"Blocking the way you block picking up impressions or whatever you call them from people without their consent?" "Not really. That's a conscious act, though it becomes as elemental as breathing. This is subconscious. The human mind is a powerful and efficient tool. We don't use it to its capacity. I don't think we dare." She picked up one of the little golden cookies she'd set out with the tea, and nibbled. "We are able to block. Trauma victims often do. They're unable or unwilling to remember the trauma, or details of it, because they can't or won't face it. You must see this sort of thing in your work." And in herself, Eve thought. In all the years she'd blocked out what had happened in that room in Dallas. "Yes." "Under hypnosis, those blocks can be removed or lowered.

I may see more. I know there's more, and I may see it. With the right practitioner… I'd need someone I'd insist on someone very skilled not only in hypnosis, but in dealing with sensitives. I'd want a medical doctor present as well.

I'd want Dr Mira to do it." "Mira." "After you gave me her name, I did some research. She's very qualified in all the areas I'd need. She's also a criminologist, so it seems to me she'd be more cognizant of what to ask me, where to guide me while I was under. You trust her." "Absolutely." Celina gestured with the cookie. "And I trust you. I don't put myself in just any hands, Dallas. To be honest, I'm afraid of this. But I'm more afraid of doing nothing. And you know what's worse?" "No." "I'm terrified I've been pushed into a new arena. That what I have, what I am, is moving down a path I never wanted for myself." She hugged her right arm, rubbing it gently as if to soothe a spasm. "That I'm going to spend the next phase of my life seeing murder and violence, linking with victims.

I liked my life the way it was. It makes it harder to realize it may never be just that way again." "And still you want me to contact Dr Mira?" She nodded. "The sooner the better. If I stall, I might lose the courage to follow it through." "Give me a minute," Eve said as she pulled out her "link.

"Oh. Right." Celina rose, picked up the tea tray. She carried it into the kitchen.

With slow, deliberate moves, she put the clean cup and saucer away, set her own in the sink.

Then she laid her hands on her face, pressed her fingers to her closed lids. And hoped, with everything she was, that she was ready for what was coming.

"Celina?" "Yes." On a quick jerk, she dropped her hands, then turned to the doorway where Eve stood.

"Dr Mira can see you tomorrow, at nine. She'll need to do a consult first, and a physical exam before she agrees to hypnotherapy." "Yes, good." She squared her shoulders as if adjusting to a weight, or shrugging one off. "That makes sense. Will you could you be there?" "If and when the hypnosis is approved, yes. Up until you're set to go under, you can change your mind." Clasping a hand over the crystals dangling from her neck chain, Celina shook her head. "No, I won't. I thought this through, up and down and sideways before I contacted you.

I won't change my mind. We're going to move ahead. I can promise you, I won't turn back now."

Eve dashed in the house, slammed the door at her back. "I'm late," she snapped before Summerset could speak. "But here's the thing, I'm not always late, but you're always ugly. Who's got the real problem?" Since she finished the question at the top of the stairs and kept going, she wasn't annoyed with any reply he might have made.

She stripped off her jacket as she hit the bedroom door.

Released her weapon harness and tossed it on the sofa.

Yanked off boots by hopping one-footed toward the bathroom, and had her shirt off when she heard the water running.

Damn, he'd beaten her home after all.

She peeled off the rest. "Turn that water temp up." "Done. I adjusted when I heard the graceful patter of your delicate feet stomping about in the bedroom." Knowing Roarke wasn't above being hysterically amused by having her scream after jumping into cold water, she stuck her hand in the spray first.

"Trusting soul," he said and grabbing her hand hauled her in. "Let's stay home and make hot, wet love in the shower." "Forget it." She elbowed him aside, pumped soap into her hand. "We're going to dinner. We're going to sit around somebody else's house and make stupid conversation and eat food we don't even get to pick for ourselves and pretend not to wonder exactly where in the apartment McNab and Charles punched each other out." "I can hardly wait." He pumped shampoo and began to lather it into her hair.

"What are you doing?" "Saving you time. What have you done here?" She hunched her shoulders. "Nothing." "You have. You've been whacking at your hair again." "It was in my eyes." "Back here?" He tugged. "Fascinating. Does the NYPSD know they have a cop with eyes in the back of her head? Has the CIA been notified?"

"I can do this myself." She pulled back, scrubbed vigorously at her hair while glaring at him. "Don't tell Trina." He smiled, wolfishly. "And what would my silence be worth to you?" "You want a quick hand job?" "See, you're being deliberately crude to put me off." He tapped her chin. "Oddly enough, it doesn't work." "She'll know anyway," Eve muttered, and stuck her head under the jets. "She'll know, the next time she gets her hands on me. And she'll make me pay. She'll pour goo all over me, and lecture, and paint my nipples blue or something." "What an interesting picture that creates in my fevered brain." "I don't know why I did it." She jumped out and into the drying tube. "I couldn't help myself." Tell it to the judge," Roarke advised.

They weren't very late, Peabody thought. And when you had two cops two currently overworked, sleep-deprived cops being on time wasn't even in the realm.

Besides, she'd wanted to take as much time as she could squeeze out to make sure she looked her best. Since McNab had given her a big, "Oh, baby!" she figured she'd pulled it off.

He looked pretty adorable himself. His hair was all shiny and slick, and his cute little butt was nice and snug against the seat of black pants saved from being too conservative by the fluorescent silver stripe running down each leg.

She had her hostess gift a clutch of fairly fresh tiger lilies she'd snagged from a vender near her subway stop and they'd been cleared through the lobby to the elevator.

"Now, you're going to play nice, right?" "Of course I'm going to play nice." He fiddled with the collar of his silver shirt and wondered if he should've added a tie. Give Monroe a run for his sophisticated money. "Why wouldn't I?" She rolled her eyes at him as they stepped into the elevator.

"Then. Now. Then you were sleeping with him, and I was drunk and pissed off. Now you're not and neither am I. Drunk and pissed off," he qualified.

She ordered Charles's floor, fluffed at her hair, and wished she'd had time to curl it, just for a change. "Neither was I." "What did you have to be drunk and pissed off about?" he asked.

"Sleeping with him. You sure my ass doesn't look fat in these pants?" "What?" "My ass." She craned her head around to try to see for herself. "It feels like it looks fat." "What do you mean you weren't sleeping with him? After Louise? You mean after Louise." "I mean ever. There ought to be a mirror in here so I could check my fat ass." "Your ass isn't fat, and shut up. You were going around with him for months." She gave the flowers she carried a little sniff. "You sleep with everybody you go around with?" "Pretty much. Now just a damn minute." "We're going to be late," she said as she stepped off the elevator and into the hall.

"We're going to be later. You telling me you never boinked the LC? Ever?" "Charles and I were, are, friends. That's it." McNab grabbed her arm, hauled her back a step. "You let me think you were boinking him." "No, you let you think I was." She poked a finger into his chest. "And made an ass of yourself, which is a pretty short walk, really."