could damage his campaign, you see.'
'When he went into the dressing room and turned on the light, you went out through the stage door entrance,' Lucas concluded. 'And then you locked the alley door so that Sheffield would be forced to wander blindly around the backstage tunnels looking for another way out.'
'I knew that sooner or later he would blunder into someone who would recognize him,' Irene said. 'And then the body and the file would be found, and everything would be neat and orderly again. It was true that Amaryllis would not be dead as I had intended, but I thought that surely she would stop asking questions once Sheffield was arrested for murder. Surely that would satisfy her.'
Amaryllis stared at Irene while she fought the psychic pain. 'But the day before I left the city to visit my family, I told you I wasn't satisfied and I had a few more questions.'
'You had become obsessive,' Irene raged. 'It was obvious that you were never going to quit. I understood then that nothing would stop you. You would continue to poke and pry until eventually you stumbled onto the truth. It has become clear to me that both you and Mr. Trent must die. Then things will be tidied up at last. Everything will be back under control.'
'It's too late for everything to be made neat and orderly.' Amaryllis summoned every ounce of emotion she could find: righteous anger at the grave injustices that Irene had perpetrated; fear for Lucas's life and her own; and love. The love she had for Lucas was more powerful than the other emotions combined. She would not let him die. She had to save him.
For some reason, she suddenly recalled the visit to Elizabeth Bailey. Some walls were too high to climb. But there were other ways around them.
Irene must be distracted so that Lucas could act. The easiest way to divert the attention of a high-class talent was to force her to use more power. Extreme power required extreme concentration.
Amaryllis consciously tore down the civilized barriers of self-control that had been built up over a lifetime. A flood of emotion and passion poured through her. She fed the fierce feelings of the moment with all the stored anger, righteous indignation, and sheer determination she had ever known. And then she threw in the will to survive and to save Lucas.
A witch's brew boiled through her bloodstream, a heady, intoxicating drug that affected everything, even events on the psychic plane.
The focus shifted and dimmed.
Irene fought back, using more energy to hold the link. Amaryllis screamed silently as the bands of talent brightened visibly. Then she forced Irene to use more power.
'Stop it.' The gun trembled in Irene's hands. 'Stop it this instant, do you hear me? You'll only burn yourself out if you keep it up.'
Burning out would be a blessing, but Amaryllis sensed that might not happen, at least not in time. She braced herself against the mounting fear of being driven insane and concentrated on what she had to do.
'What's the matter, Irene?' she said. 'Afraid you'll be the one to burn out first? Professor Landreth had a theory that it was possible to actually destroy a talent this way. Did he ever tell you about it?'
'That's a lie. You can't destroy my talent.' Irene took a step closer. 'I'm too strong for you. Jonathan said I was too strong for him. I was too strong for my husband. I'm stronger than any talent who ever lived. That's why every- thing must be organized, don't you see? That's why I must be in control.'
'But you're not in control, are you, Irene? You're crazy.'
'
Lucas moved slightly again. But Amaryllis knew that as long as Irene had the gun aimed at her, he would feel pinned down. Irene could not miss at this close distance.
Amaryllis closed her eyes against the rising tide of pain. And then she deliberately fed the pain into the fiery river that flowed through ever vein and artery in her body.
Her muscles went rigid. There was a prickling sensation on her skin. Her mouth was as dry as dust. But she knew that Irene was finally beginning to realize how great the price of control over the focus link would be.
She wondered when Irene would lose it altogether and pull the trigger.
The icy wind howled across the psychic plane. It was as strong as the violent talent that had seized control of the link. A dark fog gathered.
Amaryllis was astonished to see Professor Landreth in the mist. His head was a gory horror. He was covered in blood. She opened her mouth to ask him what he was doing in her living room.
Irene screamed. 'No, you're dead.
There was a roar of sound in Amaryllis's ears. More screaming. High, shrill, it seemed to go on forever.
At the edge of her fading vision Amaryllis saw Lucas come up off the sofa in a fluid, lethal movement.
The talent that had surged so steadily and so painfully through the prism was cut off abruptly. Amaryllis was suddenly free. The abrupt release was too much for her overloaded system. An endless wave of unconsciousness rolled toward her.
She slipped headfirst into the waiting darkness. The last thing she saw was a river of blood coursing across the carpet. She wondered vaguely whose it was.
Chapter 20
'Irene Dunley, psychic vampire.' Clementine propped one hip on the edge of Amaryllis's hospital bed and shook her head in wonder. 'Who would have believed it?'
'Sort of takes the romance out of the whole psychic vampire thing, doesn't it?' Byron said. 'Irene Dunley doesn't quite fit the image. Not exactly the lethally elegant, sophisticated, world-weary type. I wonder if Orchid Adams will change genres when she learns about this. Maybe she'll decide to write mysteries or Western Islands adventure tales instead of psychic vampire romance.'
'She's not going to hear the truth about Irene Dunley from us.' Amaryllis lounged against a mountain of pristine, white pillows and glowered at both of her visitors. 'And neither is anyone else. We all agreed that the fewer people who know about this, the better. The police are satisfied that Irene was a nutcase who murdered her lover when she discovered that he had a relationship with a syn-sex stripper.'
'Hey, sure, no problem,' Byron said quickly. 'Staid secretary murders lover and then kills syn-sex stripper. Big- time politician gets caught up in the mess and campaign falls apart. End of story.'
'Exactly,' Amaryllis said. 'We certainly don't need Nelson Buriton doing a lot of cheap, tabloid-style stories about psychic vampires on the ten o'clock news. It would only make people nervous about high-class talents.'
Clementine grinned. 'Kind of a shame not to let Buriton have the story. Just think what he could do with it.'
'The first person who calls Buriton answers to me,' Lucas growled from the doorway.
Amaryllis turned her head to look at him. It was the first time she had seen him since the police had hustled both of them off to the emergency room the previous night.
Lucas smiled at her. He had a fistful of yellow rose- orchids in one hand. His other arm was in a sling.
'Whatever you say, Trent.' Clementine held up a copy of the
'I wonder what would have happened if Amaryllis had not gone to that reception with you that night, Mr. Trent.' Byron looked thoughtful. 'If the two of you hadn't accidentally detected Sheffield while he was working the room with his focused charm and charisma, none of the rest would have come to light.'
Amaryllis shook her head. 'No, the truth would have eventually surfaced, one way or another. Irene was getting crazier by the day. When she killed Professor Landreth, she murdered the only person who could help her control her talent. She had already planned to murder Vivien, and when she learned about Sheffield's penchant for sleeping with his prism, she was determined to take him down, too. Eventually she would have gone too far.'
'Yeah, but how many more people would have died before she committed a mistake and finally got caught?' Byron said.
'Hmm.' Clementine propped her square jaw on her hand. 'I wonder if Psynergy, Inc. should put more of an
