Page 49 of Intersect

I watch my mother’s face, waiting for it to sink in. It does, first as confusion and then astonishment and finally denial. “Oh. But that’s…no. You think it’s your dad’s sister behind this?”

“What are the odds she isn’t? It seems like too great a coincidence, doesn’t it?”

“Your aunt would have no reason to do this. She’s never even met you.”

I feel certain this will not be a productive question, but I have to ask. “Could there be something she wanted to inherit, maybe? Something in the family that would pass on to her instead of me if I weren’t around?”

I want to see a light dawn in her eyes, some hint that what I’ve said rings a bell, but instead her arms cross and her brow furrows.

“That’s ridiculous. Anything your father left to me goes to you if I die. Anything you have goes to whoever you want. He didn’t leave her anything.”

“So you have no idea why she’d try to kill me?”

She stares at the table. “It can’t be her. It must be a coincidence. The woman’s never even met you.”

“Mom,” I say gently, tapping her hand to get her attention. “This matters. For a lot of reasons. We think she might have some answers about the brain tumor. If there’s something you’re not telling me, please…I need to know.”

She hesitates, and in that hesitation I realize she knows something. Something she has no plans to admit. She rises from the chair. “I know nothing about her and I’ve never met the woman.” She opens the refrigerator. “So what should we have for lunch?”

* * *

Nick calls in the afternoon, his voice groggy from being awake most of the last forty-eight hours. In typical fashion he’s mostly worried about me, when he’s the one in a foreign country pursuing a potential murderer. “How are you? Did Caroline drive you to your mom’s?”

“Something like that,” I reply.

“Quinn…” he growls.

“It’s fine! I’m here safe and sound. You can punish me for it when you get home.”

He laughs low in his chest. “I think you’d enjoy the way I’d punish you too much.”

A small fire starts burning in my stomach. “Remind me of that when you get home. Did you find anything today?”

He sighs. “Yeah. The address I had? It wasn’t a hotel—it was a palm reader who insisted on doing a reading. And it was unsettling because she got so many things right.”

I groan. “Let me guess: she said you were American and wanted to be happy? The one palm reader I ever went to told me something was drawing me to Europe.”

“What’s wrong with that?”

“Who isn’t drawn to visiting Europe? It’s like saying you’re committed to breathing oxygen.”

He laughs but it fades away quickly. “She was slightly more specific, babe. She knew about your brain tumor. And she knew my name.”

The fine hairs on the back of my arms stand on end. “Oh….I…wow.”

“Yeah,” he says. He takes a deep breath, releases it. “Cecelia—the palm reader—also said you’re pregnant.”

My heart begins to race. It’s impossible. I’m on the pill, my period is due any second now and it’s only been twenty-four hours. I’m not sure I could even have conceived anything yet. I force a laugh. “Wow, is it like some kind of vampire baby who grows at superhuman speed?”

It’s disturbingly quiet on the other end of the line. “Maybe she got that wrong.” He doesn’t sound like he means it though.

It’s too much to think about right now. And too ridiculous. I couldn’t possibly be pregnant and even if time traveling exists, I refuse to begin believing in palm readings, tarot cards or anything like it. “Did she know anything about Sarah?”

“Yeah. She’s met her several times but doesn’t have an address for her.”

I’m both relieved and disappointed. I guess I held some small hope this might work, but mostly I just want him back, and safe. “So then you’re done, right? And you’re coming home?”

He exhales. “Not exactly. This woman sells…I don’t even know what she sells. It looked like an old-time apothecary, the kind of thing you’d associate with England in the 1600s. Anyway, your aunt is supposed to be coming in at some point. She’s going to let me know as soon as she gets there.”