Page 59 of Find Me in California

Their eyes meet.

“Stay with me.”

“I have nowhere to spend the night,” she says at the same time.

They share a smile.

She kisses him lightly on the mouth and wades to the steps, climbs out. Matt follows. They gather their clothes, and he grabs her hand. Naked and giggling, they stealthily jog up the stairs. She walks backward into the room when he lets her in, dropping her clothes by the door, and crooks her finger, backing up toward the bed.

Matt likes what she’s thinking. He kicks the door shut behind him.

CHAPTER 27

JULIA

Julia presses her phone to her chest and shuts her eyes, mortified. She asked Matt, a man she hardly knows, if he’s ever been in love. And that’s not the worst of it. She wouldn’t shut up about his mom. She kept pushing him on what he’s doing about his grandmother.

Meddlesome, that’s what Mama Rose would call her. It’s what got Matt’s attention when she had Liza’s personal belongings shipped to him. She hasn’t stopped butting into their business since. But she couldn’t help herself. After he remarked yesterday that his parents are deceased, she hazarded a guess that Matt’s reluctance to assist Liza stems from more than whatever’s going on between them. That the death of his mom, Liza’s daughter, could be one of the reasons for the estrangement. Julia knows a thing or two about grief and keeping people at a safe distance to minimize the risk of getting hurt again. Goodness, she’s doing it with her own mother.

She glances at the clock and cringes at the time. She and Matt spent over two hours on the phone. Most of their conversation was her reading Mama Rose’s diary to him, but they did chat about themselves some. Matt has issues with his mom, and he’s tight-lipped about them, which only makes her more curious about who she is and whathappened to her. Aubrey’s her name, if Julia recalls correctly from Liza’s brief mention of her daughter while Julia boxed her things.

Admittedly, it was bold of her to pry into Matt’s history. But she can’t help who she is. She does feel an affinity toward both Matt and his grandmother. She and Matt lost their mothers, and Liza faces what Julia fears for herself: dying alone.

Has Matt really changed his mind about coming here, or was that just the alcohol talking?

Worried she’s partly to blame by interfering in his personal life, she sets her alarm to call him first thing in the morning. She’s starting to care for this man who’s becoming less of a stranger and more of a confidant with every phone call. Hopefully she can catch him before he leaves for home and convince him otherwise.

She leans over to set her phone on the bedside table, and the diary slides onto the floor. It lands open on an entry dated eight years ago, exactly a month after Mama Rose was diagnosed.

“That can’t be right.” The journal entries only go until midyear 1973. How did she miss this one?

Julia picks up the book and skims the passage. “What?” she murmurs and reads it again more slowly. Then again, and again.

The last entry in the Magnolia Blu diary isn’t an entry at all but a letter to Liza. It explains why Mama Rose insisted Julia promise not to move her away from Rosemont. Mama Rose was waiting for Liza to find her there. She hoped this journal would find its way into Liza’s hands.

But that discovery isn’t nearly as alarming as what else the letter reveals to Julia.

Monday

CHAPTER 28

MATT

Matt lies naked on his side. Sunlight bounces off the faceted crystal he studies. He doesn’t recall Magnolia wearing the necklace last night, but she had it on this morning.

The piece is unique. Bound by gold wire to the chain, it rests between her breasts. “Where’d you get this? It looks custom made.”

“It is.” She exhales the spicy-scented smoke from the joint they’re sharing and tucks her chin to look at the charm. “My friend June made it. She said it’s a time-link crystal.”

“A what?”

With the joint pinched between her pointer and middle fingers, she lifts the crystal to the light and studies it. “She said it’s supposed to help me get in touch with earlier parts of my life so I can rebalance them or something like that.”

“A type of healing crystal?” He’s heard of those before.

“I guess.” She shrugs. “It’s also supposed to help me access my future. Sounds far out, doesn’t it?” she says with a laugh when he makes a face.

“Not sure I believe that.”

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