Consortâs big cleaving.â
âNot Lattimer. Monty. Whatâs he after?â
âForgiveness,â I said, making air quotes.
His brow furrowed. âMontyâs crazy, but heâs not stupid. Youâre never going to forgive him, and he knows it. Whatâs he really after?â
âSame thing as ever. Rose.â
âRose is dead,â he replied. âThereâs no way she could have lasted in the Echoes for this long. Even if she had, Train World . . .â
Was gone, along with everyone in it.
He broke off and ducked his head. âIâm sorry.â
âDonât be,â I said, and turned the mug of cocoa around and around. Not telling Eliot the truth left me feeling wormy and small. âHow was class?â
âWho cares? How was Monty?â
âHis usual awful self,â I said. âI lost my temper and bailed. Lattimer was thrilled.â
âWhat did he say? Monty, I mean.â
I snorted. âHe kept going on about stories, which is Monty-speak for lies.â
Eliot nudged his glasses up. âMaybe not. What exactly did he say?â
âHe called me slapdash.â The accusation stung, hours later.
âHe insulted you? Doesnât sound like him. And itâs a crap way to earn forgiveness.â
âHe doesnât care if I forgive him. He wants to mess with my head. Itâs his only form of entertainment.â
âThereâs got to be a reason,â he said. âWe just donât see it yet. What else did he say?â
Anger blurred my memory. âHe talked about stories, I guess. He said they were more than words on a page. And he called me sloppy.â Youâll have no one to blame but yourself. . . .
â Words on a page,â Eliot repeated. He spun the stool in a circle as he thought.
âYouâre going to make yourself dizzy.â I put out a hand to stop him, and he grabbed my wrist.
âHe wasnât insulting you, Del.â He lifted my hand with his, pointing to the bookshelves in the living room, filled with neat lines of matching leather-bound books. âHe was telling you where to look for clues.â
âThe journals? You think he left me a message in their journals?â
Eliot nodded, his eyes lighting up at the prospect of a fresh puzzle. âBetter make popcorn.â
â¢Â   â¢Â   â¢
An hour later the popcorn was gone. I rummaged through the pantry looking for more snacks. Eliot sat at the kitchen island surrounded by haphazard piles of leather-bound journals and a mess of papers, his face bathed in the blue glow of his screen.
âRose took nearly two hundred Walks in the six months before she disappeared.â He groaned and took off his glasses, rubbing at his eyes. âAt least the data sampleâs sufficiently large.â
âDo you really think thereâs a pattern?â
âThereâs always a pattern,â he said, resuming his usual hunt-and-peck. I tossed a bag of Oreos on the tableâanother sign that life hadnât returned to normal. Three months ago my mother would have taken a flamethrower to any processed snacks that crossed the threshold of our kitchen. But baking had fallen by the wayside, and now our pantry looked like any other familyâs. I kind of liked it.
Careful not to scatter crumbs, I ran my finger over the pages of my grandmotherâs journal. Traditionally, Walkers kept journals as a record of their personal Walks, but Roseâs felt more like a scrapbook. Scattered among handwritten reports were recipes, notes about patients, brief snippets of songs, even photographs. Mom had told me Monty was the more free-spirited of my grandparents, but if this book was any indication, Rose was the definition of eclectic.
Now that I knew where sheâd gone, Rose herself had become the true mystery. The woman in these pages didnât seem like a rebel. She was a healer.
Morgan Parker
Kelley Armstrong
Heather Graham
Ron Hansen
Sally Mason
Chrystalla Thoma
Deborah Bladon
Ariella Papa
Kevin Barry
Sean Williams