Deliverance by Dakota Banks Page B

in her chair to think while Abiyram puffed on his pipe. Suddenly the pipe smoke revealed the pencil-sized red light of a laser gun sight. Her hand flashed out to tip his chair, to move him out of the way, but it was too late. As her push propelled him and the chair over, there was already a bullet in his brain.
    Maliha turned the table on its side to block the sniper’s view through the window, and then she crouched next to Abiyram and felt for a pulse.
    “Old friend,” she said. His eyes lost the light of life as she watched, helpless to stop the shutdown of a brilliant mind.
    When a violent death happened, there was a psychic scar left at the location. As Maliha understood it, the victim’s spirit left a remnant of itself behind in the sudden transition to its next destination. Most people would walk through the location and not notice anything, but Maliha could detect the imprint if she was paying attention. It was similar to her ability to see auras, but this viewing was intensely personal. It required her to go through the death experience of the victim.
    She pushed Abiyram slightly out of the way so that she could lie down in the spot he died. She shifted slightly, and she found the correct spot. Her eyes remained open, but the input to her sight and other senses lessened dramatically. She relaxed and let another scene come into focus. Slipping into his death experience, she looked through Abiyram’s eyes as he sat across the table from her in the last moments before his death.
    From his perspective, she saw that he was scanning around him, an old habit for a Mossad operative. Through his eyes, she saw the origin of the laser sight through the sliding door. It was a window on the top floor of a building a block away. She dropped the pipe. Then she felt pressure and pain on her forehead as the bullet arrived and penetrated her skull. Right after, so close in time they seemed to happen as one, she saw a hand as a blur in front of her eyes. Her head snapped back and she swayed and then tumbled out of the chair to the floor. She heard the comforting words “old friend” before her vision went black and she felt her heart beat for the last time.
    Maliha remained in position and in a moment, Abiyram’s traumatized, scattered spirit coalesced around her like a loving embrace, grew whole, and moved on.
    She called a friend in the Mossad, explained what had just happened, and said she would stay until he arrived to make sure no one looked through Abiyram’s office. Although Abiyram kept most of his information in his head, she couldn’t guarantee that there weren’t secret documents in his home. She found out that Abiyram had a younger brother, something she’d never known, and that he would be brought in to be the guardian of the body so that it was never alone, a Jewish custom. As a friend, she stayed with Abiyram until the brother arrived.
    A man like Abiyram must have enemies, but he said that this information had cost him a lot. What did he mean by that? We were talking about Jake’s past. Was Jake the sniper? He has the skill to do it. He could have found out that Abiyram was poking around in his past. Do I find him and try to force the answer out of him? If I did that, it might break us both.
    Maliha shuddered at the form such a confrontation would take. The Ageless felt pain, as she well knew, but their rapid healing made them ready for another torture session in a short time.
    If he’s not guilty, he’ll hate me for suspecting him and going behind his back to learn about blood gold. Can there be another explanation? If he is guilty . . . what then?
    When the Israeli agent arrived with the younger brother in tow to take over from her, she packed her few things. Then she left without a word, her eyes bright with unshed tears.

Chapter Eight
     
    T he next day Maliha attended Abiyram’s funeral. The Mossad had photographed his body and removed the bullet for their investigation, then released his body for