Storm of Visions (13 page)

Jacqueline grabbed Caleb by the shoulder and turned him to face her.

He gazed at her, his pale blue eyes cool and interested, as if she were a bug under a microscope. He said, “There always has to be one. Her term extends for as much time or as little as she likes, she picks her successor, and every seven years, she has to approve the new Chosen.”

The bastard. He’d known this all along.

“So the fate of the world depends on me and my visions?” Jacqueline spoke to Irving, but she stared into Caleb’s eyes. “Then the Chosen Ones are in trouble, because I’ve
never
had a vision.”

“W
hat?” Aaron Eagle swung away from his shot.

“Great. Just great. This seems like a good time to take a”—Samuel stopped, looked at Isabelle, and finished in a sarcastic tone—“a powder room break.”

“Why don’t you do just that?” Isabelle said. He strode from the room, and she muttered, “Run away. That’s all you’re good for.”

“How could you have never had a vision?” Aaron asked.

“I just never have.” Jacqueline didn’t like the way the American Indian fixed his dark eyes on her and demanded an explanation as if he had the right.

“Wow. I’m not the only one without a gift.” Aleksandr Wilder seemed less morose, more relaxed.

“Jacqueline, you have the mark,” Irving insisted.

“I
know
I have the mark.” Jacqueline tried to be quiet, but when she got defensive—and that happened a lot around the Chosen Ones, past and present—her voice rose. “I’ve never been allowed to
forget
I have the mark. That doesn’t mean the mark has ever done anything to me. Meant anything to me. I mean, what if it’s just a birthmark?”

Naturally, Irving paid no heed. “Have you gone underground? The earth always sheltered your mother, gave her the cradle she needed to access her talent.”

“It doesn’t work.” Jacqueline scooted into the mound of pillows, crossed her arms, and wished she didn’t feel like a sulky kid. She wished she didn’t feel as if she’d just failed the Chosen Ones. She wished Caleb would stop watching her so knowingly.

She wished . . . she wished that sepia-colored world would recede from the edges of her sight.

“If you’re not a psychic, why did you step into the circle?” Isabelle asked, her voice cool, aristocratic, and yet somehow comforting. Maybe she wasn’t so thrilled with her gift, either.

“It seemed the thing to do at the time. I didn’t know the building was going to blow up—” As Jacqueline remembered that blackened crater, her voice shook. “And I really didn’t realize there could be only one. I figured my mother would be around to pick up the slack.” Which was the truth, but not all the truth.

Caleb took her hand and toyed with the Velcro that held her glove in place. “Do you ever say something unintentionally? Something you never really thought about, but that comes out of your mouth and turns out to be true?”

Damn him. He knew the trouble she’d gotten in as a child, blithely predicting divorces and new siblings and Christmas presents.

“Yes. I did. But those aren’t visions. Those are premonitions. If you want me to tell you that your computer’s going to fry, I’m your woman. But if you want to know who blew up the Gypsy Travel Agency, or why, I haven’t got a clue.” Jacqueline had learned to close her mind to her premonitions, too. If she hadn’t, Caleb wouldn’t have found her in California. She would have hauled ass out of the country—for all the good that would have done her. She might have premonitions on her side, but he had her mother’s money on his.

“Look. It’s okay. You guys are forgetting—I’m a psychic.” Tyler sounded more than a little irritated at being ignored.

“That’s right,” Charisma said in relief. “He’s a psychic. We’ve got one.” She glanced apologetically at Jacqueline. “More than one.”

So there
, Jacqueline mouthed at Caleb.

Irving tapped his long finger on his lips and examined Tyler. “It’s unusual for males to have an intuitive gift. Usually the sensitive gifts are the arena of females. . . . Interesting.” Irving looked as if he were trying to remember something of importance. “What kind of visions do you see?”

“It depends on what happens and what I’m looking for.” Tyler was a handsome man in his late twenties, tanned, with shoulder-length golden hair and the greenest eyes Jacqueline had ever seen.

“So you have control over your visions?” Irving asked.

Tyler shook his head. “I didn’t foresee the explosion at all, but I think we can safely assume Zusane didn’t, either, or she would have stopped it.”

“But she
did
see the explosion,” Aaron said.

“She was very connected to the site and the people. I had only been in the building a few hours when they brought us down to the subway station. And unlike Zusane, I don’t receive well underground.” Tyler shrugged ruefully. “To tell you the truth, I don’t understand my gift or how it is given to me. I merely know I’m blessed to have it.”

“All of you gentlemen have done very well for yourself with your gifts.” Irving leaned toward Aleksandr and said kindly, “And I’m sure your gift will arrive in due time.”

“I hope so. It’s not easy being the untalented, unremarkable Wilder.”

Jacqueline really did like the boy. His youth hid a wry humor and an acceptance she wished she could claim.

“There are a few points about today’s explosion I don’t understand,” Charisma said.

Samuel walked in and proved he’d heard when he said, “Only a few points?”

“More than a few, but . . .” Charisma slid the bracelets around and around her wrists. “Did the perpetrators know we would be out of the building?”

No one answered. Finally Isabelle said, “We didn’t know what time we would leave to go to be confirmed. We were sent into that subway when a call came through.”

“From me,” Caleb told them.

Isabelle continued. “How would an enemy judge the right moment to eliminate us? I think it’s possible that they don’t know we’re still alive.”

“That’s a hopeful view of the matter.” Samuel watched her as if he were sorry for his previous cutting comments, as if he cared for her more than he could say.

Yes, you jerk, you hurt her when you behave like a jackass.
Jacqueline’s gaze shifted to Caleb. Oh, she knew about jackasses. And she knew about hurt. Luckily, she wasn’t as delicate as Isabelle. With a mother like Zusane, she had learned to be tough. It was the only way to survive.

“Do you think the perpetrators died in the explosion? Are we talking suicide bombers?” Tyler looked intensely at Caleb, wanting an answer from the man who, because of his experience, had assumed leadership of the investigation.

“That’s what I
think
,” Caleb answered. “Ask me what I
know
.”

In the doorway, someone cleared her throat, and everyone in the room swung around.

“If I could be allowed to speak . . .” Martha sounded, and looked, sarcastically polite.

“Of course, Martha,” Irving said.

“Someone should be sent to protect Gary.” Martha’s eyes kindled with anger. Her shock at the day’s events had curdled into bitterness; she sought to blame someone for the tragedy.

In a way, that removed her from the list of suspects.

“Who?” Irving asked. “There’s no one to do it.”

“Who’s Gary?” Charisma asked.

“Something you don’t know!” Samuel said in pretend shock.

In a smooth, cool, aristocratic voice, Isabelle said, “Samuel, you’ve already won the award as the nastiest person in the Chosen Ones. You don’t need to try and cement that honor.”

Jacqueline was starting to like Isabelle.

“Gary White. He was a team leader, one of our most talented, most trusted Chosen. Four years ago, he led his team into a dangerous situation. He lost almost every one. He returned—in a coma. There’s been no sign of recovery. He’s in a nursing home. . . .” Irving shook his head. “Forty-two years old. He could live like that for another fifty years.”

“Wow. When they recruited us, they never told us stuff like
that
.” Tyler was clearly displeased.

“Only a fool would imagine anything different.” The words escaped Jacqueline without forethought. Then she wanted to clap her hands over her mouth.

But it was too late.

Tyler glared and said, “If I’m such a fool, you’ll be relieved if I leave.”

“You can’t leave. This is more than a job. It’s a destiny. It’s your fate, and you cannot escape your fate. Tomorrow, we’ll begin to plan what we must do, but for tonight”—Irving gestured to the servants at the door—“Martha, McKenna, if you would fill everyone’s glasses again? And fill your own.”

When each of the Chosen Ones and the servants held a drink, Irving came to his feet.

Jacqueline stood. Caleb did also. Charisma and Isabelle rose. Everyone stepped forward, sensing the gravity of Irving’s intent.

Irving lifted his glass and began the traditional toast, the toast that had ended every evening at the Gypsy Travel Agency for as long as Jacqueline could remember. “To our fallen heroes, the Chosen Ones of days past.”

Jacqueline and Caleb, Martha and McKenna, lifted their glasses, and the Chosen Ones followed suit. “To our fallen heroes,” they echoed, and drank.

“And to the saviors of the world, our newest Chosen. May God bless our righteous endeavors and illuminate the right path.” Irving looked around. “Even if the path leads to darkness. Even if the path leads to death.”

The Chosen Ones froze with the glasses upraised.

“I never signed on for this.” Samuel looked around at them critically. Suspiciously.

To Jacqueline’s surprise, Charisma agreed. “I never wanted to be a hero.”

A
s the others drifted out, Caleb caught Jacqueline’s hand and held her in place.

Irving looked up inquiringly. “What can I do for you two?”

“I forgot to mention—on my trip out tonight, I did see something of interest.” Caleb’s voice was offhand.

But Jacqueline knew him too well. She read his mood, identified his posture, and recognized that this was important. Her hand convulsively tightened on his.

“It was probably nothing,” he continued. “It didn’t seem worth reporting to the rest of the group.”

Irving’s gaze grew sharp. “Yes?”

“I saw a woman. An older woman, handsome, in her sixties. She was having a drink at one of the bars I visited, and I wouldn’t have noticed her, but her nose had been slit down the middle.”

Jacqueline sucked in her breath.

“She’s had work done.” Caleb bent toward Irving. “But my mother told me that years ago in the Mediterranean basin, they would do that to women for infidelity. To see a mutilation like that here and now seems so barbaric that I wondered . . .”

Irving blinked in wide-eyed confusion. “Poor woman. I can’t imagine who she is.”

Jacqueline didn’t believe him.

Neither did Caleb, but he said, “No. I don’t suppose you can. But I thought I’d check.” Turning to Jacqueline, he kissed her fingers, intertwined as they were with his. “Shall we?”

“No, we shall not.” But he’d hooked her with that last too-casual query to Irving, and she followed him.

Before they stepped out the door, Caleb stopped and turned. “Irving, I forgot. When I left the bar, I heard a woman’s voice whisper, ‘Give Irving my regards.’ ”

Irving stared back at Caleb. “You must have imagined it.”

Caleb bent his head in sardonic agreement, then tugged Jacqueline out the door.

She went because Caleb had asked a loaded question, and Irving had lied when he answered. “Who was the woman?”

“I don’t know.”

“But she said something to you?”

“Without speaking a word or standing close.” He stopped on the stairs and turned to look at Jacqueline. “She smiled at me.”

Jacqueline contained her amusement. “Caleb, a lot of women smile at you. You’re a man worth smiling at.”