I braced myself with one hand as Marcus said, I raped several women.
"Define 'women.'" Because the brutality of his murder suggested there was more than rape involved -
especially if he'd been put away for a while. The sad fact was, courts and judges didn't treat rape as seriously as they should.
Anger swirled, thick and sharp. The stabbing pain got worse, and suddenly I was struggling to breathe.
Okay, it was girls. Sixteen-year-olds. We held them for several days and did them over proper, like.
We. The word caught in my brain, but before I could question him more, my brain overloaded and all I felt was pain. Sheer, bloody, agonizing pain. I hugged myself for several seconds, rocking back and forth, then realized he was still there, still draining me.
"Go," I whispered. "Find whatever peace you damn well can."
He went. Not happily, not easily, but he went, and the draining stopped. "Harris," I said to the man standing quietly behind me. "If you don't want the crime scene contaminated any further, you might want to help me out of here. I'm about to throw up."
Arms grabbed me, lifting me as easily as a kitten. Or a pup, as the case might be. We'd barely made it out of the trees when my gorge rose, and I struggled out of his grip and staggered away before losing the little I had in my stomach.
God, I felt awful. If I'd let Marcus drain me for much longer, it could have been fatal - though with the way my brain was feeling, it had come damn close anyway.
"Here," Harris said, handing me a half-empty water bottle. "Rinse your mouth out with this."
I accepted it gratefully, rinsing away the bitter taste then spitting it out. I repeated the action and felt a little better, though my head still ached like a bitch and my muscles were trembling.
I forced myself to stand upright and handed him back the water. He was dressed in blue sweatpants and a gray tank top that clung to his body and emphasized his lean strength, and his dark hair was damp and curling up at the ends. But his eyes were blue - a blue the color of the ocean that surrounded Dunedan - not black.
Why was I expecting black? Who did he remind me of? Suddenly that question seemed vital, and yet I just couldn't answer it.
Why, why, why?
He shoved the small water bottle back into its pocket on the side of his pants, then said, his expression grim,
"Tell me why I shouldn't arrest you for entering a restricted area?"
"Well, if you'd had a man stationed here like you were supposed to, it wouldn't have been a problem, would it?"
He didn't look amused. "People around these parts respect the law. They know - "
"As I know." I rubbed my head wearily. I really didn't feel like a lecture right now. "But people around these parts probably can't talk to souls, either. I can. But it has to be done shortly after the death, otherwise they get too weak to talk."
And if I could remember stuff like that, then why couldn't I remember the important stuff? It was like someone had systematically gone through my mind and erased random bits of information. Some of the big stuff, some of the small, leaving total chaos behind.
Harris stared at me for several seconds, his expression unchanged. It was hard to know whether he believed me or not.
"I think you and I need to sit down and have a serious talk."
"As long as it's somewhere with decent coffee and something to eat. Otherwise I'm likely to pass out on you."
He raised an eyebrow, but all he said was "I know just the place. You need a hand?"
"Yeah, I think I might."
He wrapped an arm around my waist, half holding me up as we moved forward. It felt like daggers were merrily stabbing at my brain, and my muscles felt incredibly shaky. Did this always happen when I talked to souls?
Something within said no. This was something new - a fresh twist on an old problem.
We didn't head toward the police station as I'd half expected, but rather toward a little white weatherboard house on the far edge of the paddock.
"My home." Harris opened the old wrought iron gate and led me up the garden path. Not literally, I hoped. "We can talk here unofficially, then move across to the station if I feel it's necessary."