An hour and a half later, Lizzy was waterlogged but soot-free, and the investigators’ SUV was gone. In the kitchen, she opened a bottle of chardonnay and poured herself a glass, then pulled an eggplant, a green pepper, and several zucchini from the fridge. Cooking had always been a refuge for her, a calming, almost meditative act, and if there was anything she could do with just now, it was a little calm.

From the window over the sink, she could see the sun beginning to slide behind the treetops. The days were already growing shorter, the afternoon light taking on that soft, buttery hue that meant autumn wasn’t far off. Soon the trees would turn, and the hills would go gold. Pumpkins would appear on doorsteps, along with cornstalks and bright yellow mums. She’d be back in New York by then.

A knock on the front door cut the thought short. She waited, expecting to hear the scuff of Evvie’s UGGs. When she didn’t, she wiped her hands, grabbed a sip of wine, and headed for the foyer.

She was surprised to find Andrew on the front steps. “You’re back.”

“Yes.”

“How was Boston?”

“Good. It was . . . good.”

“Does that mean you got the job?”

“Yeah. Yeah, it does.”

Lizzy cocked her head to one side, studying him. He was acting strange—distracted and anxious. “Do you want to come in?”

“I’m uh . . .” He paused, shoving a hand through his hair. “I’m not alone.”

“Sorry?”

“I picked up a hitchhiker,” he said quietly. “Someone you know.” He turned to glance at his truck, parked halfway up the drive. “It’s your mother, Lizzy. She’s in the truck.”

A pall of white noise settled over Lizzy, like the thick, cottony quiet that surrounded you when you first took off in a plane, when the earth fell away and you seemed disconnected from the world, suspended between reality and whatever came next.

Her mother. In the truck.

It wasn’t possible.

But a glance over Andrew’s shoulder confirmed that there was, in fact, someone sitting in the passenger seat of his truck. Lizzy froze when the door opened and Rhanna climbed out. She was wearing a crocheted halter top and jeans worn to strings at the hem. A beaded purse slapped rhythmically against her hip as she advanced up the drive.

Lizzy remained rooted to the spot, breath held as confusion and disbelief spun into a wave of white-hot fury. She waited until Rhanna reached the walkway, then stepped around Andrew, effectively blocking her path.

“What do you want?”

Rhanna met her gaze without flinching. “I want to come home.”

Lizzy stiffened. “Suddenly this is your home?”

Andrew cleared his throat, his discomfort plain. “Lizzy, she hitchhiked all the way from California. It’s taken her six weeks to get here.”

“I don’t care how long it took her to get here. I care why she’s here. Now. After eight years.”

“I came for Althea,” Rhanna said softly. “And for you.”

Lizzy folded her arms over her chest, eyeing Rhanna coolly. Her skin, once pale as milk, was nut-brown now, and leathery from too much sun, and there were threads of silver running through her dark hair. She’d also lost weight, enough to cause her clothes to hang limply on her slight frame. Was she sick? Was that what this was about?

“It’s a little late to start thinking of me, Rhanna. And as for Althea, she’s—”

“Dead,” Rhanna supplied quietly. “Yes, I know.”

Lizzy narrowed her gaze. She did know. That much was clear. What wasn’t clear was how she knew. “How could you know about Althea? No one’s heard from you in years.”

“I had a dream,” Rhanna said softly. “At least I think it was a dream. I woke up, and I could smell her perfume—the one you used to make for her. It was like she was in the room with me. And I just . . . knew.”

Lizzy felt the ground shift. Althea’s perfume. The same lavender and bergamot she’d been smelling since she returned to the farm. Rhanna had smelled it too. In California.

And now here they were, standing face-to-face, staring at each other across an eight-year void. Lizzy longed to look away. To walk away. To go back into the house and bolt the door. It was ironic. How many times had she grumbled that it should be Rhanna dealing with all this? And now she was here, all the way from sunny California, trying to nudge her way in.

Andrew cleared his throat, breaking the silence. “I’ll get her bags from the truck.”

“I never said she was staying.”

“She’s your mother, Lizzy.”

Lizzy stared at him, stung by the rebuke. Had he forgotten her swim in the town hall fountain? The episode at the coffee shop? She glanced back at Rhanna in her bell-bottoms and beads, in her fifties now. A wilted flower child. And family, if blood counted for anything. Was she really capable of turning her own mother away? Of treating her the way Salem Creek had treated so many Moons over the years—as a pariah? She was pretty sure the answer was yes. Rhanna had washed her hands of the Moons years ago. Now she could live with it.

“One night,” she conceded frostily, stepping back to let Rhanna enter. “One. And then you’re out.”

Rhanna seemed almost wary as she stepped into the front parlor, arms pinned tight to her chest, as if she didn’t trust herself to touch anything. “It’s the same,” she whispered, blinking back tears. “All of it—exactly the same.”

The uncharacteristic show of emotion took Lizzy by surprise. Soppy had never been Rhanna’s style. But then there were a lot of things about Rhanna that had changed. The way she smelled, for instance, like bonfires and tea leaves, rose petals and rain. The combination was as unfamiliar as it was unsettling—a blur of pagan and gypsy, layered with the loamy scent of wet earth—and sharply at odds with the woman she remembered.

“Andrew told me how it happened,” Rhanna said quietly. “How Althea got sick, I mean. I would have come back if I’d known. I would have been here.”

A nod was all the response Lizzy could muster. She’d said the same thing to Evvie the night she arrived, and wondered if Evvie had been as skeptical then as she was now. “What about you, Rhanna? Are you . . . well?”

“I’m well enough.”

“Are you lying?”

“Would you care if I was?” Rhanna smiled sadly when Lizzy didn’t answer immediately. “On second thought, don’t answer that. I’m fine. Things have just been a little tight lately. And it’s a long walk from Cali.”

Lizzy was about to respond with something snarky when she heard the mudroom door bang shut.

“I thought I heard voices . . .”

Evvie’s words dried up when she saw Rhanna. For a moment no one spoke. Lizzy watched as Evvie and Rhanna locked eyes, the air between them charged with unspoken questions. She could see by the look on Evvie’s face that no introduction was necessary. No one looking at Rhanna could mistake her for anyone but a Moon. Still, she had to say something.

“Evvie, this is Rhanna—my mother.”

Rhanna’s bags turned out to be an army-green knapsack and a badly scarred guitar case. Andrew hovered in the foyer, the knapsack clutched to his chest, the guitar slung over his shoulder. “Where should I put them?”

Lizzy flashed him a look of exasperation. She wasn’t anywhere near ready to think about sleeping arrangements. He of all people should know how this was likely to end. Which made it worse somehow that he’d been the one to drop her on the doorstep, like a stray puppy she was expected to keep whether she wanted it or not.

They were all looking at her now—Andrew, Evvie, Rhanna—waiting for her to say something that would ease the tension. They’d be waiting a long time. “Leave them right there,” she told Andrew grudgingly. “Near the door. I’ve got the supper to finish.” And with that, she turned and walked away, praying that no one followed her.

In the kitchen, she took a gulp of her now-tepid wine, then picked up her knife. She needed time to absorb this new development, and figure out what happened next. She had more than enough on her plate. She didn’t need a drama queen with a predilection for meltdowns added to the mix. And that’s precisely what she’d get if Rhanna was allowed to hang around any length of time.

While generations of Moon girls had grown up knowing the risks of making waves, Rhanna had honed the subtle art of not giving a damn, of poking a finger in the eye of convention, creating a scene, saying the unthinkable. Like the time she’d been suspended for reading tarot cards in the school talent show and predicting that her PE teacher would be discovered rolling a joint in the janitor’s supply closet. Or the time she’d painted a peace sign with a middle finger in the center, on the wall of the First Presbyterian rectory. Recklessness and rebellion. Those were Rhanna’s superpowers. And now she’d brought them back to Salem Creek.

One night, Lizzy reminded herself as she downed another sip of wine. That was all she’d promised. And what then? By the look of things, Rhanna didn’t have two nickels to rub together. She had no job, and certainly no friends in Salem Creek. Which left . . . what?