A police car was just coming down the street as we roared off in the other direction. I hardly noticed. I clung tightly to Alex; over and over, I kept seeing the two body bags. Had Mom come out of her dream world before it happened? Had she known what was going on? Oh please, no. The thought of her being scared and trapped, unable to get away, hurt so much I thought it might kill me. I huddled against Alex’s back as the cold mountain air rushed past, keeping my eyes closed and trying not to throw up.

I’m not sure how much time passed; it could have been minutes or hours. But sometime later, once we’d crossed the state line into New Mexico, Alex turned off the highway and into a small town. When we came to a service station, he pulled in and parked the bike out of sight behind it. My legs felt stiff and unreal as I climbed off, as if I were a zombie just crawled from the grave.

Alex’s face was tight with sympathy as he put his arm around my shoulders. “Come on, we’ve got to talk,” he said. He steered me into the restroom.

Talk. The word seemed alien; I found myself turning it over for different possible meanings. I stood hugging myself as he locked the door behind us. Somewhere deep within, I could feel the tears waiting like a tidal wave. If I gave into them, they’d sweep me away, drown me for ever.

Alex’s hair was ruffled from the wind as he turned to me; his hands gripped mine, feeling warm and strong. “Willow, listen,” he said urgently. “The more I think about it, the more this doesn’t make sense. I mean, yeah, the Church of Angels might want your mother dead, but why would they target your aunt, too? Everyone in Pawntucket knew that the two of you didn’t get along, right?”

I shook my head, too shell-shocked to get where he was going with this. He was right, though. It was a small town, and Aunt Jo wasn’t the type to keep her complaints to herself. Everybody had known how put-upon she felt having to support the two of us, even with the money I sometimes brought in from my psychic readings.

“Plus, your aunt believed what the Church said about you running off with a secret boyfriend, so why have her killed?” Alex went on. “It helps their story if she’s around. And if the target was your mother, it would make more sense to just stick her in a home somewhere and then quietly get rid of her. You don’t do away with people by burning their house down – there’s too many ways it could go wrong.”

A headache spiked my temples; I could hardly take in the meaning of his words. “Alex, what are you saying?”