noise. It smelled like a mixture of pungent herbs and some sort of sweet oil, the same scent I’d picked up wafting off Clarice as she passed me at The Yellow Trellis Inn. Clarice sat near the back, a small, round table in front of her, draped with the same deep blue fabric of her curtain. My eyes adjusted as I took the few steps toward her, sitting down. “I’m being forced to do this,” I told her, making sure she understood I was here against my will.
Her laughter was like wind chimes, tinkling and delicate. “Not a believer in the sixth sense, Chief Hale?”
I flashed her a smile. “I tend to be skeptical of anything that requires a cash payment for proof of its existence. No offense.”
“None taken. I understand your skepticism, and I can only tell you that though I make a business of my . . . talents, I constantly have one foot behind the veil, unrelated to cash payments. I couldn’t shut it off if I tried,” she said, leaning forward slightly. “If you look deeply within yourself, you will find that all of us have intuition that can’t always be explained by circumstance or evidence. Mine is simply stronger than the average person’s. Now,” she said, taking my hands in hers. “Let’s see what the future holds for you.”
I sighed, watching her as she gazed down at our joined hands, her brows taking turns moving up and down, her mouth thinning and then puckering as she apparently listened to whatever message might be coming from beyond the beyond. Oh for Christ’s sake.
I was sitting in here for Haven, doing this ludicrous thing because she had looked so damned excited for all of us to have our fortune’s read, and I was—apparently—unwilling to do anything that might take that joyful smile off her pretty face on a day she’d declared the best of her entire life.
I’d even helped sway Gage into asking her out on a date. Because dating Gage was her dearest wish come true.
My stomach muscles tightened. Damn cheap beer.
I considered what she’d divulged about the cantaloupe and rooftop garden. I pictured Haven as an eleven-year-old girl with curls springing out around her little face and sighed. She’d said, “when” her mother brought food home. She’d been hungry once upon a time. And it’d killed me to hear that.
She’d traveled halfway across town to work at a store where she could get an employee discount, only to bring home items off the discount shelf. In my mind’s eye, she’d morphed from an eleven-year-old to a weary teenager, but with those same runaway curls, lugging bags of bruised apples, and half-wilted spinach home on three buses so she could make meals for her mother and brother that said, I care for you. I will sacrifice for you.
I very suddenly understood what fresh spinach, brewer’s yeast, chia seeds, and all the other stuff I couldn’t even pronounce meant to her and why. And I felt ashamed for the teasing I’d done before I truly understood.
So, yeah, perhaps if anyone deserved their wishes to come true, it was this girl. Even if that meant Gage Perfect Buchanan.
I’d moved my eyes from Clarice to the fabric draped behind her as I thought about Haven, and when I returned my gaze to her face, she was looking at me strangely, head thrust forward. “There are one of two paths for you. Either lose it all. Or lose it all.”
‘Scuse me?
I waited for more. Only silence came. “Um . . . what?”
Clarice dropped my hands, letting out a loud whoosh of breath, and repeated what she’d just said.
“Yes, I heard you. Both potential future paths sound . . . equally terrible.”
“Yes,” she agreed. “It does sound that way.” Her brows did that quizzical thing again, but she offered no further insight. I gave it another moment.
Nothing.
“I don’t think things are supposed to work this way.” I narrowed my eyes. “Are you messing with me because I expressed doubt in your . . . talents?”
“Oh no, no. Definitely not. I never lie when it comes to my predictions.” She peered at me again. “The fog is very dense around your future. Very, very dense. Murky even.”
Very, very dense.
“Are you serious? That’s what you’re leaving me with?” I stayed planted in my chair. Why did I care? I didn’t believe in this crap anyway. But even so, shouldn’t you be able to expect certain things in these situations? I was under the