Scarlet had the type of personality to be all in or nothing and she knew it. With everyone else over the last years, since she’d been seventeen and her boyfriend—Robert Barnes-Holden Jr.—had betrayed her in such a terrible way, she had refused to allow herself to ever believe in a man. Absinthe changed all that.
She had become aware of the fact that not only was she very intelligent, but she had psychic gifts as well. Before, when she was very young, she thought she was just intuitive. She began reading about various talents and how to improve them, especially once she was in prison. She began trying to work on the talents she thought she had to make them stronger. It wasn’t like she could find a mentor to help her, but she had a lot of time on her hands to work on herself. She did find references to different psychic gifts and how different countries had tried to utilize the gifts in various ways. She followed up on those references, tracking them from book to book, even learning languages so she could understand more.
Scarlet had a good, very fast motor in her little nondescript car, and several times she glanced in the rearview mirror, a little worried that someone was following her as she sped down the freeway toward the cutoff leading to Highway 20. It was more of a feeling than anything else. Sometimes her radar went off and usually it was good to act on it. She didn’t spot anyone following her, and she slowed down to allow anyone to drop in behind her just in case, but no one did. She waited a length of time before speeding up again and moving into the fast lane. No one seemed to move with her. Still, she was careful, frequently watching her mirrors.
She could drive when she had to, she’d spent a great deal of money on instructors teaching her how to race around every kind of obstacle and through streets and alleyways. She had confidence in her skills. She had worked at learning to spot tails as well. There had been months of training with experts recommended to her by women she’d met in prison. She never stopped practicing and working at those crafts.
Occasionally she visited the four women who had helped her so much, just chatting, knowing everything they said was being recorded. She wanted them to know she was still alive and doing well and that she would always remember what they had done for her. They had no idea the fullness of the dark path she’d traveled down, and she would never tell them. They thought they had provided her with the ability to always protect herself from men like Holden Jr. and Sr. In return for their generosity in helping her, she always did her best to let them know they had a friend with money on the outside.
The plan was for Scarlet to meet Absinthe at a coffee shop near Fort Bragg, not in Caspar, where he said he lived. She was grateful that he was still seeking to make her feel comfortable with him. It was a public place, not his home. She had decided the fastest route would be to take the 101 freeway straight up to Willits and then cut over on 20 to Fort Bragg. She wasn’t certain why Absinthe wanted to meet her at the coffee shop, but now that she was a little anxious, she thought it was just as well. She didn’t want to lead Holden’s people to him just in case she was being followed.
She had packed enough clothes for the weekend and brought the one thing that really mattered to her: her sister’s photograph. She had a picture of her parents as well, but she had that in the go-bag in the wall back at the rental. She hadn’t been able to make herself look at them. Maybe someday. They’d left her alone to face her sister’s death. Perhaps they blamed her the same way she blamed herself.
There was a part of her that wanted to pull her car over and go through her phone to look at all the text messages Absinthe had sent to her. She’d done so a hundred times. Probably more. She lay in bed at night, unable to sleep, thinking about him, going over every word he’d said to her when they’d been in the redwoods together. Every expression on his face. He couldn’t fake that. Not what was in his eyes.
Out in the redwood forest, she had deliberately touched him, bringing one of her strongest psychic abilities into play, almost hesitant to do so at first, moving her hands over his body, exploring the play of his muscles. But there was very little information she retrieved, other than that he was really, really into her. Intensely into her. That had added to the excitement of being with him. Everything about being with Absinthe was intense.