The Broken Clock is Right Thrice: Confessions of a Fake Psychic Detective #4

Chapter 13 - Never Do the Same Trick Twice

"Wait a minute. You didn't disappear?"

~ Laurie McQuary, self-proclaimed psychic, video interview, Inside Edition, March 2011, upon mistaking a photograph of the interviewing journalist for a missing girl (clip available on YouTube)

The stadium-grade lights keep the shooting range lit like daytime even though the sun's been down for 30 minutes. At Carter's insistence, the guard joins Zandra, Sunglasses, and Carter at one of the rifle shooting stations. He also demands to use a firearm of his choice: a single-shot shotgun. Carter's ammunition of choice is a 20-gauge slug, a single projectile. Smooth bore. Open sights.

In less technical terms, it is much more difficult to be accurate with a 20-gauge slug at 300 yards using a shotgun that handles like a cranky mule than it is with the guard's more elegant .308 scout rifle, especially when unaided by a scope. Zandra knows this, because everyone in Wisconsin knows this; the state is one of the white-tailed deer hunting capitals of the world.

The four are alone on the range, unless you also count Carter's to-go cocktail. The staff cleared everyone else out for his sake. No green-light-red-light toggling required.

"Don't let her get near nothing," Carter says to the guard as they slip on their eyes and ears. "And watch her hands. She's a snake."

Sunglasses can barely contain the scribbling in his notepad. He leans against one of the wooden supports of the shooting station, keeping the video on his smartphone rolling the whole time.

Soak it up.

"I'll be using my own coin, too, thank you very much," Carter says. He means that literally. The coin he produces, about twice the size of a quarter, bears a relief of his own face looking left. The opposite side shows his face looking right.

You should've spent more money on your fake coin. The art looks like JFK melted in the sun.

"May I?" Zandra says and stretches her hand out.

"Fuck no," Carter says with a boozy laugh that bites Zandra on the nose. "In fact, you're going to stand here with your hands in your pockets while I go tape this to the target."

Zandra slips her hands inside her purple gown. "Suit yourself."

Carter doesn't like that.

"No bullshit, Zandra, not this time. Keep your hands where I can see them," Carter says. Then, to the guard, "If she so much as blinks while I'm out at the target, fucking shoot her. I am not joking. I'll pay for your defense. It's no problem. The judge here is my uncle."

The guard takes a step closer to Zandra.

"No one is shooting anyone," Sunglasses says, looking up from his notepad.

Carter will be shooting himself, though. Figuratively, of course.

Carter grabs a roll of tape and the spotting scope. He hops into the golf cart to drive out to the 300-yard target. Zandra eyes the loaded shotgun on the bench, its barrel pointed downrange.

"Don't even think about it," the guard says.

"Think about what?" Zandra says. She resists the temptation to let her eyes drift toward the revolver concealed in Sunglasses's pocket.

"You know what I mean," the guard says. "Besides, I need someone to prove to me I'm not going crazy. I saw what I saw, but if what you did with me was real, I need to see it again."

"Careful, child. If I do it again, you might actually go crazy," Zandra says in her signature dramatic croak.

The sound of something slamming into wood makes all three in the shooting station jump. Zandra looks down at the shotgun on the bench. It remains in place.