Read Online Touching the Past by Ilene Kaye - Free Book Online Page A

explain.” When his mouth remained closed, she dropped her hand. “It’s hard to explain what I…do. I’ve never really talked about it to anyone before.”
    “Your parents?” Zac was watching her with that intent gaze again. As if his every particle of his attention was fixed on her. It was unnerving, but exhilarating, too.
    She met his look. “They knew what I could do. They saw it, of course. When I was small, they thought I was making up stories. Imagining things. But then I told them things that were too close to the truth. Things I couldn’t possibly have known. So they knew something was going on. But we didn’t talk about it. Like I said, my mom took me to a psychic fair once. She didn’t tell me why, but I figured it out later.”
    “And Bill?”
    “He—” Mallory looked away, laughed slightly as she realized they were still standing in the kitchen. “Let’s go sit down.”
    In the living room Mallory paused, unsure of where to sit. If she took the couch, Zac could sit beside her. She could lean into his strength mentally, if not physically.
    She took the chair. It would be better to have a little distance as she explained.
    Zac dropped into the corner of the couch. His face was expressionless. Did he think she was rejecting him? Before she could worry about it, he said, “You were saying about Bill?”
    Mallory curled her legs under her. “Dad loved antiques when I was little. Maybe because he’d never had a settled home.” She answered Zac’s inquiring look. “His family was career military. When he was transferred to a new base, he’d hit the antique stores as soon as he could.” She smiled, remembering her father when he was younger. “And he’d bring something home. A chair, end table, painting, knick-knack. Whatever caught his eye.” The smile faded. “He stopped doing that once he figured out I was…picking up…emotions…from them.” She shook her head. “Everything that came into the house after that was factory new.” She looked down at her hands in her lap. She’d clenched them without realizing it. Her nails were digging into her palms. She opened them. “When I got older and knew why he’d done it, I felt... He’d given up something he loved for me.”
    “He didn’t mind.”
    The sound of Zac’s low-voiced words startled her. She’d forgotten he was there for a moment. She looked up at him, lifting an eyebrow. “You think so?”
    He gave a sharp nod. “I know so. I watched him with you. You were the light of his life. He’d have done anything for you and never cared about the cost.”
    She laughed nervously, but Zac’s words soothed her. She hadn’t known she’d felt so guilty about her father’s loss of his precious antiques until this moment. It was something she’d have to think about later and deal with.
    “You still haven’t told me what happens when you touch something.”
    Zac’s words pulled her back to the present. “Oh.” Mallory looked at her fingers. “It’s…it’s not always the same. Sometimes it’s just a general feeling. An impression. Almost like a sense of déjà vu .” She looked at Zac. “That generally happens with things or places that have some casual connection to a person.”
    “Like the things you touched the other day in my office.”
    She nodded. “Right. But when something’s belonged to someone for a long time or it means a great deal to them, it gives off a clear…” She shook her head. “Picture isn’t the right word for it. Neither is feeling. It’s something that falls in between.”
    “You feel it though.” Zac’s eyes were narrowed. “What the person felt. You felt…Evie Martin die.”
    “I felt what she was feeling before she…before.” Mallory kept her gaze focused on Zac. “And I experienced what Theresa Martin felt as she…” She closed her eyes, remembering against her will that sick exultation the older woman had felt. “The closer I am in time to the event when it happens, the