"As soon as you can anyway."

"But my aunt-"

I could almost hear his fingers running through his hair. "The vision, Lainey. Maybe you can see more now. G.o.d, why do I feel like I'm more concerned about this than you are?"

"I..." honestly hadn't thought about the vision, not yet today. Usually it was my first thought every morning, but Amy had woken me up and then I'd been thinking about Carter for entirely different reasons. I felt a little foolish. "You're not, I swear." But then again... "But, well, nothing can happen right now, can it? I'm here and you're there."

"s.h.i.t," he repeated. Then, m.u.f.fled, like the phone was in his lap, "No, no, I'm sorry. You'll need to go upstairs. I'll be right there...Lainey?"

"Customer?"

He sighed. "Yeah. I'm sorry. I'm...just get here when you can, okay? As soon as you can."

"Soon," I promised. Because now that he'd brought up the obvious, I couldn't get there soon enough.

THE SECOND I ducked under the century-and-a-half-old counter of Penrose Books, Carter grabbed my hand and tugged me through the door behind the register. "C'mon."

"But, the customers-"

Once out of view in the service area, he turned around and pulled me into a crushing hug. "I don't care if they steal the whole f.u.c.king store right now. You're okay, right? I...the spark, I know it's disorienting, and everything el-"

"I'm great," I told him. Truth. "About everything."

"Okay." He nodded his head-I could feel it, against my shoulder-and absently patted my back with his hand. He was nervous, I realized.

"Carter." I pulled back to look at him. "Everything's okay. Seriously."

He held my eyes and nodded again. "Okay," he repeated. "Let's do this." He led me to the dated floral couch that rested against the wall between the store and the stairwell. I'd always wondered why it was there, since no one ever used it, but it made itself useful this morning.

We sat down together, tiny puffs of dust floating up around us. It was dim in the small s.p.a.ce and quiet. I reached for his hands and held them. Before I closed my eyes, I told him, "Don't be scared."

He nodded his head once but that was it. He was scared, and how could I blame him? We were talking about my life and his part in taking it.

I didn't need to close my eyes, but it helped me concentrate. It also meant that, whatever I saw, Carter wouldn't be able to gauge my reaction until I was ready. I took a deep breath and opened my Diviner senses. What I saw surprised even me. I thought I'd been ready for anything, any possibility, even the worst-that it wasn't an accident.

But it wasn't that. It was nothing.

There was nothing. No vision, no details, no nothing. No image of my face and the certainty that Carter would kill me. My future demise was a great, blank emptiness.

I couldn't believe it, so I kept trying. I'd been seeing it or feeling the echoes for months, and now nothing. It was gone. Carter held still, but the longer we sat, the more I could tell his nervousness grew. I held on for a long time. His hands were warm, even a little damp, but he felt solid and whole and strong, just the way I always thought of him.

But also, alive. When divining produced nothing, I tried everything, including my other gift. Not using it, but sort of seeking. It was strange at first. I wasn't sure anything would happen, but the longer we sat there the more clearly I felt it. Life. All the life I hadn't felt with the rose, here it was. Carter thrummed with life.

I wondered if anyone had ever done this before, felt the life resonating within another person. If any of my ancestors had felt it within their victims. I hadn't with Jill, but I hadn't tried. I hadn't been sparked then either, so maybe I couldn't.

Or maybe it was something about me. Maybe my Diviner gift had influenced my Hangman gift in the way I'd become only a Grim Diviner. Maybe it was just chance, by a miraculous accident of genes and the way they combined, I could divine life, the paths and beats of it, before I took it. I wondered if it went any deeper than that. Was it only hearts I could stop? What if that was only one path, the simplest?

When I opened my eyes, Carter was staring at me, pleading for whatever would be the least terrible answer. I gave him what was probably the best: "I see nothing."

He didn't say anything for what stretched into an uncomfortably long time, watching me with his measured look combined with an expression that was parts incredulity and relief. "Nothing," he repeated.

I shook my head and he ran both hands through his too-long hair. He was past-due for a cut. I kept trying to get him to go shorter, shorter than his usual and much shorter than it was now. Not that he'd admit it, but I think he felt like if it was too short, he couldn't tug on it. It was a sort of stress relief for him.

"Try again," he said next.

"I don't have to."

"Please. Just humor me."

So I did. I closed my eyes once more, squeezed his fingers, and tried again. Still there was nothing.

I shook my head again. "No vision."

"Nothing at all."

"No."

He dropped my hands and it was as if all the tension that ever existed in the world rushed out of him. Before I knew it, he'd grabbed me into a deep hug, pulling me up off the couch and swinging me around.

"We did it," he said. "We did it again! I can't...I...thank you." He was practically laughing. Once he came to a standstill, he kissed me, recklessly, the kind of kiss that threatened to burn a hole in the very thin wall behind us, setting fire to the store and everyone in it. The kind of kiss that made me forget my name, the date, and even where we were.

For a long time, there was nothing in the world but Carter's lips moving on mine and a joy so deep it almost scared me. Finally I was able to say, "We really didn't do anything."

It was hard not to be caught up in Carter's elation, but I couldn't completely unravel the knot of dread that had been living in my stomach for so many months. That was me, Lainey Young, the consummate buzz-kill.

"Maybe we did," Carter countered. "Maybe it doesn't have to be as active as when we saved David this summer. Maybe it was our choices, or just by sticking together. Maybe...are you sure it was a real vision?"

"Yes." I was sure. I knew what I saw. What I felt and what I knew.

"The future is never def-"

"Definite, I know." One of the first things he'd taught me about being Sententia. "I can't explain why I can't see anything now, but it was as real a vision as any I've ever had."

Carter sank onto the couch, seemingly exhausted-in the best possible way-by his relief. He leaned his head back and closed his eyes. "It doesn't matter why you can't see it anymore. Maybe it was a real vision...at that moment. Something made that our most probable future. But the future isn't fixed. There's constant flux. Maybe that's why you had only hints of it since then, and now, none at all. It's changed. It's over."

My response was interrupted by the ring of the bell on the counter out in the store. "Customer, s.h.i.t." Kissing me quickly once more as he stood, Carter murmured, "Here's to the future. I love you."

I didn't follow him immediately but stayed on the couch for a minute longer, trying to come to terms with the prospect of a wide-open future, of the sudden weightlessness without the vision hanging over me. I wanted to wrap myself in Carter's optimism, to feel as free and confident as he did. Instead I felt strangely...let down.

That was it? The months of stress of keeping the secret, telling the secret, wondering and worrying about how I was going to die and why I couldn't predict it better? It all amounted to nothing?! For the second time in the day, I wanted to laugh and cry. I couldn't believe it was that simple. The vision had been real. I had no doubts about that. But I trusted that it was gone now, too. I had no reason not to.

So far, my gift had never been wrong.

THE NEXT WEEK did wonders for convincing me everything really would be fine. For all I knew, it would, and Thanksgiving break was an entire week of forgetting my problems and living my life. With my aunt visiting, I got to pretend the Sententia didn't exist and let myself forget that I was one of them. The year before, I'd been worried about being able to keep my new secret from Aunt Tessa, and I'd spent half the time intentionally hunting for objects that would give me visions.

This year, I relished the chance to let it all go. We visited the city, spent time with Carter and the Revells, humored Dr. Stewart, and acted like girlfriends who hadn't seen each other in months. At the movies on the day after Thanksgiving, we ate every last bite of popcorn, and when it was over, I told my aunt I was no longer a virgin.

What actually happened was she guessed it without my telling her, which is why I told her at all. I should have known it would be obvious to her, and I should also have known what she'd do next: insist I get a prescription for birth control first thing Monday morning.

"That's for you, remember, not for him," she insisted. "And a little bit for me. I love you more than anything, but I was too young to be a mother when I got you and I'm way too young to be a grandmother yet."

In all the times she'd brought it up since I was eleven or twelve years old, I hadn't believed anything could be more embarra.s.sing than talking about s.e.x in theory with my parent-until theory became practice and that parent was explaining how contraception worked and making sure I used it properly. I shouldn't have been embarra.s.sed, but privacy was in my nature despite Aunt Tessa's years of trying to get me to loosen up. Sometimes I thought my roommate was the daughter she never had. If Amy had been there, they'd probably have high-fived.

When my aunt left at the end of the week, I didn't even have time to miss her. Seniors at Northbrook called the weeks between Thanks giving and the end of December the Winter Push, or just Push. It seemed like everything was due in that little stretch of time. Mid-term and semester a.s.signments, schedules, and for us, college applications. It was the most intense academic period I'd ever had, with multiple all-nighters and one group project catastrophe. I was exhausted, but with Christmas only two days away, I was packed and headed to the airport for my customary weeks in Mexico. After Push, I'd never needed them, or deserved them, so much.

Carter volunteered to chauffeur me one more time to the airport, an offer I wouldn't refuse. I didn't mind taking the airport shuttle services, but I didn't really want any of those drivers to hold my hand or kiss me goodbye for the holidays. We took my car, but I was so tired from Push I let Carter drive. I loved my little red coupe, but I didn't stress out about letting someone else behind the wheel. In truth, I liked it when Carter drove.

My flight left in the evening, so it was dark by the time we were halfway to Logan. Traffic was light in our direction at that time of day. As the sun set somewhere behind us and the evening gloom began its quiet rush past the windows, I decided to ask a question I'd had for the longest time. I'd been thinking about it, off and on, since meeting Dan Astor.

"How does it work, Carter? Thought Moving."

He tapped his fingers on the wheel. "What kind?" If he was surprised by the question, he didn't show it. If anything, he was intrigued. He loved talking Sententia.

"Not yours. Your uncle's."

"He knows better than I do."

"I know, but just give me the basics." I could tell he was working up some of his standard disclaimer, something about we don't know, exactly, so I clarified. "Mostly I mean making people forget. Last year, your Uncle Jeff told that story about the man...the rapist, and how he made the women forget. How could he do that?"

"It's not complex, but not easy either. You have to do it in advance. Once a memory's there, it's there. You can't move it away...can't kill it once it's taken root. You can move thoughts around it, when you're in the person's presence, but as soon as the influence is gone, the person goes back to themselves. But before a memory, it's a different game. What you can do in advance is plant suggestions. Strong Thought Movers can plant a seed of forgetting, basically, just before something happens and carry it through to the end."

Carter reached over and deliberately covered one of my hands with his. He continued, "And it has to be the right Thought, specific enough to what's going to happen. 'Forget everything' apparently doesn't work very well, but something like 'Don't remember this'"-he pinched my hand and I yelped-"or 'This didn't happen'"-he picked my hand up and kissed it-"can work well for strong influencers. The best could make you remember the pinch was a kiss, instead of just forgetting altogether."

Outside, the twilight deepened, made darker by a moving cloud cover that had threatened all day. I thought I understood. "What about...like a trigger? Could someone move a thought to do something, or even forget something, in the future?"

"Nope." He squeezed my fingers before returning his hand to the wheel. "Our gifts work with immediacy, now or never. You have to be there for the whole thing. Some of us can predict the future, but no one can project into it. You couldn't touch someone today and have them die tomorrow."

And thank G.o.d for that. We were quiet for a while as I thought about Thought Moving, and what I'd just learned about it. At least Sententia had to be present to do their dirty work, unless, I supposed, that Sententia was Carter. He didn't have to be nearby, but his power wasn't limitless. He was still bound by immediacy, by time.

Something else he'd said kept rattling around in my head, about memories. Memories were thoughts. Thought Movers moved thoughts. I was a brand of Thought Mover, or so Dan and Carter had both said to me. Pieces of things I'd learned about my abilities in the last year and the last few weeks began to come together. I stared out the windshield as a theory tried to coalesce, watching the few red tail-lights that dotted the darkness ahead of us on the highway.

Watching them swerve and brighten. Watching a pair of white lights coming toward us, but that had to be wrong. They shouldn't have been white.

But they were.

Headlights, traveling the wrong way on the highway.

And then they were right in front of us.

This is it, I thought. It really was an accident and there was nothing I could do. I hadn't bothered to check our future today, and now it was about to end.

In my last moments, I heard Carter swearing, along with tires screeching, metal crunching, and gla.s.s breaking. I thought I might have heard a scream too, and that it might have come from me.

And then I heard nothing at all.

Chapter Fourteen.

Opening my eyes was an enormous, wonderful surprise. Especially since I hadn't expected to open them ever again. Dying, or sincerely believing I was dying, was nothing like people claim. It was just like blacking out, and after years of doing that while my Sententia gift was developing, I was practically a pro at being unconscious.

There'd been no life flashing before my eyes, and the only bright lights I saw were the ones shining down on me when I came to. There was never any concept of the lost time either. You're aware and then you're not and then you're aware again. I had no idea how long I'd been out, whether it was seconds or hours or days.

But no matter how long it had been, when I opened my eyes, I saw Carter, and he was beautiful. It was hardly the first time I'd been unconscious and woken up to his face, but since my whole being had been convinced I'd never see it again, this was definitely the best time ever. His lips formed a little grin as he noticed my open eyes, and I finally realized that he actually wasn't that beautiful.

In fact, he looked awful. There were red marks across his forehead, nose, and cheeks, like severe windburn or a rash, his bottom lip was split, and dark circles filled the hollows beneath his eyes. He also looked absolutely disheveled and exhausted.

And relieved.

"Hey beautiful," he croaked and then cleared his throat. "It's good to see those pretty hazel eyes. I've missed them."

I tried a smile but my face felt tight and wind burned, much like Carter's looked. When I reached my hand up to touch the marks on his face, I found my arm was much heavier than I remembered. I looked down to see it was encased in a thick cast that covered most of my hand to halfway up my forearm. And it was purple. Frowning hurt as much as smiling.

My head felt foggy and too heavy to lift, so I looked back up at Carter and said, "What happened to your face?" My voice sounded scratchy and out of practice.

He reached forward and brushed my hair back before tentatively surrounding my fingers where they protruded from the cast with his own. My other hand sported an IV. "The same thing that happened to yours," he replied. "It's from the airbags. No one ever mentions how much they hurt." I must have grimaced because he laughed and gave my finger ends a gentle squeeze. "You don't look quite so bad, don't worry. No split lip or black eyes, but a pretty good rash."

I didn't remember airbags. I didn't remember much of anything but an overwhelming sense that I should be dead. Except I wasn't. I loved not being dead. Even with whatever was wrong with my arm and my head. Even with whatever my face looked like. Though, honestly, I hoped it wasn't too terrible.

Carter pushed the call b.u.t.ton to let them know I was awake and nurses and doctors came and went. They told me my wrist should-not would-be fine, after weeks in the cast and more weeks of therapy. If I weren't so thrilled about the being alive part, I'd have cried. So much for volleyball season. It had only just started, and now I'd miss the whole thing. Brooke would be p.i.s.sed, especially since we were supposed to be co-captains.

When the medical action was finally over and it was time for me to rest, I said to Carter, "Tell me?" and closed my eyes to listen. Keeping them open was a challenge, and the lights seemed so, so bright.

He spoke softly, like a lullaby. "What do you remember?" he asked and my answer was a tiny shake of my head.

"There was a car, going the wrong way. The driver, she's old. I guess she was confused. I think she's here now, too." He took a breath and let it out. "I almost missed it, babe. It was so close, and I'm sorry. I...just...I wasn't fast enough. She clipped our rear b.u.mper and that was it. We spun. Into another car and then the guardrail." Just like my parents, I thought but didn't say. "They're okay, though, the other people. The driver helped me try to get you out."

He paused then, and I wasn't sure how much time pa.s.sed. Through our connected fingers, I felt him shift, and I imagined him running his other hand through his hair until it went in all directions.

"I thought..." His voice broke and he took another breath, then another. "I thought I'd killed you, Lainey. Just like the vision. You were slumped and broken, and...G.o.d, I thought I'd lost you. I could have lost you, again, and it was all my fault. If I'd been paying more attention, or reacted faster. I let my guard down, and I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I don't know what I'd do, if you...if you hadn't been okay. I'm sorry. I love you." I'm not sure if I squeezed his fingers then, or he squeezed mine, but his voice was stronger as he told the rest.

"Your car-it's totaled. I'm sorry. Most all the damage was to your side, and it was just worse because you were wedged against the guardrail. They had to cut you out, Lane. We tried, the other driver and I, but-we didn't know if we'd hurt you more, or if...so we had to wait. G.o.d, it was like forever, before the ambulances and fire trucks got there. Watching you barely breathing and not knowing how to help. And then they were there and they were swarming and I couldn't see you and that was worse. Hearing the screech from the tools and the police trying to ask what happened. What the h.e.l.l did it matter? They were cutting you out of the car. But that was it, and then you were here and your wrist. G.o.d. And I had to call Tessa. I don't know if they're even supposed to let me in here, but I think they realized I just wouldn't leave. Your aunt is in Mexico, and it's almost Christmas, so they let me stay. I'm sorry, babe. I-"

I drifted off to sleep then, and would never know what he said next. I'd only ever remember the accident as Carter's voice and a dream.

"WHAT ON EARTH is that?" I set my phone down on the rolling tray that was never far from reach and watched Carter unpack a surprising number of bags and boxes in my hospital room. I'd been forced to stay for a few days, to monitor my concussion and the pain in my wrist.

"Merry Christmas!" He threw a devastating grin over his shoulder as he pulled a truly ugly two-foot-tall tree out of a box.

"Happy birthday!" I countered and his smile flattened out. Carter was twenty today.

He plugged in the tree, which lit up like Las Vegas, and pushed a b.u.t.ton on the star. A tinny rendition of "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" blared out of a speaker hidden somewhere in the gaudy branches.