Beauty In Her Madness (Winterland Tale #3) - Stacey Marie Brown Page 0,52

could remember, until the last couple of years. I don’t know why, but now none of us could taste it without cringing. Alice was the worst. She wouldn’t eat anything with peppermint in it. “A crème brûlée latte, please.”

She nodded, writing my order on my cup. After paying, I went and sat down, my knee bobbing as I waited.

“Dinah, calm down,” I muttered to myself. “Look around. Everything is normal. You’re fine.” I tried to take deep breaths and let the mundane environment of the café soothe my nerves.

“Dinah?” A woman’s voice jolted me; my knee hit the table, almost knocking it over. “Oh, I’m sorry I scared you.”

I stared up at my therapist, her hands filled with two takeaway cups. She peered down at me.

“Dr. Bell?” A strange need to run licked at the back of my legs. “Wh-what are you doing here?”

“Oh, I don’t live far. I come here all the time.”

“Oh,” I responded, staring at her. I had never seen her in here, but it wasn’t like I came every day.

“Can I sit down?” She motioned to the empty chair across from me.

“Oh—um—of course.” My mouth and brain didn’t seem to be connecting on an intimate level today. “I need to go grab my coffee.”

“Don’t worry, I saw it and got it for you.” A smile grew on her lips. She sat down, pushing the coffee to me. “Saved you the trip.”

“Thanks.” I took the cup from her, steam billowing out of the open part of the lid.

“I saw you and wanted to check in. See how you were doing. You left my office so abruptly yesterday.”

Yesterday? I was there just yesterday?

My nails tapped on my cup, my eyes not meeting hers. “Sorry about that.”

“Don’t be sorry.” She leaned on her arms on the table, her hand patting mine. My teeth dug into my lip, fighting the urge to pull back. “I’m here to help you. To clear the path for you. To help guide you into finding your true purpose.”

“Sounds very cult-y.”

Her laugh rang out. “No, nothing like that.” She patted my hand again. “I know there is great potential in you, Dinah. Sometimes we just need help getting out of our own way.” She pulled away, picking up her cup, taking a drink.

I stared back down at my drink, my mind feeling slow, making everything feel as if glass stood between me and the world.

“Are you all right? You look a little pale.” She leaned in. “Maybe some caffeine will help.”

“Yeah.” I nodded, picking up my cup. Should I tell her I took more of the pills than was suggested? Tell her I was losing my grip on reality with every breath? I understood it didn’t matter if Winterland was real to me. It wasn’t real to this world, and that made me certifiably insane.

Tipping the coffee into my mouth, my nose picked up on it, but it was already too late, the hot liquid filling my mouth and gliding down my throat.

Peppermint.

“Ack!” I shook my head, struggling to swallow, tempted to spit it back out on the floor. The smell and taste lashed through me, dragging me back to another time. I got muddled glimpses of an older woman with red lips, cold blue eyes, and sleek chin-length white-blonde hair. Her arm was linked with Matt’s, which made no sense.

As fast as they came, the mental images slipped back into the darkness, leaving a residue of unrest and anxiety.

“What’s wrong?” Dr. Bell stared at me with concern.

“Nothing.” I looked again at the name on the cup. “They made a mistake. They made me a peppermint latte.” Though oddly, I could taste the crème brûlée as well. They probably mixed up and put both.

“You don’t like the flavor?”

“No.” I shook my head. “I despise it.”

“Really? It’s my favorite.”

“Well, I used to love it, but now…” I shivered, my head feeling extremely heavy.

“What made you stop liking it?”

“I—” I shifted in my chair, and something small and gray darted across the floor, catching my attention. Was that a mouse? But no one reacted, not a single person seemed to notice it in the middle of the café. I shook my head, and the creature was gone. “I don’t know. My whole family went from loving it to hating it.”

“Odd.” She lifted an eyebrow. “Your whole family at the same time?”

“Yeah.” I barely responded when something slightly bigger, another mouse, jumped onto the table next to me. This one was dressed in a red coat and top