Djinn and Tonic (14 page)

But what can I do? She wants to be with me too. She feels the same way I do, yet she still walked away before anything could happen between us.
 

So what can I do to change her mind?

I go over it all again, try to focus in on details. There’s obviously something else going on with her that she can’t or won’t tell me, and it’s keeping her from being with me. She wants me, I’m absolutely positive of that. She cares for me, too, beyond physical attraction: I saw the pain in her eyes as she walked away,

Maybe it’s her father? She’d said her dad is old-school…maybe he’d disown her if she dated the wrong person, someone not Arabic, or someone not from “her people”, someone without wind-powers or whatever? But if that was the case then why had she moved away from her family? Plus, I don’t think she’d let that stop her if she really cared for me the way I think she does. Not if she’d already run away from home in the pursuit of freedom to live her life her way. She must have a much stronger motivation than familial disapproval.

If this were an investigation, I’d say I’ve hit the wall, reached a point where the case can’t progress any further without new evidence.
 

I leave the range and go home. Sleep is slow in coming, and when it does I dream of her. In my dream, she stands in the doorway of my bedroom, wearing the sexy orange dress she wore on our date, but in the dream she watches me with those eerie white-glowing eyes, a sultry smile on her lips, slowly peeling the dress up over her head, revealing black lace panties and a matching bra. In my dream, she walks toward me, body swaying seductively, hair blowing in a perpetual breeze despite the closed window, and then she straddles me, rides me….
 

In my dream, she reaches up behind her back and unclasps her bra, but I wake up before the cups fall away from her breasts, and I’m left uncomfortably hard, sweating profusely, feeling lonely and sad.

I pour myself a finger of gin, drink it warm and straight up, and follow it with another, a third, and then I force myself to put the bottle away and return to my bedroom.
 

When I finally fall back asleep, Leila is waiting for me in my doorway, wearing that orange dress and the sexy smile, and she straddles me, reaches for her bra clasp again…

I wake up again, just before her bra falls away.
 

*
 
*
 
*

Days pass, and I dream of Leila every single night. I manage to keep my drinking to a minimum, just enough to fall asleep at night and stay asleep, but without work to distract me, it gets increasingly difficult. I stay home, watch TV shows I’ve never heard of, go to the gym and work out until I can barely move. I lace on my running shoes and run the city streets until my lungs burn and my legs tremble. These two weeks of vacation are a total waste of time; I could be working, solving cases.
 

Nothing helps. I nearly dial her number a thousand times, but the farewell I saw in her eyes stops me every time. Maybe I misinterpreted things, maybe she’d just been physically attracted to me and decided she didn’t want to get involved with someone who didn’t have the same powers, or maybe she wasn’t even attracted to me at all. The more time passes, the more tangled and distorted my memories become, making me doubt what I saw, making me doubt what I felt for her in the first place.
 

Finally, at the start of the second week, I show up at the precinct, intending to beg the captain to let me go back to work. I don’t even get past the front desk. Archer is there as I walk through the front doors, telling me in no uncertain terms to get lost.

I’ve got another week before I can go back to work; I’ll be bat-shit crazy by then, no doubt. So I run, go to the practice range, and bench more weight than is safe…
 

And Leila teases me in my dreams, peeling that orange dress over her head, lips centimeters from mine but never meeting, secrets abounding in her dark eyes, breasts swaying and moments from being bared to me.

Every gust of wind smells of her, shampoo and cherry lip balm and jasmine. Every gust of wind makes me turn around and look for her. I hear her voice, echoing just around the corner.
 

She’s in the wind, slipping through my fingers.

*
 
*
 
*

I honestly can’t explain how, today, I happen to be standing outside this particular door. It’s crazy, but here I am, at the end of my rope, about to knock on the door of a virtual stranger.
 

I lift my hand and rap on the door, hear a gruff voice say, “Just a minute, hold your horses then, I’m comin’.”

Sean Byrne opens the door, iron-gray hair ruffled, a red cardigan hanging off his shoulders despite the late July heat. “Detective Hale, yeah?” Sean says.

“Yes, Mr. Byrne. It’s Detective Hale.” I feel stupid, standing here bothering an old man I met once.
 

But I’ve got no one else to talk to, nowhere else to turn, and for some reason, Sean Byrne seems like a possible answer. He’s Jack Byrne’s grandfather, and he’s old Irish. In the course of investigating Miriam, I spent an interesting afternoon talking to Sean, who claims to have what he calls the “Second Sight”, which, as far as I can tell, is some kind of ability to see the future. When old Sean Byrne made that claim then, I’d dismissed him out of hand as crazy, just another old coot suffering from dementia or something. But now, after what I’ve experienced regarding both Miriam and Leila, I’m having second thoughts.
 

And honestly, what do I have to lose? If he claims to be able to see the future, maybe he won’t be as quick to dismiss my craziness as I was his.
 

“Well boy-o, come on in. No sense air-conditionin’ the outdoors, yeah?” Sean pulls me inside and closes the door, waving for me to follow him through a formal living room to a bright kitchen painted a powder blue.
 

Sean waves me toward a stool at the island in the center of the kitchen. “So,” he says. “What is it you want, then? Why’re you here, Detective? Hmmm? It’s not for work, I know that much. You’ve settled the investigation into Miriam, she’s told me as much.”

“I…I’m honestly not sure, Mr. Byrne.”

“Och, call me Sean. So, you’re here, but you don’t know why. Well, start at the beginning and mebbe we can figure it out.” Sean goes to a cupboard above the stainless steel refrigerator and grabs a bottle of Johnnie Walker. “Care for a whiskey? You look like you could use one, if you don’t mind my saying so.”

“Sure. I’m off duty.” I accept the tumbler of amber liquid, but I sip at it sparingly.

Sean nods, peering at me with piercing eyes. “Listen, son, I don’t know why you’re here exactly, but I’d best make one thing clear to you right now: I can’t see the future on command. It doesn’t work that way.”

I shake my head. “It’s not that. I mean, if you
could
see the future, that might help, but…like I said, I’m not sure why I’m here. I’ve got a lot on my mind right now, and I wasn’t sure who to talk to…and for some reason, you came to mind. I hope I’m not bothering you. It’s totally out of the blue, I know.”

Sean waves a hand. “No way, lad. I’m a bored old man. You’ll be the most interesting thing to happen all week.” Sean grabs my hand and squeezes it, a grandfatherly gesture that somehow makes me feel immediately calmer. “Just start at the beginning, yeah?”

I draw a breath and begin my story, hesitantly at first. I tell Sean about the case with Miriam and how it turned out, how I met Leila, and then I explain my reservations and doubts and questions, though the oddness of doing so to a complete stranger isn’t lost on me. Through it all Sean merely nods now and then, giving away nothing of what he thinks.
 

When I finish telling Sean about my latest encounter with Leila, he’s silent and thoughtful for a long moment.
 

“Look, I’ve got no Sight on this, lad. I’m sorry.” Sean shrugs apologetically. “But I can tell you this, and it don’t take no visions, only the wisdom of age and the experience with heartbreak: the girl loves you. You love her back, and that’s a fact. But if she’s got secrets, it’s for a reason. But in my experience, I can tell you that secrets will out, in time. Don’t force ’em from her, lad. That’s the surest way to make sure she bolts, and then you won’t never get her back. Take that from one who knows.” Sean’s eyes cloud, staring beyond me and into the past.

I sigh; I know Sean’s right, but I’d come to the same conclusion already, and I’m still wondering what I’m doing here. Just as I’m about to thank Sean and make my exit, the side door to the kitchen opens.
 

Jack Byrne strolls in, keys in one hand, cell phone in the other. “Hey, Gramps. I’m home,” he calls out, not looking up from his phone.
 

He stops in the entryway, the screen door not quite closed, distracted in that peculiar way people have when typing a text message. He sends the message and looks up, freezing when he sees me sitting at the table.

“Did I miss something?” Jack asked. “Is everything okay? It can’t be Miriam, I just talked with her a second ago…”

“Relax, boy-o,” Sean says, waving a hand in a ‘calm down’ motion. “He’s here on personal business, not as a copper.”

“Gramps, no one calls them ‘coppers’ anymore,” Jack says, shaking his head. “And I’m pretty sure that’s rude.”

I laugh. “No, it’s fine. It’s funny actually. But your grandfather is right, Jack. I’m not here as part of an investigation. Sorry if I startled you.”

Jack pulls out a chair between the two men and sits down, leaning back on the chair’s hind legs. “What possible personal business could you have with Gramps?” he asks, his voice openly suspicious.

Before I can respond, Sean reaches out and grabs his grandson’s hand, fixing him with a hard, piercing gaze. “Why don’t you ask him that yourself, son? Take a look.”

Jack shifts in his chair and lets the front legs touch back down. “He wants a Sight? Is that why he’s here? How does he even know about that?” Jack sounds exasperated. “You can’t go telling everyone you see that you have the Second Sight, Gramps, I’ve told you this. Not everyone will understand.”

Gramps huffs scornfully. “Jackie, son, I’m almost ninety years old. I’ve had the Second Sight since I was knee-high to a grasshopper, and I believe I know who to tell and who not to. You forget who you’re talkin’ to sometimes, boy-o. Try not to.” Sean’s voice is hard as iron, and Jack looks chagrined.

“Sorry, Gramps.”

“Eh, don’t mention it, son. Now, do as I say. Look, and See.”

Jack sighs, nodding. He reaches out and takes my hand in his, which has me shifting uncomfortably, but Jack squeezes hard, not letting me draw away.
 

“It’s necessary, boy,” Gramps tells me. “Just let it be.”

I’m not sure what to expect, especially after the unbelievable things I’ve experienced with both Miriam and Leila. What happens when someone has a Sight? Flashes of light? Mental probing? Levitation? And what is the Second Sight, anyway?

Jack is silent for several awkward minutes, eyes closed, hand clamped down like a vise on mine. The silence drags on so long that I’m about to jerk myself free, but then Jack’s eyes flick open and I’m pinned in place by the odd and unnatural light there. His brown irises seem to flicker and flare with a distant flame, and I feel a wave of heat wash over me, traveling up from my hand to my arm, then blazing through my whole body, setting every hair on my body on end. My heart palpitates wildly, each second drawing out and lengthening into lifetimes.
 

Jack’s eyes stare away into the middle distance, seeing something not physically present, and I note idly how much like his grandfather Jack looks. When he speaks, Jack’s voice is preternaturally deep and echoes off the walls with impossible volume, reverberating in my chest.

“She’s about to run,” Jack says, still gazing into nothingness over my shoulder. “You can’t let her go. The window of opportunity is short, and you have to seize it or all will be lost. You are called to greater things than you know, but Leila’s secrets will change you. You can only achieve your destiny if she is with you. Your mind is closed to the truth, Detective. You must open it, and not fear what you do not understand.” Jack’s words are oddly formal and out of character, and the inherent accuracy of them chills me to the marrow of my bones. There is no way Jack Byrne could possibly know what’s going on, as he hadn’t been home when I told my story to Sean. There’s just no way. I shake my head, pushing backward in my chair, scraping it on the floor tiles.
 

“How can you…” I stand up too fast, knocking the chair over. “You can’t…”

Sean rises as well, takes me by the shoulders, shaking me. “You came looking for this, boy-o. Don’t panic on me, now. He had a Sight, and a true one. Can’t get much clearer than that, lad, let me tell you. Sometimes these Sights only cloud the issue, but you got lucky.”

Jack seems exhausted, slumping forward on the table. He glances up at me. “Well? Don’t just stand here, dumbass! Go! Find her, before it’s too late.”

I head toward the door, but Sean stops me. “You don’t want to believe, at first,” he says. “You want to think it’s your imagination, or a coincidence. You’ll want to run off and do things your own way, and I’d advise you against that. The only answers you’ll find, looking into it your way, will be answers you won’t like. Just remember, when the moment comes, what you heard here. You’ll be faced with a choice, and it won’t be an easy one. When that moment comes, trust your heart and your instincts, not your mind.”

I feel the words hammer into me, driving down deep and resonating; I know Sean is right.
 

The moment I’m out of this house, away from Sean and Jack, I know my mind will start to play tricks on me. I’ll replay our conversations mentally, over and over again, and I’ll look for flaws and try to convince myself it’s all impossible.
 

And I’m right: as soon as I feel the freeway humming under my tires, the doubts begin. I fight them, but they seep in anyway. All the lies and evasions Leila has fed me are rearing up into insurmountable obstacles, and her strange, frightening powers are laced throughout it all, painting everything with broad strokes of implausibility.