I realize that my leg is tapping on the ground with irritated anxiety. I feel full of pent-up energy and anger towards Beatrice. She sent me this letter because she wanted me to feel this way. She wanted me to know how helpless I am. She was so confident that I wouldn’t catch her. The arrogance of the woman. And Storm has his sights set on a different direction, and she must know that too. I bet she feels really smug right now.
Either she wants to torment me, or this is a trick to distract me and throw me off the scent. The worst thing is not knowing if this is a real threat, or if it is just a game she is playing.
She’s made this personal. She hates me. I am sure of it. But why?
How can I possibly take this to Storm when I have no idea what it is? What kind of psychic am I?
And what is this thing that is supposed to mean most to me in the world? My eyes go to AngelBeastie curled up on my duvet. AngelBeastie is the only thing I have in the world.
I hurry to my door to double check the lock. I wedge the back of my other chair up against the handle. It’s a stupid measure, because I know she is unlikely to come back right now. I should be worrying about when I’m out. It’s not exactly like the lock on this door is secure. She could get into my room easily. She could poison Beastie’s food. She could attack her with an axe. The thought makes me feel sick.
What has the coin got to do with AngelBeastie anyway? Is the coin another ruse to throw me off the scent? Or a clever clue I’ll regret not guessing the meaning of?
I return to my table and carefully remove the gold coin from the plastic bag. It is heavy as real gold. Too expensive to not be a real clue. I place it onto the table top and put the tip of my finger onto one small edge, hoping I am not smearing any fingerprints. But touching it gives me nothing. It just feels like a cold gold coin.
I sit down in the chair and take several long deep breaths, holding each breath for as long as I possibly can before taking the next one. I’m trying to calm myself down and clear my mind. I can’t get anything from the coin if my mind is full of other worries.
I close my eyes and try to focus on nothing but the feeling of my breath coming slowly into my lungs and then slowly back out again. After a while I put my finger on the coin again, and keeping my eyes closed I picture the coin inside my head. I imagine the smiling face of the woman. I imagine that she wants to tell me the truth. I make my mind blank with only the coin and the woman in it. I will with all my being for the truth I need to come to me. Nothing comes.
I pace the room some more. Damn my visions that won’t come when I need them. And damn Beatrice Grictor with her uptilted nose and her soft breathy voice and her prim little blouses buttoned all the way to her neck. Beatrice Grictor who said that she and Raif moved their offices into her house so that they could put more money towards her charity. How the hell am I supposed to find out if that is true or not? I don’t even know where to start.
As I pace I fume about Beatrice. Every once in a while I returned to sit at my desk and touch the coin to give it a chance to tell me something. Nothing less than solid evidence will do for Storm. If only the coin would speak to me. But I’m agitated. Too agitated to be able to hear it. And I’m so tired. My mind is fuzzy. I put my head down on the table to rest it, and close my eyes.
Sometime later I am aware that I am asleep, and yet I am also aware that my cheek is pressed to the surface of the coin. And that it shouldn’t be, because I am destroying any fingerprints. And yet I can’t move my head and I can’t open my eyes because I am asleep. And I am dreaming.
A little boy with black shiny hair and black shiny eyes with a wedge of brilliant green in the left one is bouncing up and down. I smile, knowing it is Storm. Storm as a little boy no older than five, and he is delightful.
He is with his mother in a place that I know must be their home, and I can smell something delicious. Little Storm can smell it too. He is begging his mother for a treat, and she is shaking her head and laughing. But that doesn’t stop him begging. She picks him up and twirls him around and he laughs too.
On a table nearby are freshly baked little lemon cakes, so many of them, arranged artfully as if awaiting guests. Their aroma is mouthwatering. Storm reaches for one, but his mother shakes her head, still laughing.
“It’s mine!” he says. “You know it’s mine.”
“Later,” she says.
“Heads or heads,” he says. “If she smiles, I can have it now!”
His mom tweaks his nose, but she agrees. She flips a golden coin, and it lands in the palm of her hand. The lady of the coin is smiling. Little Storm cackles in glee, and he snatches up a lemon cake, the only one with a bright red cherry on top. The one that his mother baked especially for him.
I wake up from the dream smiling. It takes a while for reality to catch up with me and for the smile to fade from my face. The coin is Storm’s mother’s. How did she get it?
The next thing I know I am on my feet, my heart pounding loudly in my eardrums. The coin is Storm’s. She said she would destroy the thing I cared about most, and she meant Storm.
Chapter 16
DIANA
I grab my phone to call Storm, pleading with the universe for his phone to be switched on though it is night. The call refuses to go through. I have not topped up my credit. I don’t have enough money for it.
Screaming in frustration, I snatch my satchel and Beastie and race out of the room, banging my door shut behind me. It is late night, no tube available for me to speed to Storm’s place. And no bus either. And I can’t run there. I’ll be too late.
I sprint down my road towards the main road, looking back and forth for a cab, and when I spot one with its yellow light lit, I run right into the road in front of it to flag it down.
It nearly flies right into me. The driver is furious. I don’t care. Breathlessly I give him Storm’s address, which I shouldn’t know, but I do.
Shortly after I had moved to London, he had met with me in a cafe to discuss the job. I followed him afterwards. Feeling particularly lonely and lost in the big city, I’d justified it to myself that if only I knew where Storm lived I would feel safe and secure in this alienating metropolis. As if my ability to picture his home was like a comforting teddy bear that I could cuddle in my mind. So I had told myself I wasn’t being a creep, even though I was, a fact which deeply shames me. But now I am glad of it.
Storm lives in Wapping in East London in a converted riverside warehouse. It is a forty minute drive away.