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I twist to look at her. “Did you tell Grandma about—”

“No, she didn’t.” Grandma interrupts me again. “Lynn, you can stop waving now. I can see you.”

I shake my head. No matter how often Grandma does this, it’s always a bit of a shock. She claims she can’t see or hear well anymore, but she always knows everything. Her gift of foresight is sharper than ever.

“Let me prop the phone better so you can see both of us.” I set my phone down against a couple of pillows.

Lynn steps in front of me. “Hi, Grandma. Yes, she met a boy.”

I nudge Lynn to the side so I can see my phone. “Yes, I met someone. He’s not a boy. He’s a grown man and a local police detective.”

Grandma’s voice softens. “He’s one of the good guys.”

“Grandma, when you told me to come here on vacation, did you already know what would happen?” The thought has been needling at me for a while now.

Grandma pats her perfectly coiffured hair. “He’ll be good for you. But he needs to let go of a few things first.” She ignores my question, as she tends to do in situations like this. But I’m not giving up so easily.

“Grandma! Can you please answer my question? This is way more complicated than the errands you’ve sent me on before, where I find a rare book or a lost piece of art. People are getting killed.”

She looks at me for a long time, and I hold out for an answer.

She sighs. “You know I can’t tell you everything I see. The future is not defined. There are paths within paths, and the choices you make will determine what happens. I can only guide you, but the choices and the paths are yours alone.”

“And yet you sent me here. To find these missing women.”

“I sent you there to findhim. The one you’ve been dreaming about all these years.”

Her words hit me like a blow to the chest, momentarily robbing me of breath. “H-how?” I’m lost for words. She knows I met Jake that and he’s the boy who saved my life fifteen years ago?

Her shoulders sag. “Locating the missing women is his fate. Not yours. But you chose to do this, and now you two share the same goal.”

Thoughts whirl in my mind like debris being scattered around by a tornado. “What will happen?”

“What do you want to happen?” She throws the question back at me, kindly.

What do I want? “I want himandmy career. I want my life the way it was before I stumbled on that necklace. I want to erase all those terrible images from my mind.”

She smiles. “You can have him and your career. But I’m afraid what you saw is forever a part of you. You’ll need to learn to live with it, and in time it’ll fade like all things tend to do.”

Lynn takes the forgotten comb from my hand and tackles a section of my hair, unsnarling the tangles with expert hands.

I don’t see how I can have it all. “No, Grandma, this is temporary. I’ll be leaving soon. He belongs here, in this town, and I belong . . . nowhere.”

Grandma huffs. “Nonsense. He’s not a tree—he can move—he can take his roots with him wherever he goes. And you? You belong everywhere. The world is yours for the taking. You two can make it workifyouchoose to.”

My heart tries to escape through my mouth. I swallow it down. “Grandma, you can’t just say something like that and then tell me it’s my choice. I’m freaking out over here.”

Silence reigns. I wait. And wait.

She looks at the delicate watch on her thin wrist. “I have to go. There’s a game of mahjong starting soon, and I’m going to win today.”

And I know she won’t say anything else about Jake. But maybe . . . “Grandma, before you go, can you tell me anything about this killer and the missing women?”

She presses her lips into a thin line.

“Please, Grandma?”

“Be careful. Both of you. Be very careful and trust no one. Except for your detective— you can trust him and only him.” She hangs up before I can say anything else.