Sam looked up from the page. “I assume V is Hannah Vaughn and that the incident referred to is the home invasion at her house that took place a couple of days ago?”
Startled, she watched his face very carefully. “You know about that?”
“Thaddeus Webber sent me an email, too.”
In spite of everything, Abby found herself smiling. “To vouch for me? I gather you work by referral also.”
Sam’s mouth edged upward at one corner. “Whenever I can.”
“In that case, you must have done some research on what happened in Mrs. Vaughn’s library.”
“According to what I found online, a mentally unstable man with a gun invaded Vaughn’s home. He claimed to hear voices and may have been tanked up on drugs, which, in turn, caused him to collapse at the scene. He was taken into custody and is now sitting in a locked ward at a psychiatric hospital, undergoing observation to see if he is sane enough to stand trial. Statements were taken from the owner of the home, Mrs. Vaughn; her housekeeper, who fainted at some point; and an unnamed woman who was there at the time. That would be you?”
Abby took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “You seem to have all the facts, Mr. Coppersmith.”
“Like you, I don’t take every job that comes my way. And I do not have all of the facts, but I intend to get them.” He slipped the printouts back into the envelope. “Any idea what the blackmailer wants from you?”
“Not yet.”
“In that case, tell me what he has on you.”
Abby began to pace the chamber, weaving through the maze of display cases while she composed her thoughts. She had known this was coming, she reminded herself. It had been highly unlikely that she would be able to hire Sam without giving him all the information he might need to find the extortionist.
“Everything in the police report concerning the Vaughn home invasion is true,” she began.
“That makes me very interested to know what is not in the report.”
“Right.” She took a deep breath. “What’s not in those reports is that I’m the one who caused the intruder to collapse that day.”
Sam inclined his head once, as if she had confirmed a conclusion he had already reached.
“Thought so,” he said.
“What?”She stopped and stared at him, slightly stunned.
“The convenient collapse of an armed intruder in the middle of a home invasion was a bit of a red flag,” he said mildly. “You somehow used your talent to take down the intruder, didn’t you?”
“Yes,” she said quietly.
“You knew going in that you could do that.”
“I knew that if I could manipulate him into touching one of the heavily encrypted books at the same time I was holding it, there was a good chance that I could channel some of the energy into his aura and temporarily destabilize his pattern, yes.”
Sam looked intrigued. “So do you do that kind of thing on a regular basis?”
She glared at him, outraged and maybe even scared now, although she was loath to acknowledge it. Show no weakness.
“Of course not,” she said. She clasped her hands tightly behind her back and resumed pacing. “But for obvious reasons I do not want rumors of my ability to channel energy like that to start circulating in the collectors’ market.”
“You think it would hurt business?”
She whirled around to face him again. “Gossip like that could destroy me.”
“How?”
“Look, Mr. Coppersmith, I work both sides of the book market, the normal side and the true paranormal side. My normal clients are mostly legitimate private collectors who are interested in the history of the study of the paranormal.”
“Those would be your non-talent clients?”
“Yes. But to be honest, a small-time freelancer like me would starve if she catered only to that clientele. Talk about a niche market. The money is in the genuine hot-books world, which is, for the most part, an underground market. Deals conducted in that market have to be kept very low-profile. A lot of the most serious collectors prefer to remain anonymous. If they do invite me into their homes to appraise their collections, as Mrs. Vaughn did, they expect me to be extremely discreet. Generally speaking, the underground market pays well, but the clients tend to be a difficult bunch.”
“Define difficult,” Sam said.
“The spectrum of difficult clients starts at eccentric and moves on through secretive, reclusive and paranoid, all the way to dangerous. But I try to leave that last category of client to my competitors. The true hot-books market is a pool that is very deep at one end. I stick to the shallows.”
“Sounds like a smart business plan.”
“There’s less money at my end of the market, but it’s definitely safer swimming. The point I’m trying to make, though, is that in my business, reputation is everything. Aside from the fact that I’m very good at what I do, my most important credentials are that I am considered one hundred percent trustworthy and that I am not perceived as a potential book thief. I regret to say that there are some freelancers in my business who are not above accepting a commission to acquire a particular hot book by any means possible.”
“But if it got out that you can walk into someone’s private library, zap the collector unconscious and walk out with any item you care to take, some would–be clients would be reluctant to hire you, is that it?”
“What do you think?”
“I think you’re right,” Sam said. “Power of any kind is always interesting, but people tend to react to it in one of two ways. Some folks are compelled and attracted or even obsessed by power. Others get very, very nervous.”
“Exactly. I’m glad you understand what I’m facing here. When it comes to my underground clients, I walk a fine line. Like them, I try to keep a very low profile, and not only because I value my reputation. I do not want to become the subject of someone’s research experiment or, worse yet, attract the sort of freaks who want to fire up a cult.”
For the first time, surprise narrowed Sam’s brilliant green eyes. “You’ve had trouble with one or both of those types?”
“When I was in my teens, and again in college, I attracted the attention of some people who wanted to study me. It was not a pleasant experience. And even though I try to vet every client carefully, once in a while one becomes obsessed with me because of my talent. Fortunately, no one has tried to get me to channel some ancient spirit, thank heavens, but my friend Gwen had some trouble in that department a while back. It was scary.”
“Sounds like your talent-obsessed clients and the would–be cult founders have the potential to turn into stalkers.”
“Yes.” Abby paused. “I don’t suppose you Coppersmiths have ever been bothered with problems like that.”
“No, can’t say that we have.”
She gave a small sigh. “Must be nice to be part of a family that can insulate you from that sort of thing.”
“Moving right along, whoever sent you the threatening notes mentioned something about keeping your old secrets as well as the new ones. What did he mean?”
“To tell you the truth, that was what made me contact Thaddeus.” She cleared her throat. “When I was in my early teens and just coming into my talent, my family concluded that I had some major mental-health issues.”
“I can see where that might happen if you grow up in a family that doesn’t acknowledge the existence of the paranormal.”
“In my case, there were some unfortunate incidents that confirmed their worst fears.”
“Incidents?”
“Yes. As a result of those incidents, I was sent to a school for troubled teens. It was either that or a juvenile-detention facility. My father made sure my legal file was sealed, but obviously the bastard who sent those blackmail notes is aware of at least some of my history.”
“What kind of incidents?”