Page 43 of Oracle Returns: Time will Stop

Beckett went there.

“What can we do? Is there something we can do to help?” he asked.

That was very Beckett-like.

The man was always worried about others, even when he’d been through Hell himself.

“We’re going to start researching a man by the name of Thomas Vanderbilt.”

Claire lifted a brow.

“As in the Vanderbilts who helped build this town?” she asked. “The ones who have a statue in the square of a Vanderbilt heir who supposedly singlehandedly helped build Salem?”

Julian nodded.

Claire laughed.

Maybe it was the exhaustion, or the fact that they’d been through the wringer tonight, but she couldn’t help it.

“Oh, well, that should be one giant clusterfuck that gets us kicked out of Salem, or dead by whatever this is that’s hunting them.”

Oh, she didn’t know the half of it.

But Julian would fill them in later.

“We’ll be okay.”

They all hoped so.

“I can’t believe Wynter took her life. Is this part of the other deaths?” she asked. “Because she was solid and not depressed.”

Tori nodded.

“We think it took her out to slow down Lucian. He can’t go back into the static without his tuner. Ridge was the key, and he’s locked out.”

Claire was sad for Lucian.

Being psychic was part of him, like it was for everyone else there.

“I can tune for him.”

While Lucian appreciated the offer, it didn’t work like that.

“Thank you, Claire, but it’s not that simple. Ridge and I had a connection in the static. We have a partnership. Here, he’s my best friend, but there, he was my mate. I can’t go back in with you because it wouldn’t be the same.”

She blinked.

“Oh. I didn’t realize.”

Bishop raised her hand.

“Yeah, I’m not psychic, so I can’t tune for him. You have to have some sort of ability if you could help Beckett tune.”

She didn’t think she did, but Beckett had told her that same thing more than once.

“I’m out of commission. We’ll have to do this the old-fashioned way. Investigating,” Lucian stated. “Until Ridge can manage to tune again for me, IF he ever can again.”

Yeah, and if his wife didn’t kill him because they still hadn’t told her about what happened in the meditation shed. He still had to tell Bishop he’d had sex with Ridge on this plane.