No Peace for the Damned

yanked me to my feet. I twisted from his grip and fisted my hands. Lights flickered all around me. The TV shorted out.
    It’s Thirteen. Just Thirteen, not someone trying to hurt you
.
    But my mind was frazzled. I couldn’t think. He stood his ground in front of me, once again blocking my view of the others. I met his eyes and suddenly saw an image of the farmhouse. The couches in the great room, the cobwebs in the kitchen. He was giving me something familiar to focus on. And it worked.
    I followed the rise and fall of his chest. Breathe in, breathe out. All the while I walked with him through the mental layout of the farmhouse. The tacky kitchen. The tiny bathroom. My bedroom. After a moment, he motioned for me to follow him upstairs.
    The stairs from the basement game room opened into a modern kitchen. Glass cabinets, stainless steel appliances, a tiled island centered in the room. Thirteen stopped and pulled out a bar stool. “Sit.”
    I glared at him but took the seat. He opened the cabinet above the stove and pulled out a brown bottle of Jim Beam. My arms trembled; the twitching went into overdrive.
    “A couple of decades ago I was in Shanghai,” he said. He opened a couple of other cabinets, looking for a glass. “The target was a fortune-teller. A swindler who bankrupted an entire village.” He shrugged. “It was an entry-level assignment, but I wasnew to the Network so it was mine.” He brought down two juice glasses and set them by the whiskey. My throat burned. “Turned out the woman wasn’t clairvoyant, she was telepathic. She used the townspeople’s thoughts to promise them their dreams, then emptied their bank accounts.” He poured a couple of shots. My head pulsed.
    “Once I had her in custody, she begged for her opium.” He went to the fridge for ice. “We refused.”
    Was he going to withhold it? Drink it in front of me?
    He plopped ice in both glasses then slid one of the drinks across the counter to me. “She killed herself within four hours. But not before tearing her own ears from her head trying to stop the voices.” He met my gaze. “Her power was nothing compared to yours. I suspect the same is true for the pain.”
    I grabbed the glass with both hands and downed the drink. Instant coolness to the lingering burn. He slid me the second glass and poured another. The pain slowly faded. Another three glasses and I was alone again in my head.
    “Thank you,” I said finally.
    He watched me with his back against the counter. “You want to tell me what happened at Batalkis’s house?”
    I looked at him closely. His thoughts were clearer now but I still didn’t see a reprimand coming. I must be missing something. “Cordele and the others explained it enough,” I said, circling the glass on the countertop.
    “I’d like to hear your version.”
    I cocked a brow.
    “An electric igniter was found among the rubble,” he explained. “Our short-range equipment is stronger than our long-range, but it still didn’t pick up the device when we did our initial scans. I know you didn’t cause the explosion. But there are still questions. Jon said the police found human remains. We’retrying to determine if Batalkis was home, setting off the explosion himself, or if the bomb was triggered from a remote and the remains are one of the missing Network agents. We didn’t read any signs of life when we approached the house, so most likely the body was already there when the explosion occurred. Which leaves the question of how—”
    “It was triggered when Cordele entered the house,” I blurted.
    He gave me a speculative look. I sighed.
    “I followed right after you left,” I told him. Then I explained everything. Crouching beside Shane, the bomb ticking, the door, Cordele—everything.
    “There was something else, though,” I said when I was done. “When I was in the yard I, um, felt something.”
    “What do you mean?”
    “My family had been there. Maybe not today, but recently. I could feel it. It was like a shadow of their power was left behind. It was all around the house.” I took another drink. “You know, I never thought about what it felt like to use our power before. It never dawned on me that there would be an aftereffect. But it makes sense, I guess. I mean, when you use the kind of power my family uses, there should be some kind of…impression or something, right?
    He didn’t answer, but he didn’t have to. His thoughts were too concrete to hide.
Son of a