Page 47 of Evil Bones
I closed my eyes, cleared my mind, and spread a welcome mat for whatever cerebral stirrings might be out there in the universe wanting to come in.
My hindbrain conjured a vision. A man striding the trail I’d just taken, black plastic garbage sack in one hand. The sack’s contents appeared to be weighty but not overly large.
Stopping at the elm under which I stood, the man reached in and ear-yanked a dead rabbit out into the open. Raising the limp body two-handed above his head, he tipped his face to the sky, neck tendons bulging and taut.
A heartbeat, then the man’s chin leveled. Scowling, he threw the rabbit to the ground, dropped to his knees, and wept.
Unexpectedly, my face went hot.
Electricity fizzed in my chest.
I heard a voice.
No.
The experience wasn’t auditory.
It was a feeling, cold and hard as igneous rock.
The unexpected surge of emotion sent a chill down my spine.
CHAPTER 11
“Hey. Doc. You okay?”
Slidell’s sweat-slick face looked like a bright-pink peony coated with dew.
“What?”
“You zoned out there.”
“I’m fine. It’s just—”
It’s just what? I had no idea. But I damn sure wasn’t going to tell Slidell that I’d flashed into the mind of the perp we were chasing.
That the message I’d received was scary as hell.
But had that really happened?
Or was the heat getting to me?
Slidell and I looked around for several minutes, found nothing. “This is bullshit,” Skinny said, yanking a grayed hanky from a pants pocket and wiping his brow. “I’m pulling the plug.”
“Suits me.”
With that we headed back toward the Trailblazer.
Trudging through the prickly vegetation, accumulating more bites with each step, I couldn’t help wondering what the hell I’d experienced. Had my subconscious noticed something that I’d missed? Something that prompted an unsolicitedpsstfrom my id?
Triggered the sense of foreboding now filling me?
Because in that moment, in that startling peek into the psyche of another, I knew.
The perp had grown bored with nonhuman prey and would inevitably move up to humans.
Unbeknownst to me.
He already had.
