Mind Tricks Read Online Free PDF Page B

the
room while he got naked. She backed out, shutting the door behind her and then
pacing to the end of the upstairs hall to give him even more privacy—or to give
her imagination a break from going into overdrive if it heard the sound of his
clothes hitting the floor.
    Maybe it was just as well that she
couldn’t read his mind. Telepathy had brought her and her loved ones only
trouble. In Maryland, she’d set up shop as both a pet and person psychic. Two
years later, she’d left town in the middle of the night, convinced that if she
didn’t depart on her own two feet, the folks would decide six feet under was a
better solution for her.
    But that danger had been peanuts
next to the first time she’d used her “gift.” When Trish had died.
    She gave herself a shake. This time
she would be smarter and keep her telepathy a close-held secret.
    She knocked on the bedroom door. A
muffled “Okay” drifted through the wood, and she entered.
    Jake was on his stomach, arms
curled loosely above his dark head, the white sheet a stark line below his bare
shoulders.
    He must take his shirt off in the
sun or something, for he didn’t have the fish-belly white skin most Maine
residents sported beneath their clothing.
    And she must keep her mind on her
work, not on the quality of his tan.
    “Comfortable?” she asked, her voice
squeaking embarrassingly at the end.
    “Absolutely.”
    Professional, Emma. Be
professional. “Just like before, I’m going to stand next to you and place my
hands on your skin. If this works, you might feel something like a tugging or a
growing warmth, but that’s natural. Just go with it and try to relax.”
    “Sure.”
    Closing her eyes, she inhaled until
her lungs were full and then exhaled slowly. She repeated the action twice
more, trying to settle her jumpiness and clear her brain.
    She opened her eyes. Okay. She was
ready.
    Gently lowering her palms onto his
spine again, she hunted for his energy lines.
    There was still nothing there.
    This was ridiculous. Where the hell
were they? Focusing, she closed her eyes and searched.
    Ah. There. Faint, muddled, but
actually there. Good—she hadn’t lost it completely. But why were they so hard
to see?
    She started to ask him if he could
focus on his breath and his heartbeat, but a tiny snore reached her ears. Jake
was out like a light.
    She wrinkled her nose. Apparently
his excitement at being mostly naked in her presence was far less than hers.
Heck, she’d gotten excited just by him coming upstairs. That was pathetic.
    She spent a good twenty minutes
attempting to trace his energy lines, looking for knots or blockages, but the
diffuseness of the flow made the task nearly impossible. Even when she did find
areas that seemed heavy or clogged, she couldn’t get a grab on the energy in
order to smooth it out.
    Jake slept on, oblivious.
    Finally thrusting her hands onto
her hips, Emma stared down at the near-naked man in her guest bed. Something
was interfering. A subconscious desire to keep his memories hidden away from
everyone, including himself? She couldn’t figure out how that would affect his
energy, though.
    She glanced at Jake’s face. Even in
sleep, a little line burrowed between his brows.
    He’d been awake for thirty-six
hours, and much of that time he’d been a murder suspect. If there was anyone
who needed sleep, it was him.
    She silently urged Brutus to follow
her out of the bedroom, closed the door behind her, and padded down the stairs
to the phone in the kitchen. She dialed Mickey’s number.
    “Mickey?” she said when he
answered. “Hi, it’s Emma. I have Jake here—”
    “So that’s where he went. I’d
wondered why his car was still in my driveway.”
    “Yeah. The thing is, he’s fallen
asleep, and I don’t know whether I should wake him or let him continue
sleeping. He looks like he needs some shut-eye: he conked out as soon as he hit
the bed.”
    A pause at the other end. “Emma
darling, just what are you doing with