Page 6

T he next morning Kylie woke to a gray sky, a gray world, and a gray heart. She didn’t even know what that meant, but that’s the way she felt. It was stupid really. She had no reason to feel guilty or to feel as if she hadn’t done everything she could because she had. She had no reason to feel like shit, the way she did currently. The question was, could she have done anything else?

She didn’t have an answer for that. The very thought that she might have seen somebody changing a crime scene while she had been there sketching nearby bothered her in ways that she couldn’t begin to explain.

Mostly she thought it bothered her because she was the one in the trance at the time of her sketches, and, if somebody had seen her, what had they seen? She prided herself most of the time on looking normal while she sketched, just in her own world, her pencil moving quickly, and most of the time people left her alone to do her job. She did have a jacket as well as a badge that identified her as law enforcement, so everybody generally just gave her space while she went about doing her thing. It was the best way for her, the best way to move forward somehow in life.

But the thought of somebody seeing her possibly changing a crime scene while in one of her trances bothered her tremendously. She got up, had a quick shower, got dressed, put on coffee, and then headed to her home office, where she kept the other sketchbooks. As she opened her big portfolio, out fell one of the most recent sketches that she had pulled from her sketch pad before giving them to the captain. She often took a knife and just cut them cleanly. These were the ones that she didn’t want other people to see, the ones that showed things with a little too much detail, a little too intense, a little too much for her.

Not that it really seemed to matter to anybody these days. It wasn’t as if she’d had anybody knocking down her door to try and get to her. And that made her sound pathetic, but she wasn’t. She was strong. She was a survivor, and she had to be strong. However, everything else that went on in this world was just too much at times.

So much so that sometimes she needed to disappear into her artwork. It was a sane and sacrosanct space for her. She honored it and kept it in that set-apart space because there was really nowhere else for her. It was always that kind of a thought process, that something else should be out there, and she was just missing out. She didn’t know how to make that make any more sense, but it’s what she felt.

As she pulled out all the recently removed sketches, she took a slow and careful review of each one, realizing just how variable most of them were. Here was one where she was just getting into her trance, and most people were not even looking at her or even looking her way, which was a good thing. She went into another trance for other sketches, as she moved from one section to another. She could picture it as she slowly and carefully moved around the casino, as she sketched out everything she saw and everything the others didn’t see.

By the time she got to several more of these removed sketches, her heart rate was already up and pulsing with the pain of everything she had seen.

Finally she put down the pages and stared at the one in front of her. She reached out her finger and slowly retraced some of the lines, keeping her finger aloft just enough to not mar the actual pencil strokes. This sketch was one of those that was emotionally so specific, so hard, so difficult to take in, and yet so difficult to not see. She stayed in that position for a long time, wondering what she was supposed to do with this, wondering if these pictures had anything of value, when her phone rang.

Groaning, she looked over at her cell, picked it up, and answered it.

“I’m glad you answered,” Porter said.

“If I’d known it was you, I wouldn’t have,” she snapped. She could sense his smile through the phone, even though she couldn’t see it. “Stop smiling,” she snapped.

He burst out laughing. “I think you’re not telling me something.”

She guiltily stared down at the photos on her desk and then glanced around her home office, wondering if he could have bugged it.

“And I’m okay with that to a certain extent,” he admitted, “but I do feel as if you need to share something.”

“And what would that be?” she asked in a harsh tone.

“I don’t know exactly, but I sense… Do you have other drawings? Ones you didn’t show the captain?”

She slapped the removed pages sitting before her. “Sure, I do. I only gave him the good ones.”

“I want to see those too.”

“And what if I don’t want to show you?” she asked.

“That might have been something you could have gotten away with before, but not now.”

“And why is that?”

“Because another young woman died this morning,” he said, “and we’re pretty sure it’s the same killer from the casino shooting.”

“You haven’t caught the mass shooter yet?” she asked, amazed.

“No, not that killer, the second one.”

She closed her eyes and whispered, “Shit.”

“Yeah, that’s definitely a good word for it. I’m coming over. Confirm you’re there when I arrive.”

“And if I’m not?” she challenged.

“You’re not working today, at least not in an official capacity,” he replied, “and, if I have to, I’ll call the captain and get you put on suspension.”

She stared at her phone in outrage. “What good would that do?” she asked.

“Then I can get you to come sketch with me.”

“Why the hell would I want to do that?” she snapped. “I still need to eat, and I’ve got bills to pay.”

“Good. Then you won’t have a problem coming along with me today. I’ll be there in ten minutes.” And, with that, he disconnected.

She stared at the removed sketches and realized that this was her chance to destroy any she didn’t want him to see because she had no doubt he would bug her long enough until he badgered her into handing them over. She wasn’t sure that she was ready for that by any means, but she also wasn’t sure she had a choice, at least not now. He was clearly on a mission, and anybody who stood in his way would get flattened, including her.

“Hell,” she pointed out to herself, “not just including me,… especially me.”

With that in mind, she sorted through the pictures, putting a few aside, a few that weren’t as good, a few that showed a whole lot less clarity, but she left a couple in place. When she got up to answer the door, he asked, “Where are they?”

Wordlessly she led him to her home office and to the images he was so desperate to see.

He flipped the pages from the first sketch to the second one to the third, and then he stopped. “Good God. Do you see who you have here?”

She frowned at him, then came closer and shook her head. “I have no idea who that is.”

“He’s a serial killer who escaped about six years ago,” he stated. “And, if you saw him at the casino, that completely changes this entire game.”

“It’s not a game,” she corrected.

“For you and me, it’s not a game, but for this man? He lives for that shit.” And, with that, he lifted up the sketch and motioned to her. “Let’s go.”

“Where are we going?” she protested, as he led her to the door.

“First, we’ll go see the captain, and then we’ll start making some phone calls to see where the hell this guy is. They were supposed to lock him up and throw away the key,” he muttered.

“Somebody probably let him out for good behavior,” she suggested.

“And that would be a joke,” he replied, turning to look at her, “because he had killed four people already.”

She didn’t even think, didn’t blink, nor did it occur to her to restrain herself when she immediately responded, “He’s up to twelve.”

*

Porter drove Kylie straight to the captain’s office, but, so far, she had refused to elaborate on her source for the update on the escaped killer’s murders to date. “You’ll have to tell me at some point.”

“No, I don’t,” she snapped.

He didn’t say anything, at least not until they were halfway to the captain’s office. “And what if I tell the captain you said it’s twelve?”

“He’ll think I’m full of shit, some of which will spill over on you.”

“Maybe not,” he murmured. “I know Stefan doesn’t think you’re full of shit.” At that, she stiffened, and he noted it with grim satisfaction. “I’m not sure what’s going on between the two of you, but Stefan’s pretty adamant about what he thinks you can do.”

“He has no clue what he thinks I can do. He’s just hoping that I might belong to his little club of psychics.”

“You already do. Whether you’re an honorary member or a reluctant one,” Porter stated, “you are a member, and so am I.”

She froze in place and then slowly turned toward him. “Really?” she asked, her voice low and her gaze searching.

He nodded, letting her see some of the emotions in his gaze. “There’s a reason my sister was in that hospital,” he admitted, “and a reason why I feel so guilty about it because I couldn’t protect her, even though I was doing my best.”

“You were young,” she pointed out. “Nobody should have expected you to look after her at that age.”

He smiled. “See? You’re already doing it.”

“I’m not doing anything,” she growled, as she turned and stormed ahead.

“The captain will want a little more of an explanation.”

“I don’t really care,” she snapped, as she moved toward the captain’s office. “I don’t have an explanation.”

“Maybe if you would stop turning that little tiny earring in your ear, you would.” At that she froze, as expressions of pain, shock, and other emotions he couldn’t quite define rippled across her face, before she locked everything down. He nodded to himself. “Sorry. I’m not trying to burst open all your secrets and bare them for the world to see, but there is a time and a place for them, and we do need your help.”

Her gaze was stony, and he could tell there was no give to everything inside her. It was all locked behind that earring and would stay there. He couldn’t really blame her. Being exposed as a crazy psychic in this world didn’t help anybody. But he knew what it was like to try and close off that part of his personality.

He led her by the arm toward the captain’s office and added, “I know you want to keep all this locked down and out of the public sphere, and I’ll do what I can. However, a serial murderer is out there who appears to be on a killing spree, and we can’t allow that to continue.”

“Sure,” she snapped, “and, when this murder is over, there’ll be another one. And when that’s over, another one, with still another after that.”

He glanced at her face, hearing the woodenness in her tone, and nodded. “That is possible,” he murmured, “but think about it.… You could be part of the solution.”

“Or I could be part of the problem, and I could get it wrong.”

At that, his mind wondered just what had happened to her. “How much of this is coming from your aunt?”

She struggled to catch her breath, once again stunned by the personal intrusion, and asked, “Did you have to investigate my life?”

“Of course,” he stated. “You’re working for the police, so that is a given.”

“Maybe,” she conceded, “but nothing that ever happened during that time with my aunt applies to this job.”

“Maybe not, but it does apply if we have a killer out there.”

At that, she turned very slowly, poked him in the chest with her finger again and again. “There’s always a killer out there. That’s one of the sad facts of life. There is always one more. One more case, one more killer, one more victim. There is no end.” She was almost shouting by the time she finished.

He nudged her into the captain’s office, and she appeared to be completely unaware that he had already opened the door and was ushering her inside, trying to keep her out of the public view as much as possible.

The captain frowned at her. “What the hell is going on?” he roared.

She turned, glared at him, and roared right back, “Nothing. This guy is off his rocker.”

“I know that,” he agreed, “but nothing I can do about it.”

She just stared at him. “How is that even possible?” she asked, raising both hands in frustration. “He’s making all kinds of accusations.”

At that, the captain turned and looked over at him. “Porter? Is she correct?”

“Nope, not accusations at all,” he replied. “Yet she’s a little unwilling to open up about certain aspects of her life.”

The captain frowned at him and gave her a shrug. “I can’t say that I blame her.” Surprised, she turned to the captain, and he nodded. “I’ve known Porter a long time,” he began, “and, in many ways, he’s family. I know that some people would call it cursed that he’s followed in his family line with certain gifts. I know some of the pain he went through. I know of the torment his sister went through. So, Kylie, if you are dealing with anything like some of this stuff that I have seen already in Porter’s family tree, I agree. It’s something you don’t really want the public to know about.” He raised a hand in a careless wave and rolled his eyes. “However, I’m not the public.”

“No, but you’re just as likely to toss me out to the public.” She couldn’t hold back the bitterness in her words and let the accusations fly. “You’re just as likely to use me as you would want to use anybody else,” she snapped, “and I’m not up for it.”

“I wasn’t planning on using you for anything,” he shared, “except that your sketches are absolutely incredible. I wish to God they were prettier, but I understand why they’re not. They’ll be one hell of an evidentiary look for the court cases, but they aren’t something I really want the victims’ families to see.”

“Right,” she agreed, as she appeared to be trying to get a hold of herself mentally and emotionally. She walked over and slumped into the nearest chair. “And I don’t know that I have any abilities.”

The captain eyed her in surprise, then pointed to Porter. “Porter seems to think you do.”

“Of course Porter seems to think I do,” she noted, with a wave of her hand, “but that really doesn’t matter because that’s about Porter, not about me.”

The captain gave her a halfway smile, and, for the first time, she saw what was almost a gentleness in his gaze. “That is true,” he agreed, “and Porter can be damn irritating.”

She rolled her eyes at that. “ Ya think ?”

Porter protested, “Hey, I’ve been really good.”

She turned and stared at him. “Really?” she asked. “I guess we have different ideas of what really good means.”

He rolled his eyes at her.

The captain intervened, addressing Kylie, “Look. I need to know if you have anything else on what’s going on here.”

“Yes, she does,” Porter declared, “but she didn’t really understand what.”

The captain shook his head. “Kylie, you need to explain all these sketches and whatever else you have.”

She shrugged. “When I did the images, I did a lot more than the ones I showed you, and then I went home, and I sorted through them to find the ones that were the best representation of the carnage that I saw,” she explained. “But apparently, in some of the other sketches that I kept, which I tend to do a lot,” she admitted in almost a self-defensive way. “It helps me to get into the swing of things, and I know that sounds bizarre, but apparently I drew somebody who Porter here seems to think is important.”

And, with that, Porter brought over the sketch that he had in his hand and laid down the large drawing before his boss.

The captain looked at it, squinted several times. Then his gaze focused in on one face, and he stabbed at it with his finger. “Are you saying that he was there?”

“If it’s in my sketch,” she clarified, “then he was there. I didn’t know who he was, not until Porter brought it up.”

The captain stared at it in shock, then over at Porter. “Good God.”

“I know,” Porter murmured. “I understood that he had escaped at one point, but I thought he had been picked up again over the years. Obviously I was wrong.”

“He did escape, and I’m not exactly sure where that investigation went,” the captain murmured. “But it’s something we need to figure out. He’s still on the run, as far as I understood, and this would be confirmation of that.”

Porter nodded. “You would hope that he wasn’t given a pass for good behavior.”

“That would never happen in his case. I remember him, and the son of a bitch annihilated an entire family. So, he’s already got four kills under his belt.”

Porter turned to look at her and nodded. She shook her head. He glared at her and then spoke. “She has something to tell you.”

“No, I don’t,” she growled, crossing her arms over her chest.

The captain watched the two of them go back and forth. “Somebody needs to tell me what it is that she doesn’t want to say.… Porter, you’re up.”

He hesitated at first. “When I told her that our escaped killer had four kills under his belt, she corrected me, saying, He has twelve .”

The captain’s breath hitched, as if his chest had taken a hard blow. “Christ,” he whispered, as he stared at her and then gave his head a shake. “I don’t suppose you have any way of proving that, do you?”

She looked at him but didn’t say a word.

“No, of course not.” He scrubbed his face, as if all the years that he’d been on the force had coalesced into this one crazy moment. “You know that’s not what I want to hear, right?”

She shrugged. “I didn’t say anything.”

He snorted. “The fact that you wouldn’t say anything makes it worse, not better.”

“What am I supposed to tell you? That number just came into my head. You know as well as I do that it would never stand up in court, and that won’t get you any more budget money to fight whatever the hell is happening here.”

He stared at her, fascinated. “Maybe not, but if there is any credence or way to corroborate that number, then we need to know.”

“I don’t know,” she stated. “All I can tell you is that’s the number that came up.”

“And when numbers come up,” the captain asked, “do they generally mean something in your world?”

She gave him a wry glance. “Generally,… yes.”

“But not always, is what you’re saying?”

“I’m saying that I can’t prove it. I don’t know where that number came from or how I got it. All I can tell you is that, in the past, sometimes the numbers would matter.”

“Would matter?” the captain repeated. “You really don’t like going out on a limb, do you?”

Porter winced at the stony look she gave the captain. Porter didn’t understand everything that was going on, but considering how locked down she was about this whole psychic-gift mess, chances were, she’d taken a beating somewhere along the line due to her gifts and was not open to a repeat of it. He looked at the captain. “Regardless of how many he’s got to his credit at this point, if he was at the casino, you and I both know that the posed woman victim would have been right up his alley.”

“In what way?” Kylie asked, turning to face Porter. “You said he was a family annihilator before.”

“Yes, but what I didn’t tell you was that it was a kill for hire.”

She stared at him, then whispered in shock, “Somebody wanted an entire family killed?”

He nodded. “Yes, and he was convicted, then somehow escaped on the way to a transfer.”

She stared at him and shook her head. “See? This is why I don’t like people,” she announced.

“It’s also why we don’t always like people, but we can’t judge everyone by the same stick,” he reminded her.

“Why not?” she asked. “A lot of times there’s really not a whole lot of difference.”

“Regardless of whether there is or not,” the captain added, “he was suspected of killing several others.” He brought up his computer file and snorted. “In fact, according to this rather large file, we suspect he has ten dead to his credit to date, and, if he did take out that young woman at the casino and this additional woman, found this morning, his latest victims, that would be twelve so far.”

Kylie didn’t say anything, just stared at the captain.

He looked over at Porter. “How do you want to proceed? This is more your domain than mine.”

He nodded. “I want to take Kylie to the crime scene of the woman who was killed this morning.”

“You’re thinking it was our escaped killer?”

“I don’t know what to think at this point,” he admitted, “but I think it could be beneficial if we did find out if Kylie gets any feeling from this newest crime scene or can draw anything from it.”

“If the bodies have been removed, what is it you want me to draw?” she asked.

“I don’t know, but, when we get there, if you are prompted to draw something, I suspect you’ll draw it. If there isn’t anything to draw, then you won’t.”

She glared at him. “I don’t always have control.”

“I understand, and I suspect that earring of yours has something to do with it too.” Instinctively her hand went up to the tiny metal stud in the groove of her ear at the very top, almost indiscernible, but still there. “I would love to know the story behind that earring.”

“That’s nice, but I don’t plan on telling you.”

He nodded. “That will be something that bugs me forever then, but I don’t have any way to force you to tell me, so we’ll leave it for now.”

“We’ll leave it forever,” she snapped, glaring at him.

The captain clicked away on the computer keyboard. “So, let’s focus on the woman killed this morning. We don’t have much, outside of the fact that she was potentially posed, and we’re not sure if that’s accurate at this time. Porter, you’ve been at the crime scene, correct?”

He nodded. “I have, so I was going to take Kylie with me this time.”

“Good.” Turning to Kylie, the captain explained, “I know you won’t like this, but I guess a part of me would very much like you to follow Porter’s instructions and see what you might tell us from the scene.”

“I’m happy to go there and draw the crime scene,” she replied, her tone softening. “Anything I can do to help the victim is something I will do, but I just don’t want to play games over this.”

“Maybe not,” the captain stated, “but, until we can figure out exactly what’s going on here, it would be helpful if we could put some controls on your sketches. So, if Porter asks you to do something,… then maybe you could just do it.”

She stared at the captain in surprise. “You have an awful lot of trust in him.”

“I do to a certain extent,” he admitted, with half a smile. “As I said,… he’s kind of family, and we’ve been through a lot together already, so I have more of an inside look into all this woo-woo stuff than a lot of people.”

“So, let me guess. You also know Stefan?” she asked the captain.

“I know of Stefan.”

“So, then yesterday when I asked if you knew who Stefan was,… you lied to me. I had asked you if he’s the one who recommended me to you. He wasn’t. That was Porter.”

The captain nodded. “Your question came out of the blue, and I wasn’t sure how to respond. I know that Stefan has helped Annalise quite a bit. I will always be grateful for that, for everything he can and has done for us.”

She stared at him, sensing something much deeper. Then she turned to Porter. “And Annalise is your sister,” she said.

Porter nodded. “Yes, that’s correct.”

Then she stared at the captain. “Wow, and Annalise is your wife.”

He looked at her, then at Porter. “Yes, that is correct. We haven’t been married all that long,” he shared, glancing from her to Porter, “and it took a bit to even get her that far, but, yes,… she’s my wife.”

Such love and compassion filled the captain’s tone that Porter smiled. He looked over at Kylie to see a sense of confusion on her face, as if she didn’t understand.

“Not all psychics are hated,” Porter shared. She stared at him and didn’t say anything, but he still saw her confusion. He could understand how she didn’t quite know how to put the pieces together. “Not every gifted person is treated the way your aunt treated you. Regardless,… if you’re okay, let’s go grab your sketchbook.”

“I’ve got one.”

“And these three standalone sketches, we’ll keep here in the captain’s office, if you’re okay with that.”

She stared at them and then nodded. “A couple others are in that batch too,” she admitted, then turned to Porter. “I don’t know if you noticed.”

“Other sketches or other images of this guy?” Porter asked.

“I don’t know if there are other images of this guy,” she said. “I’m just telling you there were other sketches that I withheld, with other people who I drew.”

“Right,” Porter noted, “and that’s a fine distinction too.”

“I don’t know if it is or not,” she muttered and glared at him. “All I can tell you is that sometimes I know what I’m drawing, and sometimes I don’t.”

He smiled. “In this instance, I quite believe you, and that’s why I’ll ask you to do something a little bit different when we get to this next site.”

She glared at him. “Just remember that I’m not some trick pony.”

He laughed. “I would never make that assumption. Besides, I think you would get a little too angry at me.”

“I would, so keep that in mind.”

“Absolutely.”

He led her out the captain’s office door when the captain called out, “I’ll want to see those other sketches.”

She turned to him and nodded. “We can pick them up sometime today.”

The captain looked back at Porter. “The sooner, the better.”

Porter nodded. “Agreed, I’ll get them as soon as I can.” And, with that, he led her out to his car.

When they got into his vehicle, she asked, “Was that really necessary?”

“Yes. I’m not sure where all the resistance on your part comes from. I can hazard a guess, and I’m certainly not in a position to judge, not after I saw what my sister went through, but I’m here to tell you that I’m not trying to make your life difficult. All I want to do is catch a killer.”

“Sure, you want to catch a killer, but then you’ll want to catch another killer and another after that. At some point in time, I just can’t catch killers anymore.”