They waited for Jerry to sense the hostility that only a psychopath of Sanguine’s stature could radiate – the kind of hostility that he could never conceal, no matter how hard he tried. Instead, Jerry continued making his sandwich. Tanith was impressed at how cool and collected he was. It was almost as if he wasn’t even aware of their presence. Jerry started humming to himself, and Sanguine looked at her. She frowned back. Now it really seemed like he wasn’t aware of their presence.

Once he had piled every conceivable type of meat on to his sandwich, Jerry cut off the crusts and then sliced it down the middle. He picked up one half, raised it slowly to his mouth and bit into it as he turned. He saw them and shrieked, spitting it all out again as he stumbled back against the fridge. A bit of lettuce hung wetly off his chin.

“Hi,” said Tanith. “Just checking – you are Jerry Ordain, right?”

The man stood there, eyes bulging. “Whuh,” he said.

“Jerry Ordain? You are Jerry the psychic, aren’t you?”

He shook his head. The piece of lettuce fell away. “No. Not me. No. Wrong person.”

“Then who are you?” Sanguine asked.

The man gaped at him. “Me?”

It was Jerry. It was obviously Jerry, from the look on his face as his fear-frozen mind tried coming up with a false name. “I’m… I’m…”

Sanguine added an edge to his voice. “What’s your damn name?”

“Jerry!” Jerry blurted. “But not the Jerry you’re looking for! I’m a different Jerry!”

Jerry had to be the worst liar Tanith had ever met.

“I’ll get him, though,” Jerry said, stepping sideways. “If you stay right there, I’ll get him. Just stay there. I’ll be right back, with Jerry. The Jerry you’re looking for.”

Sanguine strolled over to intercept him, and Jerry reversed direction, started heading for the window.

“Make yourselves at home,” he was saying. “Want a sandwich? I just made a sandwich. You can have my sandwich. I won’t be long. Thirty seconds, tops.”

“Jerry,” Tanith said, “we’ve come a long way to talk to you.”

He shook his head. “You’ve come a long way to talk to the other Jerry…”

Tanith showed him her sword. Jerry stared. And then he bolted for the window.

In his haste, however, he completely forgot about the coffee table and, when his shin smacked into it, he barely had time to howl before his face hit the floor. Tanith watched him contort in pain, one hand over his shin, the other covering his mouth. He’d bitten his tongue. She winced. She hated that.