Kaden came back to himself gasping for breath. He planted his hands on the dirt and glanced around. But he was alone. The strawberry vine had disappeared. The flowers faced east, waiting on sunrise.

He blinked and stumbled to his feet.

He hurried back into the house.

He slipped into bed.

Come morning, he would wake to warm light streaming in from the windows, his back sore from a night on the couch, and one hell of a headache. Except for the dirt on his feet, he would barely recall his walk through the garden. It was all flashes of various memories he didn’t have, but it felt more like a dream.

What else could it have been?

Chapter 22

Sylvia

Beyond the barbed wire–topped fence at the edge of the Haywood property lay fields and fields of deep gray cornstalks that stretched toward the sky. In the predawn light, Sylvia Bonner stood in their midst. She pulled an ear from one plant, and it shuddered. The movement rippled down the row as though a gust of wind blew through it, but the night was still.

She peeled back the husk. Beneath, the black kernels were half the size they should’ve been. Some parts of the cob hadn’t even formed seeds at all. It wasn’t the first time it had happened, but more and more, the yield was turning out all wrong—ever since they stopped rotating the fields that spring and began using every last scrap of soil.

The corn slipped from Sylvia’s hand and hit the ground with a thud. With a heavy sigh, she hopped onto her golf cart and made her way back to the Bonner estate.

Chapter 23

Quinn

As usual, Quinn’s tea leaves that morning showed nothing. What she wouldn’t give for a morsel from the universe, some small assurance that she was on the right path with her nightmares or her memories or whatever they were.

Meanwhile, her cousin’s reading revealed a clear sprig of rosemary, an ear of corn, and that single curling fern. Again. She’d made three mugs of tea that morning and each one showed the same thing.

Addison looked down into her cup, then up at Quinn, and groaned. “I don’t get it. I really thought this was a sign to sell to Sylvia.”

“Maybe it was,” Quinn said. “But there’s obviously something more to it.”

“Normally I’d take it to Grams for her thoughts, but after yesterday…”

“Blaming you for the problems with the rosemary was a real bitch move,” Quinn said. “Even for Grams. Maybe Irene can help you figure it out.”

Addison shook her head. “It wasn’t just Grams. You heard them. They both blamed me.” She rested her forehead against the counter. “What if they’re right?”

“They didn’t blame you for it,” Quinn said as she rubbed at the black lipstick stain she’d left on her teacup.