Edgewood Series: Books 1 - 3 by Karen McQuestion

story. It was as if she’d been dying to share it with someone for ages and finally could. She began counting down on her fingers. “So far we have a strange astronomical event no one seems to know about. Then the field is cleared of evidence and signs go up looking for witnesses. And then the FBI ,” and here she put finger quotes around the word, “is looking for whoever was searching for information about this whole thing. At this point, our minds are blown by the implications here. Jameson starts reading everything he can about astronomy, and Nadia researches FBI procedure to see if the library incident was done by the books. We thought we were onto something, but little did we know it was just the beginning. A few days after Mrs. Wick was visited by the suits, the three of us went out night walking again. We stopped for something to eat at the diner, and when Jameson went to reach for a salt shaker, it skidded across the table right to him.” She laughed. “You should have seen the look on his face. It wasn’t long after that when Nadia discovered she can tell if people are telling the truth or not and gets a sense of who they are and what they’re all about. If she touches them and looks in their eyes, she can see their past, or at least bits of it. She says it’s as clear as watching a movie, but it comes all at once, not in regular time.”
    “And you found out you can do mind control,” I said, filling in the rest.
    “Yes.” She smiled right at me, and I found it impossible not to look at her big, dark eyes.
    I felt myself leaning toward her in fact, wanting to—wait! I straightened up. “Are you doing it right now?”
    “No!” She reached over and slapped me playfully on the arm. “I wouldn’t do that to you, at least not without asking you first, like if you want a demonstration.”
    “Yeah, I don’t think I want a demonstration, at least not on me,” I said, feeling a flush of embarrassment. I thought about the hypnosis guy on the Discovery Channel who made people do ridiculous things, like profess their love to complete strangers or dance to imaginary music. I was capable of humiliating myself on my own. I didn’t need any help, thanks.
    “How fascinating that you can heal people,” she said. “Imagine what you could do with that.”
    “I don’t think that’s what it was,” I said. “I’m still figuring it out, but there has to be another answer.”
    As if not hearing me, she continued the discussion, going in a different direction entirely. I’ve noticed that girls do this a lot. My dad will be talking about something in the news and my mom will interrupt him to ask if the car is due for an oil change. At least Mallory stayed on the subject somewhat. “We’ve done some brainstorming to try to determine who’s behind the library visit. If it’s not the government, it might be some corporation trying to develop the power from the stones.”
    The government or an evil corporation, both major movie clichés. “Maybe the light particles were sent by aliens,” I joked.
    “That had occurred to us,” she said. “We really can’t rule anything out at this point. But more likely, it’s a natural phenomenon that hasn’t occurred before. Or at least it hasn’t been reported. Scientists are always discovering new things. That’s the joy of science. As our body of evidence grows, the truths of science change along with it. It’s more fluid than most people think.”
    “So why don’t you go to the authorities with this information?” I asked. “Or tell your parents?”
    “Don’t even think of telling anyone,” she said. “I mean it. We’ve got good reasons not to go public with this.”
    “But doesn’t it make sense to inform—”
    I was interrupted by noises downstairs: the sound of the front door opening and closing, and the usual sounds of Frank and Carly arriving. Carly calling out, “Hello, anybody here?” followed by her yelling at Frank to take off his shoes