Page 27 of A Charming Touch of Tarot (The Gin & Tarot Club #2)

27

Three of Pentacles

Nick

I’m jolted awake by the sound of Alyssa gasping. Her breathing is labored, and she’s drenched in sweat. I reach out to touch her arm gently. “What’s wrong?”

Alyssa’s eyes snap open, shining bright with anxiety. Her head is shaking back and forth erratically, fear gripping her.

With everything she’s been part of lately, it’s not a wonder she’s having nightmares.

Murder. Cover-ups.

Then you add in ghosts and poltergeists, and that’s too much for anyone.

It’s my job to deal with strange events and gruesome murders. Alyssa’s a mom, a former advertising executive. This foray into detective work is all new to her, and it’s clearly taking a toll.

“I had a dream…” Her head shakes, face pinched. “A vision,” she amends, her voice trembling. “Another girl is dead, or will be.”

I slump back against the headboard, contemplating what she said. If any other person were to tell me that someone has died or is about to be killed based on a dream, I’d laugh at the absurdity of it. But I know Alyssa has abilities beyond human comprehension. I trust her implicitly, even if it goes against everything I’ve been raised to believe.

Evidence.

That’s what my father drilled into me. Yet, I’m about to go down this rabbit hole of dreams being reality.

I feel a surge of urgency coursing through me. The need to solve this case is damn near crippling.

“Tell me everything,” I urge, my mind already racing.

Alyssa jumps up from the bed and begins pacing, her movements frantic as she recounts the details of her vision.

“A dark-haired girl, petite, and likely in her early twenties,” she rattles off, as though she’s reading down a checklist.

The description already fits the Grayson and Montgomery cases.

“She was sitting alone at a crowded bar. The bartender leaned over, and she slid an envelope under his hand.”

“Could you tell what was in it?”

“Money,” she says, almost as if in a trance. “It was thick. I couldn’t see the cash, but I know that’s what it was.”

“What else?” I press, knowing the sooner we get this all out, the more accurate the details will be.

“She stood to leave, but a man sitting next to her asked to buy her a drink. He was tall, thin.” Her eyebrows tilt inward. “He had a full-sleeve tattoo. Red flowers intertwined with an octopus.” Her eyes catch on something past me, and she gets caught in a near trance. I’m about to speak when she goes on. “She finds him attractive, so she says yes.” Her eyes meet mine, and I can tell she’s shaken. “Somehow, I can feel her inner thoughts, Nick. She had reservations. She knew she should leave. She’s thinking about how they wouldn’t like her sticking around.”

My eyes narrow. “Who’s they?”

She shakes her head, shrugging both shoulders. “I don’t know,” she admits. “She just refers to them as they , but I can tell you it refers to multiple people, not a pronoun preference.”

I nod, not bothering to question how she knows that. Her abilities are morphing into something more. Something that even Alyssa doesn’t understand.

“At some point, her vision becomes fuzzy. She’s feeling off and begins to panic. While the guy is in the restroom, she leaves. She’s walking quickly toward a black car when someone grabs her from behind.” Alyssa takes a seat on the edge of the bed, putting her head in her hands. “I feel her fear. Hear her thoughts. She knew she was going to die.” She looks up at me, eyes filled with tears. “Then the vision ended.”

I have questions, but I’m struggling to ask them. I don’t want to push Alyssa when she’s this upset.

“The car,” she says, as if reading my mind and answering the questions I have. “It’s hard to tell in the dark from this far away, but I’m pretty sure it’s a black Toyota Camry. When we were buying a car for Ava, it was between the Camry and Corolla. I looked at a lot of those cars.”

I grab my phone, queuing up my Notes app and recording the most important details.

Noting that Alyssa seems calmer, I take a chance and ask a lingering question.

“Did you get the feeling that they were whoever grabbed her?”

I don’t have to elaborate on my use of they . Alyssa knows I’m referring to whoever the girl was thinking wouldn’t want her to stick around.

Alyssa’s quiet in thought for several moments. A range of emotions crosses her features, from confusion to curiosity, and finally landing on certainty.

“I don’t think it was the same people. I’m getting the feeling that she was working for the people who would’ve wanted her to drop the cash and leave.” She blows out a breath. “But I also think she knew who grabbed her.” Her head tilts to the side. “Not the actual person, but the group the killer is tied to.”

My mouth slams into a thin line as I take in everything she’s just said.

Even if I asked how she knows this, she wouldn’t be able to put it in words. It’s a gut feeling. An intuition. A new ability that has me downright speechless.

“We need to act fast,” Alyssa declares, her tone resolute. “We need to reach out to the spirit of this girl. To see if she’s dead.”

“You think there’s a chance she’s still alive?”

She bites her tongue, eyes squinting. “I’m…not sure.” She grabs her phone from the nightstand. “I need to reach out to Corinne for help. A séance typically requires more people.”

“I’ll check in with Chief Skiver in Falls Haven. He needs to know I’m chasing a lead here in Knox Harbor. It should buy me a day.”

Let’s just hope he doesn’t press for information. I can’t exactly tell him my sources are dreams and dead people.

“Darling Nick, you simply must sit next to me,” Natalia purrs. Corinne’s eccentric mother pats the spot beside her with a dramatic flourish.

When Alyssa reached out to Corinne, she was informed that they’d need more help, and since Lanie and Nina are still in New Orleans, Corinne called in her mother.

Alyssa warned me that the woman was next level, but I am now finding that depiction to be a colossal understatement.

I take a seat, and Natalia leans over toward me, placing her hand on my thigh. “I’ll keep you safe.” She squeezes my leg, and I cough, squirming in place.

My eyes dart to Alyssa, who meets my gaze with an amused twinkle in her eye. She mouths the words good luck .

I grit my teeth, suppressing the urge to beg her to intervene. This entire situation is odd enough, but I’m not sure I’m prepared to be felt up while dealing with the dead.

What the hell have I gotten myself into?

“Scoot closer. We’ll need to share energy,” Natalia coos, and Alyssa coughs, trying to smother her laughter.

I bare my teeth in a grin that promises retribution, but it doesn’t even faze Alyssa. She’s getting too much joy out of my discomfort.

It’s moments like these that remind me why I’m so drawn to her—her easy confidence and lack of jealousy only add to her allure. Except that in this one instance, I wouldn’t mind a bit of possessiveness. Anything to put some space between me and Natalia.

“Mother,” Corinne snaps, drawing the woman’s attention away from me. “I’m going to need you to focus.”

Anything negative I’ve ever said about Corinne, I take back as she rolls her eyes, making it clear she’s onto her mother’s antics and won’t allow it to go too far.

“Who are we calling upon?” Corinne asks Alyssa.

“I don’t have a name, but any spirit of a young, dark-haired girl who visited my dream who wants to come through.”

Corinne smacks her lips together, staring at Alyssa like that’s the dumbest thing she’s ever heard. She’s obviously less than happy with this spirit request.

“That is a little too broad. It could bring about spirits we don’t want,” Natalia says, and Corinne appears to agree when she nods at her mom.

“I’ll know if it’s her when she comes through,” Alyssa says, and Corinne huffs in response.

“I know this isn’t preferable,” Alyssa says, speaking directly to Corinne. “But I have to know if the girl from my dream is dead. I don’t have a name. Only a description.”

Corinne sucks her teeth for a moment, considering Alyssa before placing her hands on the table for her mother and Alyssa to take hold of.

“God, Goddess, Mother Earth,” Corinne begins, launching into an over-the-top dialogue with the air.

She’s calling out to the spirit world, asking for a dark-haired woman connected to Alyssa’s dream to come forward. Aside from her animated voice, she’s not overly theatrical. If anything, I expected more of a show from her. I’m surprised to find that my skepticism of the woman is waning. Every second I spend in her presence, it decreases a little more.

Now that I know abilities like Alyssa’s aren’t fantasy, I have to recognize that it’s likely that Corinne isn’t the fake I made her out to be. While I was grappling with Alyssa’s truth, I made Corinne the villain in my head, and now I’m not so sure I was correct in that assumption.

She’s a no-bullshit straight shooter, which I appreciate from the men I encounter, so why should it be any different with her?

Generational patterns are hard to shake, and I vow to do my best to have it end here and now. Not every detective is good, and not every person who questioned power dynamics, gender roles, and social tensions in Salem was a witch.

Corinne is allowed to be hard-nosed and blunt; it doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with her. She’s not a criminal just because she questions and defies the norms.

After several tense minutes, nobody shows, and everyone in the room is quiet and contemplative. Just when I think the entire séance will be called off, Natalia charges ahead, spouting off in a language that sounds like a cross between pig Latin and Martian to my untrained ears.

Natalia’s sitting there, swaying back and forth like a palm tree caught in a hurricane, and I’m half expecting her to jump up from her seat and break into the “Thriller” dance. This is the kind of spectacle I was anticipating from Corinne, but it would appear that the circus acts are reserved for Natalia.

As quickly as her wacky behavior started, it’s over, her body going slack. She’s completely still for well over a minute, and I’m about to check for a pulse when her eyes pop open and she’s back to normal.

“Someone is here to speak,” she says, voice shaky. “Are you open to conversing with a Chelsea?”

Alyssa and I share a glance, both of us shocked to hear that name.

Alyssa bobs her head. “Yes. Can she show herself to me?”

Upon Alyssa’s request, Chelsea must’ve appeared, because Alyssa’s eyes widen fractionally, her shoulders straightening as she looks over Natalia’s shoulder at what appears like nothing to me.

I watch in fascination at the one-sided conversation.

“Interesting,” Alyssa says. “Is Sierra with you?”

My head moves back and forth between the empty space and Alyssa, curiosity over what’s being said about driving me crazy.

“Shit. Tomorrow?” Alyssa rubs at her forehead. “Where were you going the night you were taken? You were dressed up.” She listens intently to whatever is being said before saying, “Wow…this runs deep.”

“What runs deep?” I ask, and am immediately shushed by Natalia.

“Chelsea is sharing very important information with us,” she says, eyes trained on the blank space where Chelsea must be.

I sit back in my chair, disgruntled that Natalia is privy to the conversation when I’m not.

“Sucks, doesn’t it?” Corinne drawls, slumped back in her chair, arms crossed over her chest, annoyance clear as day with her downturned lips and narrowed eyes.

I sigh, nodding in camaraderie with Corinne in our moment of being on the outside.

Several moments pass as more information appears to be shared. When Alyssa says, “Thank you,” I know Chelsea has left the room.

She turns back to the table, taking a deep breath.

“Sierra’s uncle approached Sierra about an opportunity to make a lot of cash by running drugs and washing money for a man that remained anonymous. Sierra brought Chelsea and another friend, Ashley Evans, into the fold.”

“Ashley is the girl from Alyssa’s dream,” Natalia interjects, and my eyebrows lift.

“Dead?” I ask.

Alyssa shakes her head. “Not yet, but she will be tomorrow, most likely. Thursday is the day they deliver the money to a set of bars who are in on the money-laundering part of things.”

“Let me guess, a bar in Falls Haven?” I say, and Alyssa nods once.

“We’ve gotta go,” I say, preparing to stand from the table, but Natalia lifts her hands to stop me.

“There’s more that’s crucial to this investigation, Detective.”

Gone is the flirty tone and inappropriate touching. Now, Natalia is all business, determined to relay the information that Chelsea Grayson found important enough to share.

“Chelsea said that they’d recently started getting threatened by an unknown person. The person used voice-altering technology, so she can’t even say whether it was a man or a woman. But the person accused the girls of encroaching on their territory. She said that Sierra’s uncle was warned, but he brushed it off like it was no big deal. She thinks whoever’s territory it was is who killed them.”

“Turf war,” I say, to nobody in particular. “Do you think this has something to do with the Order of Providence?”

“Chelsea was working for the Order. She doesn’t know the members or who was at the top, but Sierra’s uncle definitely knew something.” Alyssa looks to me when she says, “Sierra’s uncle is Harlan Abbott. The man from the underground poker deal in Florida.”

“Florida? He’s managing these girls from Florida?” I say in disbelief.

This is much bigger than we thought.

“She was working at another underground poker lounge in Falls Haven. One that sounds awfully similar to the one under the Montgomery Estate,” she says. “There’s a guy there who goes by the name of Rocco. He gives them the envelopes before they leave the secret poker site on Thursday morning. They don’t want them moving around with wads of cash for long.”

“Did she tell you what happened to her? The coroner’s report says that she had blunt-force trauma to the head,” I say, and Alyssa nods.

“She was flirting with a guy that sounds like the same person from my dream. She started to feel lightheaded and said she was going to leave. The last thing she remembers is waking up on a boat. She thinks she was hit over the head. She doesn’t remember anything after that.”

“He’s drugging them,” I say, and Alyssa’s eyes darken, as though she hadn’t put that together yet.

“Where’s the site of the poker games in Falls Haven?”

Alyssa’s face falls. “She wouldn’t tell me, because she said my life would be in grave danger if she did.”

My eyes close, frustration mounting. “You’ve already been exposed to one of these places that’s likely linked. How are you not already in danger?”

“They haven’t pieced together that I’m any more than a friend of an important friend. Apparently, Jill must be having an affair with Harlan, so he trusts that she’s vetted us. We know Jill from college, not Knox Harbor. He likely has no idea how close I am to their other operations.”

I rake my hand back through my hair. “This is all so damn convoluted. What the hell are the chances that you’d run into some underground activity in Florida that’s connected to home? Connected to deaths that you dreamed about?”

Natalia laughs, but it lacks humor. “Welcome to the complex cosmos, where embracing your talents often means becoming a pawn for some cosmic puppeteer.”

Alyssa’s face pales, and my own stomach twists uncomfortably.

“And this is what you want for me?” Corinne exclaims. “Why do you hate me?”

Natalia purses her lips, not bothering to humor her daughter with a response. Instead, she looks to Alyssa. “The universe is guiding you to where you need to be in order to help these spirits. The source, god or whatever you choose to call it, demands karmic justice, and you are being used to enact it.” She shakes her head, appearing almost sorry for what she’s communicating to Alyssa. “Nothing in your life moving forward is a coincidence, my dear. Much of what occurs is meant for you to use to right a wrong.”

“How will I know the difference?” Alyssa asks, sounding far too calm for someone who’s just been told she’s a glorified pawn in a real and very dangerous game of chess.

Natalia shrugs one delicate shoulder, her oversize yellow sweater slipping down her shoulder. “I never leave home without my tarot deck. It’s very useful when needing to commune with the universe.”

“I’m not well versed in tarot,” Alyssa says, and Natalia scoffs. “Get yourself a deck that comes with a book. You’ll find that the more you use them, the clearer the answers. From what I’ve gathered of your abilities, you should be able to read them intuitively.”

“Thank you,” Alyssa says before turning to me. “We need to go if we want to save Ashley.”

“One more thing,” Natalia says, her hand and one finger lifted into the air. “These…groups,” she murmurs, eyes narrowing when she says groups . “This Order of Providence…It’s bigger than Knox Harbor. Bigger than the whole of Massachusetts,” she explains. “Be sure you’ve considered your life and that of your daughter before you go chasing after something you know nothing about willy-nilly, Alyssa. There are times when, even if our gifts are urging us to intervene, we must refuse the calling. For our own safety.”

Alyssa stares at Natalia for several moments, throat bobbing as she digests the words.

I won’t allow Alyssa to put herself in danger. She’s made it clear how important it is for her to help, but I hope she heeds Natalia’s words and understands that her life is more important than going down dark paths.

I’ll do whatever it takes to ensure Alyssa remembers that.

I won’t lose another woman I care for.

Natalia and Corinne both make their way toward the front door, but before Natalia steps onto the porch, she turns.

“You’ll need your friend. The one that was with you when you visited Bee. She’ll be necessary in uncovering some of the missing pieces.” And with that, Natalia is gone.