Fatal Strike (McClouds & Friends #10)(17)

“So?” he said. “Everybody done poking and prodding?”

“Not even close,” Sean said. “Brace yourself.”

Miles let out a painful sigh. “It’s all I ever do.”

“Let’s go out on the terrace,” Nina urged. “We can talk.” She touched his arm. The contact took him by surprise. He recoiled so violently that everyone froze, shooting glances at each other.

“Jesus, Miles,” Kev murmured. “That bad?”

“I’m okay,” Miles said. “Just please don’t touch me. It’s nothing personal, I swear. Just . . . don’t.”

“Double shot of Scotch?” That was Davy’s dour suggestion.

Miles shook his head. If only it were that simple.

The place was set up for the dessert orgy later on. They all sat down at a couple of the white-draped tables, the chairs of which had been tarted up with padded, puffy, brocaded skirts. Edie grabbed one of the cards that had been folded into a tent and left on each table. Dessert menus. A glance at the one in front of Miles showed baba’, boccanotte, tiramisu and flauti filled with raspberries and crème chantilly. Plus the cake. Overkill, as usual. The hand of Zia Rosa was evident. The thought of all that sugar made his teeth ache.

Edie pulled a stub of pencil from her handbag, turned the dessert menu over, and gave him a questioning look. Miles shrugged. Edie had a psychic talent of her own. Sometimes her drawings took on oracular meanings. She’d drawn for him before, even after the Spruce Ridge debacle, but he’d never made any sense of the images.

“Go ahead,” he muttered. “Do your worst.”

“Your enthusiasm overwhelms me,” Edie said, but his permission had set her hand loose. She was already scribbling frantically.

The pencil, scratching against paper, scraped nastily over his nerve endings.

“So,” Kev said. “Woods, mountains. Did it help?”

“When I was there, it did,” he said. “Doesn’t do shit for me now.”

“It’s not a solution,” Aaro broke in. “Hiding like a rabbit in a hole.”

Miles kept his gaze fixed firmly on the dessert menu.

“So, uh, the sensory overload,” Kev asked. “Is it still . . . ?”

“Kicking my ass,” Miles supplied.

Nina reached out again, as if to touch his hand, but stopped. “So why are you here?”

“Didn’t want to piss off Bruno and Lily,” he offered.

Sean grunted. “You haven’t cared about pissing us off for a while.”

Miles was silent, trying to think of something to say that would ward them off, but no such thing existed, or else he was not smart enough to think of it. And these people were his good friends, even though he couldn’t feel the connection. He was looking at them through a tunnel that was light years long.

A racking shiver went through him. Surrender. He opened his mouth, and the miserable truth fell out, heavily.

“I was thinking about trying the meds again,” he said.

An appalled silence greeted that statement.

“You said the meds made you feel half-dead,” Sean said. “You barely recognized your own family when you were on that shit. You think you’re crazy? Really? It’s that bad? Has it gotten worse?”

Nina tugged her chair over until she was sitting directly in front of him. Forcing him to meet her eyes. “What’s going on, Miles?”

“I’ve done time on antipsychotic drugs,” Edie said. “I don’t recommend it. I don’t think you’re there, Miles. None of us do.”

“But the voices,” he blurted. “I . . . well, I don’t exactly hear her.”

“Her? Who’s her?” Aaro snarled. “Make some sense, damn it!”

“Her?” Nina’s eyes went huge. “Lara? You’re talking about Lara? You hear her?”

“Well, no. I don’t exactly hear her,” he said again. “It’s, uh, text messages. She, ah . . . she texts me.”

They all glanced around at each other, utterly perplexed.

“You mean, on your phone?” Davy said, his voice tentative.

“No,” Miles forced out. “No, I mean, in my head.”

It took them an interminable, silent interval to process that. He waited, teeth clenched. Braced for it.

“Weird,” Connor commented, finally.

“Yeah,” Miles agreed. “I never even met this girl. I’ve been assuming she was dead. And even if she isn’t dead, how would she ever have learned my password?”

“What the f*ck?” Aaro sounded angry. “Password? I could wrap my head around voices. But texts? You’re a machine, with circuitry?”

“That’s what’s happening to me, so eat it,” Miles growled.

Aaro gave him the stony mafiya stare. “Don’t give me attitude.”

“You’re the one with the attitude. If you can’t shove it around or bully it, you don’t want to deal with it at all,” Miles retorted.

“Shut up, both of you,” Nina scolded. “We’re getting off track.”

“It’s his hero complex,” Aaro said. “He needs a damsel in distress to save. Cindy’s out of the picture, so he’s creating a new one.”