And then the window and the ground and all of it was gone, and Jade registered too late his arm around her waist pulling her back, and the bathroom floor hit her too hard for her to scream out or make a sound. She could only look up as he towered over her, going to his knees, raising the knife in his hand.
Jade’s whole body was paralyzed, stiff with fear and numb with the pain of hitting the tile floor so hard, nothing responding when she tried desperately to move out of his reach. He was trapping her, straddling her legs, and she managed to put up one of her hands toward him—
And the knife flashed down, plunging into her stomach.
Jade’s senses registered the ripping of cloth, her shirt giving way beneath the blade, and she stupidly thought about work and how pissed they would be that she had ruined a uniform. A
t the same time, she managed to draw a breath, and strangely there was no pain. “No,” she managed to say, the beginning of something else, the start of a plea for her life that he would have to listen to.
But the knife ripped its way back out of her stomach, and then the pain flooded in, and then the knife came down again and even her raised hand was not enough to stop it hitting her again.
And again.
And again.
And when Jade tried to breathe there was nothing in her chest that would inflate, only darkness waiting for her, crowding the edges of her vision, sending her down and away into the sleep she had been planning for—but a more permanent and deeper one than she had imagined.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Laura walked into the crowded bar, almost immediately assaulted by the cacophony of noise in the warm, dimly lit space. The music and the conversation conspired to make her pause, trying to adjust. She hated coming here. She’d hated it last time she was here, with its cheap tiki decorations and the crowd of young parties who didn’t seem like her people at all.
But this was where she had met VirginiaMan383—the mysterious poster on a message board who had claimed to be psychic. He had been intriguing enough for her to arrange to meet with him in person, part of her desperate search for someone like her. Someone who would understand. Who would maybe be able to answer some of the questions that had been plaguing her for the last thirty-three years.
She walked right up to the bar, taking a deep breath to steady herself. This was the last place she wanted to be, but it was the place he’d chosen. The smiling faces all around her, the cheap laughter and the easy drinking, it all sickened her. All she could think of was Amy’s little body, the way she had shaken with sobs. The way Mrs. Fallow had looked, lying there beaten to death’s door. The smell of the blood was still in her nose.
The barman noticed her and turned her way, leaning his hands on the counter and raising an eyebrow at her. It was too loud for him to talk to her properly, to ask her what she wanted.
“Lemonade?” she shouted. He nodded and turned away to get the drink, leaving Laura staring at the space he had just vacated. The bottles of liquor on display behind him.
Laura couldn’t tear her eyes away from them. She didn’t want a lemonade. It wasn’t exactly the right season for a cold drink, if you weren’t going to be getting a buzz from it. It was just something to order. The bottles, their shapes and colors, their elaborate brand logos and markings, called to her like old friends. Each of them held their own temptation. Each of them could have been the one to break her. She wet her lips, finding her mouth gone dry.
But she couldn’t do it. She couldn’t break her sobriety now. She’d been doing so well for so long, and now—now it was only a few days before Lacey’s custody hearing. She had to turn up there still sober, still on the wagon. She had to show up for her daughter. It was the only way she was going to get her back.
Laura took the unnecessary lemonade from the bartender and left him a pile of change in return, counted out correctly. She retreated in search of a table, grimacing at the fact that all of them seemed to be occupied.
Until her eyes landed on one of them, and she realized that the man sitting at it was Nolan Perry—alias VirginiaMan383—also known as the man she was here to meet.
His face brightened as soon as they made eye contact, and he waved her over. He even stood up to beckon her, as though she hadn’t seen him well enough already. She took a breath. She wasn’t sure that this was going to be any fun.
Last time they’d met, Nolan had been annoyingly flirtatious, and absolutely insistent that she learn the “truth” about him, whatever that meant. As Laura crossed the crowded dancefloor toward him, trying not to let anyone jostle her lemonade out of her hand, she wondered if she’d made a mistake by agreeing to meet him again. She’d already decided for herself that there was nothing to his claims of being psychic. He was just a fake like the rest of them, or maybe an idiot.
But he’d been so insistent, sending her message after message. Finally, Laura had caved and agreed to meet him. Today had been a low point. Even though she’d saved Amy, she’d disappointed Nate so much, maybe ruined their relationship for good. She’d failed to save Mrs. Fallow. And Amy was still far from safe. What good was the ability to save people, if you didn’t end up being able to save the people you really cared about from getting hurt in the end?
She could have cancelled, given everything that had happened. But then what? Sit at home alone? Wallow in the darkness?
No. She’d thought it would be better to go somewhere, meet someone, surround herself with life.
Now, she was hoping that she wasn’t going to regret it, but the way he was looking at her made her unsure.
He was looking at her with this gleam in his eyes, like they were on a date and he was onto a sure thing.
He pushed back his red hair, which was already flawlessly in place, as she approached. “Laura,” he said, flashing her a smile full of white teeth. “You should have told me you were here. I would have picked up your drink for you.”
“Well,” Laura said, sitting down opposite him in a chair that backed onto the dance floor. She didn’t want to give him hope, but she didn’t want to be rude either. “Maybe if I get another drink later, you can get that one.”
Actually, even as she said it, she knew it wasn’t going to happen. Not that she wouldn’t stay for another drink—that much was somewhat possible, though only remotely. She wouldn’t ever let him order her a drink. Because if he did, she wouldn’t put it past him to be the kind of guy who would order it with a shot of vodka just to liven up the night.
“That sounds great.” Nolan beamed, immediately taking her words more to heart than she had intended. Laura suppressed an internal groan. Nolan was dressed much the same as last time, in a preppy blazer with the sleeves rolled up in the warmth of the bar, a plain V-necked top underneath. But his manner was different. He wasn’t so nonchalant. Like he was done trying to impress her by being cool and now wanted to convince her to stay instead. “I’m so glad you decided to meet me. It’s really important that you get to know the truth about me. After last time…”