Still Not Dead Enough , Book 2 of The Dead Among Us (4 page)

Devoe went through the same process with the other Sig. Paul apparently passed muster on that one as well. The man questioned him a bit on his background as a child hunting with his father, was happy to hear he’d gone through a couple thousand rounds at a gun range to get the feel of the two weapons. Devoe wasn’t so pleased with the holster. “This is ok, but it could jam you up a little, slow you down in a pinch. Leave it with me for a few days and I’ll make some mods.”

McGowan opened his briefcase, handed Paul a small card and an envelope full of paperwork. “That’s a CCW permit—to carry a concealed weapon—for the state of California. You don’t know it but you applied for it and received it several months ago.”

Devoe nodded toward the card. “Those’re hard as hell to get in this state. Mr. McGowan has connections.”

Devoe gave Paul a pump-action sawed-off twelve-gauge and a couple hundred rounds of his “special double-ought.”

Paul looked at McGowan and Devoe and said, “Where’s the uzi, and maybe a fifty-caliber machine gun? I could mount it on the floor of my living room to cover the front door.”

Devoe frowned and looked at McGowan. “Kid ain’t gonna live long if he don’t start taking this seriously.”

~~~

He watched her walk to the bus stop, the beautiful little Mexican girl. Watched her carefully and couldn’t take his eyes off her.

Her parents had dressed her in a blue pinafore over a pale red dress, and matching blue knee-high stockings ending in shiny black shoes—very
Alice in Wonderland
. He loved
Alice in Wonderland
, not the story but the girl.

The little Mexican girl’s parents must be very proud of her, must love her very much. She had incredible raven-black hair that hung past her shoulders, flawless olive skin and almond shaped eyes. He thought she might even be more beautiful than the little blonde, and that brought a pang of guilt. It felt like cheating to desire the little Mexican girl more than the little blonde, a horrible act of infidelity.

No
, the voice said, a faint hiss somewhere deep within his soul.
She is the one.

Yes. He’d loved the little blonde so much, but now she was gone and he so desperately needed someone to hold, someone to share his affection. But this one would be different. This time he would just watch from afar, admire her, love her even, but never touch her. He didn’t want to hurt her. She was too beautiful to be hurt. He just wanted to hold her closely, tell her how much he loved her, how much he needed her.

Own her. We must have her, all of her, nothing held back.

“No,” he pleaded, closing his eyes, grimacing as he tried to shut the voice out of his soul. “Not this time. Please not this time.”

Yes, always. Look at her.

He opened his eyes. The young girl had stopped to talk to a boy her own age, Mexican like her, though his features were a little darker than hers.

Imagine touching her, caressing her carefully, running your fingers along such delicate, flawless skin.

“Yes,” he said. “Yes . . . yes.”

Once she knows how much you love her, how deeply you care for her, she’ll love you back, love you with all her heart.

He could see that she must have a loving heart, a kind heart. “Yes . . . yes, she will.”

Chapter 2: The Black

Katherine watched from the sidelines as Paul tried a small fire spell. He and Colleen were seated opposite one another at a table they’d dragged into her father’s workshop, while Katherine and her father, standing to one side, looked on. She’d come here with considerable trepidation, but now, after about an hour with the four of them working together in her father’s workshop, she couldn’t understand why she’d been so fearful of working with Paul, fearful of just being in the same room with him. It didn’t make sense.

Paul held both hands out, cupped together as if trying to hold water or beg for alms. He concentrated and a faint glow appeared just above his hands. It wavered for a moment then steadied and became a small, hot spark illuminating the room like an uncovered light bulb.

Her father was right. She didn’t recognize the arcane power Paul used. If it was earth magic, or he was tapping a ley line, she’d sense his manipulation of such forces. But she got nothing. She looked at her father and he nodded, as if to say,
See what I mean.

Colleen spoke softly to Paul and he extinguished the bright spark. Then she said, “Close your eyes and focus on me, try to sense what I’m doing.”

Colleen extended one palm and, with a thought, she tapped a nearby ley line and fire appeared just above her hand. But unlike Paul’s hot, bright spark, this was a flickering, dancing flame a few inches tall. Katherine easily sensed her use of the arcane forces.

Colleen asked, “Were you able to sense what I did?”

Paul kept his eyes closed as he said, “I felt . . . feel something.”

Colleen nodded. “Good. I’m going to hold this flame, and I want you to extend your hand again, and try to repeat what I did.”

Paul extended a hand and his brow wrinkled with concentration. The hot spark appeared, but he said, “No,” and it just as quickly disappeared. And again Katherine had felt nothing. Then a small flame fluttered to life in his palm, and Katherine felt him pulling normal power, pulling on the same ley line. It was interesting that he could pull on a ley line so instinctively. Katherine had expected him to naturally gravitate to earth magic, and from the expression on her father’s face, so had he.

The flame suddenly flared and grew to about a foot in height, then it shrank back and steadied, though it flickered wildly. Normal magic, with a beginner’s lack of control, but still normal.

“Release the spell,” Colleen said, as her flame disappeared.

Paul did so, and his too disappeared.

Katherine had a sudden inspiration. There were some techniques she’d used with troubled children that might help here. She walked up to the table and said to Colleen, “I have an idea. Let me try something.”

Colleen stood and walked over to McGowan. Katherine didn’t take her place, but paced back and forth in front of the table as she said to Paul, “I want you to show me something. Not repeat something we’ve taught you. Just something on your own.”

He looked at her skeptically. “Show you what?”

“I don’t know. There must be something you can do that no one else can do. Maybe something unique, something you’re really good at. Think about it.”

“I’m assuming you don’t mean belching the national anthem at a beer drinking frat party.”

She stopped pacing. “Can you actually do that?”

“No, but I knew a guy who could.”

“Come on,” she said. “There must be something you can do that’s unique, and doesn’t involve disgusting bodily functions.”

He pondered that for a moment, then a little sparkle appeared in his eyes.

She prompted him, “There is something, isn’t there?”

“Well, ya,” he said reluctantly. “But it’s just a party trick. I used to do it in college.” He grinned. “It was great for meeting girls.”

She looked over to her father and said, “See, he’s slutty too.”

She turned back to Paul. “What is it?”

He was clearly embarrassed at having to make the admission. “I can throw knives. Well, anything that’s metal and sharp: nails, whatever. I can stick it every time, and I can hit a half-inch target from across the room.”

“Did you practice this a lot?”

“No. I can just do it.”

“So you could do it now?”

He shrugged, still clearly embarrassed. “I suppose, though I haven’t tried since I was in college.”

She stopped pacing and faced him squarely. “Let’s give it a try.”

She turned to her father. “Any knives down here?”

He shook his head. “Not that aren’t heavily spelled.”

She looked around the workshop. There were three old wooden cabinets against one wall, all about six feet high, scratched and scarred old things. She pointed at one, looked at her father. “Mind if we use that as a target?”

McGowan shrugged. “Sure, go ahead.”

Katherine turned to Colleen. “Would you go up to the kitchen and grab a random selection of knives?”

Katherine walked over to her father’s workbench, scrounged in a drawer and found a black ink marker, walked over to the cabinet and quickly painted several small circles on the face of it, each about the size of a thumbnail. By the time she’d finished, Colleen had returned and dumped an assortment of knives on the table in front of Paul. He stood and examined them carefully.

Pointing at the cabinet, Katherine said, “Ok, Conklin, let’s see what you got.” Then she stepped several feet to the side, well out of the way.

“Thanks for the show of confidence,” he said, as he picked up a small paring knife and flipped it in the air a few times, catching it each time by the handle. “Ok. Now in the movies, the knife thrower always holds the knife by the blade when he throws it.” He flipped the knife a few more times, was clearly warming up to the show. “But that’s not necessary when you’re as good as I am.” He flipped the knife a few more times as he spoke. “You know, I met Suzanna doing this.” He stopped abruptly, and with a flick of the wrist tossed the knife across the room, stuck the point in one of the targets she’d drawn.

She walked over to the target, noted that the knife was perfectly centered in the small bull’s-eye. She’d felt a flow of power as he’d thrown the knife, just the tiniest bit, probably just enough to nudge the direction of the knife. But he wasn’t drawing on a ley line, or earth power, and she didn’t think he’d used his own life force.

She turned back to him. “Not bad, Conklin. Let’s see it again.”

“Ok, sweetheart,” he said in a bad Bogart imitation, now juggling three knives easily. A flick of the wrist, another flick, another flick, and all three knives were stuck perfectly in three targets.

She shouted, “Wooooooo!” and slapped her hands together, applauding loudly. “I’m impressed, Conklin.” She pulled the knives out of the cabinet. It wasn’t difficult since they’d hardly penetrated the wood. She laid the knives back on the table in front of him. “Can you throw them harder?”

“I don’t know. I suppose. Why?”

She wanted to get him to use more power than just the hint she’d sensed. “Oh, I don’t know. I’d think if you’re throwing a knife as a weapon, like they do in the movies, you’d have to throw it a lot harder than that. Otherwise, you’d just give someone a nasty cut. And in the movies they always drop the bad guy with one throw.”

Paul picked up one of the larger knives. “I’ll give it a try.” He flipped the knife in the air a couple of times, then drew back his arm and threw it hard. It thudded into the cabinet with considerable force, again centered in the target. But his throw had disappointed her. He’d still only used a hint of power to direct the knife, while the extra force had come from his arm.

“Come on, Conklin. You can do better than that. Harder.”

He picked up another knife, followed the formula of flipping it a few times, then threw it so hard he grunted with the effort. Again the knife landed home, but again all its force had come from his arm.

“Come on, Conklin. Harder.”

He picked up another, followed his usual formula and threw it with all his strength. But again no real use of power, though she saw his frustration growing as she taunted him. And that was exactly what she wanted.

She pulled a bit of power, formed a small spell to increase his frustration, fed the power into it and tossed it at him as she shouted, “That’s not it. I want to see you throw it really hard, much harder than that. Harder, damn it.”

He picked up another knife, flipped it in the air several times, concentrating on it. He had become clearly, visibly frustrated. But this time, with each flip she kept shouting “Harder,” and she sensed him drawing power from somewhere and concentrating it in the knife, most likely doing it unconsciously, instinctively. And each time he drew she felt a chill wash over her. Then he suddenly drew back his arm and threw the knife with a tremendous release of power.

Katherine heard a loud crash and her knees went weak. She dropped into a chair gasping for air, had trouble catching her breath as if she’d just run a mile, wrapped her arms around herself and shivered uncontrollably. Amazingly enough, her breath formed a cloud of steam in the chill air.

“Jesus!” she heard Paul say. The knife was buried to the hilt in the face of the cabinet. He put one hand against the cabinet, tried to pull the knife out with the other, grunted a couple of times and finally gave up.

Katherine’s shivering grew uncontrollably violent as Colleen sat down next to her and her father approached Paul. Colleen wore a sweater which she quickly pulled off and wrapped around Katherine. “You’re bordering on hypothermia.”

Katherine noticed that everyone’s breath was visible in the air. Walter looked at Paul but spoke for the benefit of them all. “He pulled the energy out of the air, pulled it out of Brownian motion—heat energy—dropped the temperature around the two of you by about thirty degrees.”

Colleen put a hand on Katherine’s forehead and said, “He also pulled it out of her, dropped her core temperature by a couple of degrees.”

Katherine’s father nodded. “That adds up. The body is mostly water, which has a considerable heat capacity. Air temperature would drop much more than body temperature.”

Katherine felt warmth flowing into her from Colleen’s touch. The shivering slowly subsided, but she was still weak in the knees. Colleen helped her to her feet and they started across the workshop.

Paul looked badly shaken, stunned, and his gaze kept switching between the knife and Katherine. Colleen hesitated at the workshop door, looked at him angrily and said, “You could have killed her. You really need to control that.”

~~~

Paul looked at the knife buried in the cabinet. The cabinet was made of heavy oak. The knife, with a blade about six inches long and a handle made of some sort of hard, black material, had plunged a good inch past the end of the blade, splitting and cracking the handle. It was impossible, utterly fantastic, and yet he remembered how he’d done it, that feeling of control over the environment around him. There had been a vast well of . . . something. He couldn’t put a name to it. Maybe it was energy, as the old man had said. But for Paul it had just been there, something he could tap into without consciously thinking about it. He had pulled on it effortlessly, drawn it to him, into him. And as Katherine had shouted at him, he’d drawn more and more of it, filling him with a sense of strength and confidence.