And there was Sarah’s dark gaze, watching her over a wide silver bowl filled with consecrated water. She thought those things were happening in the present, but she saw other things as well, shards of the past and possibly hints of the future.

Josiah, standing beside a grave. His hair was much longer, and his black suit looked like it belonged in a different time. There were tears on his bitter face.

A much younger Sarah, screaming in pain and joy as she gave birth.

And Molly saw herself as Austin swung a baseball bat and struck her with all his strength. She collapsed, and when she stood again, a night-skinned goddess settled a dark mantle of Power like a raven’s wings across her shoulders.

Sarah said clearly in her ear, “Focus.”

Molly’s snapped back to the present, and her vision became singular again.

The approaching witch was very near. Molly moved to the driver’s seat of the Volvo and sat halfway in, one foot on the brake while she shifted to drive.

Up ahead, a car growled around the bend in the road. It was some foreign model, racy and expensive. Just as when she had felt the search lock onto her, conviction settled into place. This was her adversary.

Taking her foot off the brake, she knocked the rock onto the gas pedal and jumped out. The Volvo roared forward. She wasn’t quite fast enough, and the car knocked her off her feet. Hitting the pavement, she rolled, twisted, and came upright again in time to see what happened next.

The expensive, racy car swerved sharply to avoid the Volvo. The road was too narrow. The car plunged over the shoulder into an adjacent, four-foot-deep ditch. Molly saw airbags release while the Volvo continued straight off the curve and crashed into a tree.

Light from the tilted headlamps of the witch’s car threw everything into exaggerated relief. The fancy foreign car wasn’t getting back on the road anytime soon.

The driver’s door opened, and a man spilled out.

She felt a brief, intense warmth, as if Josiah had put his arms around her. He said in her ear, <Kill him now.>

She knew all the reasons why she should, but preemptively killing an unknown person felt very wrong. Maybe they could come to some kind of truce. She shook her head. “My rodeo. My decisions, my mistakes.”

Yellow cat eyes blazed. <Milaya! Save your life!>

While they argued, the warlock climbed out of the ditch and straightened. He was beautiful with a striking Slavic bone structure and long, dark hair pulled into a ponytail.

He felt Powerful too, but with a sudden conviction she couldn’t explain, she knew he wasn’t as strong as she was. He wore jeans, sharp-toed boots, and a black cashmere sweater pushed up over tattooed forearms. She caught a glimpse of a blue pentacle and a sun atop a pyramid.