Blind Rage Read Online Free PDF Page A

ETA on those files.”
    “The scarf, too. Don’t forget the scarf. I’ve got a feeling about it.”
    While Bernadette walked back to her car, she replayed the expression she’d seen on Garcia’s face. Was it concern beyond that of a boss for an underling? Her eyes must have been playing tricks on her. She slipped her sunglasses back on her face.
    Some days she despised her damn eyes.
    With those damn eyes, Bernadette could see things. She could hold something touched by a murderer and watch through the killer’s eyes. Problem was, her talent wasn’t a science. She could be seeing through the murderer’s eyes in real time or be observing something from recent history. An execution could pass before her eyes, or she could be saddled with mundane scenes of everyday life: A pair of hands scrambling eggs for breakfast. An old movie on a nondescript television set. The pages of a paperback book at bedtime.
    If she landed in the murderer’s eyes during his dreams, she saw bizarre images that would be no help at all to a case. She’d suffered through the visions of maniacs who were hallucinating because of their drunkenness or drug use or mental illness. Again, no use when it came to solving a crime. She could misinterpret what she saw (not hard to do since her vision was filmy when using her special sight) and lead an investigation in the wrong direction. Send the bureau running after the wrong person. Even in the most ideal settings (she often went to empty churches to help her concentration) she came up with blanks. Conversely, it could come on unexpectedly with a casual brush of her hand. Each time she used the sight, it sapped her of energy. Worst of all, it could put her in the same emotional state as the killer, leaving her furious or frightened or homicidal.
    Certainly she’d had successes over the years—otherwise the bureau would have cut her loose a long time ago—but her missteps were what attracted the most attention from the front office. A transfer routinely followed the failures. She’d landed in Minnesota the previous May after getting shuffled around Louisiana, where her coworkers had nicknamed her “Cat” because she had weird eyes like the South’s Catahoula leopard dogs. She had a brown right and a blue left.
    Garcia liked calling her Cat, and she didn’t complain. He’d asked for her when none of the other bosses wanted her. She was thrilled to be back in her home state, even though she had no close family left there. The farm had been plowed over by developers. Her parents and only sibling, a twin sister, were dead. So was her husband.
     
     
     
    HEADING BACK downtown, Bernadette steered the Crown Vic onto the interstate. Halfway to St. Paul, the traffic slowed and then stopped. “I hate cars,” she muttered, and tried to see around the minivan parked in front of her.
    While waiting for the logjam to break, she struggled to keep her mind off of the skeletons that the drowning case was bringing to the surface. She punched on the radio and turned up the volume on an ancient Rolling Stones tune, hoping to blast away the memories filling her head. The last thing she needed was to relive that sunny September day, three years ago, when Michael hanged himself on the water with his own boat rigging.

 
     
    Chapter 4

     
    BERNADETTE WAS STUDYING THE DIRECTIONS ON THE BACK OF a frozen turkey dinner when she was interrupted by a knock.
    “Cat. It’s me.”
    She tossed the carton onto the counter and went to the door. Garcia was standing in the hallway with a pizza box in his hands. “Hope you don’t mind. I slipped inside the building right after one of your neighbors went outside. The front door doesn’t shut all the way unless you force it. You should tell the caretaker—it’s dangerous and should be fixed.”
    “I’ll add it to the list.” She inhaled. “Sausage and green peppers and onions. Now that’s dangerous.”
    He looked past her into the open loft. “I thought I heard