Dead and Dusted by Lily Webb (most recommended books .TXT) 📗

I’d forgotten about my plan to break into his room, but I had the solution to that problem sitting right in front of me. Gemwood smiled at my reaction. “What is it?”

“Have you searched Leland’s room yet?”

“It’s next on my to-do list.”

“Please, let me come with you,” I said and jumped out of my chair, but Gemwood reached out to rest her hand on my forearm.

“Whoa, what’s the rush?”

“It’s about the letter that Leland got. It’s missing, but I think I might have a way to figure out what it said.”

Gemwood raised her eyebrows. “Would this have something to do with your powers?”

“Yes, exactly. Evie Church, Leland’s assistant, told me she found it on the floor by the door of his room when she took his briefcase up there, but I know for a fact we never left a letter.”

“So, you think it might’ve fallen from his briefcase?”

“Possibly, yeah, but even if it didn’t, if I can get my hands on something of his, it might prompt a vision that could give us some answers.”

“I’d be a fool to say no to a tool like that,” Gemwood said as she rose from her chair, and I could hardly believe it. She had little reason to trust me, a random employee who might entirely compromise her investigation, but she’d chosen to give me a chance — I just hoped my powers and I didn’t disappoint. As I’d learned the hard way, they could be finicky and unreliable, and we needed their insight now more than ever.

Still, I followed Agent Gemwood to the door and out to the elevator. As she closed the grate, I pressed the button for the sixth floor and wondered whether the rest of Leland’s guards would give us any trouble when we got to his room. I doubted they’d be bold enough to turn away an FBI agent in the middle of an active investigation, especially since Brady had called her in to help, but I couldn’t be sure.

Much to my surprise, however, when we stepped out of the elevator a few moments later, there weren’t any guards at all outside Leland’s room. Maybe they didn’t think it was worth watching now that it was unoccupied?

Agent Gemwood didn’t seem as at ease about it as me. She paused and held out a hand to stop me. “Wait here for a second. Better safe than sorry,” she said and stepped cautiously forward. She leaned with one pointed ear turned to the door, and I couldn’t help wondering if she had enhanced hearing.

A minute or two later, seemingly sure there weren’t any surprises waiting for us inside, Agent Gemwood waved her hand in front of the door and it popped open, but I stayed back while she disappeared silently inside. My heart hammered in my chest as I waited for a word from her, and when she finally returned, I breathed a sigh of relief.

“All clear. Nothing looks out of place, so work your magic,” she said with a smile as she beckoned me inside.

I stepped through the open door and recognized the room immediately because it was a mirror image of Aron’s room that’d been located right next door until Blair moved it at Leland’s orders. The room looked like no one had touched it. The observation sent chills tearing down my spine because I realized that, except for Evie dropping off Leland’s briefcase inside, no one else had set foot in the room — and Leland never would.

After shaking off the chills, my eyes swept the room and landed on Leland’s briefcase where Evie had left it on the foot of the bed. With an electric current of excitement coursing through me, I dashed across the room to the bed and plopped down beside the briefcase. Cautiously, I reached for its leather exterior and closed my eyes to brace myself for the familiar rush of an oncoming vision as my fingertips grazed the hide, but frustratingly, nothing happened.

“No luck?” Agent Gemwood asked as she fluttered to my side.

“No,” I grumbled as I yanked the briefcase into my lap. “But maybe the stuff inside will shake something loose.” Unfortunately for me, though, when I tried to pry the briefcase apart at its opening, it wouldn’t budge.

“It’s sealed magically, most likely for security. Here, give it to me,” Agent Gemwood said as she held out a hand. I passed her the briefcase, and she clutched it in both hands. She closed her eyes and started muttering in tones so low I couldn’t make out a thing she was saying, but several moments later, a sighing sound echoed through the room like an ancient vault opening for the first time in centuries. “There we go,” Gemwood said with a pleased smile and handed me back the briefcase.

Without hesitation, I turned it over and watched its contents spill out onto the bed. Dozens of sheets of paper fluttered out, accompanied by half a dozen pens and a few small, unlabeled black rectangles that looked like memory cards. None of it stuck out to me as odd or interesting, but when I turned over the nearest piece of paper, a yelp jumped from my mouth.

“What? What is it?” Agent Gemwood asked, peering over my shoulder, but all I could do was point at the grainy, almost illegible photo printed on the paper. Though the rock-toothed, hunchbacked creature appeared in black and white, I didn’t need color to know it also had ice-blue irises. But how had a picture of the creature from my dreams ended up in Leland’s briefcase? Did he know about those, well, things in the mountains?

Agent Gemwood grabbed the piece of paper off the bed to examine it. “Is this the creature you saw in your dream?”

Still unable to speak, I nodded and reached for the pile of other pieces of paper, despite the fear of what else I might find among it. As I lifted the pile, another object fell out from between the pages and into my lap.