Sense of Evil - Kay Hooper [51]
“You said it was a miracle she hadn't gone insane.” Rafe kept his voice low.
“Yes. But she didn't go insane, that's the point. She is an exceptionally strong lady. She lives her life and she does her job, whatever the effort or the cost. What you saw happen in here is a rare thing, but similar things have happened before. It hasn't stopped her in the past, and this won't stop her now. If anything, the strong connection will probably make her even more determined to put all the puzzle pieces in place and get this killer.”
“He's gotten away from her twice before,” Rafe said, more to himself than to Hollis.
But she nodded. “Yeah, it's personal. How could it not be? It was her best friend he killed ten years ago, in case you didn't know that. She and Julie King grew up together, practically sisters. Isabel was only twenty-one when it happened, in college, trying to decide what to do with her life. Taking the most amazing variety of subjects, like classical Latin, and computer science, and botany. Nerdy stuff.”
Hollis shrugged. “She was drifting, mostly. Getting by with good grades because of a good mind, not effort. Sort of . . . shut in herself, detached, uninvolved. From all I've been told, Julie's murder changed her completely.”
“That isn't what . . . triggered her psychic ability?” It wasn't really a question.
“No. That had already happened.” Hollis didn't offer to elaborate.
Rafe wasn't surprised. “But her friend's murder more or less started her life as a cop.”
“I'd say so. In the beginning, she just wanted to find out who had killed Julie. That's what motivated her, what began to shape her life and future. By the time he surfaced again in Alabama five years later, she had a degree in criminology under her belt and worked for the Florida State Police. She apparently did routine searches of law-enforcement databases on her own time, waiting for the killer to strike again. Just after he killed the second victim in Alabama, Isabel took a leave of absence and turned up there. That was when she met Bishop.”
“And turned in her state badge for a federal one.”
“Pretty much, yeah.”
Rafe drew a breath and let it out slowly. “So now she uses her knowledge, training, and psychic abilities to try and ferret out killers. Especially this one. Tell me something, Hollis. How many more times can she go through what she did in here before it breaks her?”
“At least one more time.” Hollis grimaced at his expression. “I know it sounds harsh. But it's also the truth; we take this stuff one . . . experience . . . at a time, and none of us can be sure when the end will come. Or how.”
“Wait a minute. You're telling me you guys know this stuff you do is going to kill you one day?”
“I'd call that a radical interpretation of the text,” she murmured.
“Hollis.”
“We're not the only stubborn ones, I see.”
“Answer my question.”
“I can't.” She shrugged, more than a little impatient now. “Rafe, we don't know. Nobody really knows. We're all checked out medically after assignments, and the doctors have noted some changes in some agents. They don't know what that means, we don't know what it means. Maybe nothing.”
“Or maybe something. Something fatal.”
“Look, all I can tell you is that for some agents, there's a price for using their abilities. Some, like Isabel, live with pain most of the time, usually headaches. Some finish up assignments so exhausted it takes them weeks to fully recover. I know one agent who eats constantly during a case, and I mean constantly; it's like her abilities cause her metabolism to shoot into high gear and she has to fuel her body continually in order to do her job. But there are other agents who never seem affected physically by what they do. It varies. So, no, I can't tell you using our abilities is going to kill us one day. Because we just don't know.”
“But it's possible.”
“Sure, it's possible, I guess.