She gave it. Resentfully. Because this wasn’t enough. Something was wrong. It was wrong.
She was halfway out the door before she had her coat all the way on. Because if her son was going to text her like she was the one who could save them, then she would damn well be the one to save them.
She got halfway down the stairs when she remembered she didn’t have a car.
Should she knock on Declan’s door? Should she tell him what was happening? Everything in her rejected that. She couldn’t show up to whatever was happening with him. She couldn’t involve him in this.
It wasn’t just because she was embarrassed about the sex. That after a lifetime of being puritanical and judgmental, she’d folded like a house of cards because a hot guy had given her a smoldering look within one hundred feet of a bed.
Though that was one reason.
She called Nora.
“Nora! Someone is trying to break into David’s house, and Levi texted me about it, and emergency services aren’t taking it seriously, and I have to go!”
“I’ll come get you.” Nora sounded stretched thin.
“Are you okay?”
“I’m ... Ben is in the hospital. I’ll come over and get you and explain everything on the way.”
Ben was in the hospital?
Someone was trying to break into the house. She was having difficulty wrapping her head around all of this.
She paced the hall until Nora texted:I’m here.Then she ran down the stairs and out to the street and jumped into the passenger seat.
“Did you text Daisy?” Nora asked.
“I thought she was probably busy with ... well, either her kids or Zach.”
“She was.” Nora pulled away from the curb. “Well, she was with Zach. Now she’s with the kids because Jonathan is also in the hospital.”
“What!?” Any worries she had about Nora looking at her and seeingharlotstamped on her forehead were gone now.
There were much bigger issues at play.
“Ben had a hiking accident. Jonathan had a construction accident.”
Soraya pulled her phone out and fired off a text to Daisy to ask if everything was okay. “How’s Ben?”
“Fine. For a cheating liar.”
“I’m sorry, Nora.” Soraya scrubbed her hands over her face. She felt cold. Like she was a hundred miles away from her own body. She felt like nothing was real.
“I’m not. It’s better that I know. It’s better that I see him for exactly what he is. Better that all of this came out, and if he had to fall down a mountain for me to see it all, then that’s what had to happen.” Nora sounded grim but resigned. Almost bloodthirsty.
She thought of the Tower card Nora had drawn that day at her apartment, that she’d quickly put back in the deck. Fire and men falling to their doom.
“This is the magic, isn’t it?”
Nora was silent for a moment. “I don’t know what else it could be.”
“My kids might be in danger.”
“But it’s David’s fault,” Nora said. “Whatever is happening is David’s fault.”
“Maybe.” Soraya wrung her hands together. “But if something happens to them because we messed with power and spirits and whatever else that we weren’t supposed to, it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter.” Her throat went tight, fear making it hard for her to speak.
