Page 7 of The Shop on Hidden Lane

Luke, however, suddenly seemed to be in no great rush to leave the cabin.

“Where would you go to hide a body around here?” he asked.

“Pick a spot, any spot.” She swept out a hand to indicate the thick woods that surrounded the cabin. “We’re in the middle of a forest, in case you haven’t noticed. We lose a hiker or two every summer. Sometimes the bodies are never found. There’s also the lake. It’s very deep.”

Her teeth were starting to chatter. Damn. This was not good. Bruce was watching her in an attentive, concerned way. Or maybe that was how a hellhound looked just before he went for the throat.

“I asked whereyouwould hide a body,” Luke said.

A jolt of anger flashed through her. “Are you implying that I had something to do with what went down in this cabin?”

“No, I’m trying to use some logic. Connect a few dots. It’s what I do. If you kill someone, you have to deal with the body. We know it wasn’t left here. You grew up in Mirror Lake. You know the territory. It seems reasonable to ask you where someone might dump a—” Luke broke off, frowning. “Are you all right?”

“Yes. No.” She wrapped her arms around herself but she knew nothing would stop the shivering. “I always go through this after I do a reading. It doesn’t usually happen so fast, that’s all. I spent too much time in the trance. I’ll be okay.” She managed a steely smile. “I’m a professional. Don’t try this at home.”

“Do you need medical attention?”

“A…a…absolutely not,” she bit out through clamped teeth. “A doctor would diagnose my symptoms as a panic attack.”

“Is that what’s going on?”

“No. Please take me home. I’ll make myself a nice cup of tea and I’ll be fine.”

“You’re shivering,” Luke said.

“One of the side effects of my stupid talent. Don’t worry about it. I’ll live.”

He started to strip off his jacket. “Here, put this on.”

“It won’t help. I’m already wearing a coat.”

“What does help?”

“A cup of tea, like I said.Take me back to the shop.”

“Looks like you’ve got all the symptoms of para-hypothermia,” Luke said.

She couldn’t tell if he was genuinely concerned for her health or if he was alarmed because her traumatized aura meant she might not be of any more use to him. He was a Wells, so probably the latter.

“Don’t worry,” she said. “Just a few chills. I’ve been through this before.”

Okay, not quite like this, but she knew what to do. She needed the tea.

“How long until you recover?” Luke asked.

“Not long.” She gave him another sharp smile. “About a half hour after I get my tea.”

“We can probably speed up the recovery process if I use my energy field to help stabilize your shocked wavelengths. You know the old rule—two auras are stronger than one.”

Bad idea, she thought.A really, really bad idea. Also potentially dangerous. What he was suggesting required physical contact. In her shaky state, there was no way to know how her rattled senses would react to an attempt to calm her energy field.

“It’s too risky,” she said, trying to sound like she knew what she was talking about.

“Don’t worry, I won’t hurt you.”

There was no point trying to hide the truth. So what if she scared the living daylights out of him? It wasn’t like they had a personal relationship. He wasn’t another experiment.

“You don’t understand,” she said evenly. “If you attempt to manipulate my aura you’re the one who most likely will be damaged.” She paused for emphasis. “Seriously damaged.”