Blood Ties

by Kay Hooper

  “So nobody comes back from being lost in the gray time?” Hollis held her voice steady.

  Diana shook her head. “Nobody, as far as I know. Because even if the body is kept alive on this side, the gray time really is a corridor between two realities. Nothing belonging to either side can exist in there indefinitely; the guides have told me that much. For us, from this side, the exhaustion becomes overwhelming, all our energy is drained away, and…”

  “And?”

  “And our spirits apparently pass on to whatever lies beyond the gray time. I’m told there’s peace to be found there. But I’m also told peace isn’t necessarily the destination for every soul.”

  “So there is a hell,” DeMarco said, sounding thoughtful. “I’ve always wondered.”

  Diana nodded a bit hesitantly. “I think so. At least it sounds that way, that something… unpleasant… is waiting for at least some spirits. Calling it hell is probably as good as anything else.”

  Hollis said, “Let’s not get sidetracked by a philosophical—or theological—discussion, if you don’t mind. Not tonight, anyway. Diana, you’re basically telling me that if I got trapped in the gray time and couldn’t find my way out before the door closed, I’d be dead.”

  “Afraid so.”

  “And the door closes—how?”

  Diana blinked. “You know, I haven’t really thought about it that way. Because there are doors in the gray time that seem literal, and they open or close without seeming to affect me.”

  “Guess,” Hollis suggested.

  “Okay.” She thought about it for a moment. “My guess is that if anyone of this world stays in the gray time too long or… somehow … wanders too deeply into the gray time, gets too far away from their physical self, then the door would close. The door we open as mediums. I suppose, thinking about it, that it’s less a door than a connection that gets severed—the connection between the body and the spirit. Cut that tie or have something cause it to snap, and… and it doesn’t get repaired. The spirit can’t return to the body.”

  “Well, that doesn’t sound fun.” Hollis’s voice remained calm, even somewhat sardonic. But her eyes were wide and dark, and she continued to chew on her thumbnail—until DeMarco stepped away from the dresser, reached around to grasp her wrist, and with seeming gentleness pulled her hand down and away from her mouth.

  Very interesting indeed, Diana thought, distracted again.

  Hollis turned her head briefly toward him and said, “Leave me my vices, will you?” But her voice was still calm, and her hand remained in her lap where he had put it.

  “That’s not a vice, it’s just a bad habit,” he said. “If you’re interested in vices, I’ll go find some booze. Don’t know about the rest of you, but I could use a drink.”

  Diana shook her head. “Not me. After spending most of a lifetime medicated to the gills, I don’t drink.” As personal as the first part of that information was, she was completely aware that most if not all the other SCU agents knew at least some of her history. As Quentin had pointed out with a shrug, even stuff never said out loud was known when there were so many telepaths around.

  Hollis laced her fingers together in her lap and said, “I’m so tired one drink would knock me on my ass. Diana, I hope you have a few tricks you can teach me to protect myself over there. But even if you don’t, stop blaming yourself, okay? It was my idea to go the first time. I can deal with the consequences. I’m a survivor.”

  “She is that,” Quentin agreed. “More lives than a barrelful of cats, if you ask me.”

  Diana wished that made her feel better. It didn’t.

  Either seeing that or else pursuing a thought of his own, Quentin added, “And then there’s Reese. After tonight, I’m betting he could be Hollis’s lifeline and pull her out before she gets lost.”

  “Happy to oblige,” DeMarco said.

  “Let’s hope it isn’t necessary,” Hollis said without looking at him, her tone rather careless. “Anyway, at the moment I’m more interested in what happened after I was pulled out tonight. Why something in the gray time—presumably a spirit—tried to trick you, Diana. And what it was trying to trick you into doing. Or believing.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Can you speculate? Guess again?”

  Diana shook her head, trying to throw off the last tendrils of that weird fuzziness in her mind. “I can’t even imagine what it might be.”

  “Sure you can,” DeMarco said.

  She stared at him, frowning. “Oh? And how is that?”

  He didn’t appear to be the least bit bothered by her stiff tone. “First, stop assuming it was a spirit. Just because we haven’t encountered another medium who can walk in the gray time doesn’t mean one doesn’t exist. In fact, it’s almost certain one does, since psychic abilities aren’t unique. Certain aspects, sure; I have a double shield and, so far as we know, that’s unique. But most psychics have a shield of some kind, and without knowing every single one of them I could hardly be sure there isn’t another double shield out there.”

  “He has a point,” Quentin noted thoughtfully.

  DeMarco nodded and said to Diana, “You can walk in the gray time, and you’re exceptionally strong there because of most of a lifetime’s experience. But on two separate occasions, Hollis has been able to function there as well.”

  “If you can call it functioning,” Hollis muttered.

  “I can,” DeMarco told her, then added before she could comment, “She may not be able to open the door to the gray time, but only one previous visit enabled her to form a connection to that place, to be drawn back into it when Diana opened the door. Which could mean it’s a lot more accessible to mediums than we’ve assumed and that others have been drawn there as well. And that, somewhere, another medium exists who was drawn to cross through that doorway rather than just open it for spirits. Curiosity alone would surely drive at least some to wonder what it would be like. And it’s a small step from wondering to attempting.”

  Hollis said, “It would better explain the deception. I mean, if the guides have never attempted to deceive you, why start now? But if it’s another psychic trying to do that…”

  DeMarco finished: “…what better way to attempt a deception than to show you a face you trust?”

  “It makes sense,” Diana allowed. “At least as much as any other possibility does.”

  Quentin said, “It also opens up the probability that this particular enemy knows you well enough to know who you trust. Or has been watching long enough to … draw certain conclusions.”

  Diana wasn’t sure which possibility made her more uneasy. But both of them did. She was about to comment on that when the sudden ringing of a cell phone made all of them—except DeMarco—jump. He reached back to pick up Diana’s cell phone from the dresser, looked rather automatically at the caller I.D., and then tossed the phone to land within Diana’s reach.

  “Elliot Brisco. Your father, I gather.”

  Diana reached her free hand to pick up the phone—and turned it off midway through its ring tone. “Yeah. He’s been out on the West Coast—and never considers time differences when he’s calling me. Or anyone else, for that matter.”

  “Could be an emergency,” Hollis suggested.

  “Trust me, it isn’t. Just him ready to argue one more time that joining the FBI was the worst idea of my life.” She drew a breath and let it out slowly, then ruthlessly got them back on topic. “Okay, so let’s assume for the moment another medium was there in the gray time. And either knows me well enough to be sure of who I trust or else has been able to read me. I don’t have much of a shield, right?”

  It was DeMarco who answered. “Not much of one, no. But you don’t broadcast like Hollis does, so it would probably take a fairly strong telepath to read you.” Before Hollis could make an indignant comment, which she seemed about to do, he added, “But there’s nothing to say another medium with a lesser telepathic sense might not be able to read you far more clearly in t
he gray time than on this side of the door. Or even another medium who isn’t telepathic at all. A lot of the rules we’ve come to accept in this world, this reality, may not be true in that one. In fact, the chances are pretty good that there are a lot of differences over there.”

  Diana wished she could dispute that, but the more she thought about the possibility, the colder she felt. “So another medium could be reading me in the gray time. And maybe… influencing me?”

  DeMarco was utterly matter-of-fact. “Maybe. We’re generally more vulnerable in an unconscious state—which is what your dreams and trances amount to.”

  “You’re strong in the gray time,” Quentin reminded her.

  “Am I? What if I only think I am? There’s… something I’ve never been able to explain about the gray time. It hasn’t happened often, but throughout my life I’ve awakened from trips there to find my physical self somewhere other than bed. Somewhere dangerous.”

  Quentin nodded, clearly remembering. “Up to your waist in a lake. Driving your father’s sports car at high speed when you were too young to drive at all.”

  “Yeah. And there were other things, awakenings I haven’t told you about. Finding myself in other dangerous places or just baffling ones. Sometimes miles and miles from home. With no memory or understanding about what I was doing there. Or what I was meant to do. At the time I thought those things were more symptoms I was losing my mind—or had already lost it. Once all the meds were gone and I could think clearly, once I knew I was a medium and understood what that meant, I guess I thought I’d been trying to help a guide get a message to someone but that my body and spirit were still so out of sync, things got confused and I tried to act before knowing what it was I was supposed to be doing, before I was even awake.”

  “That sounds possible,” Quentin said. “Maybe even likely.”

  “I guess. Looking back now… I don’t know what to think.”

  In his usual neutral, pleasant tone, DeMarco said, “But it’s equally possible that someone could have been trying to influence you. Make you behave in ways you wouldn’t have consciously done.”

  “Even when I was a child?”

  “Maybe especially then. When it was still new to you, still something you were trying to learn to control.”

  The possibility that someone could have been following her around in the gray time all these years, without her knowledge or even awareness, made Diana feel cold to the bone. It felt like a violation, a rape of her mind, of herself. She forced herself to speak calmly. “I suppose it’s possible. But—”

  Still in that impassive tone, DeMarco said, “Psychic abilities often run in families.”

  Understanding, Diana said, “My mother was psychic, I believe. Probably my sister, Missy, as well. But they’ve both been dead for years.”

  “Is it possible your father—”

  Diana laughed, hearing how brittle it sounded. “No. My father isn’t psychic. At all. My father doesn’t believe in psychics. He was convinced my mother was mentally ill. He chose to believe I was mentally ill rather than accept the possibility I might be a medium. How’s that for not believing in psychic abilities?”

  DeMarco’s expression didn’t change, but his voice softened somewhat when he said, “I’m sorry. I didn’t intend to open up old wounds.”

  “Oh, no need to be sorry. You didn’t reopen anything. He more or less said that about a week ago. So, still a fresh wound, I’m afraid.”

  Quentin said, “Diana, I told you it takes some people a lot longer to come to terms with this. My father still refuses to accept I’m a seer, and he’s known it for years.”

  “Yeah, well, your father didn’t threaten to have you committed when you first told him, right?”

  Hollis said, “Your father seriously did?”

  Diana nodded jerkily. “He was deadly serious, believe me. Quentin can tell you; he was there. So was Bishop. I don’t know what Bishop said to my father later, but whatever it was, it at least stopped him threatening me. Now he just… It’s like water dripping on stone. I don’t belong in the FBI. I’m out of my element. I’m going to get myself killed. On and on.”

  “I’m sorry,” DeMarco repeated.

  She looked at him, then at the other two, and sighed. “No, I’m sorry. That’s … personal junk. Baggage. We all have it. Mine doesn’t alter the possibility that somebody could have been there with me in the gray time, trying to influence me—for whatever reason.”

  “Creepy,” Hollis noted.

  “I’ll say. Especially when I don’t have a clue who it might be—and have never been aware of another presence there.”

  Quentin said, “Maybe because there wasn’t one. Look, this is all speculation.”

  “But possible,” DeMarco noted.

  Quentin sent the other man a quick frown, then said to Diana, “Never mind that now. Let’s focus on what happened tonight. How did you know it wasn’t me?” His voice was calm and steady, as was his gaze when she finally looked at him. “We both know I could have said those words, most of them at least. So how did you know it wasn’t me?”

  “I just… knew. Almost from the first instant. It felt wrong. Like something was off. And all my strength was draining away suddenly, too suddenly. As if…”

  “As if you were under attack?” DeMarco asked. “Because when I was pulling Hollis out, that’s what it felt like to me.”

  He sat up and swung his feet off the bed, reaching immediately for the bottle on his nightstand.

  A strong hand beat him to it, removing the bottle from his reach, and the visitor said, “Not just yet. Tell me.”

  “Look, this shit isn’t easy, you know. Takes a lot out of me, I told you that. I’m tired and thirsty. I need—”

  “You need to tell me what happened in the gray time. Now.”

  He studied the visitor for a moment, then sent a longing glance toward the bottle and shrugged, trying not to look as wary as he felt. Money was great, and he was as willing to use his God-given talents for hire as a gifted artist was to sell his paintings; a man had to make a living, after all. But this particular “buyer” made him nervous.

  Ruthless men with scary agendas made him nervous. Especially when they looked dangerous as hell.

  “Tell me,” the visitor repeated.

  ‘Okay, okay. But I’m not so sure you’re going to like what I have to say, Bishop.”

  “You let me worry about that.”

  Six

  DEMARCO WAITED UNTIL Hollis disappeared around the corner of the hallway toward her own room before saying to Quentin, “If someone’s been influencing Diana for years, we need to know about it.” He kept his voice low, since Diana’s closed door was only a few feet away.

  “Doctors were influencing her for years. Her father was influencing her for years. The goddamn meds they had her on to treat her because they didn’t understand or refused to accept her abilities influenced her.”

  “You know what I’m talking about.”

  “Yeah, well, we don’t need to know more about that tonight.” Quentin kept his voice low as well. “Look, she’s been through a lot. A hell of a lot. She’s made progress in the last year, but she’s a long way from feeling secure in herself and her abilities, especially with Elliot Brisco trying to undermine her confidence just about every step of the way.”

  “He sounds like a real prince.”

  “He’s a very wealthy man accustomed to getting what he wants. And he wants Diana back under his control. To protect her.” Quentin shook his head. “I try to be sympathetic, because he lost his wife and Diana’s sister, Missy, thirty years ago, and he naturally doesn’t want to let go of his only surviving child. And I’ve tried to stay out of it as much as I can, because it just isn’t smart to interfere between a parent and child—even a grown child. And especially between a father and daughter.”

  “True enough.”

  “Yeah. Though I’ve wanted to deck the man more than once, I don’t mind telling you.” Quentin s
hook his head. “But that’s not a situation that’s going to change anytime soon. What’s concerning me now is Diana’s reaction to the idea that someone else, some other medium, might have been hiding in the gray time with her since she was a child, watching her and, yes, maybe even influencing her. It’s bound to spook her. Hell, it spooks me.”

  “It should spook all of us, Quentin, and you know it. What happened with Samuel plus all the other little leaks and breaches in security we’ve had to deal with these last few months are clear evidence that someone inside the SCU has been passing on information, to the Director and possibly to others.”

  “We don’t know it’s one of us,” Quentin protested, because he had to.

  “We don’t know it isn’t. In fact, it more than likely is an SCU team member, considering how little specific information about the unit gets out otherwise. Given that strong possibility, we’ve got two alternatives: Either an SCU member is deliberately and consciously betraying the rest of us, or else a psychic outside the unit has found a way to tap into one of us—maybe more than one of us—and get information without our awareness.”

  Quentin didn’t like hearing either possible scenario voiced aloud, mostly because he’d considered both long before now. But all he said was, “It can’t be Diana, and I mean can’t. Not only is she new to the SCU, but up until a couple of months ago, she was in training, completely uninvolved in any of our cases.”

  “You didn’t talk to her?”

  “Not details, not until we were set to join this investigation and she needed to be brought up to speed. And she didn’t see any of the reports until then.”

  “Okay. Still, if her ability makes her vulnerable in any way to outside influences, we need to know about it.”

  “Not tonight,” Quentin repeated.

  “Personal feelings aside—”

  “My personal feelings are aside, at least about this. Reese, so far the only remotely psychic activity we’ve had in this case has involved Hollis, Diana—and the gray time. I haven’t seen anything, and if she’s being straight with us, Miranda hasn’t seen much. Unless—can you read her?”