The Edge of Madness Cafe (The Sea and the Wasteland Book 2) by Mark Reynolds

when you have a
moment?”
    “Okay,” she said, leaving
a box of bestsellers on the floor beside the turning rack where he displayed
them, the literary equivalent of candy at the checkout line. Nicholas Dabble
was all about giving people what they wanted, whether it was good for them or
not. “But I need to leave soon.”
    “Tuesday.” He nodded. “I
haven’t forgotten.” Dr. Kohler, every Tuesday and Friday. Ellen hated her
twice-weekly sessions; hated more being late, being scolded, risking her
freedom. So she pretended otherwise. Such a delicious conundrum.
    Dabble knew a thing or
two about Dr. Kohler, as well. The good doctor harbored secrets he told to no
one, not even himself. But Dabble was a disciple of human nature. He could
fathom most men with a glance, learn their most intimate secrets with a few
well-placed remarks about the weather or the Indian’s chances of a pennant. And
in the grand scheme of the universe, Dr. Kohler was essentially harmless,
though like any insect, the closer you brought the microscope, the more
frightening he became. But Dabble dealt with larger scales, greater distances
that brought people like Kohler into perspective; a minnow in the ocean. Well,
maybe more like a small leech or a fluke. Yes, definitely more like a fluke.
No, what worried Nicholas Dabble about Dr. Kohler was that he was Ellen
Monroe’s psychiatrist, and psychiatrists liked mysteries no more than he did.
Only where he was interested in resolving the mystery and leaving the vessel of
that conundrum (i.e., Ellen Monroe) intact, Kohler was more interested in
dissecting Ellen’s mind, extracting the unusual pieces, and discarding them. He
would make her scrub her own dreams with Borax and a wire brush until they were
stripped raw of everything; until they sparkled like polished bone. Ellen’s
soul would die and her heart would shrivel, and Kohler would congratulate himself
on saving another piece of walking meat with a sanitized mind and an addiction
to prescription drugs, ever pursuing the elusive state of normalcy. If Kohler
succeeded, the mystery that was Ellen Monroe, the secret she guarded, would be
lost, even to her. And The Sanity’s Edge Saloon would be lost as well.
    He couldn’t allow that.
    But could he plumb those
secrets before they fell victim to Kohler’s weed-whacker methodology? The good
doctor’s idea of delicate ministrations involved a mallet and a meat cleaver: Delicate
work. Whack! Got to be careful where to cut . Shawk! Mustn’t hurt
her too much. Wham!
    He held Dr. Kohler in no
greater disdain than he did most people.
    Simply put, he hated the
man.
    “Do you still happen to
have that book with you?” he asked. “The one we can’t seem to find anything out
about?” As if she needed reminding.
    Ellen nodded and turned
back towards the counter, her bag stowed below the register, the book tucked
safely towards the bottom. Dabble knew this. He knew a great many things about
her. He knew for instance that Ellen always carried the book just as a dying
man carries a Bible. And he knew that she dressed differently on Tuesdays and
Fridays; days when she had her sessions with Dr. Kohler. It was for the same
reason that she hated to be late to her appointments. But was it a conscious
act of deception? Dabble knew a great many things about Ellen Monroe, but not
everything, and that made him curious. And while frustrating, curiosity was a
powerful and addictive drug.
    Ellen returned with the
book, the cover’s gloss already dulled, flakes of ink gone from the spine
streaked white with cracks. The book did not even sit flat anymore, the pages
fanning slightly. How many times had she read and reread it? In another
month, this once-new book wouldn’t fetch a quarter at a church lawn social.
What did she hope to find in its pages?
    What do you hope to
find, Old Nick? he
chided softly.
    He took the book from her
carefully, slowly, the way a person might take something precious from the
hands of a