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“Probably.”
“Did any of them leave around the time that India and Rachel left?”
Charlie shrugs. “I really don’t know man. You’ll have to ask them.”
Chapter 9
DIANA
As evening grows closer, my nerves ratchet tighter and tighter. When Remi calls the search off at 9.15 in the evening, she insists that the volunteers must meet at the starting point for a debrief. I hope none of them will show up, but nearly all of them do.
Around twenty-five of them are civilian volunteers, one of whom might be a murderer who felt the need to involve him or herself in this search according to Remi’s theory.
As Remi takes a roll call and makes a note of anyone who hasn’t stayed, my nerves stretch to breaking point. My brain scrambles for ideas, but I am now too panicked to think of what to say to them all. Even if my psychic powers had been on point, I would have struggled to address this many people. Without them I am going to fail miserably.
This day is about to go from bad to pathetic. It is going to be a farce. They are going to think I am making a mockery of them.
I try to concentrate on what Remi is saying in case she has called me up. She is still debriefing each team. None of the volunteers report seeing any signs that India has been to any of the locations they covered. Remi ticks off the properties which have been completed, and I stand at her side feeling completely useless.
I can feel DI Zael’s eyes on me. He and his officers are standing off to the side of the crowd, their arms crossed over their chests, waiting for the moment when I will have to prove myself. He seems to be eagerly anticipating the moment I am going to flop.
I know how I would have started if I had my powers. I would have spoken to each of the volunteers in turn. I would touch their hands. I would try to get a sense of their involvement in this case from what they said, or any flashes of their memories that might pass through my mind when I touch them.
I don’t know how my gift works, just that it does. Did. Randomly. In unexpected ways that sometimes didn’t seem to mean anything until they suddenly made sense.
It is only since it has been gone that I had realized how much I had relied on it in my everyday life.
The only way I can describe it was that it was like there used to be an invisible web all around me that some other sense of mine was attuned to, and which could guide me in the direction of things that I needed or away from any danger or unpleasantness. It was so subtle I never knew it was there. I had been able to trust my instincts on whether to trust a person or distrust them. Or I had known exactly how much time I had to run to a bus stop before the next bus might arrive without needing to check a timetable. It had helped guide me in all of the little things that I would do or say to someone every day. And then suddenly it was gone.
And now I have to navigate the world blind of this extra sense, so I am constantly bumping into problems, tiny problems, that I might have completely unconsciously avoided before. It is as if my happy luck, my serendipity, has gone. Not that I had thought I was lucky when I actually had it. Not that I ever felt it had brought me any happiness.
No wonder DI Zael had referred to it as mumbo jumbo. It sounds like mumbo jumbo even to me.
Despite all that, there is a tiny mote of certainty inside me insisting that if my psychic gift had been active right now, and there was a clue to be found that would lead me towards India, then I would have found that clue.
I may not have known what the clue was, but maybe my subconscious psychic mind would have followed it, and trusted it, and then maybe India would have been all right in the end. Somehow I could have helped her.
But now that it is gone I feel humbled and helpless. It horrifies me, the idea that one of these people gathered here before me might have something to do with what happened to India and Rachel, and that I have simply no idea and no way of knowing.
It almost makes me want to throw the amulet that Theo gave me into the bin. But if I do that I will have a worse problem.
I remember the insidious words of the little voice, and how she would mutter and whinge and beguile, guiding me in my everyday life towards decisions that would benefit her, which I was never aware of. And now that I know she is capable of murdering, of killing in cold blood, how can I possibly justify letting her out?
I cannot do that, because all it would take is one slip up on my part for her to do something terrible that I can never undo. That would turn me into a murderer. I cannot take off the amulet until I find some other way of keeping her in check, or of getting rid of her for good.
Knowing this does not make my current task easier. Remi gives me a glance, checking if I am ready to talk to the gathered crowd. Not just the civilians, but the Agency officers and police officers who had also taken part in the search are watching me.
Every one of them looks expectant. They have reached the end of a grueling and disappointing day. They are hoping I will perform a magic trick and fix it. They are hoping there is still a chance for us to go home victorious.
Well, some of them are. Not DI Zael. Nothing would make his day brighter than for me to fail.
“This is Diana Bellona,” Remi says, introducing me to the crowd. “She’s assisting us in this search, and she is going to ask you a few questions. I’d like you to cooperate with her.”
Thankfully she did not tell them I was a psychic. She didn’t have to. Zael has already sown those seeds. I don’t want Remi to have to look a fool when I fail.
I take a deep breath and force myself to look into the eyes of every single person in the crowd. The evening has brought a chilly breeze. Some of them are shivering slightly, having left thei
r jackets at home. They are impatient to be gone. Their good deed is done. There is no need for them to come back tomorrow. Many won’t. No wonder Remi wanted me to seize this chance to catch anyone dodgy.
