"THIS WAS A BAD MOVE, a major mistake. I can't believe I'm doing this." Sarah Tucker's head pounded. She turned the steering wheel, rounding a curve. Most women who were nearing thirty were leaving home, but not her. No, she was returning to her hometown after nearly twelve years away, and she didn't want to think about the reasons why.

Pulling up at the stop sign just before one of the last few turns leading to the town of Gold Tree, Wisconsin, Sarah popped the clutch and wrestled the aging beige rustmobile through the gears, negotiating the snaking road. In the winter the road would be slippery with snow that threatened to send a car skidding into the trees, but in the July heat the tires clung to the asphalt and held tight into the turns.

Ever since she'd made the decision to come home a headache had been threatening, and now the pain blossomed. The steering wheel thrummed beneath her fingers. The licorice road with its yellow center stripes was like a rope pulling her back into the past.

Her younger years had been ordinary, even happy... right up until that day when she had been ten and had had her first vision. After that her world had changed, and nothing had ever been ordinary or right again, especially where her father was concerned. He had tried to use her gift to make money. He'd become a verbal abuser, and he had continued his using and abusing until she'd finally bolted just after her eighteenth birthday.

She hadn't been back since. When she'd lost the baby she'd been carrying by a boy who had promised her everything and then left her with nothing, she had swallowed the grief that threatened to consume her and continued to run, knowing that her father and the boy weren't unique. There were others who would use her or any offspring she might have. A normal life wasn't in the stars for someone like her.

She passed the road leading to Lake Apple. She was getting close now. The pain in her head seemed to increase. "Nonsense," she told herself. "It's just nerves."

Probably because her communication with home these past twelve years had been sporadic and stilted. There were days early on when she would have liked to have had the chance to see her mother and little sister, but her father had made it clear that he would not provide the funds for anyone to visit her and if she came home, she did so on his terms. That meant using her special talents to find missing objects or people who sometimes turned out to be dead. All for money. It meant living with nightmares, so she'd kept her distance until the distance no longer seemed to matter and her past seemed like something she'd once watched in a movie. A movie she didn't want to sit through twice.

And yet, here she was, headed toward Gold Tree. "Not quite the conquering heroine marching into town wearing jewels and a tiara, either," she said, rubbing one aching temple. "I can see the headlines of the Gold Tree Weekly now. Sarah Tucker Returns Home Almost Broke, Completely Homeless, Jobless and in the Company of a Questionable Companion," she said, turning toward the passenger seat, wrinkling her nose. "What do you think?"

Her companion wagged his tail.

Sarah smiled wearily. "Yeah, pretty unlikely. I'm yesterday's news now. I doubt anyone here cares about my former quirks. And yes, I'm sorry for the insulting comment, Smooch. You're the best companion a woman could have."

She looked at the big dog strapped in to the low, torn bucket seat. Smooch, a gold-and-brown mutt of indeterminate ancestry, was a mass of wayward, fuzzy fur. His right ear looked as if it had been chewed on many times by other dog bullies, and it probably had. He had the words "street tough" written all over his wiry, scarred body, and he had undoubtedly lived a violent and abused life before Sarah had pulled him from the animal shelter, brought him home and finally coaxed him to tolerate her company. Still, despite his checkered past and the fact that he had every reason to distrust humans, his big brown eyes held no accusation and plenty of unabashed loyalty and devotion, his body wriggling just at the sound of her voice. He was the only male she had ever known who had not passed judgment on her or tried to use her. And he didn't care about her particular talents or even if she had any talents at all. For that alone she loved him.

"Stick with me, pal, and sooner or later I'll find us a good home," she promised, throwing out a hand. "For now, we've got to stop here for a few weeks."

And she wasn't just stopping because her boss in California had closed his antique shop to retire, leaving her out of work, or because her landlord had raised the rent and instituted a no-pets policy, even though those were both good reasons for coming home.

If that had been the case, she would have been here six months ago for her father's funeral. She hadn't been able to bring herself to do it, not even when she found out that he had left her the shop, Tucker's Lost & Found Emporium, where her father, R. J. Tucker, had tried to harness her powers and turn her into a golden goose, punishing her whenever she refused. It was the last place she ever wanted to go. He had probably known that and left it to her as a final punishment.

Instead, she had ignored the bequest. She hadn't even wanted to think about that place, but then the taxes had come due, and with almost no money in her pockets, it was obvious she would have to do something about it.

She'd tried to think positively. Her life these past few years hunting down antiques for hungry dealers had been mostly good. The fact that she'd met with a few setbacks lately was just life. She'd reasoned that she could sell the shop, handling the transaction from afar.

Then yesterday her mother had called. Madeline Tucker never called. She had to be the world's most retiring woman and had never made any demands of Sarah in her life.

"I think your sister, Cass, is in trouble. I think she might be...becoming like you. I wish...I wish you would please come home," was all her mother had said.

It was the first time in all these years that her mother had said the words "come home" or implied that Sarah might be needed. Her request, her worries about Cass hung in the air, and this time Sarah couldn't stay away. Despite the fact that she didn't even know her younger sister. Cass had only been six when Sarah had left home.

Becoming like you. Sarah knew what her mother meant. If what she said was true, then Sarah had to help Cass, because no one else could truly understand. Cass must be frightened. Sarah knew every bad thing that went along with her gift. She knew the fear of seeing things not meant to be seen...and the horrified looks of the townspeople when they learned about her gift. Maybe she could protect Cass in some way or at least teach her how to handle a situation the way she wished there had been someone to help her.

Sarah rounded the last curve, the big pine trees bending low over the car. She breathed in the heady scent of woods, of green, of earth, of long-lost little-girl memories. The good ones, the only ones she planned to allow herself.

"We're home, Smooch," she said. "I might not want to be here, but it can't be helped, so we'll do the best we can. We'll settle here for a few weeks, see if we can help Cass if that's possible. We'll use this as our base until we regroup and find a new place to stay."

In the meantime, she was going to do her best to make lemonade out of the lemons she had been given and come to terms with her past, maybe even rid herself of the nightmares at last. She would take that shop her father had left her and rip it apart, shred it, sell it.

And this time when she left, it would be because she had chosen to leave town, not because she had no choice.

This time things would be different. When she had lived here before she had been known as an oddity, but that had probably been because of the way her father presented her. He had wanted people to be in awe, to be a bit frightened. This time things were bound to be different, better.

Sarah stopped and got out of the car a half mile outside of town. She looked up, up, way up into the crests of the tall pines that swayed with the wind and brushed at the town with their branches.

"I'm back," she declared to no one in particular. Yes, the witch of Gold Tree was back, but with one major difference. She had submerged the clairsentient powers that had cursed her all her life. In doing so, she had finally, finally lost them.

She could touch something nowadays and not feel a thing out of the ordinary other than a slight pain behind her eyes, no worse than a mild sinus headache.

She was glad. At last she was free. And no man would ever chain her up, tie her down or try to use her again. No man would ever have a hold on her or any say over her life.

In fact, if she played her cards right, men would only play a marginal role in her life.

OFFICER LUKE PACKARD surveyed the scene before

him and immediately swung into action, grabbing for his radio.

"Ben, get an ambulance over to the Tucker place pronto," he said, dropping to his knees beside Madeline Tucker. She was lying at a crooked angle at the bottom of the stairs. Her ankle was swelling, she had a lump on her head and she was blinking as if she didn't know who he was. He didn't like any of this. "Luke?" she asked, her voice weak.

He managed a small smile. "Well, welcome back to the world of the living, neighbor," he said. "When I heard that you were hurt, I was pretty worried." He decided not to mention the fact that Madeline's eighteen-year-old daughter, Cass, had delivered the news that her mother had fallen and then Cass had immediately disappeared. As a concerned friend, he definitely needed to know what that was about, but now was not the time to ask.

Madeline tried to sit up. "Mad, no," he told her. "You were unconscious when I came in, and there's definitely something wrong with your ankle. No sitting up until the doctor says it's all right, and that's not going to happen until the ambulance arrives."

A look of distress came over Madeline's face. Normally she didn't look her age, which was probably fifty-something, but right now her pallor and the worry lines on her forehead made her look much older.

"Where's Cass? Where's Danny?" she asked, referring to her daughter and Luke's son, whom she'd been babysitting. Her voice broke.

"Not here, but Cass is the one who called me to the scene. She dropped Danny off at the police station, and Jemma is adding looking after him to her clerking duties. He's fine." He didn't tell her that Cass was fine, because he didn't know. Again he wondered what had happened here and why Cass hadn't come home.

Madeline gave a tight nod of her head. Her hands clenched. She looked as if she might cry. He almost closed his eyes. He'd seen so many women in pain. His mother, every time his abusive father had beaten her, his wife when she'd realized he didn't love her. He didn't want to ever see another woman hurting, but of course he would. He was a cop. He didn't get to turn away. In fact, part of the reason he'd gone into law enforcement was to be able to protect women who were in danger, to try to prevent some of the tragedies he had seen.

"Want to tell me what happened here?" he asked quietly.

He saw a slight flicker in her eyes and knew what that meant. He'd seen it too many times. She was going to either lie or give him an edited version of the facts.

"Nothing. Cass and I argued a little and I wasn't paying attention and slipped on the stairs. But I can't go to the hospital, Luke. Sarah is coming. I have to be here."