Asshole. With a smile, Brooke shook her head. “That should do it. Because it seems as though we are accelerating the timeline, I will have your new craft beer label design finished as soon as humanly possible. As far as incorporating the completed and approved design into your keg collars, tap handle designs, and case trays—as well as scheduling the creation of merch like posters, taproom coasters, T-shirts, and swag—we can talk about the production piece when the label is finished.”
After packing up and thanking them for their attention, telling Gene she would call him, Brooke and Neeta left the brewery, the art student chattering madly the whole way to Brooke’s vehicle about howawesomethe entire experience was.When they walked out the door, though, Brooke gave a last glance over her shoulder, seeing that Gene was back behind the bar—but the three Reflex partners were huddled together, talking quietly for a moment before disappearing into the office.
When the two women had buckled themselves in and Brooke had pulled out of the parking space, however, Neeta’s ditzy art student demeanor abruptly changed when they were out of sight of Cask & Canvas.
“Dude,” she said to Brooke, a grim look in her eyes as she turned to stare at the side of Brooke’s head, “you have fuckingproblems. I know neither you nor Lys gave me any details as towhyyou’ve been having all these misgivings about Reflex, but I gotta tell you…those are some dirty damn creeps. Some serious shit is getting ready to go down in that place, and I don’t think you’re safe, Brooke.At all.”
Chapter 10
“This is going to sound really weird, okay? First, I need to give you a wee bit of background so you can understand where I’m coming from. And believe me, this isnota joke. I think your girl might be in danger, and I want to make sure you understand the reasons why I’m feeling the way I do.”
The APS management team—along with Kelly, Piper, Brooke, and Alyssa—were sitting in the larger of the two APS conference rooms with Alyssa’s art student, Neeta Pourciau. When Neeta had made her startling pronouncement that she didn’t think Brooke was safe at Cask & Canvas after she and Brooke had left the brewery, Brooke had instantly touched her comm and reported what Neeta had said to the management team. Blake directed her to bring the art student to APS right away so they could discuss Neeta’s impressions.
After everyone had settled, Brooke and Alyssa introduced Neeta, then Brooke had reiterated what she had said in the car. Taking a deep breath after her opening bombshell, Neeta looked heavenward and crossed herself, then focused her attention back around the table.
“Do any of you understand what claircognizance or clairsentience is?”
Right away, Bryn nodded. “Clairsentience is a metaphysical sense, a physical or emotional feeling that washes over you out of the blue, without any apparent connection to your actual state of mind. For example, you can suddenly feel sad or anxious without reason or feel an unexplained sense of foreboding. Claircognizance is also a metaphysical sense, but it happens when youknowsomething happening is one hundred percenton target—with absolutely no doubt—but you can’t necessarily back up your thoughts with fact or an explanation ofhowyou came by that information.”
“Correct.” Mumbling to herself, “God, this is weird,” Neeta continued, her small fingers twisting on the table in front of her. “I’m originally from New Orleans. My family is generations-old Creole, and…and…and myTanteLéonie Pourciau is a voodoo priestess. My entire life, she has told me I have one of the strongest clairsentient and claircognizant abilities she has ever seen. Today, in that presentation with Brooke, I have never—in my twenty years of existence—evergotten the impressions that I did today from those men.
“I know it sounds crazy, but the thoughts and imprints I received? Brooke isnotsafe, I don’t think…or, at the very least, the potential exists for her to come to a whole lot of harm. You may throw me out of here, but I could have never lived with myself if something happened to her and I hadn’t said anything.”
Jaime smiled at her kindly, her arm wrapped around Alyssa’s shoulders. “Sweetheart, at least three of us sitting around this table are of Puerto Rican descent.Espiritismo, or a belief in semi-magical spiritualism, is not at all uncommon in our culture. I promise you, you can speak freely here, and none of us will think you are crazy.”
Blowing out a breath in relief, a clearly more comfortable Neeta went on. “Okay, then… thank you. To start off, let’s take the guys who attended the meeting today, one at a time.
“First up: Gene? The microbrewery owner? Totally legit dude. He loves his business and is willing to do whatever it takes to make it a success, so you have no worries there. The other three, however?Completedirt bags.” She rolled her eyes as Trill’s fingers flew across her keyboard, taking notes.
“Let’s start with Clay, who feels to me like the most guarded of the three who were there. The energy surrounding him hasan oily feeling.Slippery. And he’s got that fast-talking salesman spiel down pat. The drivel he threw at Brooke when she asked them about talking to other brewery owners that Reflex has helped in the past? I felt my gag reflex try to kick in, as if my body wanted to vomit out the deceit he was spewing. Clay is the hit-and-run guy, who would normally be gone with the wind by this time in whatever little con they’re running. I have my theories about why he was there today, when he should be out of the loop by now, but we’ll get back to that.”
She took a sip of water. “Next, we have Robert. There’s your brains. He’s your behind-the-scenes guy, the not-so-flashy invisible partner. My senses kept screaming that, whatever con job they’re running, he’s the one solely responsible for putting together the cogs and gears of the scam. He has probably thecoldestenergy of anyone I’ve ever run into.
“That dude is fucking ice, you guys. Where his soul should be was a big black pit ofnothingness.TanteLéonie taught me years ago how to identify a sociopath when my metaphysical senses started firing in the presence of evil, and he definitely checks all the boxes. You would think that would make Robert the mostdangerousone of them all, but that honor goes to another one of them. We need to talk about Thom for a minute first, though, before I get to Jack.”
Her arms crossed behind her head as she leaned back in her chair, Drew mused, “Since Brooke was hired to do the graphic art for their rebranding, it doesn’t sound like anything she does would be of much interest to Robert or would put her on his radar. He’s a tech guy, and Brooke is an artist. She would have no dealings with him, so the threat must be coming from somewhere else.”
Neeta nodded. “Thom wasn’t there in person, but I received adistinctfeeling of intuition that the others aren’t happy with him at the moment. And I don’t think the reason why is goingto make any of you very happy either.” The room went wired as Neeta turned to Brooke with a grave expression. “You need to be careful, girl, because I sense an interest in you coming from him. His physical presence was absent, but the energy I felt from the others pointed to Thom being excluded because they were convinced you would cause him to lose focus.”
Uncaring that Neeta was in the room, Blake reached over and lifted Brooke onto her lap as thunder hit every face. “I will break that motherfucker intwoif he dares to come so much as within a mile of her,” the Utopia head snarled, wrapping her arms around her femme. “He is adead manfor even remembering she breathes.”
“We have her covered,broki.” Riley’s voice was mild even as she and the rest of the team remained alert to Blake’s mood, although they were clearly pissed. “Brooke is never alone at the moment, and there is no reason she has to go back to Cask & Canvas by herself. Everyone will keep her safe.”
“Thom isn’t going to risk being cut completely out of this scam because he’s thinking with his dick,” Neeta reassured them. “The others refusing to allow him to attend the presentation today is going to be enough to pull him back into line. He won’t want to lose that money, not over a woman he barely knows. Still, be extra careful, Brooke, just in case this dude decides to go off the rails, even though I don’t really get any sense of danger from him. However, who youdohave to worry about is Jack.
“If Robert is a sociopath, that fucker is ademon.” Neeta rubbed her forehead. “His energy is malicious, controlling, and the dudekills. Seriously, it’s like some netherworld black evil spirit resides where his soul should be, different from the bottomless pit of nothing in his partner. You’d better believeTanteLéonie made sure I knew how to recognize these entities and how to protect myself. They. Are.Dangerous.
“While Jack doesn’t necessarily suspect Brooke of anything—because she’s never shown herself to be anything but a naive graphic artist who has given him no cause for concern—he is paranoid and suspicious ofeverything. It’s easy to forget that even malicious people have a capacity for claircognizance and clairsentience, although they don’t think of it in those terms. Jack operates purely on gut instinct, and heneverignores his gut. If he perceives a threat, he simply eliminates it. All done.”
Drew stared up at the ceiling, thinking. “If he and his partners have been in the area for approximately eighteen months, you can’t tell me a trigger-happy piece of shit like him hasn’t left a trail somewhere then. I don’t care how smart he thinks he is. Now that we have a little more intel, I can give Liz and Toni more of a direction down in Purgatory. They’ll focus on learning who Jack has made contact with. What else is he sniffing around? They’ll dig it out.”
“As far as why Clay was there,” Neeta added, “my imprints indicate the others are very aware Jack needs to be leashed since he is the most volatile one. He gives the impression he’s the one in charge, but I don’t think he is. I think that honor actually belongs to Robert. And Jack may be the enforcer, but Clay is the salesman, the schmoozer. He’s more skilled than the rest of the Reflex guys when it comes to controlling the demon inside Jack, so Clay made an appearance at a presentation he wouldn’t normally attend to make sure Jack didn’t step out of line.”
Riley and the rest of the team smiled at her, obviously impressed. “Neeta, you have been enormously helpful to us,” Riles said, the team murmuring assent.” Thank you for being so willing to share your impressions with the team. You have no idea how much you’ve done for Brooke, as well as for APS.”
Clearing her throat, Neeta said softly, “It isn’t often that I meet people who will take my impressions this seriously. I mean, you made it clear you were absorbing everything I said andbelieved me, and you didn’t hesitate. That’s not something I’m used to, so thankyou.”
“Honey, you wouldn’t begin to believe some of the stuff this organization has seen over the years.” The corners of Trill’s eyes crinkled. “We are alsoextremelygood at detecting bullshit, and not a thing you said was a belief we couldn’t or wouldn’t believe. Can I ask you a question? If you don’t want to answer it, that’s perfectly okay, though. No pressure.”
