Unlike Nick, Allie never forgot her last name. It was Johnson. With such a common last name, however, locating her parents in Memphis was not an easy matter. Her parents names were Adam and Andrea, so naturally they chose A names for their daughters. There were ten Adams, two Andreas, and more than a hundred A. Johnsons in the Memphis phone book. She had already determined that both their cell phone numbers had been disconnected, so Allie would have to skinjack someone, and start making cold calls. It had to be done by skinjacking—she already knew that. She didn’t know whether or not the “gravity” of home would apply here, but she didn’t want to take the chance. Showing up at her family’s new house and witnessing their lives moving forward without her might turn the ground to quicksand just as standing on her old doorstep had. Besides, she had another compelling reason to skinjack. The Everlost wind. It was uncanny, and maddening—a gale force that only Afterlights could feel blasting off the Mississippi River.
