“Oh,” he said. Taking out his notepad, he thumbed through it. “And it seems that assailant who tried to put you in the ground yesterday, that Zeke Herschel, was well on his way to becoming a mass murderer. You weren’t the first person he went after. Thank God you put a stop to it.”

My breaths stilled in my chest, my lungs seized, suddenly paralyzed, and a prickly sensation cut down my spine. “What … what are you talking about?”

“PD got called to his house this afternoon. We found his wife in their bedroom, marinating in a pool of her own blood.”

The room dimmed and the world fell out from beneath me.

“One of the worst domestic cases I’ve ever seen.”

I fought gravity and shock and a pathetic, panicky kind of denial. But reality swept in and kicked my ass, hands down. “That’s impossible.”

“What?” Uncle Bob looked up, took a step toward me.

“Herschel’s wife. It couldn’t have been her.”

“Did you know her?”

“I … sort of.” She couldn’t be dead. I dropped her off at the airport myself. I met Herschel at the bar immediately afterwards. There was just no way it was her.

“Charley.” The sternness in Uncle Bob’s voice jerked me to attention. “Did you know her? Is there something else I need to know about this case?”

“You’re wrong. It wasn’t his wife. It must be someone else.”

Uncle Bob sighed. Recognizing and dealing with denial was a daily part of his job. “It’s Mrs. Herschel, hon. Worried because she hadn’t heard from her, Mrs. Herschel’s aunt flew in from Mexico. She ID’d the body this afternoon.”

I sank onto my sofa then into myself and let oblivion take hold. I wasn’t sure when Uncle Bob left. I wasn’t sure if I was awake or asleep. I wasn’t sure when I crawled onto the floor and curled into a blanket I had stashed in the corner. And I wasn’t sure when—not the precise moment, anyway—I became the monumental f**kup I was infamous for today.

Chapter Twenty

Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons,

for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup.

—BUMPER STICKER

No, that was a lie. I did know the precise moment I began my long and illustrious career as an utter and complete f**kup who should never have been allowed to walk and chew gum at the same time, much less be set loose on the streets of Albuquerque. I’d been in the habit of leaving death and destruction in my wake since the day I was born. Even my own mother wasn’t immune to my poison. I was the very reason she died. Every life I touched, I tainted in some irreversible way.

My stepmother knew. She tried to warn me. I just didn’t listen.

We were at the park—my stepmom, Denise, Gemma, and I. Mrs. Johnson was there, like she’d been every day for two months, staring into the tree line, hoping for a glimpse of her missing daughter. She wore her signature gray sweater, kept it wrapped tightly about her shoulders, as though afraid if it opened, her soul would fly out and she’d never be able to catch it. Her dingy brown hair was pulled back in a messy bun with strays flying out of her head in every direction. Denise, in one of her more unselfish moments, sat beside her, tried to strike up a conversation, to little accord.

Denise had warned me not to talk about the departed in public. She said my imagination upset people, and on several occasions, she’d tried to talk Dad into putting me in therapy. But by that time, Dad was beginning to believe in my abilities.

So, it wasn’t like I didn’t know not to talk about it. But Mrs. Johnson was so sad. Her eyes were glazed over with it, and she was turning almost as gray as her sweater. I just thought she’d want to know, was all.

I ran up to her with a wide smile on my face. After all, I was about to give her the best news she’d had in a long time. After a quick tug on her sweater, I pointed to the field where her daughter was playing, and said, “There she is, Mrs. Johnson. Bianca’s right there. She’s waving at you. Hey, Bianca!”

As I waved back, Mrs. Johnson gasped and jumped to her feet. Her hands shot to her throat as she searched frantically for her daughter.

“Bianca!” she screamed, running forward and stumbling through the park. I was going to lead her to where Bianca was playing, but Denise grabbed me, her face frozen in mortification as she watched Mrs. Johnson run through the field, howling her daughter’s name. She screamed to a little boy to call the police and rushed into the forest.

Denise was in a state of shock when the police arrived. My dad had answered the call as well. They found Mrs. Johnson and brought her back to see what was going on. But my dad already knew. His head was bowed in something disturbingly similar to shame. And then everyone was yelling at me. All I could see were legs and fingers and teeth screaming my name. How could I? What was I thinking? Didn’t I understand what Mrs. Johnson was going through?

And Denise stood on the front line, crying and shaking and cursing the day she became my stepmother. Her fingernails dug into my arms as she shook me to attention, the disappointment on her face palpable.

I was so confused, so hurt and betrayed, that I withdrew into myself. “But, Mom,” I whispered through my pathetic tears that meant nothing to anyone there, least of all my stepmother, “she’s right there.”

She slapped me before my eyes even registered movement. There was no sting at first, just a baffling force and then a moment of blackness when my mind processed the sharp crack as my stepmother’s hand clapping against my face. Then I was back, nose to nose with Denise, her mouth moving in an exaggerated, angry fashion. I could barely focus on her through the flood of tears distorting my vision. I glanced through the blur at the faces of fury, the outraged expressions on each and every person surrounding me.