Energized (10 page)

Hannah's eyes brimmed with tears in her too-pale face. The sight had his gut twisting even as his mind struggled to wrap itself around this absurd conversation.

“I'm so sorry, Karma. I didn't mean to frighten you. If it makes you feel any better, it scared the dickens out of me too.
Psychopath
is a good word. That vision was definitely seen through the eyes of one crazypants individual.” Hannah rolled the open bottle against her cheek, as if needing to cool down. “But I'll be honest, I've never seen anything like that before. I've never been inside a killer's head until now and she was seriously screwed up.”

“‘She?' The killer was a woman?” Karma asked, her accent gone again. “Do you know anything about her?”

Hannah squinted as if trying to see in the distance or draw up a memory, then shook her head. “Not really. All I can remember is that she called herself Mercy. Wait, there was something else.” Hannah squeezed her eyes closed, then shook her head and opened them again. “Something about her hand. Something wrong with it? I can't really remember it clearly.”

Karma held up a dirty knife wrapped in a hand towel. “Do you want to try again?”

“Definitely not. Two trips into her crazyland are more than enough for one night. I've never felt so ill after a vision before. Not even when I accidentally stumbled into Mr. Hobson's hidden porn room memory.” She paused, grinning. “Although, I'm pretty sure I was blushing when I came out of it.”

Niall slowly straightened and just listened to the women talk. He was used to Karma's weird utterances about auras. Hell, she had a gift for reading people and had done more to help him weed out the worst of their staff than Ross and his parents put together. But damn, now he had two women working for him and claiming to be in touch with the other side or some other woo-woo shit.

He should have stayed home.

“Will you drive us?” Karma asked, touching him on the forearm and drawing him from his thoughts.

“Drive you where?”

“To the station. I think someone needs to know about what I saw.” Hannah pushed to her feet, finished off the last of the water, then pitched the bottle in the recycling bin. “I have no idea how the cops deal with people like me down here, but I can't do nothing.”

“You want me to go with you while you tell the police you imagined you were in a killer's head?”

“No, I want you to drive us to the police station so I can report what I saw in my vision of being in a killer's head.” Hannah narrowed her eyes on him. “You'll come with me, won't you, Karma?” When Karma nodded Hannah added, “I need to report a murder. I can give a description of the man who was killed.”

“Don't you have a car?” He couldn't help but ask. “How'd you get here from Fincastle?”

“What does that have to do with anything? I took the bus.” She gave him a withering sort of smile. The kind of smile that was both adorable and reproachful all at the same time.

He might have laughed if what she was saying hadn't been so serious. And fucked up. She needed to see reason.

“Do you know who did it? Where it happened?
When
it happened? Hannah, how do you know you didn't dream it up? Couldn't this all be in your imagination?”

Hannah's shoulders rolled back and down, as if preparing for a fight. “I didn't dream it up. Nowhere in my imagination would I want to picture some poor young guy getting stabbed to death. And I'd have to work pretty freaking hard to imagine the stench of blood and death that darn near seared the inside of my nostrils during that vision. Whatever! Don't drive me. I'll walk over. Someone just point me in the right direction.”

“Hannah, people don't just go to the police to report crimes they haven't actually beared physical witness to.”

“I did,” Karma interjected. When he turned to glare at his restaurant manager she arched an eyebrow at him and added, “Well, I did.”

“As I recall, that wasn't well received, was it?” He remembered the story of what happened when Karma had repeatedly contacted the police to report that a child declared dead was actually alive and kidnapped. No one would listen to her. Well, almost no one. In the end, she'd been right. Something that still floored Niall to think about. “As I recall, that experience was hard on you. Very hard. And people weren't exactly happy with you. Do you want to put Hannah through that?”

“The only people unhappy with me for going to the police were the ones responsible for what happened to that little boy. As I recall, his mother was overjoyed.” She turned her back to him and took Hannah by the hands. “Hannah, unlike when I did it, you won't go in there alone. And I'll make sure to introduce you to someone I guarantee will believe you. We'll go see my boyfriend, Zig. He'll know what to do.”

The women started past him. Hannah's golden eyes were dull. They'd been vacant when he'd first come into the kitchen but this was different. Hurt swam in them. She paused and glanced up at him. “I'm not crazy. I know what I saw. I thought you would believe me.”

“I barely know you. You honestly expect me to tell the cops that I believe you had a psychic vision?” Okay, that was a shitty, vicious lie. He knew her intimately. Niall heard the words come out of his mouth as if someone else spoke them. If ever he wished life had a delete key, this was it. He'd have gone back and erased his thoughtless, rude-ass words from existence.

“I suppose not.” She lifted her chin in the air, the dull look in her eyes replaced by golden ice chips and she strode out the back door.

“Very nice, Boss,” Karma said, reminding him she'd been standing there.

Crap!

“It's not—”

“You know one of the things I've always respected about you was your brutal honesty. Don't bother to lie now, remember I can see your aura.” She was almost to the back door when she turned and added, “You know, if you're trying to drive her away, you're doing a bang-up job.”

H
ANNAH
SKETCHED
THE
image of the victim from her vision on the sketch pad she kept in her backpack. It was hard to stay focused on the image with her squeezed between Niall and Karma in the front seat of Niall's truck. She did her best not to touch him, but it was impossible to avoid his arm considering the truck was a stick shift and her legs were sprawled on either side of the gears.

“Sorry,” he muttered when his muscled forearm brushed the top of her left thigh again. She felt the heat of him through her black work slacks.

She held still until he slid the gear into fifth, then she straightened her leg to give them both some much-needed space. She was not going to be attracted to him anymore. Hadn't she been telling herself just that since his comment in the kitchen?

Barely know you.
Okay, yes, their time together had been a single, solitary night. But they'd shared something more. At least, she thought they had. Perhaps, she'd been wrong. He hadn't been thrilled to see her today. Except . . .

Except for that single spark she caught in his eyes when he didn't realize she could see him watching her during her shift. No matter his words, he
was
attracted. Even if he had acted like a jerk.

Then Niall had surprised her. He'd followed Karma outside and offered to drive them to the station after all. Hannah hadn't wanted to climb in, much less sit in the middle, but Karma refused to walk in the dark. Not that the city was terribly dark with all the streetlights. But since she didn't exactly know where she was going, she needed Karma.

She glanced at her pad, examining the lines and shading made shaky by the bumps in the road. It wasn't perfect, because she couldn't recall everything. Still, it was good. Good enough to compare to missing persons' photos like she'd seen in TV shows and movies.

Besides, if she kept drawing and erasing, she'd end up drawing Niall instead, since he was foremost in her mind. Tucking the pad and pencil back in her backpack, she stared at the street ahead. Niall radiated an air of quiet brooding that unnerved her. It made her want to strike up a conversation with him, but after his last smackdown, she wasn't sure it was worth the risk.

Hannah inhaled a tired breath. That was really stupid. Now she had to work hard to ignore his delicious masculine scent. That wonderful, earthy, male aroma combined with some light, spicy cologne. She'd first noticed that scent during their night back in December. Sometimes she wished she could draw scents the way she could pictures. She'd capture his and rub it all over her.

Stop it, Hannah!

What was she thinking? She was furious with him, not attracted.

Right. And the sun was a peaceful shade of blue.

The truck bumped and rolled to a stop outside a two-story brick building. Hannah didn't wait for Niall to shift gears again, but flipped her leg over the stick shift, knocking his hand with her knee.

“Sorry,” she said, hip-checking Karma, who had the good
sense to get out of the truck so Hannah could follow. “Thank you for the ride, Niall.”

He opened his mouth but then closed it again without uttering a sound. A muscle worked in his cheek as if he were chewing on his tongue. The light from the dashboard cast him in an odd, sickly green glow. With a curt nod, he threw the truck into reverse and left.

Hannah stared at the taillights until they disappeared around a corner. An odd sensation pinched in the center of her chest. That was the third time she'd watched him leave. Maybe that was the universe telling her something.

And the temper that had been brewing since the scene at the Cat faded into a cold, withering sense of loss.

“You make him nervous.” Karma wrapped an arm around Hannah's shoulder. “Or maybe he's just a coward.”

“Yeah, I don't think so. He's anything but a coward.” Hannah whipped her head around to gape at her new friend. “He didn't seem nervous to me. He seemed anxious to get as far from me as possible.”

“You're right about the not-being-a-coward thing. He's the first to run into danger but you can't see his aura. It was all green when he came in and found you. But just now, it had a nasty yellowish tinge to it. I've never seen his aura so off before. Yep, you make him really, really uncomfortable.”

And didn't that just suck to hear?

“I think your gift might be off tonight. I saw that yellowish-green. It was the lights from the dash of the truck.”

Karma laughed. A rich, throaty laugh. “Normally, I'd be offended by someone doubting my gift, but since I can see your aura too, I understand. You're under a lot of pressure.” She looped her arm through one of Hannah's. “Are you sure you want to go through with this? Niall wasn't altogether wrong about the cops. Not all of them are receptive to the idea of a psychic.”

Hannah thought about it for a minute. “I need to tell someone. What if that guy isn't dead yet? No, he is. I know it. I've never had a premonition in my life. I only see what's been. But what if he's still tied up in that building? What if
his family is searching for him? He'd want them to know what happened to him. I have to tell someone who can do something about it. The police station is the best place to start.”

“All right, let's go inside. Zig is waiting for us. I texted him in the truck.” They started up the steps but Karma pulled them to a stop. “Just so you know, I think you and I have more in common than you realize. That wasn't the dashboard lights you saw. Those lights were orange. You saw Niall's aura.”

“Orange? You sure?” Hannah asked, then realized she knew the answer. “You're right. So that means what? I'm going to start seeing the auras of everyone around me too?”

“Well—” Karma began but was cut off by Hannah raising one hand.

“Never mind, explain later. Let's just get this over with.”

Because somewhere in Tidewater a man's body was rotting in a building under construction.

*   *   *

“
T
ELL US AGAIN.”
Detective Reynolds crossed his arms over his chest and sat on the corner of his sturdy wooden desk. His partner mirrored the pose on the opposite corner. Both men stared at Hannah with enough skepticism in their eyes, they could have probably written a tome on its definition.

“I told you. All I saw was that guy was my age-ish. Mercy stabbed him once in the chest but must have missed the heart because he didn't die right away. Mercy got really angry and stabbed him in the throat next to make sure he was dead.”

“And you say, you got this
vision
from a knife where you work?” the partner asked, his voice oozing disbelief.

“Yes, Detective O'Toole.”

“O'Dell. Detective O'Dell,” he snapped. “Where's the knife now?”

Karma, who'd been standing against the wall next to Zig, strode forward. “Here it is.” She reached into her purse and pulled out the object still wrapped in the hand towel from the Boxing Cat.

“But that's not the
actual
murder weapon,” Hannah said as Detective Reynolds examined it. “The blade she used was
bigger, sharper. It didn't look like any kind of knife I'd seen before. The one side was curved and the other side was serrated with wide teeth.”

“But this knife is what made you go all hooey?” Detective O'Dell asked.

“I wouldn't say
hooey
, but yes, it gave me the vision.” Hannah huffed in exasperation, glancing at Karma helplessly. Her friend gave her a small nod. It didn't do much, but it did embolden her to keep going. “Look, the killer must have touched the knife tonight at the restaurant. It's the only thing that makes sense.”

“Right. Makes sense,” Detective Reynolds scoffed. “You got a vision, saw a murder, but you can't tell us what the killer looks like. You can't tell us where to find the body. And you have no murder weapon.”

“Wait, just give me a sec.” Hannah pulled her sketch pad out of her backpack and flipped it open to the page she'd been drawing on. “I have a drawing here of the victim. That's got to count for something. Can't you run it through a facial recognition program or something? Find out where the guy lives, who he knows?”

“You watch too many cop shows on television.”

The detectives didn't even glance at the drawing. They looked at each other over her head and seemed to share a silent conversation. One that was interrupted by Karma tugging Hannah by the arm. “Let's go, Hannah. They don't believe you.”

They were most of the way to the door when one of the detectives muttered loud enough for Hannah to hear, “You need to keep your girlfriend on a tighter leash, Harmon.”

Karma must have heard it too because she swung around and hissed out something in Spanish, then spun on her heel and all but pushed Hannah out the door.

Outside on the sidewalk, Karma spoke rapid-fire Spanish under her breath, her cheeks splotchy and her fists clenched.

Hannah patted a hand on Karma's back. “You okay?”

“Yes,” her accent thick again. She sounded as if she were choking back tears.

“What did you say to them?”

“I told them their mamas would be disappointed to know that their sons were really little pussies with peanut-sized dicks and no imagination.”

Hannah laughed. God, it felt good to laugh. It had been so stressful in the police station. She hadn't really been prepared for it.

Karma laughed too, but her laughter fell away as Officer Zig Harmon stepped outside. By the fierce expression on his face, Hannah expected him to be angry or frustrated. Her jaw went slack when he swept Karma into his arms and kissed her loudly.

“Damn, Karma, you make me so hot,” Zig whispered in a deep baritone. “You really pissed them off this time.”

“And you just let them talk about me like that?” Karma pushed at his hold, but he didn't release her.

“
Mi amor
, I told them you weren't anyone's bitch, and if they knew what was good for them, they'd hold their tongues around you. You are a McKinnon after all and not all of your cousins operate within the legal system anymore.”

Karma laughed and swatted him on the shoulder. Then they stared into each other's eyes as if they were the only people in the world. Their love poured out of them, making Hannah's breath hitch.

Wow, third wheel thy name is Hannah.

She sidled down the steps to the sidewalk, giving them room and a semblance of privacy.

“Hannah, wait!” Karma called out. She whispered something to Zig who nodded, then followed Karma down the steps until they were beside Hannah.

He pulled a card out of his pocket, cast a sheepish look at Karma, then said, “Give these guys a call. If you say there's been a murder, they'll look until they find a body or can prove nothing happened. And unlike the bozo twins,” he hiked a thumb toward the police station, “they're more open-minded about visions. They have some experience with that.”

Hannah accepted the card and blinked. It was a business card for Tidewater Security Specialists. The same private investigators who'd come to find her in Fincastle. A sign she
was doing the right thing. Something she desperately needed after being verbally pummeled by the cops.

Pocketing the card, she nodded. “Thanks, I'll call them when I get back to my hotel room.”

“You need a lift?” Niall's voice spoke softly behind her, but that didn't stop her from jumping.

“Hey, Boss, thanks for coming back.” Karma smiled warmly at Niall, then gave Zig a kiss on the cheek. “I can definitely use the ride. Zig's got work tonight.”

“What about you, Hannah?” Niall asked, his grass-green eyes locked on hers.

Hannah eyed Niall with a mix of lust and distrust. Outrage still pumped through her body at his callous, but all-too-true words but so did the desire to lose herself in those lovely eyes of his.

Who needed Mercy for insanity? Hannah was driving herself crazy without any help.

Niall held out a hand to her and she eyed it suspiciously. It wasn't him she didn't trust, it was herself. She really wanted to invite him back to her hotel room, but she had more self-respect than to throw herself at someone who had already made it clear he didn't want to repeat their time together.

“Sure. I'm at the Blue Owl Hotel.”

Niall opened the passenger door. The dome light from the truck cast him in a greenish glow. Not a sickly color but a warm, comforting, soothing light. Hannah nearly sighed until Karma coughed behind her.

“It's him,” Karma mouthed to her when Hannah glanced at her friend.

She whipped her gaze back to Niall but the green light had been replaced by the orange glow from the dashboard lights. Before she had time to think, Karma gave her a slight push and Hannah climbed into the cab.

“That's a pretty good hike from the Boxing Cat. How'd you get to work today?” Karma asked once they were all inside and on the road.