“I’m only getting two,” she whispered to them. “Daniel and Aylia. Upstairs, I think.”

“Think or know?” Bishop asked.

She went still for a moment, then nodded. “Know. Upstairs, dammit. In a bedroom. We’ll only be able to come at them from one doorway, maybe two.”

Bishop was already at the window, using a small, thin tool Nellie didn’t recognize to slide inside the wooden sash and silently unlock the window. Then he was easing the window open and seemingly in the same action slipping inside the house.

The window was low, but Nellie was still glad of Finn’s help and tried desperately not to make a sound.

And nearly cried out when she straightened inside and found herself staring at a bed only a few feet away. Lying across the neat bedspread was an older woman, perhaps seventy-five or even older, with snowy white hair. She was fully dressed, her hands folded peacefully over her lean middle.

Her eyes were open, reddened and unblinking as they gazed up at the ceiling. Her mouth was slightly open, her tongue protruding from between bluish lips. There were faint bruises on her throat.

Nellie had no idea how she managed to trap the scream inside her, but somehow she did. She watched as Bishop bent over the bed, his long fingers quick and deft as they checked for a pulse. Then he straightened, looked at them grimly, and shook his head once.

Nellie heard Hollis let out a slow breath, then saw her turn her face toward the doorway of the bedroom. Dimly, and then more loudly as she herself unconsciously concentrated, Nellie could hear the low drone of a male voice. Then a female voice, quicker but softer, holding a soothing note.

Aylia’s keeping him talking.

I know, she answered Finn.

They slipped from the bedroom and out into a short hallway. Bishop paused to move noiselessly into a second bedroom, only a glance needed to show Nellie there was a younger woman, probably in her late fifties, on that bed, more sprawled than peaceful but with the same reddened, staring eyes, the same bruises on her throat.

Nellie had no idea why Daniel would have strangled his mother and grandmother, but horror didn’t change her certainty that he had. When Bishop came out of that bedroom with another slight shake of his head, she merely fell in behind Finn and Hollis as they followed their team leader on down the hallway.

They entered the small front room, with its tiny foyer and painted wooden staircase leading upward, just as DeMarco, Miranda, Quentin, and Diana reached the same space.

To DeMarco, Bishop whispered, “Do what you can to dampen his abilities. If he’s telekinetic, that’s something we don’t need working against us.”

DeMarco nodded, his gaze turned toward the upstairs as he focused to employ a rare ability, one he seldom had cause to use. His immediate but slight frown was just as rare. “Interference.”

Hollis was staring at him. “We’ve been able to use the energy.” Her voice was hardly a breath of sound.