Running Hot (The Arcane Society #5)(8)
Author: Jayne Ann Krentz

The agency was unique. It was established during the Victorian era, and it was always understood that its chief client was the Governing Council of the Arcane Society. Its highest priority was to protect the Society’s deepest secrets.

But somewhere along the way, the Council had acknowledged that most police departments simply weren’t equipped to deal with certain types of psychic sociopaths. Few members of modern law enforcement were even willing to acknowledge that some killers were endowed with talent. By and large, the Council considered that a good thing. The paranormal got enough bizarre press as it was, most of it in the harmless form of outrageous tabloid headlines and silly television talk shows. No one wanted the police to start making serious announcements to the media about psychic killers.

As far back as the Victorian era, the Council had reluctantly accepted responsibility for hunting down certain dangerous, renegade talents on the theory that it was better to handle such problems internally rather than risk allowing the freaks to continue to operate.

The Maui job might be a routine bodyguard assignment but it was something and he could use the money. And Petra had a feeling about it.

“I’ll do it,” he said.

“About time you came to your senses,” Fallon grumbled. “By the way, you’ll be working with a partner this time.”

“Whoa. Hold it right there. In your voice mail you said it was a bodyguard gig.”

“More like a chaperoning gig.”

“What the hell does that mean?”

“The person you’re going to be looking after is not one of my regular agents. She’s what you might call a specialist. A consultant. It’s her first time in the field. Your job is to make sure she doesn’t get into trouble. Let her do her job and then get her out of there. Simple.”

“I’m not mentor material, Fallon.”

“Don’t go into your lockdown stubborn mode on me, Malone. You’ll definitely be in charge of the operation.”

“That’s supposed to reassure me? In my experience specialists and consultants don’t take orders well.”

“Damn it, we’ve got a real shot at nailing Eubanks here. I’m not about to see it blown just because you don’t fancy working with a specialist.”

Eubanks was a suspect in the recent murder of a young woman whose family were all registered members of the Society. After the police officially ruled the death a tragic accident, the victim’s parents asked J&J to investigate the death. A psychic profiler who visited the scene of the crime prepared a profile that Fallon then handed over to one of the librarians in the Society’s Bureau of Genealogy. The librarian ran the data through the department’s latest whizbang computer program and produced three possible suspects. Eubanks’s name was at the top.

“I think you’d better find someone else,” Luther said.

“There is no one else. I need you and Grace Renquist on the scene by tomorrow. Eubanks is due in the following day. If he’s worried about being followed, he’s more likely to be watching to see who arrives after him, not who is at the hotel before he gets there.”

“I know how surveillance works,” Luther said patiently. “Who’s Grace Renquist?”

“Among other things, she’s an aura talent like you but with a twist.”

“Every talent has a twist. What’s hers?”

“She can read auras like no one I’ve ever known.” Fervent admiration hummed in Fallon’s voice. “When she gets a look at Eubanks, she’ll be able to tell me whether he matches the psychic profile that was prepared by the agent who investigated the crime scene. What’s more, she’ll probably be able to tell if Eubanks committed an act of extreme violence anytime within the past few months. Our client’s daughter was murdered six weeks ago.”

“Give me a break. No one can see that kind of detail in an aura.”

“Grace Renquist can. You know that old saying about murder leaving a stain? She says it’s true in the sense that it taints an aura in some unusual ways.”

“Uh-huh. And just how would she know that?”

“With Grace I don’t ask too many personal questions,” Fallon said.

“Look, even if she can make a positive ID for you, that’s not going to be of much help. You need solid evidence to give to the police in cases like this. Oddly enough, they hesitate to arrest people on the basis of an aura reading.”

“Which is a major pain in the ass,” Fallon grumbled. “But I’ll worry about digging up hard evidence after I know whether or not we’ve got the right guy. I’m still looking at two other possible suspects.”

“You said Grace Renquist is not one of your regular agents. What does she do?”

“She’s a reference librarian in the Society’s Bureau of Genealogy.”

“A librarian?”

“Specializes in the familial patterns of genetically inherited psychic traits.”

The Arcane Society had kept extensive genealogical records of its members since its inception in the late 1600s. It had not escaped the notice of the founder of the Society, Sylvester Jones, a brilliant if decidedly twisted alchemist, that psychic talent could be passed down through families. In the past few years, the Bureau of Genealogy had put the contents of its extensive collection of dusty tomes containing the family trees of generations of members into a computer database.

“I don’t believe this,” Luther said. “You want to pair me with some gray-haired little old lady from Genealogy? Is this your idea of a joke?”

“Now do you see my problem? I can’t send a sweet, innocent elderly librarian into a situation like this alone. She wouldn’t have a clue. With my luck she’d give herself away to Eubanks, who would bop her on the back of her bun and dump her body. Next thing you know, I’d have Old Beak yelling at me for getting one of his people killed on the job.”

Harley Beakman was the notoriously obsessive and powerful head of the Bureau of Genealogy. The name Old Beak had been bestowed on him decades earlier because of a certain unmistakable aspect of his profile. The moniker had stuck because he possessed the personality of a bad-tempered rooster.

“You can skip the high drama,” Luther said wearily. “I get the point.”

“I depend on Genealogy for a lot of my research. I need the cooperation of Old Beak and his staff. If I let anything happen to one of his people, I’ll be screwed.”