Living With the Dead (Otherworld 9)

Portia opened her mouth. Only a split-second shriek escaped. Then the chaos surged, so strong it blocked the rest of the vision. Hope had to replay it twice to see the ending. Portia started to scream, reeling back, then the first bullet hit and the scream died in her throat. A second bullet struck as she was already going down, the silenced shots barely more than loud puffs of air.

It was over quickly, the chaos surge brief but powerful, that final explosion... exquisite.

The first time Hope had seen a vision of a recent death, there'd been no pleasure in it. Too intense. Too uncomfortable. She'd taken solace in that. It was one thing to get a thrill from hearing strangers arguing. But to enjoy another's death? She wouldn't know how to deal with that.

Soon she had to. As her powers grew, she started to enjoy death. It was the purest, most perfect chaos imaginable. The ultimate high.

Even if she stopped chasing weird tales for True News and investigating rogue supernaturals for the council, she couldn't escape the experience of death. Passing the site of a recent car crash was enough. Short of locking herself into a room for life, she had no choice - she had to learn to deal with it.

With Karl's help, she was learning to accept the demon in her. She'd come to think of it that way: the demon. That didn't mean it was a separate entity - she could never make that mistake. It was as much part of her as Karl's wolf was of him. But it didn't need to rule who she was. She had to learn to appease it and control it. Accept the demon, master it and use it to her advantage, to protect herself and help others.

If it sounded like she had it all worked out, she didn't. Intellectually, she understood the lessons Karl taught her about acceptance and control. But that didn't keep her from feeling like a ghoul.

When Karl came looking for her behind the club, she was huddled against the alley wall, hugging her knees, forcing herself to replay the vision over and over, through that endless cycle of bliss and self-loathing until she'd wrested every last clue from it, fighting and cursing when he hefted her over his shoulder and carried her away.

So, no, she didn't have it worked out. And she was starting to think she never would.

* * *

ROBYN

There had been a moment, after waking on the park bench, when Robyn had reflected back on the events of the night and decided the answer was simple. She'd cracked.

After one too many glasses of champagne, she'd gone into that dark hall at Bane, and like Alice falling down the rabbit hole, she'd emerged in some hellish alternate reality of her mind's own making, where Portia had died, then Judd, and she was the primary suspect.

A shrink would claim the whole scenario was a subconscious manifestation of illogical guilt over Damon's death. Whether it was indeed a complete mental collapse or simply a drunken nightmare, she was relieved. A mental hospital she could deal with. Not like she hadn't expected to end up in one anyway.

Her relief lasted until she passed a newsstand outside the park and saw the newspaper headlines. It was like someone cut her power cord again, and she meandered for an hour, shocked, confused, lost... and thoroughly disgusted with herself for it.

A few years ago, when she and Damon had passed a poster for a book called The Purpose Driven Life, Damon joked it must have been written by Robyn's long-lost twin. She always had a purpose, a goal, a plan. Even on vacation, she never left without researching the locale and drawing up an itinerary. That didn't mean she scheduled every moment, but she'd hate to later hear someone talking about some hidden gem she'd missed.

In high school, she'd taken a test to identify where her strengths lay, and the answer came as a surprise to no one. Logical reasoning, organization and planning. Public relations might not have seemed the ideal fit for her, but it was. No matter what scrape a client got herself into, Robyn could say, "Give me a minute," and come up with a solution, usually two or three.

Now there was a citywide alert out for her, and here she was, wandering aimlessly, as if hoping someone would catch her and save her the trouble of taking action herself. When she heard a man call "Robyn," she turned to embrace her fate.

It was a testament to her mental state that it wasn't until the dark-haired man stopped three feet away from her that she recognized him.

"Karl?"

"It's all right." He moved forward slowly, hands outstretched, as if approaching a timid deer. "Hope sent me."

She nodded.

He took a cell phone from his pocket and held it out. "I'm going to take you to her. Do you want to call her? Check first?"

Robyn shook her head and let him lead her away.

They drove in silence to a motel. Karl parked right in front, checking to make sure no one was watching, then hustled her to the door.

Hope was inside. She closed and relocked the door as Karl strode past, scanning the dark, cool room, shades drawn.

You'd almost think they were harboring a murder suspect.

Robyn tried to laugh, but couldn't. Hope led her to the bed, where icy bottles of water, sandwiches and brownie bites waited. Robyn eyed the food, as if she could mentally will it into her hand. Hope handed her a bottle and told her to drink slowly. She did and it seemed to unstick her brain.

"How did you find me?" she asked.

"We found out where that undercover officer lived," Hope said. "Was he a friend of yours?"