Touched - By Cyn Balog Page 0,81

pound above me. Rain. More than rain. Downpour. Taryn said something, but I couldn’t hear it amidst the pounding on the roof. The flap opened, and rain and cold air swirled in.

The client was here. A shape stood in the doorway, shaking the rain off itself like a dog. It was too dark. I couldn’t see more than a hulking black shape. “Freaking rain,” a voice rumbled. It was a man. A young one. He moved forward. Taryn’s grandmother nodded at him and he stepped under the lamp to sign the book.

I was so busy trying to figure out who it was, what kind of guy would want something like Invisible Assassin, that I almost didn’t notice Taryn, sitting there, shaking. His face came into view under the chandelier just as I realized she was yawning. But there was nothing about her face that was tired—she was sitting bolt upright, her eyes wide with fear. She yawned again—what did a yawn mean?—and I finally took in the face that was standing over the table, the face that belonged to the man who was signing his life away.

Bryce Reese.

And the yawn.

Get out.

She wanted me to leave.

Her grandmother and Bryce were busy standing over the book, so I opened the curtain a little and shrugged at her. She looked carefully at the two of them, then nonchalantly turned to me, biting her lip. Her eyes glistened in the minimal orange light from the chandelier. Then she ran her hand through her hair. “Grandma, before we start, I have to use the bathroom.”

That was another signal. She wanted me to meet her out by the crane game. I hoisted myself up and hurried over there. By that time the rain was pouring down in sheets. Taryn’s hair hung in her face in wet ropes. She didn’t wait for me to be standing next to her before she began to sob. “He’s going to use it on you,” she wailed. “The Invisible Assassin.”

I swallowed. “Wait. What? What is the Invisible Assassin?”

“It’s so horrible,” she said. I tried to grab her hands, but they were wet and trembling so much I couldn’t get hold of them. She tried to get more words out but instead another sob caught in her throat. Finally, her breathing calmed enough so she could speak again. “It allows him to target people, and he can just walk away. It will kill their family. And it will kill them. In the worst ways you can imagine.”

“You mean …,” I started. I suddenly thought of my visions, or the lack of them. “Why would he use it on me?”

“You know why. Emma was always his world. And you saw him.” She sighed, but the last bit of air came out as a cough. “And he kind of … He’s not all there. He’s crazy and he hates you.”

“It kills my family, too?” I asked. I thought of Nan and Mom.

“All of them,” she sobbed.

“But my mother never leaves the house.”

“It doesn’t matter. It will find her.”

I studied her. Oh, she was still beautiful. She’d always be. Fifty years from now, if she lived that long, she’d still turn heads. But now, she was dying. Her hair was no longer golden and platinum but frizzy and strawlike, and her pretty features were all sunken in her colorless skin. Then I looked out toward the sea. Everything beyond the boardwalk was gray, the color of nothingness. “You’d better go back in there. He’s going to wonder where you are.”

She narrowed her eyes. “I can’t. Nick. I can’t do it to you. To your family.”

I grabbed her wrist with a lot more force than I meant to. “You have to.”

“No. I’ll find someone else. I’ll—”

“Who?” I demanded, dropping her wrist. “You’ll be dead in three hours if you don’t. Go. Do it. And don’t worry about me and my family. I can take care of us.”

“But you can’t. How can you—”

I didn’t know how I did it, because my heart was beating its way out of my chest, but I managed a smile. “It’s okay. I can see the future, remember?”

She bit her lip. She started to leave but then ran toward me, pushing her lips against mine. When she pulled away, her eyes didn’t meet mine. Maybe because she was ashamed, or maybe because they were so filled with tears she couldn’t see straight. Her voice was barely a whisper when she spoke. “I love you, you know.”

Before I had a chance to tell