Page 8 of Dark Visions

He looked up at her and smiled, nodding his head ever so slightly.

“Thank you. We were just about out of that shithole when our Humvee was attacked. Three guys in my vehicle were killed. Me? I was the lucky one,” he said with a dark laugh. “He decided to torture me for a few days before killing me. He broke a few bones, tried to… well, he tried to make sure my manhood was inoperable, and then the burning started. First, it was just hot pokers against my skin. Then they got creative. Anything they could heat up and lay against me was used.”

“Oh, God,” she said quietly, holding her stomach. It was the pain she felt when she touched him, the agony of those burns.

“I was in and out of it for a while. Then I woke up one morning staring up at fluorescent lights in a hospital room. Some SEAL team saved my ass and got me to Germany and then home to D.C.”

“I’m so sorry, Kane. I wish I could have been there for you, I mean, at the hospital.” She said the words without thinking, but the pit in his stomach grew wide, and somehow he knew that Aislinn meant the words.

“I wish you could have been there as well, Aislinn. I needed someone at that point in my life. I honestly didn’t think I would live. I didn’t want to live. I dreamed of ways to kill myself every night.”

“Please don’t do that. Please don’t ever…” she held tight to his fingers, searching his face.

“I would never, Aislinn, I promise.” She let out a long, slow sigh of relief and nodded.

“My mother killed herself,” she said quietly.

Shit! Way to go, asshole! He winced and looked down at her, still holding his large hand in her own.

“It’s okay, Kane. You couldn’t have known. I don’t know why she killed herself. My father just said she was always sad. I think she had dreams like mine and didn’t know how to control them, but she never told me, and neither did my father.”

“Can you control them?” he asked with a raised eyebrow. Aislinn laughed, a soft, beautiful lilting laugh.

“No, I can’t.” He nodded and grinned at her. “Believe me. I’ve tried everything. Meditation, anxiety medication, marijuana, anything, and everything. Nothing works.”

“So, the doctor?”

“Right, the doctor. The visions happen when I touch someone. You know that already. But it’s not usually about past acts. It’s about what will occur in the near future. These are pre-meditated murders. Thought out, planned, and ready to execute. My vision with the doctor, it was… it was the worst I’ve ever experienced. It had several people in it. Two women and one man that I could see.”

“Could you tell where they were?” he asked.

“No. I only saw, I only saw his eyes. He was happy. He was enjoying what he was doing. The victims, the way they looked, the way they looked at him, I think they knew him.”

“What makes you think that?”

“I-I don’t know. They were looking at him the way you would if you had a relationship with someone. I tend to see visions from the view of the victim. It’s as if I’m inside their heads, like I’m looking through their eyes.” She looked at his face once more, their fingers still linked. “You believe me, don’t you?”

“I believe you, Aislinn.”

“Why? Why do you believe me? No one, and I do mean no one, has ever believed me. I can tell when people lie, and everything you’ve told me has been the truth.”

He looked down at her face, the full red lips, the smooth creamy white of her skin, flush with color, the deep rich chocolate of her eyes, her hair matching almost identically. Everything about this woman made him want to be a good man.

“I believe you because I felt it, too.”

CHAPTER SIX

Aislinn’s fork stilled inside the Chinese food box. She set the box on the table and scooted a little further away from Kane, turning to look directly into his eyes.

“That’s cruel, Kane. I can’t help what happens to me. It’s not nice to make fun of me or commiserate by trying to pretend that you see, too.”

“Aislinn, I swear to fuck, I’m not teasing you. Believe me. I would give anything if I could joke about this, but I can’t. I wish to fuck I could.”

“You-you get visions?” she asked.

“No. I don’t get visions. It’s different for me.”

She stared at him, waiting patiently for the words to come. Kane let out a long slow breath and leaned back against the sofa, running his long fingers through the tangled mess that was his hair.

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