Free The Unseen Trilogy by Stephanie Erickson Page A

questions?”
    “Depends on the question, I suppose. What else do you want to know?”
    “Got any job openings for a music therapist?”
    He smiled. “No, but I do have an opening for you if you’re interested.”
    “What are the pay and benefits like?”
    “Excellent.”
    I eyed him, feeling like I was missing something important. “A short answer.”
    “I can go into details once you agree to work here.”
    That seemed fair to me. Not all employers would be free with information, particularly where it came to confidentiality of patients, duties, and possibly methods.
    “And what exactly would my job responsibilities be?”
    He sat back in his chair. “Each assignment is different and all are highly confidential.”
    “Okay, well, give me a for instance. I’m having trouble picturing what mind readers do for a living.”
    “We read minds, Mackenzie.”
    I frowned, getting frustrated, but before I could ask another question, he held up his hands. “Fine. For example, in the beginning, you might be asked to provide background information on a mark for an assignment. As you advance with us, your tasks will involve more and more reading.”
    “Background information? So you target certain people for readings? To what end?”
    “To all different ends. It depends on the assignment.”
    “Also, I’m not a researcher. I’m a music therapist. How do you know I would be any good at this job?”
    “Let’s just call it a gut feeling.”
    His evasive answers were making me uneasy. Clearly picking up on my thoughts, he said, “Listen, as with any job, I’ll be able to provide you with more details once you commit. The work is classified, so for now, this is all I can give you.” He looked like he meant it—that he’d like to give me more information but couldn’t—so I decided to let it go for now.
    “Fine, but I have one question that has nothing to do with me working here. It’s pretty clear that Owen and Mitchell followed me. Why?”
    He frowned. “I hope you don’t see that as a breach of privacy. Mitchell wasn’t following you initially. He stumbled upon you in your time of need, and then he reported to me that he’d found a reader who had no idea other readers existed. He felt your need to belong, all your questions about who and what you were. So I sent Owen to confirm his suspicions. When he did, I gave him the go ahead to make contact.”
    Finally, a straight and truthful answer, from what I could tell. It gave me the confidence to go back to asking him questions about my potential future with the Unseen. “Owen said I could live here if I wanted, and he implied it would be rent free. But he also said it would require a commitment of sorts. What exactly does that mean? Is room and board one of the benefits?”
    “Owen is right, our members live on site, and I suppose it is part of the benefits package. If you want to be one of us, you must live here, and make a full-time commitment to honing your gift.”
    “My…” I hesitated. “Gift?”
    “That’s right.”
    I’d never thought of it that way. It had always been more of a curse—a burden, at best.
    The boss frowned. “I am sorry you’ve been alone for this long. Normally, we would have tried to approach you sooner. Circumstances kept us apart. But I do hope you’ll consider staying. Just imagine your potential, Mackenzie, how different your life could be if you knew how to control your gift.”
    Control it, I thought, tempted by the possibility. I shook my head, struggling to bring rational thought back to the forefront. “Although I’m excited about this new opportunity, I just graduated from grad school, and I have a lot of applications out there. I’ve spent the last six years pointing myself down the road I’m on. I’m not sure I want to change direction so suddenly.”
    “Music therapy is important to you, isn’t it?”
    “Yes. It’s been my dream ever since I found out about it. I need to help people. I need to be