out.
Daisy took a deep breath and tried again. “My dad gave me Aunt Jo’s camera. I like photography, you see, so he thought I might want it. It’s very expensive, the type of camera professional photographers use. I could never hope to buy a Leika for myself or wheedle one out of my parents for my birthday or Christmas.” She sounded breathless as she spoke. “I was happy to have it, especially since I’d never really known my aunt, so I felt no sense of loss,” Daisy explained. “I’d never even met her in person.”
“I’m sure she would have been glad to know that someone was using it. She loved that camera.”
Daisy nodded. “Leikas take amazing photos.”
Quinn finished making the sandwiches and handed the plates to Daisy, who set them on the table. She then poured them both mugs of tea and brought them over. Daisy sat down across from Quinn but made no move to touch her sandwich. Her face was flushed, and she looked even more anxious. It wasn’t the lack of welcome she’d been worried about, Quinn realized. Her stomach dropped, her heart beating faster as an unsettling idea took hold and made her reevaluate Daisy’s pained expression.
“Daisy, you can tell me anything,” Quinn invited, trying to keep her voice even.
“Can I?” Daisy asked. Her gaze was searching Quinn’s face, as if she were trying to decide if she could trust her.
Daisy picked up half a sandwich and took a bite, chewing slowly, as if stalling for time. She swallowed and took a sip of tea. Quinn took a bite of her own sandwich, giving Daisy time to compose herself.
“I saw things,” Daisy blurted out. “I saw awful things.”
“When you held the camera?” Quinn asked.
Daisy nodded, her head going up and down like a bobblehead’s. “I don’t know what it means. I thought I was going crazy. Every time I picked it up, I saw these scenes. It was like watching a film, only I knew all the actors from my own life.”
Quinn experienced a sudden chill as she tried in vain not let Daisy see her shock. Her pulse was galloping, and her breath came in short gasps. Daisy was biologically related to Jo, and to Seth, through whose line the psychic ability had been passed, although it had skipped his generation. Daisy had the gift.
“What did you see, Daisy?” Quinn finally asked, overwhelmed with sympathy for the girl. It must have been shocking, to say the least.
“I saw Jo and my dad,” Daisy said, her voice barely audible. “I saw them…you know.”
Quinn nodded but didn’t interrupt.
“I saw, and felt,” she added vehemently, “what Jo had felt. She was Quentin then. Quentin Crawford,” Daisy spat out with disgust. “My dad’s sister and my mother,” she cried, tears spilling down her cheeks. “My biological mother, who gave me up without even looking at me, without ever asking what had become of me.”
Daisy’s eyes flashed with anger, and a shiver of recognition surged through Quinn. At that moment, Daisy was her mother’s daughter. “Dad never told me,” Daisy spat out. “He’d lied to me my whole life.”
“Daisy, he was only trying to spare you pain,” Quinn said. “Had you known, you might have hoped for a relationship with your mother, but Jo wasn’t interested, at least not then.”
Grabbing a napkin, Daisy furiously blew her nose and buried her face in her mug of tea, taking several sips in an effort to calm down. She set the mug down and took a shuddering breath before trying again.
“I saw it all, Quinn. I saw her whole life play out before my eyes. I hate her. I hate her so much.” The tears began to flow again, but this time Daisy angrily wiped them away with the back of her hand. “She was horrible. Cruel. Selfish. Indifferent to the feelings of others.”
“I’m so sorry, Daisy. It must have been an awful shock,” Quinn said, her sympathy inadequate in the face of Daisy’s suffering.
“That’s the understatement of the year,” Daisy scoffed. She sniffled loudly, then gasped for air, as if she’d forgotten to breathe and only now remembered she needed oxygen. She exhaled slowly, trying to calm herself. “But then I saw you,” she said at last, and her expression brightened somewhat. “She cared for you, even loved you, I think,” Daisy said.
“She had a strange way of showing it,” Quinn said archly, and wished she hadn’t.
“She feared you. You had forced her to take a long, hard look at herself and