Chapter 1
Chapter One
SOME PEOPLE JUMP into the deep end of the pool feet first, some head first, but I’ve always been a traditional belly-flopper.
Splashy, messy, and usually painful. Which still didn’t explain why I was sitting on the floor of a closed diner, nursing my bruised butt, not to mention my pride, and staring woefully at a naked unconscious man in the middle of Peculiar, Missouri.
My parents are crazy from way back. Maybe that’s where I get it from.
Seriously, who names a child Ambrosia Sunshine?
Two hippies, that’s who. They told me when I was old enough to resent the flower child name that they’d thought it was cool at the time, but I personally believe it was the result of one too many ’shrooms. As it is, I’ve been forced to sit through many painful renditions of “You Are My Sunshine.” If I had a dead body for every time I was teased, well, let’s just say I’d get an express pass to the electric chair.
Although, if I got a sympathetic judge, he’d probably consider my lifetime served.
Maybe my parents’ experimentation with drugs is what had made me psychic. (No, I didn’t say psychotic. I said psychic.) On the other hand, it could also explain why I’m so bad at it.
My ability allows me glimpses, more like screenshots, of the past, present, and future.
But, clearly, the visions have not been helpful over the years.
And the side effects, sheesh. Most of the time I feel a little dizzy when they hit, but every once in a while, it’s as if someone has taken a sledgehammer to the inside of my skull.
Usually, I can feel one coming on; otherwise driving might be an issue.
If only they made medic-alert bracelets for my type of ailment. It certainly hasn’t been a gift.
That’s why my friendship with Chavvah Trimmel is so important.
We’d met at the community college in San Diego.
She thought my name was weird and awesome all rolled up into a spring roll.
After finding out her family’s propensity for strange biblical names, I thought it was a bit of the pot calling the kettle rusty.
Chavvah, or Chav, as she likes to be called, was my first best friend.
And when she’s around me, my psychic mojo kicks up twenty notches.
It’s as if I can tap into some kind of mystic hotline whenever she’s near.
As a matter of fact, the last time I’d gotten a clear vision had been in my dining room back in California.
Chav, who’d been renting my spare bedroom at the time, had just turned down the heat on the spaghetti sauce, and I was setting the table.
We were having an “I finally dumped the cheating bastard” celebratory dinner.
Did I mention I’m a bad psychic? So I hadn’t a clue what I was walking in on when I caught my boyfriend of three years having sex with the skank waitress from the coffee shop.
On my couch, no less. Jerk. I took his spare key and kicked his ass (and the couch) to the curb.
At dinner that night, when the vision hit me, I’d hit the ground, along with some clattering dishes.
I saw a present moment of Chav’s parents huddled together, debating whether to call her about her missing brother.
Talk about being the bearer of bad news.
I didn’t blame her for not believing me at first, or the stunned look she gave me when she called her parents, and it turned out to be true.
Her brother Judah had dropped off the map.
Chav flew back to Missouri the next day.
After a year of searching for him, the local police had pretty much given up on Judah, but by that time, Chav had forgotten about the ocean and fallen in love with the little town of Peculiar.
Hell, from her letters and phone calls, I’d kind of fallen in love with the place as well.
She’d found a restaurant in the rural town, a real fixer-upper, for the two of us to run. A fifty-fifty partner split.
I wasn’t supposed to leave California for another two weeks, and Chav had said she needed to talk to me “in person” before I made the trip, but the text I’d gotten from her had sent me packing in a hurry.
All it said was: Sunny. I need u.
After that, every call I’d made to Chav went straight to voice mail.
Without any real plan, I jumped into my gas-guzzling Toyota 4X4, which I had purchased explicitly for the move.
One thousand six hundred and sixty-two point four miles later, as I drove over a swinging bridge (the only way in and out, I soon discovered) into the quaint little town, my whole body heaved a sigh of relief.
I felt strangely wonderful. It was as if someone unzipped my off-the-rack skin and fitted me with a tailored Sunny suit.
The town looked very similar to Mayberry from The Andy Griffith Show.
Dirt streets, old fashioned shops and houses, white picket fences, and lots of Chevy and Ford pickup trucks.
I was a little nervous when my GPS said, “You have arrived,” right outside a two-story yellow building on the corner of Third Street and Main.
My heart pounded as I stood outside our restaurant for the first time.
I’d always expected some kind of fanfare.
Chav waiting to usher me into our future.
She’d even named the restaurant for me. Sunny’s Outlook.
I’d blame allergies for my eyes watering at that moment, but I knew it was a mixture of happiness and sadness all rolled into one big bundle.
This was our place. Mine and Chav’s. And she’d done it up spectacularly.
I smiled at the brightly colored lettering. All the letters except the big O in Outlook were blue. The O was not an O at all, but a bright orange sun. If it was possible to feel both warm and cold at the same time, I accomplished it.
Where was Chav? I knew in my bones something was wrong. The year we'd spent apart had dulled my psychic ability toward her, so once again I had become inept with crazy flashes that didn’t amount to much of anything.
I jiggled the door handle. It wasn’t locked, so being the smart, city-savvy girl I am, I decided to let myself in. After all, I owned half the joint, so I wasn’t trespassing.
Darkness enclosed the front room except a few areas illuminated by sunlight filtering into the two small windows near the ceiling.
They were surrounded by open wooden shutters.
Where were the large storefront windows?
This place was more dive bar than restaurant.
Strange decor choice but my concern for Chav kept me from imagining a complete makeover.
I couldn’t find a light switch around the door.
I should have just gone back out to the truck for a flashlight, but I thought I saw a panel on the wall across the room, and frankly, it was sheer laziness that moved me forward.
I managed to maneuver around the counter, open the panel, and flicked several of the switches at once.
The lights came on and when I stepped back to admire my new home lit up—it didn’t look half bad; hardwood floors, cute little tables with black-and-white gingham cloth, and a couple of booths with the same checkered design on the benches.
And that’s when it happened. My heel caught on something large, and I fell ass-backward to the ground. It didn’t take more than a nanosecond to see that I’d tripped over a naked man passed out cold on the floor.
After a startled yelp, heart palpitations, and worry that he’d wake up at any moment and kill me, I reached over and touched him. Just his arm, mind you. He didn’t move, but his skin felt warm, and his chest raised and lowered, so I didn’t bother to check for a pulse.
Instead, I found myself staring…for several minutes.
(Come on. He was naked and lying on his back.
Who wouldn’t stare?) Dark-brown hair populated his broad chest and led to a happy trail that, well, if the circumstances had been different would have made me very happy indeed.
He had thickly muscled thighs and arms, and his face, except for the scruffy five o’clock shadow, looked as if it had been chiseled by Michelangelo.
Imagine a better-looking Wolverine (Hugh Jackman’s version), but much younger and with a burly lumberjack vibe, and coarse, medium-length walnut-brown hair.
I chewed my lower lip as I took my time pondering the situation—in other words, I wasn’t ready to stop staring at the naked man.
His hair was near the same hue of brown as my own, when it wasn’t dyed blonde, which was never.
And mine was shorter with a better haircut.
I sighed with regret. I already missed my stylist in California.
Taking a deep breath, I counted backward from ten to pull myself out of the hormonal frenzy going on in my head.
The man was hotter than a habanero, but I wasn’t looking for a date.
I smelled a pungent sweet scent I hadn’t noticed before, but frankly I was surprised any of my senses still worked.
It was whiskey. Some kind of blended version, if I had to guess.
Great. Just perfect. Burly Hugh looked more and more like a drunk who had crawled into the diner to sleep off a bender.
I found an empty spray bottle by the sink and filled it with water.
Positioning myself on the opposite side of the checkout counter (just in case I needed to make a run for it), I leaned over the top and proceeded to spritz the unconscious man.
The mist must have been too fine, because other than the rise and fall of his chest, he still didn’t move.