The Vengeful Dead Read Online Free PDF Page A

been the hardest aspect to deal with?”
    Jackie’s brain spun in a helpless neutral. She had no gear for emotional sharing. “Um . . . being out of work, I guess.” Tillie just stared at her, tea cup held perfectly still in her hands. “You know, you should be an interrogator, not a shrink. All that tea and silence and that damn look you have would break down alfucking-Qaeda.”
    Tillie sighed. “Jackie. You’re making this harder than it needs to be. Inside these walls, you’re safe from everything. I’m not here to judge you. Nothing you say here will ever leave this room. You can be as calm or crazy as you want.”
    Jackie picked up the tea cup, focusing her will upon it to keep it from quivering in her hands. The warm liquid was strong but it wasn’t coffee by any stretch. “Not working really has been the hardest part,” she said. “I need it. I’ll be saner here than cooped up in my apartment all the time.”
    “An agent isn’t the only thing you are, Jackie.”
    “But it’s the only thing I want. OK? Nothing else matters. Everything else in my life is utter shit. When I’m here, I know what the hell I’m doing. Everything makes some kind of sense. Hell, I’d be happy pushing paperwork.”
    “I can’t OK you coming back,” she said, a curtain of stillness against Jackie’s rant, “until I’m sure you can go to bed at night without thinking it would be better not to wake up in the morning.”
    “That’s bullshit!” Jackie set the cup down, spilling half of it into the saucer. “I’m not suicidal.” God! If she thought that, she would never get her job back.
    “But the thought has crossed your mind?”
    “Why would I tell you that even if it were true?” Jackie threw up her hands in frustration. “I want my job back, not to be locked up for my own safety.”
    Tillie leaned forward, elbows resting on her knees. She folded her hands together beneath her chin. “Because it’s a normal thought to have, Jackie. I understand you better than you may realize. I know what you lost. The anchor in your life is gone and you’ve been cast adrift. The tomorrows look just like today, lacking any meaning. You have no idea what direction to set yourself in now.”
    Jackie cast her eyes down to her lap. The words had gripped her stomach and twisted it into knots. She could feel the tears welling up again. She hadn’t cried in three days and she wasn’t about to start. “It really isn’t fair that you can just look at me and see that.”
    “It’s what I get paid to do,” she said, a gentle smile upon her face. “I also spoke to Laurel at great length about your relationship.”
    “What?” She stared at Tillie in disbelief. “When? Why?”
    Tillie laughed softly. “Dear, I saw your friend twice a month for five years. We had a great deal to talk about.”
    Her mouth worked soundlessly for a moment. She made a quick swipe at her eye with the back of her hand. “I never realized, not until just before . . .” Her voice trailed off, unable to say the words.
    “Do you still blame yourself for her death?”
    Jackie flung herself back in the chair, letting out the breath she had been holding. No point in lying about that, now that she was a blubbering mess. “What do you think?”
    She sat up straight, eyes so full of sympathy and pity that Jackie could not look at her. “I think that if you can’t find a way to stop, you’ll never be able to come back. It will ruin you as an agent, Jackie.”
    “What! No! That is so not fair, Tillie. You can’t hold me to that.” She stood up, hitting the coffee table so hard that her cup fell over, spilling tea across the surface. “Shit. You want me to just forget about what happened in thirty days? You have some nifty little drug that will wipe my memory?” She spun away, walking across to the opposite end of the room by a bookcase stuffed to the brim with psychology books. Jackie stared blankly at the titles. “I can’t forget.”
    “Nor do I