"But you believe there's something here to see?"

It was her turn to frown, and she looked away to gaze up the hill toward the "natural" pulpit. Her eyes seemed unfocused for a moment, almost dreamy. "I'm not a cop," she said absently. "I'm not so sure I'd recognize anything unusual."

"Then why do you"

"Except for the Stepford bit. They're all very perfect, aren't they? Scrubbed and polite and smiling. Content." Her gaze returned to his face, the gray eyes sharp now. "I hear some people get that from their religion, but up here it seems a little excessive."

"Just a little?" he said almost involuntarily.

Tessa smiled. "Okay, more than a little. A nosy question, but are you religious, Sawyer?"

"Not really. Raised with it, of course. Hard not to be here in the South."

"But it didn't speak to you?"

"The preachers yelled quite a bit, but, no, I didn't much care for the fire and brimstone."

"Me either. Do you think that's why what Samuel offers his flock is so seductive? Because he doesn't yell? Because he promises reward instead of punishment?"

Sawyer studied her for a moment, conscious of the very odd but strong impulse to tell her that they should both leave. Now. But he had no idea why, specifically, he felt a threat directed at them both.

"Sawyer?"

He actually turned his head and looked all around them, wary, realizing that the hairs on the back of his neck were stirring in warning, and not because of the damn camera.

"We should leave," he said.

"They turned the microphone off."

He looked quickly back at her. "Tessa, what are you talking about?"

"There's a microphone hidden up there just behind the pulpit. Didn't you feel it? Can't you feel it now?"

Carefully, he said, "How could I feel a microphone?"

She studied him, a tiny smile playing about her mouth. "That's your thing, isn't it? Electronics? So you always know when there's a camera around, when there's surveillance? I bet watches die on you within weeks or even days and cell phones lose their charge much faster than they're supposed to. And I'll bet you short out lamps and screw up computers from time to time. Unless you've learned more than basic control, at least."

Sawyer was rarely speechless, but at that moment he couldn't think of a damn thing to say. The sense of a threat was still there, hovering, but he honestly wasn't certain if it was the cameraor something else.

"Sorry. Under normal circumstances I wouldn't have said anything," Tessa continued. "It's your ability, after all, and your decision who to tell about it. I know from experience that keeping quiet is usually the better way. People tend to fear what they don't understand, andBut we don't have a lot of time, so I have to be blunt."

"Blunt in saying what?" He wasn't giving in without a fight.

"That you're psychic. Probably since you were a kid, but you may not have been aware of it until you hit your teens."

"Tessa"

"Most of us move from latent to active in our teens, unless there's some kind of traumatic event earlier than that. Or sometimes much later in life. We're the lucky ones. Our abilities aren't born in pain and suffering."

Again, Sawyer didn't know what to say.

Tessa smiled, this time a bit wry. "Technically, you have a heightened sensitivity to electrical and magnetic fields. We don't really have a name for that, other than a kind of clairvoyance. I don't know if you're able to manipulate the fields, but you do affect them, they affect you, and you could probably feel that microphone about the time you topped the hill." She nodded slightly to indicate something off to his right. "Just like you can feel the camera trained on us from that tree over there."

Sawyer didn't bother to turn his head to look at the camera thirty yards away from them but kept his gaze on her face. "And you know all this because?"

"Because I'm psychic too. And one of the things I'm really good at is sensing another psychic and knowing what abilities they have."

"One of the things?"

"I'm also clairvoyant, though not like you; I tend to pick up bits of information, emotions, snippets of thoughts. I have an unusual shield that hides my abilities from every other psychic I've ever encountered, and I'm mildly telepathic both ways."

"Both ways?"

Yes. Both ways.

"Shit. Was that"

"Me, yeah. Sorry. It is, to say the least, intrusive to shove thoughts into other people's minds without so much as a by-your-leave, and I generally ask permission first." Her shoulders lifted and fell in a little shrug. "The ability only seems to work with other psychics. And even then I'm limited to very short phrases and sentences."

Sawyer thought about the sarcastic inner voice that had been nagging at him and had to ask. "You haven't beenyou haven't done that before? Put thoughts in my head?"

Her eyebrows went up a bit. "No, that was the first time. Why? Has there been an alien voice in your head?"

"I assume you mean alien as in unfamiliar."

"Well, I'm not a big believer in visitations from little green men, so, yeah, that's what I mean."

"How could I have an unfamiliar voice in my head?"

Her mouth twisted slightly. "Around here? Pretty easily, I'd say. There's a weird sort of energy in this place, here in the Compound and even in Grace, and you can't tell me you don't feel it."

"Lots of places have weird energy. That doesn't translate to somebody else's thoughts in your head."

"It might here. I can't be absolutely sure of the number, but I can tell you there are quite a few psychics inside this Compound."

"I can't believe I'm having this conversation," he muttered.

"It gets worse," she told him.

"JESUS. How does it get worse?'"

"We believe Samuel is one of the strongest and most unusual psychics we've ever encountered. Extremely powerful and extremely dangerous. And probably at least one of the people closest to him is an unusually strong psychic as well. Maybe DeMarco." She shook her head. "I couldn't get a read on him, and that's rare for me."

Sawyer took a moment to sort through the questions rattling around in his mind and focused on one. "We believe. Who is we?"

Tessa answered readily, having clearly expected the question. "I work for a civilian investigative organization called Haven. We're called into cases that present difficulties for cops and federal agents, for whatever reason. Most of us are licensed P.I.s, but we obviously don't have quite as many rules and regulations to worry about during an investigation."

"You break the law?"

"Personally, no. Well, not so far, though I have to admit I've never been faced with that particular choice. And it isn't company policy, believe me; we also work with cops and federal agents, both of whom would be more than a little uncooperative if we didn't mostly play by the rules."

"Mostly."

She ignored the muttered word to add, "This time out, we're part of a federal investigation of the Church of the Everlasting Sin. And of Samuel."

"First I've heard of it." He tried to keep the suspicion out of his voice and undoubtedly failed, judging by her faint smile. Or, hell, maybe she's just reading your mind.

"You'll have to forgive us for that. We had reason to believe that Samuel could have people inside local law enforcement. Church members, perhaps. So we couldn't be sure who to trust. Until we had someone here who could"

"Read me?"

Tessa nodded. "We had to be sure. We couldn't take the chance of confiding in the wrong person, not with so many lives potentially at stake. I'm sure you know enough about cults to know that if and when the cult leader is threatened, or even just feels threatened, the consequences can be devastating."