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Oh joy. That was one fun trip home she planned to miss. “I’d like to speak to Evan before then, if possible.”
Mack regarded her for a long moment. She had a feeling there was little he missed. Including her dislike of Steve.
“Okay. I’ll go see if the doctor has finished with him.” He rose and walked quietly from the room.
Left with nothing else to do while she waited, Maddie sipped the coffee. It tasted as bad as it looked. The minutes crawled by, and the coffee slowly cooled.
“Aunt Maddie?”
She glanced up. Evan stood in the doorway, staring at her with an odd mixture of relief and uncertainty on his face. It made him look older, and yet somehow more vulnerable. She smiled and opened her arms. He ran across the room like a child and fell into her hug.
“I knew you’d come for me,” he whispered. “I watched you in my dreams.”
She closed her eyes. So it was true. Evan had inherited abilities just like hers. And like her, he had a mother and father who didn’t want to know. How could she have missed that? How could she not have known? Had she been too wrapped up in her own misery to see what was happening to Evan?
But at least she was here, and she’d do whatever it took to ensure his abilities didn’t take him down the same path as hers. One murderer in the family was more than enough. “Are your mom and dad here yet?”
“No.” He hesitated and pulled away slightly. “Why isn’t Jon with you?”
She raised an eyebrow at the unexpected question. “He went after Hank.”
Evan grabbed her hand, sudden desperation filling his eyes. “You have to save Teresa. You just have to.”
Teresa was obviously the name of the other kid. Maddie wondered how he knew her, then she saw that Evan’s gaze was distant and shadowed, as if he were viewing the scenes of a movie no one else could see.
Maddie rubbed a hand across her eyes. She really wasn’t up to this. It was only thanks to Jon’s intervention that she had escaped Hank’s clutches. If she stayed any longer in Taurin Bay, she had a horrible feeling she’d have some sort of run-in with Eleanor. And escaping that woman’s claws a second time would not be so easy. Better to avoid her altogether.
“Jon will find Teresa, Evan.”
“No!” The sudden urgency in his voice made her shiver. He sounded so much like his stern, uncompromising father that it was frightening. “Jon will go after her. You have to rescue Teresa—promise me you will. Promise me you won’t leave.”
She took a deep breath. It would be nothing short of madness to make such a vow. She’d been lucky up until now, but that luck surely wouldn’t hold. It never had. She opened her mouth to refuse, but the sheer desperation in Evan’s amber-brown eyes made her hesitate. He was seeing the future, and it obviously wasn’t good for the second teenager. Could she handle the weight of another death?
She sighed and closed her eyes. “I promise.”
Evan blinked, and his eyes became clear again. “Good. So tell me, why is Dad mad at you?”
It was almost as if a switch had been flicked somewhere in his head. He obviously suffered none of the confusion she had when it came to clairvoyance. She sipped at the cold coffee, searching for a tactful answer. “You’ve talked to him?”
“Yes. And he’s furious.”
She smiled grimly. How did she explain to a thirteen-year-old that his father’s anger stemmed from the fear that she would destroy his family as she had destroyed her own?
“He’s not really mad, Evan. I think he’s a little scared.” She hesitated and brushed the stray red-gold strands of hair out of the teenager’s eyes. “I think he believes my gifts do more harm than good, and that it might somehow affect you and your mom.”
Evan tilted his head and studied her for a moment. ?
?But if you weren’t gifted, I would never have been able to send Jon to you, and you would never have found me.”
She smiled. There spoke the logic of a child. “True, Evan. And perhaps you should remind your dad of that when he gets here.”
“I will.” He hesitated, and fear touched his gaze. “She’ll come after me, you know. I’m not safe, Aunt Maddie. Not here, and not at home.”
She remembered the venom in Eleanor’s voice—and the fact that they still needed Evan to complete the ceremony. Remembered the shapeshifter’s contempt for the protection the police station offered. Evan was right. He wasn’t safe—not until Eleanor was caught, or dead.
She squeezed his shoulder lightly. “I’ll talk to your mom and dad. I’ll get them to take you somewhere else for a couple of days.”
He nodded. Footsteps rattled down the hall, and she glanced at the door. Mack walked into the room, followed quickly by Steve. Meeting her brother-in-law’s steely gaze, she saw only contempt. Evan ran to his father, and Steve’s big arms all but engulfed him.
