Would the people I was serving laugh, if they knew what I was thinking? Would my anxiety over the state of my soul amuse them? Lots of them would probably tell me that all situations are covered in the Bible, and that if I read the Book more, I’d find my answers there.

That hadn’t worked for me so far, but I wasn’t giving up. I abandoned my circular thoughts and listened in on the people around me to give my brain a rest.

Sara Weiss thought that I seemed like a simple young woman, and she decided I was incredibly lucky to have been given a gift, as she considered it. She believed everything Lattesta had told her about what had happened at the Pyramid, because underneath her practical approach to life there was a streak of mysticism. Lattesta, too, thought it was almost possible I was psychic; he’d listened to accounts of the Rhodes first responders with great interest, and now that he’d met me, he’d come to think they were speaking the truth. He wanted to know what I could do for my country and his career. He wondered if he’d get a promotion if he could get me to trust him enough to be my handler throughout my time of helping the FBI. If he could acquire my male accomplice, as well, his upward trajectory would be assured. He would be stationed at FBI headquarters in Washington. He would be launched up the ladder.

I considered asking Amelia to lay a spell on the FBI agents, but that seemed like cheating somehow. They weren’t supes. They were just doing what they’d been told to do. They didn’t bear me any ill will; in fact, Lattesta believed he was doing me a favor, because he could get me out of this parish backwater and into the national limelight, or at least high in the esteem of the FBI.

As if that mattered to me.

As I went about my duties, smiling and exchanging chitchat with the regular customers, I tried to imagine leaving Bon Temps with Lattesta. They’d devise some test to measure my accuracy. They’d finally believe I wasn’t psychic but telepathic. When they found out what the limits of my talent were, they’d take me places where awful things had happened so I could find survivors. They’d put me in rooms with the intelligence agents of other countries or with Americans they suspected of awful things. I’d have to tell the FBI whether or not those people were guilty of whatever crime the FBI imagined they might have committed. I’d have to be close to mass murderers, maybe. I imagined what I might see in the mind of such a person, and I felt sick.