Hot Spot by Debbi Rawlins Page A

years.”
    His brows dipped as he digested the information. “So how did they meet up again?”
    “Karrie was sent to Las Vegas on business. In fact, her company sent her to specifically meet with Rob concerning a piece of land where he wanted to conduct a dig with his students.”
    “How long after Madam Zora’s prediction did that happen?”
    Madison shrugged. “About three months maybe.”
    “Interesting.” He thought for a moment. “Anyway Madam Zora could have known that Karrie’s company would be sending her to—”
    Madison shook her head. “No way. She didn’t know. Her boss didn’t know. Karrie had always sworn she’d never go back west. Everything just sort of happened.”
    “Do you have a pen and piece of paper?”
    “I think so.” She lifted the camera bag strap off the back of her chair and quickly found a pen and an old to-do list. “This is all I have,” she said, handing it to him. “The back of the paper is clean.”
    He started scribbling right away and she leaned forward for a peek. Except it looked like some sort of personal shorthand and she couldn’t make it out.
    “Let’s go over this again,” he said. “Just the highlights.”
    “Yes, sir.”
    He looked up, surprised, and then he smiled. “Please.”
    She smiled back. “But I’ve already told you everything.”
    “Humor me.”
    She sighed, staring into his beautiful eyes, knowing she was the envy of every woman in the room, and he wanted to talk about psychics. Okay, so that was pretty much the way her life went. Nothing new.
    “Karrie and I went to this party. She made me go with her to have a reading. Madam Zora told her she would be having this torrid affair with someone from her past.”
    “You didn’t tell me about the torrid affair part.”
    “Is it important?”
    He chuckled. “I guess not.”
    “Do you want me to continue or not?”
    “I won’t interrupt again.” He pressed his lips together, looking so boyishly adorable she wanted to lean across the table and kiss him.
    Of course she wanted to do that, anyway. She sighed, forced her attention back to their conversation. “Okay, let’s see—Oh, yeah, I have to give Madam Z. her props here. She knew that Karrie’s brother was a pilot. No one else at the party would have known that.” She shrugged at the astonishment on his face. “Although, the way she put it was that he was content to soar like a bird, or something like that.”
    “That’s pretty remarkable.”
    “But she didn’t specifically say he was a pilot either.”
    He studied her with far too much interest.
    “You realize you interrupted again,” she said, and hesmiled. “Then you know the rest. Karrie was supposed to hook up with someone from her past with the initials R.P., they’d have an affair and yada, yada, yada.”
    “So basically everything Madam Zora predicted would happen did, in fact, happen.”
    “Well, yeah. Sort of.” Why in the hell had she allowed this conversation to continue? She looked around for the waitress. Madison needed dessert. She’d heard the Death by Chocolate was to die for. Why not? He was buying.
    “And you still don’t believe that this woman has some kind of sixth sense?”
    “She got lucky. That’s all.”
    He blinked, confusion flickering in his face. “You don’t want to believe.” He narrowed his gaze and stared at her with fascination. “What did this woman predict for you?”
    Heat crawled up her neck and into her face. She was probably as red as a cherry tomato, which in itself told him more than she wanted him to know, but she’d die a thousand deaths before she admitted what Madam Z. had said.
    “Tell me, Madison,” he whispered. “Did it have anything to do with me?”

8
    J ACK WATCHED THE TIPS of her ears redden. He’d never seen anyone blush so completely like that before. She’d obviously had a whopper of a reading that still resonated. A gentleman would back off. He couldn’t help himself. “What did she tell