Scarlett's round face turned deathly serious.
"And when I first touched hematite," she said. "The feeling in my chest was - "
"I know!" Cassie screamed out. "Me, too!"
"It's my working stone," Scarlett said.
"Mine, too," Cassie said.
Scarlett grinned knowingly, as if she suspected as much.
"It's a truly rare occurrence, you know. To have hematite as your working stone."
Cassie turned away for a second, feeling ashamed. She had to remind herself that she didn't have to be embarrassed of her connection to Black John, at least not with Scarlett.
Scarlett watched her patiently. "It's okay," she said. "I know this is a lot to digest."
She does feel it, Cassie thought. Scarlett understood the mortification of Cassie's deepest secret. Scarlett endured that same crushing darkness dormant inside herself.
The air between them momentarily quieted, and Cassie knew this was her chance to ask about their father. "It's because of him," she said. "That hematite works for both of us. Right?"
Scarlett nodded. "I'd say that's most likely the reason."
"Did you know him?" Cassie asked, not having to utter their father's name.
Scarlett shook her head. "No. But my mom told me stories. Didn't yours?"
Cassie blushed, shamed by her own mother's shortcomings. "Not really."
"Our moms were best friends growing up," Scarlett said.
"Did you know that?"
Cassie searched her memory for any recol ection of her mother talking about old friends, but she came up blank.
"No," she said, disappointed. "I don't know much at all about my mother's past."
"Well, our moms were best friends," Scarlett said, matter-of-factly. "Until Black John came between them. Your mom stole him from my mom. That's why my mom left town."
"I had no idea." Cassie's heart fell a little because of this new picture of her mother, but also because she suddenly thought of Diana and Nick, and how she and Adam came between them. Would things ever be the same between them, or were they bound for the same fate?
Scarlett noticed a change in Cassie's disposition. "Have I upset you?" she asked. "Maybe I'm saying too much too soon."
"No, don't be silly." Cassie forced herself to relax and to put Adam and the others out of her mind for now. "I want to know everything. Don't hold anything back, please." Scarlett puckered her lips and eyed Cassie skeptically.
"We have our whole lives to catch up with each other, you know. We don't have to do it all in one night." It was an amazingly comforting thought. Our whole lives.
They could go back to giggling and goofing around, and pick up this seriousness tomorrow. But Cassie had waited for this chance for far too long to let it go any longer. She needed to know the truth, about everything. "Please tell me more," she said. "I can handle it."
"Okay then." Scarlett took Cassie's hand and squeezed it, and when she did, Cassie looked down at their intertwined fingers. It seemed like she could almost see a cord wrapping around their hands, connecting them. Just like the connection between Adam and me, Cassie thought. She and Scarlett were linked. They were fated. It explained everything she felt about Scarlett since the moment she'd set eyes on her, how she was willing to go against the whole Circle to defend her and protect her.
If Scarlett saw it, she didn't mention it. She went on talking as usual, while massaging Cassie's hand in her own.
"I'll never forget the day my mother told me I had a sister," Scarlett said. "It changed everything for me. I knew one day I'd find you. And see, I was right."
She waited a moment to read Cassie's expression and then added, "I don't understand why your mom never told you."
Cassie suddenly felt herself snap to a new level of awareness. She pulled her hand away. "Wait a minute. My mother knew about you?"
"Of course she knew." Scarlett's voice contained the
"Of course she knew." Scarlett's voice contained the slightest hint of outrage. "They were all still in New Salem when we were born."
Cassie thought back to the conversation she recently had with her mother. How she'd looked deep into her eyes and swore she'd told Cassie the whole truth about her father. I loved that I was all his, and he was all mine, she'd said, but it was a lie. Her mother knew he was with someone else.
"How could my mother not have told me I had a sister?" Cassie said aloud. This was a new divide that had sprung up between her and her mother, and at the moment, it felt insurmountable. Her