Hourglass (Hourglass 1)

Lily was the only childhood friend I had who still talked to me, and possibly the only good thing about coming back from the boarding school where I’d spent my sophomore and junior years. The official line was that my scholarship for senior year had been cut due to “dwindling alumni donations,” but I wondered if maybe they’d just run out of charity for girls with dead parents who occasionally hallucinated and made their classmates uncomfortable. I had money for incidentals from the small trust fund my parents left, but not enough to cover my last year of school. Thomas offered to pay for my senior year so I could stay in Sedona, but I declined. Often and loudly. I would live with him because he was my legal guardian, but I wouldn’t accept his money outright.

Back to Tennessee it was. Surely I could survive anything for a year, even public high school.

“I had something else to talk to you about.” Thomas flattened the plans again. I kept expecting the ink to rub off the paper. “We … We have a new contact. A consultant who says he can help.”

Every few months or so Thomas heard a rumor about someone who could help me. So far, they had all been freaks or flakes. I slammed my water bottle down on the counter, crossed my arms over my chest, and leveled a glare at him. “Another one?”

“It’s different this time.”

“It was different last time.”

Thomas tried again. “This guy—”

“Has a third eye you can visibly see?”

“Emerson.”

“I don’t have a lot of faith in your contacts,” I countered, crossing my arms more tightly, as if I could protect myself from the onslaught of unwanted “help.” “I swear, you must get their names from the popup ads on the paranormal sites you search all the time.”

“I only did that … twice.” He tried not to grin. He failed.

“Where did you find this one?” It was hard to stay mad when he was trying so hard to help. “Fresh from rehab?”

“He works for a place called the Hourglass. The founder was part of the parapsychology department at Bennett University in Memphis.”

“The department that was shut down because no one would fund it? Stupendous.”

“How did you know about that?” Thomas asked in surprise.

I gave him a look that loosely translated as: I’m a teenager. I know how to work a search engine.

“The Hourglass is a very reputable place, I promise. My contact—”

“Okay, okay … if I say I’ll meet him, can we stop talking about it?” I asked, holding up my hands in mock surrender. Thomas knew he would win. He always did.

“Thanks, Em. I only do it because I love you.” His expression turned serious. “I really do.”

“I know.” He really did. And regardless of any disagreement, I loved him, too. Eager to avoid any displays of emotion, I looked around for my sister-in-law. “Where’s the wife?”

Thomas and Dru were a renovation dream team—interlocking pieces of a puzzle—their skills complementing each other perfectly. I once watched Dru take a sledgehammer to a wall to help speed up work on a job site. When she finished, her manicure was still intact.

“At the restaurant with the new chef. He wanted her opinion on which wines to serve tonight.”

“She would know.” Her taste was impeccable. Thomas’s cell phone started chirping. Seeing my chance at escape, I threw my empty water bottle into the recycling bin. “Getting late. Need a shower.”

As the door swung shut behind me, I inhaled the scent of new paint. Dru had recently refinished the walls in the front room with a deep red Venetian plaster. Cozy leather couches with silk-covered pillows in sepia tones complemented hardwood floors. One wall was nothing but plate-glass windows; another was lined with bookshelves holding leather tomes and ragged paperbacks. I ran my fingers across their spines, itching to grab one and settle in. Not tonight. Thomas and Dru had renovated the old phone company into a chichi restaurant that they actually decided to keep and operate instead of selling to an investor. The big opening was in a few hours. My attendance had been requested, sort of as a reintroduction to town society.

My brother had a gift for making broken things shine. I was pretty sure he was hoping that tonight his magic would work on me.

Losing our parents four years ago threw us together, even though Thomas and I hadn’t been close when I was growing up. I was a surprise baby, and there were almost two decades between us. He hadn’t exactly been ready to raise his younger sister, and I’d done my best to keep my particular brand of crazy out of his life. Receiving that scholarship had been an answer to a prayer. I wanted to get away from my hometown, all its memories, and Thomas’s renovation sites. I didn’t like the position I was in, now that my scholarship had evaporated.

Mainly because of “my problem.”

“Hello.”

The unfamiliar voice threw me off balance. I spun around to see a man standing by the wall of windows, looking unreasonably at home and completely out of place at the same time. Exceptionally handsome, tall, and slim, he was dressed in a black suit. A lock of hair the color of wheat fell over one eyebrow but didn’t mask the elegant features of his face. Slipping a silver pocket watch attached to his vest into his pants pocket, he clasped his hands behind his back.

“Can I help you?” I tried to keep the sound of apprehension from my voice but couldn’t. He hadn’t been there a second ago.