Authors: Jennifer Ryan
“How do you prevent it? Why not just tell me? Then, I can make sure the event doesn’t happen at all.”
“It doesn’t matter how I prevent it. I can’t be specific enough about the vision to say, ‘Don’t go here on this day.’ I don’t know which day it is, and it’s an event that happens in your family often enough to make it difficult to say exactly when it will happen.”
“Either you’re deliberately trying to confuse me, or you’re being vague to piss me off.”
“I’m not doing either,” she snapped.
She couldn’t get Tyler to accept what she did and the things she saw. It shouldn’t surprise her Jack remained just as skeptical.
“I’m simply trying to explain the event I see is something you do all the time. I can’t pick out a specific enough time to tell you when it will happen, except to say that on this occasion I’m there to stop the person from being harmed.” She put her hand up to stop him from interrupting again. “Now, if you tell Tyler where I am, you change the timeline. The event I see happening will still happen, but I might not be there at that time because you’ve changed things. You see, the event happens on a day that Tyler and I meet again. In the vision, he isn’t expecting me to be there. That, I know for sure.”
“So, you’re saying if I change things now, it could change things then.”
“Exactly. You don’t like lying to Tyler, or keeping secrets from the people you love. But you can’t risk one of your family members getting hurt. Right?”
“I’ll make the deal, if you swear the person won’t be harmed.”
“I can’t promise. What’s meant to be will be. I can only tell you in my vision I keep them safe.”
She had to make him understand. Just because she saw something in the future didn’t necessarily make it absolute. “We’re talking about a future event. When I see the vision it’s only the truth so long as none of the events leading up to it aren’t altered. The future isn’t written in stone. I can only promise that if I show up at the event in the future, and it happens the way I envision it, I’ll stop the person from being harmed.”
“Then how do I know my meeting you now hasn’t altered that future already?”
“Because I knew you were coming today because you want to put your horses on my land.” She gave him a brilliant smile.
“You did?”
“Yes. I also know that Sam and Tyler are on their way. Go home to your family. Leave the future to fate. Let life happen.”
His frown deepened. He didn’t quite believe her, but he couldn’t ignore her prediction either.
“Go home. Have your family dinner with everyone. Decorate cupcakes and enjoy the evening. Things are as they should be. Tyler will wait. It’s how it’s meant to be. He isn’t ready to see me. He hasn’t figured out what he wants from me, besides to ring my neck for not doing what he wants, when he wants it.”
He took a deep breath and accepted he couldn’t change a future he couldn’t see with a slight nod. “Will you be all right here alone?”
“I’m fine. I’m not alone. I have Tyler, whether he likes it or not. I hope I have you, too, Jack. I hope we can be friends.”
“We are.”
Struck by his certainty, it had been a long time since someone simply accepted her for who she was. She stood on tiptoe and kissed his cheek. “Thank you.” Her voice cracked, despite her valiant attempt to hide her emotions. “I can’t wait to see the horses.”
“You’re welcome at the ranch anytime you want to visit. Jenna would love to meet you.”
She smiled. She’d be a part of their lives soon enough. They had their own living to do for the time being. “We’ll see. Like I said, I don’t do well around people.”
“Let me clean this up for you.” Jack indicated the broken glass at their feet.
“I’ll take care of it.”
“Sorry about that.”
He boosted himself up on Blue and stared down at the striking woman who’d kept them all guessing for years. She wasn’t what he’d expected. He didn’t think she was what Tyler would expect either.
“I won’t tell Tyler, or anyone else, you’re living here. I’ll bring the horses myself and take care of the fences and water. I’ll be the one to check on them. If I have to send someone else, I’ll tell him to stay clear of the house. Is that okay?”
He wouldn’t involve Caleb. He didn’t want to make his brother-in-law lie to the family too.
“That’s fine.”
“Do you have everything you need?” He looked around again at the house and the SUV parked in the driveway. The car wasn’t new, but it looked well maintained.
“I’m fine, Jack. I work from home, so I’m here most of the time. Don’t worry about me. I’ve gotten along for a lot of years on my own.”
“Okay, then. Oh, about the money?”
“The amount you have in mind is okay with me.”
“You know the amount?”
She gave him a cocky half grin and winked. “I sure do.”
“Tell me what it is.”
“Goodbye, Jack.” She’d let him question that for a while. It would drive him crazy wondering whether she really knew or not.
W
ITHIN THE MONTH,
Jack arrived several times with small herds of horses. In the end, there were more than twenty-five beauties in her pastures. She visited with them often. Jack spent time working on the fences, and she enjoyed hearing about what Tyler and Sam were up to. It was strange getting information about Tyler from someone who knew him personally. Everything she learned about him came as glimpses from his mind. She still didn’t understand the connection between them, but she’d learned to accept it. She wished Tyler would do the same.
The first month the horses arrived on her property, Jack came to pay her for the use of the pastureland minus the amount for the improvements to the fences and water lines.
He gaped at her when she caught him lying about the amount.
“This isn’t the agreed-upon fee. You know it and, more importantly, I know it. You just wanted to see if I’d say anything, or if I’d know. Shame on you, Jack,” she said and tried not to laugh.
“Oh, come on. I just wanted to see if you were pulling my leg, or if you really did know what I was thinking.”
“I know. It’s okay.” She didn’t really care about the money, but he handed over another hundred dollars. She accepted it and his juvenile behavior. Used to it, people questioned her all her life about whether she really had a gift, or if she was simply lying.
“How’s the baby?”
“Beautiful like her mother. Come to the house and see her.”
She would love to see the baby. She wanted one of her own and a family like Jenna and Jack had created. Not in the cards. Her future remained uncertain, shrouded in a thick fog she couldn’t see past. Frustrating as hell to see other’s so clearly, but not her own.
Her future rested on the outcome of seeing Tyler again… and beating the evil waiting for her.
“We’ll see.”
“You won’t come, will you?”
“It’s not time yet. You’re going to California tomorrow.”
Jack smiled. A last-minute trip, Jenna had some work to do at Merrick International. “Yeah. Want to come? You could see Tyler.”
“Not yet. Timelines, Jack. This trip you’ll spend time with Cameron. He’s got quite a journey ahead of him.”
“Yeah? I hear he’s got a new woman in his life. I hope Emma likes her.”
She concentrated on Cameron, his daughter, and their life. The woman in his life now swirled Cameron’s future into chaos, sweeping up his past and obscuring his ability to see things clearly. The second woman had the ability to bring him into the eye of the storm where everything was calm and clear. There, he’d find the future he wanted—for him and Emma.
“Emma won’t like the woman who’s there now. She’ll like the second one.”
Jack knew she wouldn’t tell him anything more. He’d reluctantly accepted that about her over the last month.
“I’ll see you soon.” He slid back into his truck, shaking his head, and left her alone on her porch, an angel with golden hair and a smile on her lips.
“I can’t wait to see Tyler’s face when he sees you again.”
Present day…
“I
HATE PAPERWORK,”
Tyler grumbled and grabbed the coffeepot, pouring himself a second cup. Might as well have an apple-raspberry turnover from Decadence to go with it. The food would be good, even if the coffee was several hours old and probably tasted closer to motor oil.
Ever since his partner, Sam, met and married Elizabeth, he’d gained ten pounds and spent an extra day at the gym each week trying to keep from gaining ten more. The fact that she owned and ran two of the best places to eat in the city didn’t hurt. He often ate at both places. Most of the time it was so he could see her and his other friends. They just happened to be Sam’s family, his twin brother Jack, along with Jack’s wife Jenna and their three kids. Cameron Shaw was another friend and part of the group. Jenna was the CEO and Cameron the president of Merrick International. Cameron had recently married Martina Fairchild.
All his buddies were married with children.
Being the odd man out didn’t sit well with him. He wanted what they all had, a family.
The only steady woman in his life was simply a voice over the phone—and strangely, as he believed, in his mind. His psychic ghost. She floated into his life without warning, gave him some clue to a case, and then she disappeared into thin air. Well, not even that, really, because she was just a voice. A really sexy voice. She kept him up nights thinking about her and the sultry tones that haunted his dreams. He didn’t want to analyze too deeply the fact that he sometimes thought he could actually hear her talking to him in his mind. Or admit it to anyone else.
Haunted, like a ghost occupies a house. Somehow a piece of her lived inside of him.
Morgan. God, she was in his head. A chance meeting in a restaurant more than five years ago started him down the road of the longest relationship he’d ever had with a woman. If you could call it that. The fact that he’d only seen her for maybe five minutes and spoken to her in person for less than a minute didn’t really matter. She left an indelible print on him. About five-seven, blond hair down to her waist, and long legs. He could almost feel them wrapped around him, so vivid were some of the fantasies he had about her.
She’d burrowed deep into his psyche. He thought about her all the time. Sometimes she was a blessing, and other times a curse. Mostly he blamed her for things in his life that he couldn’t seem to get right. If he had a bad date, it was because he spent the night with the woman wondering if she was like Morgan. Were they similar or different? If Morgan were there, what would they talk about? What would they do together? Would he kiss her? Take her to his bed?
He thought about her at work. Every case he took, he wondered whether she’d call with a clue. Over the past year, his need to hear her voice grew to a gnawing hunger.
At a low point, in need of someone to comfort him, she’d call out of the blue. It could be late at night, or in the middle of the day, but she’d know he needed a shoulder to lean on and a friend’s ear to bend. She’d listen, and then remind him he wasn’t alone. Every time they spoke she reminded him of that simple fact. She might not be with him physically, but she lurked in the shadows of his mind.
It was a comfort and a curse.
Loneliness grew in his soul like a vine, wrapping itself around everything in his life. Watching his friends and their happy family lives took its toll. He wanted so much to have the kind of life Sam, Jack, and Cameron enjoyed with their wives and children.
Instead, he sat in his beige walled cubicle typing out the latest reports for the case that Morgan had helped them solve. The walls were closing in on him. He stared across the aisle at Sam’s back as he wrote out other reports. The constant clicking of his partner’s fingers on the keyboard drilled into his head and made the splitting headache that had taken hold hours ago pound with every tap of the keys.
He took in his life, sitting in his cramped cubicle next to his partner, eating his partner’s wife’s outstanding food, drinking stale coffee, and wondered why he couldn’t make a relationship with a woman work.
Doo, do, do, dooo
—
“You really need to change the ring tone on your phone, man.” Sam smiled.
Tyler frowned at the thing.
“I’m just happy I finally figured out how to get the thing to stop beeping every time I have a message. Why can’t they make a cell phone that’s simple? Punch in the number you want to call and it goes through. What do I care if it can access the Internet or play music? I have a computer and a radio to do those things. It just makes the damn things more expensive and more difficult to use.”
Doo, do, do, dooo
—
“Answer the damn phone and make it stop that ridiculous ring.”
“Reed.”
Happy to hear the voice on the line, he tipped his head back and silently swore at himself for forgetting to call her.
“I’m working. I can’t come over now.”
Tyler rolled his shoulders and rubbed two fingers at his temple. He’d been working nonstop for more than two weeks. He hadn’t seen or taken Maria out on a date. He’d missed more than one of her calls. More nights than he could count, he got home too late to return her call.
“I’m sorry I haven’t seen you in the last couple of weeks. We made the arrest last night. I just have some paperwork to finish and there’s a press conference in…” Tyler glanced at his watch. Not much time left before his meeting with his boss, Agent Davies, about the press conference. “I’ve got twenty minutes to finish the reports and see my boss before he makes a statement to the press. Once that’s done, I can go home.”
He sighed and ran his fingers through his already disheveled hair. Exhausted, he hadn’t slept more than three or four hours a night for the past four days. He needed a decent meal and twelve straight hours of sleep. Either he saw Maria, or got some sleep. If he wanted to make a relationship work, he needed to work to make it a relationship.
“How about I pick you up in about two hours and I’ll take you out to dinner at Decadence at the Merrick Building. We’ll have a nice dinner and spend some time together.”