Chapter One

Destiny ran for cover under the closest awning as the sky opened up and rain splashed down around her. In the few moments it took her to escape the downpour, her hair was ruined, and the shoulders of her light cotton sweater were damp through to her skin.

“It figures,” she muttered to herself, wiping a wet curl from her face and thinking how well the thunderous gray sky matched her mood. It was her first Christmas without family, and she was feeling as gloomy on the inside as the weather was outside.

She watched as other holiday shoppers ducked into the colorful shops and cafés all along the street in the hip North Hollywood theater district, everyone as unprepared for this sudden storm as she was. Even in December rain was rare in Los Angeles, especially when it had been balmy and clear only minutes earlier. Since her car was parked a good six blocks away and she had no intention of ruining a brand new pair of suede boots, she was stuck there in front of…what? She turned around to read a neon sign stating “Psychic Readings”.

“Seriously?” she muttered. “Why couldn’t I have been stranded in front of a Starbucks?”

She let out a small sigh as her cell phone rang.

“Janie, hi! I’m glad it’s you. Listen, you don’t happen to be free at the moment, do you? I know this sounds stupid, but I’m out in this pouring rain, and since your place is only a few blocks from here, I thought you might want to come get me and grab some coffee?”

“I’m sorry, love,” came her friend’s English accent, “but I’m down in San Diego for work. And what do you mean rain?”

“It’s crazy, isn’t it? The sky just opened up, and it’s pouring here. I’m in your neighborhood to do some shopping, and now I’m stuck in front of this psychic’s shop…”

“There’s nothing else nearby?” Janie asked.

“No, nothing I can get to without getting a good soaking. Looks like a law office on one side and an empty building on the other.”

“Why don’t you go inside and have a reading, then? It sounds like the universe put you there for a reason.”

“You know I don’t believe in all that stuff. No offense.”

“None taken—and I do know, Miss Logical, but it could be amusing—or you might actually learn something. I went to that Tarot reader on Venice Beach last summer, and the woman was right about me landing this job. You should do it.”

“Maybe. I’d feel kind of silly, but…I guess it’s better than standing outside in this weather.”

The rain came down harder and she began to shiver in her damp clothes. Looking once more at the warm glow coming through the glass door of the psychic shop, going inside suddenly didn’t seem like such a bad idea.

“Maybe just to escape the rain until it has a chance to clear up,” she said. “It doesn’t mean I’ve changed my mind about the universe having some intention, or people being able to see the future. You know that’s simply an archaic psychological construct created by ancient cultures to explain pain and suffering, right?”

“So you’ve mentioned. And you know being besties with a psychologist can be huge pain in the ass, right?”

Destiny grinned. “But you love me, anyway.”

“I do, but don’t go reading any Freudian crap into that, yeah? Now go waste a few bucks on something you don’t believe in and have some fun.”

“Okay, okay. But you owe me a cup of coffee.”

“I’m not sure how things worked out like that, but you’re on. Call me later and let me know how it goes, love.”

“I will.”

They hung up and Destiny leaned closer to the blue, glass-paned door to look inside. It was too dark to see anything, but as she pulled away she caught her reflection.

Her reflection?

She had to do a double take. The face in the glass was hers, yet not hers.

Nana?

A sharp pain lanced through her chest, the one that never seemed to quite go away these days, thinking of her beloved grandmother. But she was the spitting image of Nana, or how she must have looked at this age—the wild red curls, the pointed chin, the lips that had always seemed too full to her. Only her eyes were green, and Nana’s had been gray—and she could have sworn for a split second the image in the glass had shorter hair, the features a bit softer than her own, and those warm gray eyes... Why did she feel as if it were Nana telling her to go inside?

Don’t be silly.

But with her darling Nana so recently passed, she could allow herself a moment of sentimental foolishness, couldn’t she?

God, she missed her. Her grandmother had been her best friend, her confidante, her rock. And now she was gone. Since Destiny had never met her father, and her mother was off living a new life with her latest husband—number four—she was facing the holidays alone.

“Wish you were here, Nana,” she whispered, staring into the glass, trying to recall the shifting image she thought she’d seen there.

The sky thundered and the rain came down harder, pounding the sidewalk, splashing her boots, and it seemed a reminder that she was truly on her own now. With a sigh of resignation she pulled on the brass handle of the blue door and slipped through.

It was several moments before her eyes adjusted to the dim light. The scents of amber and sandalwood hung in the still air, and she found herself in a small foyer with a hardwood floor and a curtained doorway to her left.

“Hello?” There was no answer. She tried again. “Is anybody here?”

She had just decided this was a bad idea after all when she heard a crisp rustling to her left and the curtain was pulled aside. She didn’t know exactly what she’d expected, but the woman holding the curtain didn’t fit any idea she might have had of a fortune-teller. Maybe a dark-haired gypsy in flowing skirts and dangly gold jewelry? But instead a short, plump woman with rosy cheeks stood in the doorway, her silvery hair a soft cloud around her face. She wore loose linen pants with a silk tunic the color of new grass, and a simple crescent moon studded with amethysts swung from a long silver chain around her neck as she moved into the foyer. Gray eyes hid behind small wire-framed glasses. She looked like somebody’s grandmother.

Like Destiny’s grandmother had before she’d gotten sick.

No. Impossible.

Why was she thinking so much about Nana today? It had been a year already since she’d passed—a year this month. What was the date?

“Ah, you’re here,” the older woman said with a warm smile. “Welcome. I’m Madame Anna. And it’s December twenty-first, the winter solstice. Right this way.”

A year ago today!

“How did you…?” she started to ask, then bit the question back. She wasn’t entirely certain she wanted to know.

Madame Anna turned and disappeared through the curtain, and Destiny had no option but to follow her into a small room that looked exactly as a fortune-teller’s lair should. The walls were painted a dark shade of red that was barely discernable in the dim light cast by a Tiffany-style lamp and flickering candles. The woman led her to a round, red-draped table in the center of the room where a cone of incense burned on a small plate, a tendril of gray, scented smoke snaking its way into the air. She sat in one padded, velvet-covered chair and gestured Destiny into the other.

“What would you like, my dear? A palm reading? Tarot cards? Tea leaves?”

“You’re the psychic, you tell me,” Destiny quipped, then was immediately remorseful. Why was she being rude to this nice woman?

But Madame Anna simply nodded, the same sweet smile on her face. “You’re a sceptic, but that’s fine—I’ve faced much worse. I’ve been married twice.” She gave her an exaggerated wink. “Come on, give me your palm then, and we’ll see if we can make a believer out of you.”

“I don’t know about that. I’m pretty sure I’m not the believer type.”

“Ah, but everyone is, given the right circumstances, my dear. Come now—your hand.”

Destiny hesitated. She didn’t even know why. This was all simply for fun, wasn’t it? What was there to be afraid of? She was being uncharacteristically silly.

“Come now, I won’t bite.” The woman’s gray eyes twinkled, looking once more too much like her lost Nana.

The tiny hairs at the back of Destiny’s neck prickled as she laid her hand, palm up, on the table. Madame Anna held it in hers lightly, tracing soft fingers over the lines, her eyes closed.

Nana had had the same kind of hands, soft and gentle. Destiny remembered being sick with a fever as a little girl, and her grandmother’s sweet touch as she smoothed her hot forehead.

Her heart gave a twist.

Don’t think about it now.

But it was hard not to get into her own head, sitting there in the silence and the dim lights. Drawing in a long breath, she took a moment to glance around, noticing for the first time a large gray cat curled up on a footstool in one corner, half-hidden by a potted palm tree. The cat’s eyes gleamed golden in the reflected light of the candles, and she had the oddly uncomfortable feeling that the animal was watching her.

Madame Anna squeezed her hand, and a shiver raced up Destiny’s spine.

“Ah, yes, I see it.”

Destiny had to force herself not to pull her hand away. “What do you see?”

“You have come to me on a most portentous day.”

“Have I?” she asked, certain the woman said the same thing to all her customers.

“Do you know what today means? The Winter Solstice is when the dark relinquishes to the light. Change will come. In times past, people celebrated the rebirth of the Sun King after the dark of fall and winter months. It’s a time for new beginnings, a time for celebration, feasting and in ancient Rome, where this time was called Saturnalia, a time for debauchery—of the best kind, of course. One must keep oneself entertained and warm on these long, cold nights.”

Madame Anna gave her a wink, and Destiny’s cheeks went warm. She wasn’t uptight when it came to sex, but this woman looked too much like her grandmother to make this kind of conversation—insinuated or not—at all comfortable. And it was a stinging reminder that she’d been on her own and without male company for far too long.

The older woman stroked her fingertips across Destiny’s palm. “Let’s take a look at you. I can see you’re naturally analytical, organized—a place for everything and everything in its place. It serves you quite well in work, but perhaps not as well in your personal life.”

“Well…”

Destiny thought about the arguments she’d always seemed to get into with her last two boyfriends. They’d both told her she needed to loosen up. Maybe she did like everything in its place, but she couldn’t understand why anyone wanted to live surrounded by chaos. And anyway, it seemed the sort of thing you could say to almost anyone, a generic remark. As a psychologist, analysis was the definition of her job, but this woman had no way of knowing what she did for a living.

“I also see that you have a great love for designer shoes.”

Destiny gave a small snorting laugh. “You can tell that from looking at my hand?”

Madame Anna glanced up. “You’re boots are Prada. I spotted them when you came in.”

The twinkle in her eye made Destiny relax a bit and she smiled, her shoulders loosening.

“Look here.” Madame Anna brushed her finger over a spot on Destiny’s palm, and she could have sworn heat from the woman’s fingertip burrowed into her hand and spread up her arm. “This is your love line, and this is your fate line. They converge right here.”

“And that means…?”

“It means you are going to meet your soul mate.”

“There’s no such thing as soul mates.”

“Oh, soul mates do exist. But I’m not the first to tell you that, am I?”

The woman’s eyes met hers, and Destiny had a flash of her grandmother’s sweet, lined face, of her grandmother telling her very much the same thing only days before she died. She’d said she felt fine leaving this earth because she knew her granddaughter was going to be happy.

She had to blink back the tears burning behind her eyes. Of course, Nana had been lucky enough to have one of those marriages. Her husband had been the great love of her life. Her passing had been bittersweet, because ever since Destiny’s grandfather had passed five years earlier, all Nana had really wanted was to be reunited with her beloved. But Destiny had never for a moment thought she would find that kind of love. Her mother certainly hadn’t, with Destiny’s father running off before she was born, and the long line of subsequent marriages that never seemed to work out. No, there was no soul mate in her mother’s future, or her own. Her Nana had been lucky. Just luck, plain and simple.

“All this talk of soul mates…it’s nothing more than a fantasy, a fabricated ideal that’s impossible to live up to. I’m the kind of person who lives my life grounded in reality.” She shook her head. “I don’t know why I even came here. I’m sorry to have wasted your time.”

Madame Anna’s gaze locked on hers, her voice gentle. “She told you, didn’t she? If you can’t believe me, believe her.”

The woman’s words seemed to come to her from very far away, carried on a whiff of lilacs.

Nana.

Destiny yanked her hand back.

Fumbling for her wallet, she pulled out a few twenties and tossed them on the table. “I think I’m done here. Thank you all the same.”

Why did she feel so jangled? She had to get out of there. The smoke from the incense, or whatever it was, was making her eyes water.

The older woman stood, holding the crumpled bills out to her. “I can’t take your money—you haven’t had a full reading. There’s more to tell.”

“I don’t think I want to know any more. All of this soul-mate stuff…I don’t believe it. And even if I did, how does anyone know? A person can talk themselves into believing anyone they’re attracted to is their soul mate. It’s a combination of transference and a sort of delusional denial.”

Madame Anna took Destiny’s shaking hand and held it in her warm grasp, tucking the bills back into her palm. “Attraction and the merging of two destined souls are entirely different things. It always starts with attraction, doesn’t it? But this goes far beyond that. You’ll know. It will be unmistakable. And it will be soon.”

She shook her head again. “This is silly. I don’t mean to insult you, but it is.”

Then why was every hair on her body standing on end? And why couldn’t she get that last conversation with her Nana out of her mind?

She was facing her second Christmas without her grandmother, that was all. It was a classic case of separation anxiety—which must also explain why she could still smell the lilacs, her grandmother’s signature scent. Her mind was playing tricks on her. “I have to go.”

“Yes.” The woman’s smile widened, her eyes lighting up behind her glasses. “Yes, you do, Miss Walker.”

Destiny had already opened the blue door to the street before she realized she’d never told the woman her name.