Page 136 of Sweet Dominion

“Let me give you a quick test to settle all of this.”

She looked up at him, her curiosity piqued despite her earlier discomfort. “A test?”

He nodded and raised that little notebook. “Yep.”

TT looked at me and then put her view back to him. “O-kay.”

“Let’s see.” He flipped his notebook open to a page filled with his tight, neat handwriting and placed it in front of her. “Take a look at this.”

TT glanced at the page and her eyes flicking over the words. She looked at it for barely two seconds before Dima quickly took it back.

Hey. That’s not fair. It wasn’t long enough.

He closed it. “Now, tell me, what did everything say?”

TT blinked, then without hesitation, she began to recite what she had seen. “You can call Monique, Moni, and you like that. Lei is in love with her and you think you are happy about it but you also have a question mark for what it could mean for him to be in love with her. Then, you put that Marcelo may use this all against Lei, but you are sure that Banks is only worried for hiscousin and not thinking about Syndicate politics. And it goes on to say that Moni is the key to solving Diamond Syndicate issues when dealing with the South and East and that she could be used to maintain the peace. You write the wordpowerfive times. Then you put in big letters: BUT HOW? And under that, you wonder if the carousel is safe for Barbara Whiskers to ride on.”

My breath caught in my throat.

I hadn’t expected those notes.

Lei shifted beside me, but Dima just smiled. “That looks like a photographic memory to me. Although the official name iseidetic memory.”

He tapped the notebook against his leg. “It’s when a person can recall an image, a page of text, or a scene in vivid detail after only seeing it once for a brief period. Like a mental photograph that can be recalled with high accuracy.”

Showing no emotion, she returned to pulling out the daggers.

Yet, Dima continued, “Only asmallpercentage of children possess this ability.”

TT frowned. “Maybe I just remember things sometimes, so it’s not that special.”

Dima shook his head. “It’s more than that, TT. What you did just now—most people couldn’t do that, no matter how hard they tried. It’s a rare gift.”

She placed another dagger on the ground.

“What you have isspecialand it’s something you shouldn’t be afraid of. You shouldn’t hide it.”

I could see the doubt in TT’s eyes, the uncertainty that had been planted there by years of trying to fit in, of trying not to stand out too much.

It broke my heart to see her struggle like this, to see her question something that was so clearly a part of who she was. And even more, I didn’t know if I should stop this conversationsince it was making her uncomfortable or if I should stay silent and let Dima talk to her.

Mom, how did you do this? And do it right?

Dima touched her chest. "You would be surprised, but people think I’m weird too.”

TT snickered as if she was absolutely sure people thought Dima was odd.

"When I was young, I was told I had aneidetic memorytoo. When I would show this off in class, not. . .understanding it was strange, kids would make fun of me.” Dima frowned. “But that was because they were little stupid imbeciles with pathetic brains—”

“Dima. . .” Rose muttered.

“The truth is the truth. I was better than those kids and they are adults now and I am even better—”

“Dima.” Rose frowned.

Dima shrugged. “TT, people will always find something to judge you for, no matter what you do. You have a superpower. The important thing is that you don’t let that stop you from being who you are. Don’t make yourself. . .smalljust because someone else can’t handle your light.”

TT stopped putting out the daggers and stared at him. “Have you killed people?”

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