sister,” Quinn said to head him off as she led him inside.
Sam picked up a sheaf of papers lying on the table. “Her name is Marley Canton and she lives in Maine.”
“Never heard of her,” Nick called from the bedroom.
Neither had Quinn, so did that mean she wasn’t a goddess? Marley. Quinn let the name roll through her head. If Marley wasn’t a goddess, that could mean she wasn’t the attacker. But it also gave a potential motive, if she was jealous of Quinn’s power or considered it demonic or something. Quinn scoffed at a prick of hurt. It was far too early to be thinking of building family relationships.
“How did you find her?” she asked Sam.
“Birth certificate with your birth parents’ names on it. The correct names.” Sam shot Nick a dirty look as he came out into the main room.
“You must have read it wrong,” Nick said.
“If your handwriting was better, I wouldn’t have.” Sam settled at the table in his usual position in front of the laptop. Today he wore a snug T-shirt, and his arms flexed as he worked the keyboard. Quinn sat on the couch and glanced up at Nick. He looked back at her, then at Sam, and chose a chair far from either of them.
Quinn took a deep breath against the far larger ache that didn’t care how much she understood Nick and his motivations. A rejection was a rejection.
Concentrate. She considered what Sam had said about the birth certificate. “Both my birth parents were listed?”
“They’re still married, as far as I can tell.” Sam looked apologetic.
“Did they keep her? Marley?” She couldn’t help asking the question but wasn’t surprised when he nodded. It was what she’d always feared. They hadn’t wanted her, not even enough to find her after she’d grown up.
“She’s a registered goddess, but inactive.” Sam picked up the folder with the database information and stretched to hand it to her.
“What’s her power source?” Quinn flipped open the folder to scan the roster. She didn’t know what she expected. Some kind of zing of recognition when she saw her name in black and white, maybe. An invisible weight pressed on her, and she glanced up to meet Nick’s eyes. Instead of distant and reserved, they were warm, encouraging. Quinn flushed and looked back down, flustered. She wasn’t sure how to interpret that, and she was too raw to try right now.
She forced herself to concentrate on the roster. Sam had highlighted Marley’s listing, the word “crystals” circled as her power source.
“She can pretty much bring her power anywhere she goes,” Sam said.
“Son of a bitch,” Nick growled, clearly taking that as evidence against Marley.
Sam frowned at him. “I don’t know what level her power is. Crystals have been used as a focusing medium for centuries, so—”
“It could be limitless,” Quinn finished. She set the folder down and covered her face with her hands, resting her burning eyes.
“You’re not reacting like I expected,” Sam said. “What’s wrong?”
“She’s not overjoyed that she has a powerful goddess sister who might be evil.” Nick moved to sit next to her and rubbed his hand up and down her back. It went far to negate the pain of his rejection a few minutes ago.
“What are you talking about?” Sam demanded.
Quinn shrugged at Nick to bring him up to date.
“The goons who kidnapped—”
“Abducted,” she corrected from behind her hands. “I’m not a child.”
“The goons who took her from the convenience store said a woman was in charge. They were under orders not to hurt Quinn.”
“That’s weird.”
“She could also have been behind the hotel attack and your car accident.”
“The flash I saw could have been a crystal set in a puddle,” Sam agreed. “She could have been watching and focused her energy through it to flip my car.”
“And used the same energy to control the flip so you didn’t get killed.”
Quinn raised her head to see Sam nodding. “It makes sense. Endanger me, then make Quinn afraid to pursue whatever trail we were on. I thought I imagined the slow motion of the Camaro’s roll, but maybe it actually was.”
“Same thing with the hotel,” Nick said. “The noise and tossing stuff around? Amateurish. But instead of someone who didn’t have control over their power, like the leech…”
Quinn stood and walked to the stainless steel sink. “It could have been someone holding back, giving us time to get out. It would be frightening enough to make us think it was real, without intending to hurt us.” She took