“There’s another player in this game,” Owen said. “Someone who wants you as badly as Kelbrook and Twitchell do.”
Chapter Thirty
She took a moment toabsorb his words. It was as if she’d been struck by a fever. Her palms tingled. She could feel perspiration trickling down between her breasts. She was suddenly a little lightheaded.
The walls of the hotel room metamorphosed into the walls of the cell at Serenity Gardens. She needed to breathe.
The balcony. She had to get outside onto the balcony.
She stood too quickly. Her head spun. She grabbed the edge of the table to steady herself.
“Alice.”
Owen was out of his chair, wrapping a strong, steady arm around her shoulders before she realized that he had moved. Sebastian appeared on the table in front of her and made soothing dust bunny sounds.
“I’m okay,” she declared.
“Liar,” Owen said gently.
“Panic attack,” she admitted. “I need air.”
He did not argue. Maintaining his grip on her, he steered her toward the balcony, opened the door, and ushered her outside. The clean desert air was a tonic. She forced herself to go into the familiar breathing routine. At the same time, she felt the steadying pulse of Owen’s energy field. Sebastian hustled after them and hopped up onto the railing. She rested a hand on him and took comfort from his sturdy aura.
Her training kicked in—finally. When in doubt, go back to the Core Principles.
Core Principle Number One:Do not mistake impulse for true intuition.
No, that didn’t fit the situation.
Core Principle Number Five:You control your talent; your talent does not control you.
That wasn’t useful, either.
“Talk to me,” Owen said.
“I’m trying to find a Ballantine Principle that can be applied when you discover that two different people are trying to kidnap you and also murder the man who is protecting you. Turns out there isn’t one.”
“If all else fails, apply logic. Can you think of anyone else besides Kelbrook who might want to grab you?”
Her mind began to clear. She forced herself to concentrate. “Webber? The director of Serenity Gardens? I was evidently worth a lot of money to him.”
“I did a psi profile on Webber. He’s a mid-level aura reader who probably accepted gratuities from other people who were desperate to make difficult relatives disappear into Serenity Gardens. But getting you back to the hospital would not do him any good now. He has to know Kelbrook would never deal with him again. Besides, Webber took off, remember? Someone else is in charge of Serenity Gardens.”
“Maybe the new director thinks that if he gets me back he can convince Kelbrook to have me committed there again?”
“Maybe. But it feels weak on several levels.”
She wrapped one hand around the railing as a thought struck. “I suppose it’s possible that one of my clients here in Illusion Town decided to try to take advantage of the situation. It’s hard to believe that any of them would do that to me, but in recent days it has become very apparent that I can’t trust my judgment.”
“Your judgment is fine. You were drugged and hypnotized by a psychic con man. Even a high-rez aura reader would have been fooled by a creep like Travis Poole.”
“The bottom line is that Iwasdeceived. Now I can’t be sure of my read on any of my clients.”
“Are there a lot of them?”
“Several.” She frowned, trying to think. “They all seemed grateful when I was able to help them. And there’s another thing. The street clinic clients are a mixed bag, but they are on the street in the first place because they can’t manage their lives very well.”
“Hard to see one capable of organizing an amateurish kidnap and ransom scheme, is that what you’re thinking?”
