The man rushes to my side, concern sweeping across his features.
“You’d better not be pulling my chain. How would you know all that?” he asks.
“I—I saw it when you threw the packet at me. Esther’s in a cabin by the river. I need to get these details to Detective Radovich so we can locate it. She doesn’t have much time. There’s a man—someone the family’s never seen—he’s the one who—” I say, pulling up short.
I blink back the surprise.
“Don’t stop there, what else?” the man says, leaning in.
“Hang on, who are you?” I say. “I don’t even know why the hell I’m telling you all of this. You could be part of the whole scheme, for all I know.”
I clutch the packet and stand up. Backing away, I hold a hand out as he tries to follow.
“Back the hell off,” I warn.
“Okay, okay,” he says, holding his hands up, “name’s Blake Wilson. I’m Ted and Lacy Trundle’s friend,” he says. For a far too long and awkward moment, he holds my gaze.
“Friend? Since when do friends break into people’s houses?”
“Well, I’m also a private investigator—”
I cast my eyes to the floor, absently consuming this new information.
“Why on earth are you wasting your time with me? Shouldn’t you be out there doing your damn job?” I say, anger suddenly welling up.
“As a matter of fact, I am. I needed to know for sure you could be trusted,” he says. “You may have convinced Ted with whatever parlor trick you had up your sleeve today, but I can’t have someone working with me I can’t trust. I needed to know for sure. Hell, I’m still not entirely convinced.”
“Trust for what?” I say, pressing the packet to my chest. “As far as I’m concerned, between the two of us, I’m a goddamn saint. I haven’t accosted you or broken into your damn house. Besides, the one you really need to be concerned about is whoever took Esther.”
“Ordinarily, I’d say you were right. But before your talk with them today, Ted was convinced you were a charlatan. He was concerned about you impeding the case with some wild goose chase, but Lacy has been hellbent on bringing you in. This is their daughter, we’re talking about. Then something changed; whatever you said to him this morning had him confused, but he wanted me to confirm before I brought you in. I don’t need some fake psychic screwing up my investigation. I gotta know you are what they say you are. Or what they think you are, anyway. It didn’t seem, well until now, like you had anything special,” he admits. “But that coulda been an educated guess based on the packet.”
“Gee, thanks for your thorough analysis,” I say, making a face and flipping him the bird.
“You know what I mean. Every interaction with you has yielded absolutely nothing. You didn’t even know I’d come back into the home,” Blake says, reaching for his cellphone.
“No offense, but it doesn’t always work that way,” I say, glaring at him. “Sometimes I actually have to push myself to see things. Other times, they come easy.”
I let out a long sigh.
Why in the hell do I feel like I need to defend myself to this arrogant asshat?
“Fine. You’ll have to tell me more on the ride,” he says, pushing send on his phone.
“What?” I snort.
Holding up a finger, he walks a few steps away, waiting for someone on the other end to pick up. “Yeah, it’s me. Might be something to this psychic chick, but we’re gonna have to confirm. She thinks we’re looking in the wrong place. According to Diana we’re gonna need to refocus the search along the river. I’m bringing her in to go over satellite images now to see if her hunch pans out. Be there in a few.”
Blake ends the call and turns back to me.
“Ready to go?”
I fling the manilla packet back at him.
“Since the moment I got home, I’ve been assaulted by you twice, nearly passed out from using my abilities, not to mention knocked out by you—god, I probably have a lump on my forehead now, thanks by the way—and interrogated like a criminal. I think I need a damn minute to regroup.”
Blake’s deep brown eyes widen and his dark eyebrows tug in.
“I didn’t knock you out. You passed out as I walked back in.”
“Well, that’s a relief,” I say, rolling my eyes.
“Look, you said it yourself, we don’t have much time. If Esther’s with this man at the river, we have to get our asses moving. If things really are going down the way you say they are, then this should be super easy. I’m sure I don’t need to tell you the statistics for missing kids and the chances of being found alive, but if I do—”
I hold up a hand, “No need. I’m well aware.”
“Well, good. Then you know we need to figure out which house we’re dealing with and we need to know now. If you’re as real as you claim to be—I need you to come with me so we can corroborate your story.”
“Story?” I say, my mouth popping open.
“You know what I mean,” Blake says. “We gotta help her.”
His eyes plead with mine and I can’t help but be a little moved by it. I mean, here’s a guy who has only a friendship connection to the family…but he’s genuinely concerned about finding her in one piece. It’s written all over his face.
“Yeah, yeah okay. Let’s go,” I agree, walking over to him. “Don’t get your panties in a bunch.”
As soon as I walk toward him, I’m instantly dizzy, and reach for the front of my head.
“You okay?” Blake asks. “I swear, I tapped you on the back to get your attention and you passed out. Your head slammed on the kitchen counter. I didn’t expect you to pass out like that.”
He reaches for my arm, hoisting me up and helping me walk along with him.
“I swear you knocked me out,”
