Diane's bike skidded to a stop at the edge of the sidewalk, and she stared at the boardwalk. "Oh no!"

Richie skittered to a stop next to her, almost overshooting her as his front wheel slipped on a patch of ice. He frowned as his eyes swept the boardwalk from one end to the other. "What?"

Crown Drive had been named such because its looping shape right at the northernmost point of Haven was somewhat reminiscent of a crown. It followed the river to the east and the canal to the west. The boardwalk was intended to be the jewel of the crown.

The "jewel" had become lackluster to say the least. The short stairway leading up to the boardwalk was missing every other step. Upon the boardwalk itself, rotted timbers lay warped and bleached by snow, rain, sun, and neglect. The railing separating it from the canal was broken in a few places. Rampant graffiti covered every inch of available surface.

None of this mattered to Diane. All that mattered to her was the chain across the entrance with the sign which blared "CLOSED - STRUCTURE CONDEMNED - DO NOT ENTER"

"What do you mean 'what?'" Diane demanded.

Richie again scanned the boardwalk and shrugged.

"It's closed!" Diane cried.

"Yeah, so?"

"We can't go on it! You said we have to be right at the place where it happened."

"Who the hell says we can't?" Richie declared. He leaned his bike against a nearby aspen. He stepped up to the stairway, over the chain, and onto the boardwalk, the remaining steps creaking. He turned to face Diane. "See? Nothing to it."

Diane stared for a few moments before she shook her head and leaned her bike against the same tree. "My mother would have a fit if she knew I was doing this."

"It's not that bad."

"Richie, the thing is condemned!" Diane shouted from behind the chain. She sighed and gingerly stepped over it. "They don't do that unless it's for a good reason."

"Big fucking deal. They have the same thing on the bridge heading towards the old rail yard. I've gone across that fucker a million times by now."

Diane now realized it was little wonder why other parents saw him as a bad influence. If she had not had this duty to fulfill for Heather, she would have seriously considered abandoning her task. She spent the better part of a minute trying to come up with an alternate approach to the stairs and failed.

The last step cracked under her heel. She uttered an alarmed cry as it gave way when she tried to leap off the ailing timber. Her fall was arrested when Richie grabbed her arms and hauled her onto the boardwalk. She stumbled into him, briefly squeezing her bosom against his chest. "Sorry," she said in a sheepish voice.

Richie glanced briefly at her breasts and gave her a tiny smirk before he caught himself. "Yeah, okay, we're here. So where do we stand?"

Diane looked towards the canal. On the other side was a large field buried under an expanse of white which glistened in the sun, untouched save for animal footprints. Even they were muted as well, and as she stepped forward, she understood why. A sudden gust of wind whipped over her, channeled between a stand of aspens near the river to the left and a thicket of pines to the right. Fine powder peppered her face and sweep across the field in waves.

Richie frowned and wiped his face. "Yeah, now I know why they closed it. Let's do this thing before I freeze my face off."

Diane stared at the field. She saw the occasional dead stem poking up through the snow and understood why this place bloomed so well. The river came down from the north and veered east, the canal branching to the west. With water on two sides and snow blanketing it most of the winter, she imagined this to be a bright spot even when the rest of the area was brown with drought.

"No, something else caused this to be neglected," Diane said. She placed her hands on the railing but snatched them away when the wood began to splinter at once. "The whole town is like this, Richie. It's been going on for some time."

Richie plunged his hands into his pockets and hunched his shoulders. He turned his body away from the field as another gust raised a fog of powdery snow around them. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"Look at the abandoned church. It was that way even back in 1985. And how much longer was it before the cemetery fell into disrepair?"

"Beats me."

"It couldn't have been long. The fact that Penny found the comb months after Stephanie was buried means no one was really maintaining it even back then. But that's not all of it. I've been doing some research on Haven. There's lots of other places like that, places that used to be important and started falling into disuse."

"So what's that supposed to mean? Don't that happen to other towns?"

"Yes, but that's because people move away," Diane said. "Haven is just the opposite. It's grown in the last few decades, yet all these places keep getting abandoned." Diane shivered. "It kinda scares me, I have to admit."

Richie rolled his eyes.

"Yes, I know," Diane said in a glum voice. "Just more silliness from Diane, who's afraid of her own shadow."

"Hey, I didn't mean ... look, never mind," Richie said. "Let's just get this done. We came here to see Heather's mother tell Jo to fuck off."

Diane reached into her pocket and pulled out the pendant. A puff of wind sent it swinging back and forth like a tiny pendulum. "I hope so," she said as she brought it to Richie's outstretched hand. "Or at least to get a clue as to where to go next."

Her hand clasped his, the pendant squeezed between them, and reality shifted.

The snow was gone. The wind was light and fragrant, and birds sang in the branches of the bright green tops of the aspens. She heard the wood creak -- a healthy creak of full and straight timbers rubbing against one another -- and turned her head towards the sound. Penny Donovan -- no, Sovert, now, from the glint of gold on one hand -- stood leaning against a freshly-stained railing, clad in a summer dress which rose only to her knees, looking out over the field.

Diane followed her gaze and gasped. The field exploded with color. Delicate hues of blue, red, and purple swayed in the gentle breeze. Tall grasses rose along the fringes, their seed-stalks rustling as they bent gently towards the boardwalk. The midmorning sun glinted from the river, sparkling like a jewel against indigo velvet.

"Oh, it's beautiful!" Diane whispered.

"I told you, you don't have to whisper," Richie said.

Diane did not try to explain it to him. Places like this, she thought, deserved a sort of reverence. Her heart ached as she saw herself standing in Penny's place, but with Heather at her side.

"Thought I would find you here," came a voice from behind.

"Beautiful, huh?" Richie growled, his free hand curling into a fist. "It's about to get uglier now."

Jo stepped onto the boardwalk, Penny affording her only an abbreviated turn of the head. Jo's outfit was far less conservative. Tight, high-riding denim shorts hugged her hips and ass, her legs smooth and bare down to her sandals. Her midriff-bearing top was pulled taut over breasts held by a bra at least one size too small.

"Look at how she's dressed!" Diane remarked as Jo passed in front of them.

Richie snorted. "Yeah, who the fuck if she kidding? Her thighs are way too thick for freakin' Daisy-Dukes."

"I don't mean that, I--"

"I needed some time to think about all this," Penny said in a low and troubled voice.

Jo swung around and leaned against the railing, facing away from the flower field. "You already had that. You thought about it all through the engagement, all through the wedding planning, all through--"

"Stop it, Jo," Penny said.

"Yeah, put that bitch in her place," Richie growled.

Jo fell silent for only a moment. "I'm sorry," she said in a more contrite voice. "You used to like it when I was blunt. It helped prevent you from missing things."

"It hasn't been much help recently," Penny muttered. She turned to face Jo when her sister raised an eyebrow with a face somewhere between curiosity and admonishment. "I didn't quite mean it that way."

"You're really that obsessed with it. Still."

Penny frowned and thumped her fist on the railing, then turned away. "I keep feeling like I'm so close. Like I'm just a step away from finding the truth."

"And yet it's been like that for the last, hmm, how many months has it been since you made those accusations against Charles Remmer?"

"I didn't accuse him of anything! Jo, if you had been there, you would have seen for yourself he was doing his best to hide something from me."

Jo gave her sister a level look. "How many months, Penny?"

Penny uttered a frustrated sigh and folded her arms. "Eight," she said in a low voice.

"This is 1987, then," Diane said. "Probably about June."

"And what have you found in that time?"

"Enough to convince me that Victor Mann is tied up in all of it."

Jo sighed. "I investigated him for you three times now. He's nothing more than he seems, a highly-trained psychologist and behaviorist with a strong philanthropic bent."

Richie pointed into the sky. "Hey, look, some flying pigs! Not."

"You've investigated him when you wouldn't believe me," Jo said. "And did you find anything more?"

Penny let out a slow breath through her nose. "No, nothing that would stand up to intense scrutiny. It's just ... I can see patterns, Jo, you knew I always could. I could see them in what people do, in how they speak. I think it's how I've, well, managed to get my way with our parents a lot when I was a teenager."

Diane heard an intake of breath from Jo, and turned her head in time to see the brief look of incredulity in Jo's face. Her heart thumping, Diane thrust out her hand and plunged it through Jo's shoulder as if it were only mist.

... crock of shit. She really has the fucking gall to claim that's all it is? What a little snot-nosed bitch. Who the fuck is she trying to fool? Yeah you just want it all, just like you always did, just like you always GOT. Not anymore. You can't even hold a candle to ...

Diane blinked and swayed. Her trembling hand now lay in open air, Jo having taken a step away. Her eyes widened.

"What did you pick up?" Richie said. "What--"

"Not now," Diane hissed.

"--can't have it all, Penny," Jo said in a far softer voice than suggested by the feelings Diane had sensed. "You have to decide what's important to you. Or did you forget you've been married for the past two months?"

Penny looked down and cradled the hand which bore the ring. She turned it into the sunlight, admiring the shiny and untarnished gold. She uttered a soft sigh. "How could I, Jo? It's what I've wanted for the past year."

"And you still want children with him as well."

Penny looked up and nodded. She smiled slightly. "David is partial to boys, but I'd rather have a girl. Two girls, actually."

Diane could not help but smile as well. She was suddenly very glad that these were windows only into the past. She would have dreaded doing anything which could possibly lead to Heather not being born.

"And how can you do that and still pursue this when he can't move from Denver?" Jo asked.

"Yes, Jo, the commute is horrid, you're not telling me something I don't already know."

"Denver?" Richie said. "But he works from home now."

"This was way before anyone could do that, Richie," Diane said.

"--you expect to do this, and be with him, and raise a family?" Jo asked.

Penny stared at her sister for a moment, then turned away in a huff, stepping up to the railing. "I can't," she said in a low voice. She lowered her gaze. "Dammit."

"What?" Diane said in confusion. "She almost sounds like she's going to--"

Jo stepped up and placed her hand on her sister's shoulder. "Penny, I know we haven't seen eye to eye on a lot of things. I hope you don't think I've been trying to work against you."

Richie snorted. "No, where the fuck would we get that idea from, you conniving cunt."

"--course not, Jo," Penny said in a sincere voice. "I mean, yes, I think your skepticism can edge over into downright debunking, but--"

"But that's not the issue here."

"So what is the issue, Jo?" Penny said in irritation. "Use that bluntness you're so found of wielding and tell me."

"The issue is that you don't know how to let go."

Penny stared at her sister with shimmering eyes.

"Fuck, she must be using some sort of power over Heather's mother!" Richie cried.

"No, nothing," Diane said. "If she has any sort of power like Victor, I would have felt it by now."

"Stephanie Fowler is gone," Jo said. "Nothing you do is going to bring her back."

"She's using emotional manipulation, that's all," Diane said.

She balked at her own words. That same manipulation was often enough to get Diane to do things she did not want to do. She always traveled with the crowd. It was how her relationship with Heather had been at first. Heather was a leader, she was a follower. She toed the line and ensured she remained interested in everything which interested Heather.

Penny shook her head. "This isn't about just her, it's bigger than that. It's--"

"And yet you're haunted by this one thing. Penny, I've seen how many times you've gone back to that grave. Maybe you are seeing something bigger, but your life still revolves around her, and it's dragging you down."

Penny uttered another sigh. She looked back down at her ring.

"You haven't even given up your old apartment, have you?"

Penny shook her head without looking up.

"You need to get away from this," Jo said in an earnest voice. "You need to let it go."

Penny looked up. "But ... but other girls are in danger."

To Diane's surprise and Richie's incredulous snort, Jo nodded. "Yes. If all of what you found is really connected. If Victor is really more than he says he is. If Charles really was hiding something from you. If the discrepancy in the coroner's report really wasn't just a minor clerical error."

"And if some of the more recent things I've found point to something even bigger centered around the Li'l Missy Inn." Penny threw up her hands. "Yes, more if's, I know!"

Diane gasped. "The Inn? She found out about it way back in 1987?"

"Fuck, they both wanted her out," Richie muttered. "Victor and the Dark bitch."

"But why? What threat was she to the Darkness?"

"--some if's you want to consider now," Jo said. "If you want to remain close to your husband. If you don't want him to resent your career. If you want to raise a family."

Penny nodded halfway through her sister's last sentence. "Yes, I know. God, I hate this. I hate having to choose."

"Nothing says you have to give it up entirely," Jo said with a small smile. "I'm going to maintain the business."

"Yeah, nothing like recruiting the foxes to guard the fucking hen-house," Richie said.

"Then you're going to have to make me a promise, Jo," Penny said. "You're going to have to promise me you'll keep pursuing this. I know, not to the exclusion of all else, but I don't want to abandon it. Maybe ... maybe I am haunted by Stephanie more than I want to admit. Maybe your fresh eye on it--"

Richie wrinkled his nose. "There's something fresh around here, all right. Fresh and steaming."

"--find something I didn't."

Jo slowly nodded and smiled. "All right, Penny, I promise. Anything if it means you and David can have a happy life together."

"Fuck, am I the only one who feels like I just fell into a vat of manure?" Richie growled.

Penny embraced Jo. "Thank you, I knew I could count on you," Penny drew back and smiled. "I'll call David soon as I get back to the apartment." She looked wistfully out over the field. "I have to admit, I will miss this town."

"Then don't be a stranger," Jo said. "If you're going to continue in some sort of consultant role, you need to come down every now and then."

Penny nodded and smiled. She and Jo turned towards the stairs and vanished into the past.

Diane withdrew the pendant from Richie's hand. "Fuck, she did leave," Richie said. "What the hell's up with that?"

"I-I don't know." Diane said, shivering as she looked out over the snow-covered field. "Well, she must have come back, of course. Or she changed her mind later ... dammit, I don't know what to do next! If she left town, then we can't get any more visions of her in Haven."

"If she really left Haven."

Diane's eyes widened. She looked towards the street. "Wait, I got an idea." She rushed towards the stairs, remembered the broken step, and eased off the edge of the boardwalk instead in a short drop. She turned to face Richie as he followed. "Whether she stayed or left and came back, she had to have moved into her house at some point. We could see that happening if we go stand in front of it."

"Yeah, maybe," Richie said. "And maybe we'll see any of a thousand other times she's come and gone."

"But you said yourself that these things seem to follow a pattern. I mean, what do we have to lose?"

"You really want to stand in front of that house? When Heather's Mom tried to fuck you over?"

Diane realized how crazy it sounded coming from her own mouth as well. She also realized that if she stopped to think about it for too long, she would lose her nerve. "Penny is likely still at the Inn. Jo is probably ... um, engaged ... with Melinda."

Richie frowned. "I don't like this. I'm supposed to fucking protect you, not let you walk right into danger. Fuck, I wish Ned was here."

"Yes, I know, but Cassie ... well ... needed him."

Richie frowned and shifted his weight. "She ain't the only one that fucking needs something," he muttered.

"It's only a few minutes from here," Diane said. "This shouldn't take long. I have to know one way or the other."

After Jason had followed Richie and Diane along the Ridge Road loop around the northwest corner of town and saw where they were going, he realized the timing was going to be slim. While he had the advantage of dashing down Main Street, where all the traffic lights would favor that thoroughfare on a late weekday afternoon, they may see that advantage as well and take that route back to Diane's.

Then again, Richie was not prone to strategic thinking, and Diane always preferred the "prettiest" route, which meant another long loop around Ridge Road.

As soon as he had confirmed their destination was the boardwalk, he had retreated around the bend and hid himself among some pine trees off the side of the road. He would see them approach as they headed back to Diane's, then he would take off the moment they were gone.

He had calculated the likely time it would take Richie's vision to play itself out. It was generally never more than five minutes, yet by the ten minute mark, no one had appeared.

He pedaled cautiously around Crown Drive, but the old boardwalk was empty. He raced past it, taking the looping road around until it turned south and met with Green Avenue at a T-intersection. He paused and thought over his options.

They may have gone to the right, to the west, if they had spotted him and wanted to frustrate his ability to follow. Or they had gleaned something from Richie's vision and were going somewhere else to see if they could get another, which would mean they went left.

Jason deduced that, if they had gone right, his opportunity was lost anyway, for they surely had so much of a head start that he would never be able to set Stacy's plan in motion. Thus his best option was to go left and hope.

A few minutes later, his chance of success went from slim to assured. He caught up with them just as they stopped in front of Heather and Melinda's house.

Jason did not waste any time. If they remained there for at least five minutes, Jason would have all the time he needed to get back to the Inn.

Diane began having second thoughts as the Sovert house loomed. She gazed up at it as if expecting it to exude an Aura of its own. She thought about suggesting they try this from across the street, but that was likely too far away, especially if she wanted to peek into Penny's thoughts.

It still felt like a violation, an intrusion on someone's privacy. It was one thing to look into the past, but quite another to look into someone's head.

Diane looked up at Heather and Melinda's bedroom window. She shuddered to think what Aunt Jo was doing to Melinda that moment. She wondered if the half-dose of the potion would do Melinda any good.

"Let's get this over with, huh?" Richie snapped.

Diane shot him a sharp look. She resented how he had browbeat her into providing the diversion which allowed him to save half his dose for Melinda. She knew she could never convincingly fake a cough, so she had to experience the real thing.

"What now?" Richie asked in an annoyed voice.

Diane could never sustain the anger. Everything always devolved into others knowing better than she did. "Never mind. You're right, we shouldn't stick around too long." She pulled out the pendant and clasped her hand to his.

Reality shifted. The sun hung low in the sky over a house several re-paintings removed, going from its present earth tone and slate gray to a more flashy blue with white trim. Opportunistic flowers pushed up around the edges of the property among patchy splotches of grass, sometimes poking up from the layer of snow still piled in a corner shaded by a row of aspens absent in the present.

Diane was startled by the sound of metal sliding back, followed by a loud thunk. Before she could turn around, a diminutive red-topped blur barreled past her.

"Snow!" cried a delighted voice as the toddler skip-jumped across the yard, nearly stumbling twice on the muddy ground. "Snowsnowsnowysnowsnow!" The little girl's straight, flaming red hair flew around her like a banner.

"Shit, her hair looks just like Heather's, 'cept that it's straight," Richie said.

The girl stopped beside the low snowbank and turned around. Diane's eyes widened as she beheld the girl's cherubic face. "Richie ... I think that is Heather!"

Richie gaped. "No way!"

The girl bounced up and down, her hair flying around her shoulders and in front of her eyes. "Mom! Mom! Mom! Look! Looklooklook!"

"Heather, come back here, please," said a more familiar voice behind them.

Diane and Richie turned around. Penny Sovert stood beside the open side door of the minivan. Diane gasped as she saw a tiny girl with red-brown hair tied with pink ribbons clinging to Penny's hand.

"But snow, Mom! It's April and there's still snowysnowsnow."

"Heather, please, get back here before you get yourself more muddied up than you already ..." Penny trailed off and sighed when Heather took a spill as she skip-jumped back, smearing mud and dead grass on her knees and elbows.

The girl at Penny's side sniffled, then giggled. "I wanna shee her fall down more!" she squeaked in a high, demanding voice.

Richie goggled. "What the ... Melinda?"

Heather ran up to her mother, bouncing with boundless child energy. "Can I play in it? Pleeeease?"

Diane heard a door close on the other side of the van. She almost did not recognize the younger David Sovert. He came around the front of the van and stood on the curb, a somewhat sober look on his face as his gaze flitted over the house.

Melinda sniffled again. "Mommy, I'm cold."

"You're always cold, snotty nose," Heather retorted.

"Don't call me that," Melinda said, sulking.

"Snotty nose! Snotty nose!" Heather sang.

"Shtop it! Shtop calling me shnotty nose, you shtupid-head."

Richie suddenly howled with laughter.

Diane stared at him, but her own lips were twitching into a smile, and her voice was quavering with amusement. "What's so funny?"

"Oh God, listen to the pipsqueak! She has a lisp! That is so freaking hysterical!"

Diane thought it was adorable. Heather may have had the hints of the beauty she was going to become, but Melinda was hands-down the cuter of the two at this age.

"That's enough, both of you," Penny said in a firm but soft voice. "Heather, be nice to your sister. You know the cold air makes her sniffly.

"Heather can't be any more than five," Diane said. "So Melinda is three. This has to be around, um, 1994."

"--barely enough snow left to do anything with," Penny said.

"I'll just throw snowballs at Melinda," Heather said with a mischievous grin.

"No shnowballs!" Melinda shrieked, tears flooding her eyes. "It'sh gonna hurt again!"

Penny drew Melinda to her side. "Shh, it's okay, she didn't mean it." She looked up. "Heather, if you really want to play, take your little sister, too."

"Okay, Mom!" Heather said in a bright voice.

"No shnowballs," Melinda murmured.

"No snowballs," Heather said. "Honest injun."

Melinda slowly parted from her mother and let Heather take her hand. Diane's heart lurched as she watched Heather carefully lead the tiny Melinda over the lawn. They've always been closer than they realized, Diane thought. She turned to Richie. Even he had stopped laughing and was looking on in wonder.

Penny sighed and folded her arms. A tiny smile ghosted her lips. "Might as well give up on keeping either of their clothes clean."

David stepped up to her, a sheepish look on his face. "I'm ... I'm not so sure about this, love."

"Oh, but I want them to interact with each other as much as possible, David," she said as she watched the girls crouch by the side of the snowbank. "I don't want sibling rivalry to come between them. Besides, I want Heather to make up for that slushball she--"

"I don't mean that," David said in a reluctant voice. "I mean ... I mean the move to Haven."

Diane edged closer as Penny turned to face her husband. "Dear, isn't it a little late for that considering we've already signed the mortgage papers?"

"I know, it sounds silly, but--"

"I think maybe you're just having cold feet. You did the same thing when you started your job in Denver in the first place."

David paused and nodded, his eyes clouded and flitting about, as if he were struggling for the right words. Diane raised her hand and almost placed it through him, just to see what it was he couldn't get himself to say.

Penny looked away to check on her children, and an intense and troubled look shadowed her face. Where Heather and Melinda were doing nothing alarming (and seemed to be getting along well, with Melinda giggling madly at something Heather had whispered to her), it had to be her own thoughts. Diane passed her hand through the woman's arm.

... where to start first? I wish Jo hadn't shut down our business. I try not to resent her for that, and I understand her reasons, but it seems so unfair. She almost forced me to come back right then. I have to know what's behind what I saw, what it means. Thank God it was no one close to my immediate family, and Jo still seems okay, other than her attitude. And what of ...

Diane blinked when Penny suddenly turned around and broke contact with her mind. David must have said something momentous that Diane had missed, for now Penny was looking at him in surprise. "What did he--?"

"David, you can't be serious," Penny said in a hushed voice.

David uttered a small, pleading sigh. "I don't mean permanently. Just ... just to make absolutely sure we want to do this."

"Dude said he thought they should go back to Denver tomorrow," Richie said.

Penny glanced over her shoulder at the girls before she took a step towards her husband. "We went over all this," she said in an earnest but soft voice.

"I know, dear, I know. But ... I don't know, I feel like maybe I didn't think this through."

"You did think it through, David. Very much so."

Diane flinched. Her skin tingled as if tiny static discharges were going off in the air around her.

David paused. "But I ... well ... yes, I suppose I did."

"The fuck?" Richie muttered.

"We talked about this," Penny said in a silky voice, her hand sliding up David's arm and shoulder. "You took a lot of time to think about this. You thought about it long and hard."

"You're feeling it too!" Diane cried in a shaky voice. "Tell me you're feeling it!"

"Yeah, but what does--?" Richie started.

David slowly nodded. "Yes, I remember." He chuckled. "Damned if I know why I had forgotten for a bit there."

"Oh my God," Diane breathed. "Oh. My. God."

"What? What?!" Richie demanded.

Penny smiled and relaxed. "It's a big transition, I know. And ... I know we'll be strapped for money for a bit with that pay cut they saddled you with for moving to the field office."

"Ah, well. They keep saying how the idea of people working from home will take off soon, though I really have my doubts about ..."

He trailed off, and the air was once more electrified. Diane paled. "I-In Charles mansion. I thought it was him. It wasn't. It--"

"It will happen eventually, David, and you'll want to do it," said Penny.

David nodded. "Yes, of course. Hey, it's starting to get dark. What say we get the kids inside and maybe see about finding a good pizza place around here for dinner?"

Penny smiled. She pulled the side door to the minivan closed and took her husband's hand. Did Diane see a bit of melancholy or regret in Penny's eyes? She couldn't be sure, she was too excited about her discovery.

They headed up the walk towards the house, beckoning the children to come to them, and all four vanished back into the past.

"I-it was Penny," Diane said in a shaky voice. "She ... her ... th-the influence she talked about having over her parents. What Jo thought about it. It all makes sense!"

"For Chrissakes, will you fucking let me in on the big secret already?"

"Don't you see?! It's nowhere near as strong but it's there! Penny has the same power that Victor has!"

As Jason turned down Main Street, he realized he still had one remaining problem: how to get inside the house.

Could he influence Diane enough through the closed door to let him in? Failing in that endeavor would alert everyone to his scheme. He hit upon an idea, but it meant again reducing his comfortable lead to slim timing.

He had never felt such a sense of adventure since the Harbingers were first founded. The reward waiting for him helped spur him on. His cock swelled at the thought.

Richie looked thoughtful for a moment, then frowned and said, "Well, fuck."

"That explains how she's able to keep her husband in the dark about everything," Diane said. "I mean, not only was he right there in the house when Penny tried to get me, he even walked right in on us when we didn't have all our clothes on. He didn't bat an eye, yet he never had an Aura. She must be using her own power and not Dark power to do it."

"Well, shit, if she had that sort of power back then, why wasn't she using it more?"

"Remember what Penny was saying to Jo? How she always got her way with her parents? I don't think she realized at the time she had it. I sensed from Jo that she was really pissed at her sister. She knew about Penny's power, and she resented it. I think she joined Victor just to get back at her sister."

Richie paused and nodded. "Okay, yeah, I get it. Shit, Heather's Mom musta gotten away with murder in her house."

"And got all the attention, all the popularity, all the boys, and on and on. A teenager's dream. Only it must've been a nightmare for Jo."

"Don't go fucking trying to pawn off any sympathy for her," Richie declared. He swept his arm towards the bedroom window. "When you know what she must be doing to Melinda right now."

"I'm not, Richie. I'm just trying to understand why things happened the way they did."

"Okay, fine. So now what?"

Diane glanced at the house and headed to her bike. She looked down the street and noted how long the shadows were. "First, we get out of here. I don't want to risk running into Mrs. Sovert when she gets home."

"Yeah, I'm with you on that," Richie said as he bolted to his own bike. "But what about the next vision? Where do we go for that?"

Diane sighed. "I don't know. I guess it would be too much to ask that what we have now is enough."

"Enough for what?"

"To talk Melinda out of her hatred for her mother."

Richie eyed the window. "What the fuck for? Her mother still did a number on her."

Diane sighed. "It just ... it's important to me. I can't explain why."

Richie shrugged and started pedaling, glancing behind him until Diane had caught up with him.

Face your greatest fear or confront your greatest flaw, Diane thought. With Melinda, that had to be her hatred of her mother. I don't know how she can get past it. Maybe everything I'm doing is worthless. Wouldn't be the first time I ...

Her thoughts trailed off. Was that her own flaw, her sense of inadequacy, her lingering feeling that perhaps she was indeed better off as the slave? How would it manifest in the mental battlefield?

She swallowed, as she already had the answer. Just seeing his harmless vision from the past was enough to frighten her. Her heart pounded each time Richie shared a vision with her over the fear that she would have to confront Victor again.

Jason breathed hard as he pedaled down Orchard Street, whizzing by the school and squinting at the sun as it dipped lower towards the mountains. His legs were starting to ache, but he hoped that would not last long once he was finally off the bike. He did not want any discomfort distracting him from enjoying his task.

Stacy had agreed to have her police officer friend wait exactly ten minutes before placing the call. As he pumped his legs in the long climb up to Ridge Road, he figured he had timed it just about right.

The only wrinkle in the plan would be if Richie or Diane thought to have Debby park herself along the street as she likely did every day to protect Diane in her walk from the bus stop to her house. Again, he realized he was assuming too much forward thinking from Richie and too much leadership from Cassie.

At the top of the hill, he waited for the traffic to clear and to catch his breath. This was the most exertion he had done in a long time. He raced across the street and down Ridge Road as soon as he was able. As he entered Diane's neighborhood, the street appeared empty.

He stopped his bike and looked for a good place to stash it while he put his part of the plan into action.

Janet Woodrow glanced at the clock on the microwave again as she fetched another condiment from the cabinet. She shook her head as she stepped towards the island in the center of the kitchen, where a bowl held a mixture of raw ground beef, tomato paste, and various spices. Next to it sat a circular, greased baking pan.

She tried not to worry about Diane, despite her daughter staying out later each afternoon this past week. She resisted saying anything about it. She had come to the realization that perhaps she had been too protective of Diane these past few months. She was even considering lifting the phone curfew.

Janet sprinkled a liberal amount of the condiment in the mixture and slapped the bottle back on the counter. She paused to resist another look at the clock before pulling on a pair of latex gloves and plunging her hands into the meat to mix it more thoroughly before setting it in the pan.

She could not get the school principal off her mind. Janet feared for Diane more than herself, especially if Diane continued her relationship with Heather. Janet did not want to say anything for fear of sounding like she wanted to break them up. It would also force her to admit that her daughter's lesbianism bothered her in any way, if only that it was something the principal could exploit if she set her sights on Diane.

Janet was about to transfer the meat to the pan and shape it into the evening meal when the phone rang.

"Of course," Janet muttered. She stripped off the gloves and tossed them in the trash before walking to the phone on the wall. She reached for the phone and paused, her heart skipping a beat as her eyes fell on the caller-ID window: Haven PD.

"Oh dear God," Janet muttered before snatching the receiver from the hook. "Yes? Hello?"

"Good afternoon, ma'am," said a crisp, businesslike female voice on the other end. "May I speak with Janet Woodrow, please?"

Janet's heart sank as she leaned against the wall. "Th-this is she. Who am I speaking with?"

"I'm Officer Sarah Tanner with the Haven Police Department. I'm calling about your daughter, Diane Woodrow."

Janet swallowed hard as she felt the bottom drop out of her world. "What happened?" she demanded in a shaky voice. "I-Is she okay?"

"Ma'am, I need you to come down to the police station."

"I will, but is she okay? What happened?!"

"All I can tell you over the phone, ma'am, is that she's involved in a rather sticky legal matter," said the officer with maddening calm. "And you need to come down immediately."

Janet grabbed a handful of her hair. "Can't you give me any clue what this is about? Is she hurt? That's all I really care about now!"

"I'm truly sorry, ma'am, but due to the sensitivity of the matter, I cannot speak any further about it over the phone. The sooner you get down to the station, the sooner your questions can be answered."

Janet had not had such a terrible sick feeling since the time Diane fell down the side of a hill while hiking and broke her calf when she was twelve. The call she had received had been just as ambiguous, leaving her to believe it could have been anything from just the broken bone it turned out to be to being hooked up to life support.

Yet this time her thoughts turned to far darker themes involving terms such as sexual assault which should never, ever come up when talking about one's children.

"A-all right, I'll leave now." She grabbed the pad and pen sitting on the edge of the island. "What's the address?" She dashed it off in barely legible writing, her hand shaking. "Okay, I'll be right over."

She slammed the receiver back on its hook. She grabbed the bowl and shoved it into the fridge, cursing when it knocked over a bottle of juice. She slammed the fridge shut and did not bother changing clothes. She raced out of the kitchen and up the stairs long enough to grab her purse and her car keys.

Janet thought about leaving a note for Ralph as she barreled into the garage but did not want to waste precious minutes. Ralph was able to stay almost superhumanly calm, and he would just wait for his wife's call. She was going to need that calm if this was anything other than some mundane infraction of the law.

She slammed her hand on the garage door opener and dove into the car. She had the engine going before the door was even halfway up and started backing out with only inches to spare. Her view tipped up as she backed down the steep driveway. She thumbed the remote for the garage door and confirmed it was going down before turning her head to watch her descent towards the street.

As she started to turn the car onto the street, she glanced towards the house and saw the garage door going back up.

"Dammit!" Janet muttered as she pressed the close button again, squeezing the remote hard enough for the plastic to creak in protest, her eyes glistening at the thought of having to waste more time going inside via the front door and lowering the door manually. As she watched the door come down again, she thought she saw a flicker of movement inside the garage, but she shook her head and disregarded it. The door closed, and she took off down the road with a squeal of tire.

Jason lifted himself from the floor and smiled at the closed garage door. The timing had been a little off. He had not quite become prone before Janet had turned her head. He had intended to use the slope of the driveway to his advantage and remain below her field of vision. She had unfortunately reached the bottom faster than expected. He gambled she would be in too much of a hurry and too worried about her daughter to want to check on it.

What mattered was he was now inside the house.

As he had hoped, Janet had left the door into the house unlocked in her haste. He stepped inside and strolled about to get a feel for his environs and choose a good place in which to wait for his prey.

By the time he had positioned himself, his cock was rock-hard. No amount of distraction would dismiss it. No matter. His desire would only fuel his mental strength, and his wayward erection would be satisfied soon enough.

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