Chapter One

The room smelt of cigar smoke and old books. Even the sheets emanated a scent of dusty paper. April was lying in Russell's arms. Whenever she blinked, her eyelashes got caught in the wiry gray hairs on his chest. His haywire breathing and pounding heart resounded in her right ear.

She shot up.

"Again?" he asked.

Why was it that whatever she said Russ always thought she wanted more sex. "A memory just came back to me. I'd rather not think about it."

Russell reached around her and grabbed something from the bedside table. "Here, sweetheart, my Christmas gift for you. A very special gift."

She hesitated then extended her hand to the plain white envelope he was holding. He lifted his arm. "First promise to accept it, whatever it is. I know how proud you are."

Goodness, he wasn't giving her money, was he? When he lowered the envelope again, she ignored it. He opened the flap and took out two flight tickets. "California. Business class flight, first class hotel, excursions to—"

"Hold it. When is this trip?"

"In two weeks."

"You're crazy. I must study for my exams." As if he didn't know. He was her French lecturer.

Russ ran his fingers through his thinning hair dyed a shoe-polish black. "You said you'd love to go on a holiday with me."

She had said no such thing. He was always reading her wrong, twisting her intentions and bending them so they fit in with his plans. "You asked me if I'd like to go away with you for a few days and I said why not. Right now, it's impossible."

He tickled her earlobe in an irritating way. "It'll do you good. You can't sit and study all the time."

"I'm sorry to hurt your feelings, but you must cancel the booking."

"I left my family for you, I moved from my luxurious home to this shabby bedsit, and all you can think about is your exam."

April pressed her palms together. "I never asked you to leave your family. Rumor has it your wife threw you out because she was fed up with your affairs."

"Rumors. Jealousy. Melodramatic figments of the imagination. I left Julie because I wanted to be with you. I love you from the bottom of my heart. Would I spend two thousand pounds on a trip if I didn't mean it?"

The time had come to end this affair before it spun out of control. With a mix of sadness and relief, April said, "Russ, I don't love you and I'm not flying to California with you."

He pried her hands apart and shoved the tickets between them. "I'm sure you'll change your mind."

The next moment, the world came off its hinges. The walls shook and swayed. The air vibrated. The ceiling caved in. She frisbeed the tickets across the room and jumped out of the bed. The vision was over as suddenly as it had started.

"There's going to be an earthquake," she gasped.

"What are you talking about?"

April picked up his heavy robe that lay over a chair, slipped it on and hugged herself. "Russ, I'm psychic. I mean I have visions. I wouldn't mind if they were about something nice, like childbirth or weddings or lottery numbers. But they're always about death."

"So what?"

She wriggled the worn belt of the robe around her fingers. "I had a vision right now."

"But we were talking all the time."

"A couple of seconds, that's enough. And now I know if you and I fly to California we'll die in an earthquake."

Russ shook his head. "Oh, baby, are you so desperate to get out of this trip that you invent such silly excuses?"

"Please, you must believe me. My visions always come true. I've never managed to prevent them from happening. My Dad and my brother were killed in an accident seventeen years ago. I had an intense foreboding that the car would catch fire. My mother stayed at home with me, and when it happened, I could feel it. It was as if I was there, suffering the pain of their scorched flesh, inhaling black smoke. It wasn't just a coincidence."

"Don't lay it on too thick. The more you elaborate your story, the less believable it becomes."

"I'm not making it up. I've had visions all my life."

"Oh, fine." He swung his legs over the edge of the bed and pulled on his socks. "So let's assume we're meant to die in an earthquake. The logical conclusion is if we stay here, it will happen here. An earthquake in Cambridge! Geologists will be staggered."

"You don't understand the mechanics of my visions. When you forced the tickets into my hands I felt the earth shake. This means the earthquake is going to happen at our destination. People will die, but we don't have to be among them, just as my mother and I didn't die in the car crash because we stayed at home."

Russ struggled with his undershirt. "This is the worst attempt you've ever made to get rid of me. But I know that deep down you love me and you'll marry me as soon as my divorce is through."

She raised her voice. "Don't tell me how I'm going to feel, think or decide."

"A strange thing to say for someone who claims to be clairvoyant. According to you, fate has already made the stage directions. You're just acting your part. We're going to marry and we'll have four lovely kids and a puppy."

April emitted a sigh. "The puppy survived."

"Huh?"

"His name was Prince. He jumped out a smashed side window when the car caught fire." She crossed the threadbare carpet to the bathroom, closed the door behind her and slithered down with her back against the wood until she was squatting. Two years of peace, two years of growing confidence that the visions wouldn't return, and now this.

"Are you okay, sweetheart?"

April could feel Russell's knocks like little jolts against her spine. This wasn't a good moment to show him the full extent of her misery. Bad enough she had told him about the vision. But how else could she have prevented him from flying to California where he would meet his certain death?

April forced herself up again, leaving the robe like a mud-brown puddle on the floor, and put on her jeans and sweater with quivering hands. When she emerged, Russ had dressed as well. He sat on the bed with his feet outstretched on the faded chocolate-colored duvet, smoking the inevitable cigar. "This trip will do you the world of good."

She marshaled her reserves. "I know you can't take no for an answer. But it's the only answer you'll get." She gathered some of her possessions that had migrated to his apartment.

He blew smoke towards the ceiling. "You're not the only willing girl on the campus. I bet most of them have never been to the States."

She crumpled a lace handkerchief into her purse. "You still want to go to California? I thought I'd made it clear this is a death sentence."

"All you've made clear is that you're overworked and hysterical."

In a sudden surge of energy, April bolted across the room, grabbed his shirtfront and snapped, "I'm not hysterical. I'm psychic. If you don't believe me, you're welcome to drive me home and meet my mother. She can tell you about the violent deaths I saw happen before they happened, felt as they came true, and later dreamt about in countless nightmares. She can tell you about the quacks who tried to cure me, the sects, the exorcism rituals." She let go of him, stomped towards the corner where the tickets had landed, picked them up and tore them up until the snippets couldn't become any smaller.

"I can always get duplicates at the travel agency," Russell said with a smirk. "I'm beginning to doubt I'd have enjoyed a holiday with you." He flung her purse in her direction. "Over and out, sweetheart. How's that for taking no for an answer?"

The purse landed by April's feet, and its contents emptied on the carpet. Russ frowned, bent over the edge of the bed and snatched up a small dark-brown bottle that rolled his way. He squinted at the label. "Librium. Do you take that regularly?"

She sank down on her heels and stuffed everything back into her purse. "I had a nervous breakdown after my last vision. I was given an injection of the stuff and it calmed me very quickly. The doctor said if I took it orally on a regular basis, it might stop my visions. Well, he didn't say visions…he said psychotic episodes. For two years, I thought it worked. Obviously it didn't. It was just a lucky coincidence that no violent deaths happened around me for a while."

Copyright © 2004 Christine Spindler