A pause, then she glanced at me. "I have to--I can't do this here. Too strong. Can you get the...stuff and bring it out to me?"
I nodded.
A COUPLE of minutes later, I slipped into the cleaning closet and found Hope there, rubbing the back of her neck.
"Sorry about that," she said. "It was just--"
"Too much."
A wry smile. "Yeah. Asking me to get a sense of those--" she waved at the bags in my hand, "--while I was in that room, would be like asking a bloodhound to pick out a month-old trail in an airport terminal. Way too much else going on."
"Are you okay?"
Nodding, she took a bag from my hand. She stared at it, but I could tell she was still watching the movie playing in her mind. A sharp shake of her head.
"Maybe you should get some air," I said. "I know whatever you saw couldn't have been very pleasant."
"I'm okay. It's not...They don't disturb me." She lifted the bag. "Nothing here. Let's try another."
She went through three of the half-dozen bags, then stopped on the fourth, eyes closing, eyelids flickering, like someone in the throes of a vivid dream. Her breathing accelerated. Sweat beaded on her forehead. Then her eyes flew open and she handed the bag back to me.
"Car accident."
The next two gave her nothing.
"One accidental death, five chaos-free deaths. My sensors aren't perfect, but if all those folks were murdered for their body parts, I should have picked up something from at least one. All I got was a car accident--single-vehicle collision. Not pretty, but normal enough."
"So they're likely morgue or cemetery pickings. Like necromancers use."
"You guys use...?"
I nodded. "Only we don't get the nice protective wrapping. Physical contact is a must."
"Ah."
"We get used to it. Like you and your visions--a nasty part of life."
She glanced at the bags. "So could this guy have been selling to necromancers?"
"Only without knowing it. More likely, he was just selling to humans wanting the stuff for medicine or magic. We use our own black markets, but even those are iffy. If I want quality goods, I have to go to the source."
"You mean..."
"Grave digging. Fortunately, it's not something I have to do very often."
Hope found one more violent death in the next batch--electrocution--but again it seemed accidental.
"So this cult draws the line at murder?" she said. "That surprises me. You'd think if you're going to kidnap and torture your victims, you'd kill them, if only to cover your tracks."
"Kidnap and torture?" I shook my head. "It may seem hard to believe, but they don't need unwilling victims. That bondage stuff is for the cult members. Consenting adults."
"Maybe that's what you saw. What I saw was definitely nonconsensual. And it was recent. I've been working on distinguishing past and current images and I have no doubt about that one."
"What did you see?"
"Not much. I was watching it from the victim's point of view, and his or her head was covered. Not just a blindfold or leather mask either. This thing was heavy."
"Like a metal helmet?"