All Seeing Eye by Rob Thurman

Author:Rob Thurman
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Published: 2012-07-30T22:00:00+00:00

11

“Do you drink?”

Hector stood in the doorway of my “room” with a six-pack in his hand. “I wasn’t sure if it would affect your …” He circled a finger to finish the sentence.

“My mojo? My happy hoodoo?” I indicated the desk chair. “Screw it, and bring it on. Tonight I’d drink paint thinner if it was in a nice enough bottle.” I did have the occasional beer while Houdini snuffled around my feet for a sip. It didn’t affect my abilities. I could drink myself deaf, dumb, and blind, and it still wouldn’t have mattered. I’d done it once or twice before, when I was young, stupid, and a little less able to deal. All it did was make the psychic movie a little fuzzy around the edges. It didn’t dull it enough to make drinking a hobby or a necessity. And I wasn’t going to be like those drunken losers who’d hung around the house when I was a kid. The old man included. Mom had tried, but if there was an asshole in the tristate area, she’d fall head over heels for the bastard.

But there are always exceptions, and with what I’d seen today, I was all about exceptions. I accepted an already opened beer from Hector as he twisted off the cap to his own. “Isn’t drinking on duty against the rules?” I took a cool swallow.

“That’s the advantage of being ex-military. If I get caught, the worse they can do is fire me.” He took a long swallow of his own before rubbing his forehead with the heel of his hand. “So … what did we learn today?”

“That reruns are for shit.” And that I missed my dog, my home, my nonhomicidal secretary. Abby had never once tried to throw anyone off a roof for God. Okay, there was the Bible-thumper or two who regularly vandalized my poster. Jacob gave me bad ideas. It would be ironic, considering this situation: toss a man of God off a roof because absolutely no one told you to. I was sure God’s hand would ease him to the ground as gently as a feather.

“And that Charlie isn’t necessarily going to be drawn to the places with the most violence. Maybe he can sense things only so far, geographically speaking. Maybe he’s just drifting here and there, and wherever he happens to pass …” I shrugged and took another drink.

“Does he know?” The question was as abrupt as Hector’s thumb was methodical in peeling off his bottle label. “Does Charlie know what he’s doing? Does he know what’s happening?”

I could finish the rest of that without his words. Because he couldn’t. Charlie couldn’t know, because Charlie wouldn’t cause death and terror. His brother wouldn’t believe that of him. Couldn’t. And Hector was right.

“No.” I shook my head. “He doesn’t know. I’m not sure he even knows he’s Charlie anymore. All he knows is being lost. He’s lost, and he can’t find his way, but I’m not sure there’s any reason behind what he does.

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