reading chairs, probing for the feel of the energy flow.
She was only a couple of steps away from the first chair when the whispers of darkness snagged on her fully engaged psychic senses.
She nearly screamed in shock. It was as if she had blundered into the sticky strands of an invisible spiderweb. Flinching, she hurriedly stepped back out of range. A shiver went through her as her pulse jumped into high gear. She struggled to close down her wide-open senses.
What on earth ?
An old memory from an especially bad night at Candle Lake rose like a monster from the depths. She squelched it swiftly. This was her show house library, for heavenâs sake, not H Ward.
Okay, letâs try this again . Maybe she had overreacted. It was true that her imagination coupled with her psychic senses could produce some unnerving moments on occasion.
But her psychic senses had never betrayed her, she reminded herself. Cautiously she opened them wide once more and took a step forward.
The cobwebs drifted across her senses, making her shudder. There was something there near the chair. She had experienceda similar sensation once before in her life, and the recollection of it still had the power to chill her blood.
This is not H Ward .
She repeated the mantra to herself several times but her throat remained clenched against nausea and she was getting light-headed. She refused to allow herself to retreat. She had to know what this ghastly stuff was.
The invisible threads drifted around her, so faint she could barely sense them, but unmistakably there.
Impossible. Just two days before she had come here to add some final touches. She had picked up nothing out of the ordinary that day.
What is going on here ?
Calm down and think. Youâve been to enough murder scenes to know what they feel like, and this room isnât giving off those kinds of vibes. The walls arenât screaming the way they do when blood has been spilled in a room.
The energy was quite faint but extremely murky. That was not typical of most of the psychic sensations she encountered. Her sixth sense responded keenly to traces of the stronger passions, and those tended to be primitive and raw in nature. Rage, fear, panic, hatred, lust and obsessive need were elemental energies. The taints they left behind were usually sharp and clear.
This was . . . something else, something very frightening.
The psychic web seemed to be emanating from an area around the footstool. She examined the space closely. Everything looked exactly as it had the last time she had been in that room. There was no sign of recent violence or destruction.
No, that wasnât quite true.
Light glinted on a shard of glass near the footstool. She reached down and picked it up. The color of the glass was familiar.
She glanced at the small table beside the chair. The bud vase was gone; smashed.
There was something else that was not right about the space, but she could not immediately identify it.
She turned slowly on her heel, examining every inch of the library. When she came to the table in the childrenâs corner she stopped.
She had arranged a handful of colorful, everyday objects on the low table. Jeff had supplied a small dinosaur for the informal collection and Theo had given her a tiny model motorcycle. She had added one of her new chili-pepper red mugs because it picked up the color of the bookcase shelves.
The red mug was gone.
14
T hat night she dreamed of Xanadu.
Â
She rose from the narrow bed and put on the hospital-issue robe. The garment hung loosely around her. It had fit when she was admitted to Candle Lake Manor, but she had lost a lot of weight during the past few months. The drugs that Dr. McAlister tried to force down her in hopes of inducing her cooperation in therapy had effectively smothered her appetite.
She had eventually learned how to dispose of some of the pills without anyone realizing that she was not swallowing them, but she could not
She was only a couple of steps away from the first chair when the whispers of darkness snagged on her fully engaged psychic senses.
She nearly screamed in shock. It was as if she had blundered into the sticky strands of an invisible spiderweb. Flinching, she hurriedly stepped back out of range. A shiver went through her as her pulse jumped into high gear. She struggled to close down her wide-open senses.
What on earth ?
An old memory from an especially bad night at Candle Lake rose like a monster from the depths. She squelched it swiftly. This was her show house library, for heavenâs sake, not H Ward.
Okay, letâs try this again . Maybe she had overreacted. It was true that her imagination coupled with her psychic senses could produce some unnerving moments on occasion.
But her psychic senses had never betrayed her, she reminded herself. Cautiously she opened them wide once more and took a step forward.
The cobwebs drifted across her senses, making her shudder. There was something there near the chair. She had experienceda similar sensation once before in her life, and the recollection of it still had the power to chill her blood.
This is not H Ward .
She repeated the mantra to herself several times but her throat remained clenched against nausea and she was getting light-headed. She refused to allow herself to retreat. She had to know what this ghastly stuff was.
The invisible threads drifted around her, so faint she could barely sense them, but unmistakably there.
Impossible. Just two days before she had come here to add some final touches. She had picked up nothing out of the ordinary that day.
What is going on here ?
Calm down and think. Youâve been to enough murder scenes to know what they feel like, and this room isnât giving off those kinds of vibes. The walls arenât screaming the way they do when blood has been spilled in a room.
The energy was quite faint but extremely murky. That was not typical of most of the psychic sensations she encountered. Her sixth sense responded keenly to traces of the stronger passions, and those tended to be primitive and raw in nature. Rage, fear, panic, hatred, lust and obsessive need were elemental energies. The taints they left behind were usually sharp and clear.
This was . . . something else, something very frightening.
The psychic web seemed to be emanating from an area around the footstool. She examined the space closely. Everything looked exactly as it had the last time she had been in that room. There was no sign of recent violence or destruction.
No, that wasnât quite true.
Light glinted on a shard of glass near the footstool. She reached down and picked it up. The color of the glass was familiar.
She glanced at the small table beside the chair. The bud vase was gone; smashed.
There was something else that was not right about the space, but she could not immediately identify it.
She turned slowly on her heel, examining every inch of the library. When she came to the table in the childrenâs corner she stopped.
She had arranged a handful of colorful, everyday objects on the low table. Jeff had supplied a small dinosaur for the informal collection and Theo had given her a tiny model motorcycle. She had added one of her new chili-pepper red mugs because it picked up the color of the bookcase shelves.
The red mug was gone.
14
T hat night she dreamed of Xanadu.
Â
She rose from the narrow bed and put on the hospital-issue robe. The garment hung loosely around her. It had fit when she was admitted to Candle Lake Manor, but she had lost a lot of weight during the past few months. The drugs that Dr. McAlister tried to force down her in hopes of inducing her cooperation in therapy had effectively smothered her appetite.
She had eventually learned how to dispose of some of the pills without anyone realizing that she was not swallowing them, but she could not
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