Blind Sight: A Novel by Terri Persons Read Free Book Online Page A

black velvet over the coats and jackets they’d deposited in the guest bedroom.
    The three corn-pudding ladies plopped next to one another on a sofa, their cake plates balanced on their laps and their coffee mugs locked in their fists.
    “Did you see the cake before they cut into it?” asked the one in the middle. “It was one of those photo cakes from that bakery in Park Rapids. It had his hospital picture on it. Adorable.”
    “I didn’t get a chance to see it,” said the witch on the right, taking a sip of coffee.
    “My grandson had one of those for his graduation open house,” said the witch on the left.
    The one in the middle took a bite of cake and declared, “Marble. A little dry. I would have ordered the chocolate instead. That bakery does a good chocolate.”
    “I’ve got the best recipe for carrot cake,” said the witch on the right, and the other two leaned toward her to hear it.
    Herne, named for the god of the wild hunt, was in the bathroom getting his diaper changed.
    Separated from the group, two of the men stood whispering in a corner. Both were tall. One was bony and haggard, and the other was carrying extra weight around his middle. Each had a paper coffee cup in his hand, but neither was drinking out of it. Neither seemed very happy.
    “I warned her to leave it alone, but she did it anyway,” growled the gaunt man.
    “What’s done is done,” said the man with the gut.
    “Should we tell the others?”
    “No need to agitate them. We agitate them, one of them might do something rash and foolish.”
    The gaunt man chuckled dryly. “You mean more foolish than has already been done?”
    “I don’t want to talk about it anymore.”
    “We have to talk about it. What if the feds come after one of us? We all need to be telling the same story, otherwise they’ll know.” The narrow man swept the room with his eyes. “I say we tell the group. They’re all here.”
    The man with the big gut finally took a sip of his coffee and shuddered. It was ice-cold. He tipped the cup back and swallowed. “We don’t know who we can trust. Hell, for all I know you did it.”
    “You know for a fact that tonight I was—”
    “I’m not talking about tonight. I’m talking about last night.”
    “What about you?” the gaunt man growled. “Where were you? It could have been you.”
    “That’s my point. It could have been you. It could have been me. It could have been any of us.”
    He surveyed the room again, finding potential fiends instead of friends. “You really think one of ours did it? Why would they?”
    “I don’t know why.” The fat fingers crushed the paper cup. “But if it was one of our own, I say we take care of it ourselves.”

CHAPTER SEVEN
    T hat was a workout,” said Bernadette as she and Garcia trudged to the truck. She checked her watch. It was ten in the morning. They’d spent fourteen hours in the hospital and she’d been without sleep for twenty-four. She’d also consumed about a gallon of coffee. She was both exhausted and wired.
    “No solid suspects beyond the witch,” said Garcia, squinting into the falling snow.
    Seth’s deputies had taken off at dawn, but the Minneapolis agents were staying behind to do some mop-up at the hospital. The ERT guys hadn’t yet showed at the facility—they were still at the tented crime scene—and the Ramsey County Medical Examiner’s wagon, though on the road, was an hour away. B.K. had been assigned to stay planted outside the storage room/morgue. “Maybe he should be relieved,” said Bernadette as they came up to the truck. “Poor kid was standing in that hallway all night.”
    Garcia fished his keys out of his pocket. “What is it with you and Cahill?”
    “It’s just that he’s so … I don’t know … green.”
    “He’ll be fine.”
    Bernadette yanked open the front passenger door and climbed in. Their next stop was the Ashe place. “Delores said we should call ahead because of the dogs.”
    “Like we’re gonna