Six Seconds

13

Blue Rose Creek, California

After repeated attempts, a woman finally answered Maggie’s call to Madame Fatima.

She listened to Maggie’s request and told her to call back the next day, which Maggie did.

“Madame says not today. Call tomorrow.”

“If I could just come and talk to her, please.”

“She has little time to help. Call tomorrow.”

“Please, I need to see her. Please. I beg you.”

Maggie heard a second voice in the background then a hand covered the mouthpiece muffling a conversation between two people at the other end of the line. Then the woman said, “Madame says you may call back this afternoon, around three.”

Maggie thanked her and, with spirits lifted, resumed work at the bookstore.

She restocked shelves and was taking care of orders when a customer jingled her keys to get her attention before thrusting a napkin at her with a title scrawled on it. The woman reeked of cigarettes.

“I need this damn book right now for my sister’s birthday.”

After Maggie’s computer search showed it was out of print, the woman left muttering.

“What’s the G.D. point of a bookstore!”

Maggie was used to rude customers. Shrugging it off, she glanced at her watch. Nearly three. Her turn to take her afternoon break. She went to the children’s section and approached Louisa to cover for her.

“Did you see him, Maggie? He’s here again. He was in history and politics, but I lost him on the third floor.”

“Who?”

“The creep who pretends he’s reading.” Louisa stepped up on a toadstool and scanned every aisle she could see from the Enchanted Story Corner.

“Don’t be so paranoid. This is a bookstore. I’m going on my break, okay?”

“He stares at us all the time. I’m going to tell Robert to tell the creep to leave.”

“I’ll be back in fifteen.”

Maggie went to the public phone outside the staff room near the coffee shop. As Madame Fatima’s line rang, Maggie’s heart filled with anticipation. Would this lead her to Logan? She whispered a prayer. How had her life reached the point where she needed a re luctant mystic to help her find her son and husband?

I don’t care. I’ll do whatever it takes to find them.

Maggie fought her tears as the line was answered and she identified herself.

“Yes, Madame says come tonight.”

“Tonight?”

“Yes, Maggie, at seven.”

“Oh, thank you, thank you so much.”

“There is no certainty she can help you in any way, you understand?”

“I understand.”

“You must come alone. Do you agree to come alone?”

“Yes.”

“Madame says to bring a personal item of your hus band’s and one belonging to your son. Something they’ve touched many times, something metal if possible.”

“Yes.”

“Here is the address and directions. Do you have a pen?”

“Yes.”

Maggie jotted the details on the back of the page Stacy Kurtz had given her, folded it and put it in her pocket and returned to work, never noticing that the man Louisa had called “the creep” had been standing an aisle away in the magazine section.

He’d had a direct line of sight to Maggie.

During her phone call, he’d been reading The Econo mist.

Or so it seemed.