old, old timbers. The air was musty and damp, the dripping of water somewhere an incessant sound.

She was so cold.

With fingers that were slowly going numb, she reached out to touch the walls around her. After several minutes, she touched a ledge or narrow table and upon it found rows of pillar candles connected with the wispy, sticky threads of cobwebs.

She jerked her hand back, wiping it fastidiously against her thigh, and for a moment had to stand perfectly still and breathe evenly. It was all right. Nothing here could hurt her. Because she wasn’t really here, was she? She was…well, she was somewhere else. So nothing in this place could hurt her.

But it could scare the hell out of her.

She forced herself to go on, searching the darkness with every sense except sight. The cavernous sensation had diminished as she had grown accustomed to the dark, and she was aware now of a roof of some kind not many feet above her head. In one small room, she found stacks of old furniture, the wood splintered and smelling of rot. In another, she found the tattered remains of some kind of cloth in moldy piles against the cold earthen walls. In still another, she found shelves and cabinets containing dusty, rusted objects she tentatively identified by touch.

She kept going, and after she passed through what she thought was the back of a closet, she found herself in a low-ceilinged corridor that felt like a tunnel. It was leading her away from the rooms and the place where she had gotten up from the floor, and though the air around her lightened and she was aware of climbing as though out of a pit, it disturbed her to get so far away from what she had left behind.

It was important, though, so she kept going. Until, finally, she pushed her way through heavy brush and found herself standing only a few yards from a rocky shore. The ocean, she realized, watching waves lapping against the rocks. She turned to look back at the tunnel’s entrance, finding that it was cut into almost solid rock with a cliff rearing steeply above it.

She lifted her gaze beyond the tunnel, beyond the cliff. And in the twilight, etched sharply against the sky, she could see a cross.

Behind her, something tugged sharply.

“I don’t like this.”

“Neither do I.”

“Then bring her out of it, dammit.”

“She has to find her own way back. If we disturb her now, she could lose the connection.”

“Look at her. Her skin’s like ice, she’s barely got a pulse—and she’s been like this for nearly an hour. What the hell is going on?”

“I told you. She’s out of body.”

“Christ. I thought she was just going to reach out to Mackenzie, not go visit him.”

“She did reach out. And since he was unconscious, it seems this was the only way she could find out where he is. By going there.”

“There must be a better way.”

“I don’t think so. My God, Brodie—she is the one!”

“She’s going to be the dead one if we don’t get her back soon. Sarah? Sarah!”

“Brodie—”

“Sarah!”

“What?” She opened her eyes, abruptly and completely awake and aware, and found three pairs of eyes staring at her. Their expressions varied from Cait’s half-fearful fascination to Leigh’s excited interest. Brodie just looked relieved.

“Jesus. Don’t do that again.”

Sarah shifted a bit in her chair and found herself a little stiff, but curiously refreshed and no more tired than she’d been before. Either this was getting easier, or she had borrowed some of Tucker’s strength. Or else this new thing required much less energy. But her hands were very, very cold. She rubbed them together. “How long was I gone?”

“You realize you were gone?” Leigh asked.

“Sure,” Sarah replied, absently stretching her arms out before her to ease the stiffness. “How long?”

Brodie glanced at his watch. “Since you closed your eyes, an hour and five minutes. You became a zombie about ten minutes into the procedure.”

She smiled at him. “A zombie?”

“Soulless,” he explained frankly. “A body with a beating heart. Creepy as hell.”

Rather to her surprise, Sarah found that his honest aversion didn’t make her feel like a freak. Or maybe she was just getting so accustomed to this that acceptance had built its own armor. “Sorry I creeped you out.”

“Oh, don’t mention it. I find this sort of thing happening with alarming frequency these days. You’d think I’d get used to it.”

Leigh cut in impatiently. “Sarah, were you there? With Tucker?”

She nodded. “It was dark; that’s why it took me so long. I had to feel my way around until I found the way out.”

Bewildered, Cait said, “I thought the way out was back through Tucker. Leigh said that’s how you got there, and—”

Sarah didn’t blame her for being confused. “I got there through Tucker, and I came back through him, but I was looking for a physical way out. One we could use when we actually—I mean physically—go there.”

There was a part of Sarah that couldn’t believe she was discussing this so calmly and matter-of-factly. Yet to another part of her, it seemed perfectly normal and nothing to get upset or excited about.

“A way out,” Brodie said. “As opposed to a way in?”

Sarah looked at him. “They believe there’s only one way in, and they’re all around it—that’s the trap they’ve set. I go in, and no matter what happens inside, I can’t get out, because they close the way behind me. But I found a back door we can use, an entrance they know nothing about. How we use it depends on the plan we decide on.”

“Where is this place?”

“It’s an old, abandoned church right on the coast. Outside the city, but not too far away. Tucker is being held in the cellar, and it’s a big one. Lots of rooms and a rabbit warren of narrow corridors. And there are tunnels spreading out from the church; I think they were built and used for storage, and to get to other buildings when the weather was bad. Most of the tunnels are probably caved in now, but one leads through the rock and out to the beach. At that point, in that place, no one paying attention to the church would see us go in.”

Brodie frowned. “Do you know how many of them are there?”

Sarah felt herself shiver and looked down to watch gooseflesh rise on her arms. “I…couldn’t count them. Couldn’t…differentiate between them somehow. Just shadows lurking around me, and above me in the church. But I know there are several of them, at least. Maybe half a dozen. And one very close to Tucker, keeping watch.”

“Did they know you were there?” Leigh asked.

“No.” Sarah looked at her. “I was very careful not to touch any of them. I knew it was vital that they not find out I was there. Because if they had, they would have killed Tucker immediately.”

“Why?” Cait asked, still baffled.

Softly, Leigh said, “They would have known how she got there. They would have understood that she was already lost to them, her potential fully realized. Worse, they would have known that she was able to move among them, unseen. Find out things about them. They would have had to destroy her. Killing him would be the quickest, easiest way to do that.”

“If they aren’t psychic,” Cait said, “could they have known she was there?”

Leigh looked at Sarah questioningly.

Slowly, Sarah nodded. “If I had touched any one of them…they would have known. They may not be psychic, but they—somehow—instantly recognize the paranormal when it comes into contact with them, I’m sure of that. If they had touched my…my spirit, the energy of me that was there, they would have sensed and recognized me. And if any one of them touches me physically, they’ll know I’m connected to Tucker.”

This time, Leigh looked at Brodie. “There’s something new, something we didn’t know. We can recognize them by touch—and they can recognize us.”

Brodie was still frowning, though he didn’t seem bewildered, just thoughtful. “I’ll make a note—for future reference. So…we have to get in there and get to Mackenzie before any of them touch you. What about him? I assume they’ve touched him already.”

“He isn’t a strong enough psychic for them to sense,” Sarah said slowly. “And he doesn’t yet realize he can tap into my abilities. As long as he doesn’t know that, doesn’t do that, they can touch him without sensing the connection. But…”

“But?”

“They’ve got him drugged. But if the drug wears off and he becomes conscious, he’ll reach out to me.”

“You’re sure of that?” Leigh asked.

Sarah nodded. “Positive. When he became briefly conscious hours ago, I reached out to him. If I’d realized…but I didn’t. I just wanted to touch him, to make sure he was all right. And just before they drugged him again, he realized what was happening. When he can think clearly again, he’ll try to reach me. And I can’t close that door.” I wouldn’t even if I could.

“So they’ll know about the connection if they touch him when he’s conscious.”

“Yes.”

“And will immediately kill him.”

“Yes.”

Brodie raked the fingers of one hand through his hair. “Great. Just great. We have to get past their guards without any of them touching you in any way, get our hands on Mackenzie, get him and you out of there without any of them grabbing or even touching either of you, and get away with our hides intact. And all that’s assuming we can sneak in and out and that Mackenzie doesn’t wake up and give away the show.”

“That’s what we have to do.”

Cait said, “But if you’re such a threat to them, won’t they just keep coming after you? I mean, even if we can get Tucker away from them, it won’t be over, will it?”

“No,” Brodie said.

“Duran always backs off once he’s missed his chance,” Leigh disagreed. “Sarah will have to be careful, of course, because we do know they tend to keep tabs on us. Every time I participate in one of the psychic fairs in the area, or meet some reporter for an interview, I can feel one of them nearby. But I haven’t had to look over my shoulder in years.”

“And I think that’s a mistake,” Brodie said flatly.

Leigh smiled at him. “You worry too much.”

“It’s my job to worry.” He looked at Sarah. “I’m plenty worried now. Even with a back door they don’t know about, finding Mackenzie sounds like finding the center of a maze in pitch darkness—without touching any of the walls.”

Sarah looked at him with a certain amount of sympathy but said reassuringly, “I have an idea. I think.”

He eyed her. “Glad to hear it. Because I’m fresh out.”

“Do you think you could get your hands on a few pairs of those infrared glasses I’ve seen soldiers wear in the movies? The kind that let you see in the dark?”

His brows rose, but Brodie said, “Given a few hours, I think I might be able to do that.”

“Good. I don’t know how many we’ll need—enough for all of you.” Almost absently, she added, “They like the dark, and they can see in it better than we can. I guess they have the glasses too, or something like them.”

Brodie shook his head slightly but brought her back to the point. “Enough glasses for all of us. Okay. What about you? Please don’t tell me you’re planning to just walk into the trap?”

“I’m afraid so.”

“Goddammit, Sarah—”

“It’s the only way, Brodie. All their attention has to be on me, or you won’t be able to get to Tucker. But don’t worry, I don’t have a death wish.” She glanced at Leigh, who was smiling. “Not anymore.”

“If that’s supposed to make sense,” Brodie said, “it doesn’t.”

“That’s okay. It makes sense to me.” Sarah began to lean forward to tell them all what she had in mind, but when her hand came to rest on her thigh, she felt something peculiar. She looked down and, as she lifted her hand slowly, saw the sticky white threads clinging to her fingers and to the denim covering her thigh.

It was just where she had wiped her hand in the cellar of the church.