Absolutely, Positively

finding his balance on the glass bridge that stretched above the abyss.

    He was not going to fight the conflicting sensations this time, he promised himself. He would try Molly's suggestion. He would simply sink into his senses. The way he did when he was with her.

    Too late. Too late.

    A rat named panic was trying to eat into his awareness. Harry forced the creature back into its dark hole.

    Just another sense. No different than sight or touch or smell. Just another one of his natural abilities. Like his reflexes. Perfectly normal, Molly had said. For him.

    Perfectly normal. All he had to do was accept it. Use it. Be at peace with it. Molly's life might depend on his acceptance of his own natural abilities.

    Molly's life.

    Harry took a deep breath. He steadied himself on the glass bridge.

    From out of nowhere an alert calm stole over him. Harry began to breathe more easily. He knew without experimenting with them that he had regained control of his reflexes. He had stopped trembling. He straightened away from the elevator wall.

    The elevator door opened. Harry drew another deep, steadying breath.

    He stepped out of the elevator and went down the carpeted corridor to his front door. He shoved the key into the lock and turned the knob.

    “Molly?” He slurred his voice and stumbled deliberately as he let himself into the hall. The feeling of impending danger threatened to crush him. “Honey, I'm home. Hell of a party. Should have seen the fight at the tavern.”

    “Well, well, well. Blind drunk.” Cutter Latteridge smiled as he came around the corner into the hall. He grasped Molly's arm in one hand, chaining her to his side. In his other hand he held a silenced gun that was leveled at Harry's chest. “How very convenient.”

22

    “Harry, I tried to warn you.” Molly's eyes glittered with tears of despair. “I'm so sorry.”

    Harry peered at her, as though having a problem focusing on a moving image. “What the hell's he doing here?”

    “I'm here to set the stage for a proper departure, Trevelyan,” Cutter said.

    “I'm not going anywhere.” Harry staggered toward him, allowing the momentum of his awkward movement to send him careening into a wall. He fetched up against it and started to slide gently toward the floor. “Put that gun away, Latteridge. You can't shoot anyone here. Not your style.”

    “My style has changed, thanks to you, Trevelyan.”

    “Harry.” Molly tried unsuccessfully to shake herself free of Cutter's grip. “Are you all right?”

    “Haven't felt this good in a long time.” Harry scrabbled around on the floor. His fingers brushed against his ankle sheath. He made a show of heaving himself back into an upright position. The knife was now tucked into his shirt sleeve. “What's going on here?”

    “He wants to make our deaths look like a murder-suicide,” Molly whispered. She searched his face as if trying to see past the facade of drunkenness. “Harry, he's going to kill us.”

    “Nah. He won't do that.” Harry floundered forward. “Will you, Latteridge or Laxton or whatever your name is?”

    “Stay where you are,” Cutter ordered quickly. He backed away, dragging Molly with him.

    “Can't shoot me in the chest,” Harry explained cheerfully. “Wouldn't look like a suicide, now would it? Got to go for the head or mouth or something.”

    “Damn you,” Cutter hissed. “You really are crazy, aren't you? Your sister-in-law is right.”

    Harry shook his head sadly. “And here I thought a shrink was supposed to maintain confidentiality.”

    “Keep your distance or I'll kill Molly right now,” Cutter warned. “Rightnow , do you understand me?”

    “Sure, sure.” Harry massaged the back of his neck as he lurched to a swaying stop. “I hear you.”

    Cutter frowned. “I'm delighted to see you drunk, Trevelyan, but I must admit this is beyond my expectations.”

    “I make it a practice never to live up to other people's expec…expectations,” Harry said.

    Molly's eyes widened with sudden comprehension. He knew then that she had finally realized he was not drunk. He willed her not to give the game away.

    “Stay right where you are, Trevelyan.” Cutter started to raise the gun.

    At that instant the intercom buzzed. Cutter froze.

    “Hey, we got a visitor,” Harry said brightly. “Party time.”

    “Don't answer it,” Cutter ordered.

    “Got to.” Harry lifted one shoulder in an elaborate, what-can-I-do shrug that sent him