Oracle Seeing (The Phoenix Files Book 2) Read Free

there.
    No one.
    Well, there had been that one. That missing piece to his life, and the reason he rushed out of the courthouse that day. She’d come…
    He’d sent her away.
    It was for her own good.
    The world was safer now that Lucian was locked behind the gates of the massive manor. It was for their protection, not his.
    His reflection wavered as the one blue eye, which remained, was filled with anger, loathing, and sadness. It was a bright pale blue, and it stood out in his face—it’s twin long gone thanks to justice.
    Or the lack there of.
    At one time, he’d been everything. He’d been so much, and now…he was a miserable drunk who hated the world.
    Yeah, that seemed about right.
    Hate had become his legacy.
    Hate had become his fuel.
    If he had to fight the world, he’d rather stay in bed. There was nothing left to live for, and this was his proof.
    He was shattered.
    As he went to sip his whiskey, the pain in his head began. He knew what it was, and he’d ignored it so many times before. It was the precursor to the visions.
    They kept coming, even when he didn’t want to have anything to do with them.
    How did a psychic stop his gift?
    There was only one way.
    You ignored them.
    You simply didn’t do anything to help the people screaming out for your help in your head.
    You quit.
    You got angry.
    You ran away.
    Only this pain was like nothing he’d ever felt before. It was growing inside him, burning his insides like hot pokers into his flesh. It was like a million knives being shoved into his head.
    It took him to his knees, the tumbler falling from his now dead fingers.
    He followed it to the floor as it stole his breath and made his heart thunder in his chest. He was being sucked under, and he couldn’t stop it.
    The visions came.
    They flashed.
    They tore through his mind.
    They didn’t give him a chance to breathe.
    Lucian watched them play out, memorizing the story they told, so he could think about it when he was ready—when the pain was gone.
    Only he wasn’t prepared for what he saw.
    They were horrible.
    He could hear the screams, the smell of blood, and the sick laughter of the person doing it. Lucian could hear the person begging, and it sounded like someone he once knew.
    It was familiar.
    It was there in his mind, a not so distant memory from his charmed past.
    Then he put the face to the voice.
    It was Judge Abrahms.
    He was begging for his life.
    He was crying.
    He was screaming.
    Jesus Christ!
    He was being disemboweled. The man in the chair was being tortured, and he was privy to it. Worse, Lucian was trapped, unable to break free from the pain-filled flashes. He was being forced to watch someone he’d worked with and respected, being taken apart piece by piece.
    Arron Abrahms was being murdered.
    He wanted to be sick from the sight alone, but the howls, the smell, and the horrors, pushed him to the edge.
    Lucian couldn’t focus.
    The visions came fast.
    They were rapidly racing though his mind.
    “Help me!” he begged, holding his head as he tried to fight past what he was seeing. Curled into the fetal position, he fought to keep the pain from taking him under.
    He had to stay conscious.
    Lucian felt as if his mind was being torn into two, and if he didn’t get it under control, he was going to have one hell of a stroke.
    Everything hurt.
    Nothing lessened.
    In his large home, Graymoor manor, he screamed for someone to help him get past the agony. He screamed for so long for help that he became hoarse.
    Just when he was about to give up hope, he felt someone creeping into his mind, trying to soothe him.
    There was a calm touch to his mind.
    Whisper light.
    It was like snow coating the ground on that first day of winter. It silenced the demons. It silenced the terror. It helped him breathe through the nightmare until he could get it back in control.
    Somehow, it found him.
    It saved him.
    ‘You’re safe,’ came the whisper through his mind.
    He didn’t know who was reaching