Timestorm: A Tempest Novel (The Tempest Trilogy)

by Julie Cross

  Courtney’s eyes widened. “Norway!”

  “Saltstraumen is the most powerful,” Marshall said. “Also off the coast of Norway.”

  This was all getting too insane for me to grasp. I needed it broken down into simple terms so that I could begin mentally preparing myself. “So, we’re going to head on over to Norway, paddle off the coast in our North Face jackets, follow the signs that lead to the giant swirling whirlpool, and then do a time jump? To where?”

  Marshall didn’t even attempt to put it gently and at this point, I appreciated the straightforward approach. “We won’t be time-jumping from the boat, we’ll be actually jumping off the boat. If I’m understanding everything that Eileen and Mr. Silverman have laid out for us correctly, we’ll need to jump from the most powerful access point and that will be as close to the bottom of the ocean as we can get. As far as where we’ll be aiming for, it needs to be the largest, longest jump possible. Since I’ve seen the point the world ends, I will pull us toward that year and date. Just before we leave the boat, I’ll describe this location to you in enough detail that you’ll be able to use your own mind to search for it.”

  “Great.” I pressed my forehead against my hands and tried to breathe normally. “When exactly have you had time to go and visit the end of the world? With leading a division and signing up my friends and loved ones for the CIA…”

  “Eileen provided me with the dates based on her theories and I performed the action to provide that data for her research. Trust me when I say this,” Marshall added. “Your brain will not survive the jump this far into the future. You won’t bleed to death and become covered with bruises and experience the incapacitating pain you experienced when jumping to 3200. The lack of oxygen from being underwater prior to jumping combined with the distance of the jump will be enough. We’ll all be dead upon arrival.”

  I stopped breathing.

  Courtney’s leg pressed against mine. Her breath caught in identical fashion to mine. There was no denying the fact that I was scared shitless. My hands shook and I balled them up into fists to hide it. I didn’t want Adam or Courtney to know I still had doubts.

  Marshall stood up, looking almost relaxed, or at least, the same as he always looked. “We’ll leave tomorrow at 0400 hours. I’ll arrange the flight and the boat upon our arrival in Norway. I will also see to it that no one is in any condition to try to stop us from completing this mission. Mr. Silverman, I trust that you’ll keep this information under complete lock and key?”

  “What about after?” Adam managed to croak.

  “What you tell Tempest Division agents after our mission is of no concern to me whatsoever.” Marshall angled himself to face me and Courtney. “Take the rest of the day to fulfill any last-minute tasks of your choosing.”

  He made it sound like he was leaving us time to pick up travel-sized toiletries. Not to say good-bye to everyone. Good-bye to life itself.

  The second Marshall was out of sight, Courtney covered her face with her hands and started crying. She leaned against my chest and the crying turned into shaking sobs. I sat there with my arms around her, my eyes completely dry, and waited until she could breathe again.

  Adam’s head was down, his fingers dragging furiously through his hair over and over. “I hate this. I hate knowing these answers. I hate knowing the bigger picture.”

  I looked over his way, desperate for a guarantee and assurance that it would all be worth it. “Will it really work?”

  He lifted his eyes to meet mine. “I wish so badly right now that I could tell you no or even that I don’t know, but it makes so much sense.”

  Courtney stopped crying and used my sleeve to wipe her face. “Then we’re doing it. We have to.”

  Grief sat heavily on my heart, but this type of grief came with a complete lack of guilt, which I welcomed. I brushed the remaining tears from Courtney’s face and nodded.

  “We have to avoid Dad if we can,” Courtney said. “It’ll be so hard … God, I just want to say good-bye, but he’ll know. He’ll see it on our faces and try to stop us.”

  “I think Marshall must be planning on drugging everyone tonight or something,” I said. “So then Dad’ll wake up and we’ll already be—”

  “Gone,” Courtney finished for me.

  She started crying again and all I could do was hold her and let her fight this emotional battle in her own way. That was all we could do at this point.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  DAY 3: 2009. 1:20 P.M.

  I was rifling through a medicine-supply closest in the underground hospital when Holly bounded into the exam room.

  “Fancy meeting you here.” She grinned at me, waiting for some clever response, and then kept talking. “So, I was thinking that since my mom is working all day, maybe we could hang out today.”

  I stared at Holly, a bag of pills hanging limply in my hands. I hadn’t planned on seeing her. I hadn’t planned on even talking to her, fearing she’d change my mind, but looking at her now, I knew I wouldn’t chicken out. Not if chickening out meant Holly slitting her arms with razors and hanging herself in a hospital room. And now I wanted more than anything to be with her for a little while.

  My smile wasn’t even forced. It was genuine. “Give me a few minutes to get some more medicine for Courtney?”

  “That’s perfect because Dr. Melvin wants to scan my brain, so I’ll be in the FMRI center.” She opened the door again and called over her shoulder. “Come find me when you’re done.”

  I turned my attention to the closet and removed the small scrap of paper I had written medication names on. I was pretty sure Marshall wouldn’t want us drugged up and loopy for the actual mission but I sure as hell wasn’t about to sit on a seven-hour flight doing nothing but thinking about what would happen after we arrived at our destination. I wanted to be out cold the second I sat down and not wake up until we got there.

  I read the list carefully and filled a few empty bottles, which I stuffed into my backpack. I added plenty enough for Holly in case we ended up in the same place tonight. If anyone was going to prevent her from waking up and stopping me from leaving in the morning, I wanted it to be me and not Marshall.

  After I finished in the supply closet, I headed up the elevator to the FMRI room. Even before seeing Holly, I had planned on going in there to finally give Kendrick the letter and ring I had promised Blake I’d pass along.

  Kendrick was seated in the control room alone while Holly’s head disappeared into the tunnel. I knocked on the window and Kendrick buzzed me in.

  “Holly,” she said into the microphone. “You’re going to hear a lot of clicking. That’s normal; try to breathe and keep your heart rate from fluctuating.”

  “How’s it going?”

  Kendrick’s eyes were glued to the computer screen as Holly’s brain image lit up in a multitude of colors. “Not too bad. Her scan looks great so far. Mason had some slight damage and Stewart, too. Nothing major. But your dad and Holly look like they didn’t actually jump to the year 3200. It’s amazing how resilient the two of them are.”

  It was a relief to hear this about Holly, and I already knew Dad was a survivor. “That’s good. I was worried about her.”

  Kendrick glanced sideways at me and smiled. “So tell me about this partnership we had in another version of this world?”

  I released a nervous laugh. “Right. We had an interesting dynamic, that’s for sure. I was all antisocial, I’m the job—”

  Her eyebrows shot up. “You, antisocial? I can’t even fathom that. Not that we’ve ever socialized much but I read plenty of reports.”

  “Yeah, yeah, so I’ve heard.” I rolled my eyes. “Anyway, I was focused on work and avoiding getting too personal and you were constantly like, ‘Let’s hang out, let’s talk about our feelings. This is where I want to have my honeymoon someday. Where do you want to have yours? Why haven’t you thought about this before? Are you having fun yet, Jackson? Isn’t this great? Let’s be friends.’ And ou
r introduction came after I’d spent over two months going neck and neck with Stewart, throwing daily insults at each other. Needless to say, I was very confused by your approach and pretty much backed away with my hands in the air.”

  She laughed and shook her head. “You make me sound like one of those talking dolls where you pull the string on the back and they say a total of five different phrases. I’m so not like that. In any version of this universe.”

  I shrugged. “Hey, I’m just repeating the facts. I do have a photographic memory and you did say all of those things at one point or another.”

  Her eyes narrowed and pink rushed to her cheeks. “This was a platonic partnership, right? I mean you did hug me when I first saw you the other night.”

  “Actually…” I wiped the amusement from my face. “We were passionate lovers and you had three of my babies.”

  Her glare faltered for a split second, and then she released a breath and turned her attention back to the computer screen. “Real funny, Jackson. All right, so I drove you crazy with my friendliness and then what happened? Eventually you caved?”

  “My dad disappeared. He was supposed to be on this mission with Marshall and we came back to New York without either of them. And none of the agents except Dad and Marshall knew that I could time-travel. Then I found out about Holly’s being an agent and that Adam was dead. I couldn’t get through it alone.” I raised my gaze to meet hers, remembering all this made me wish for that Kendrick again so I could thank her. “And you were there. It was some of the worst moments of my entire life and you were there for me. That’s not something I can easily forget, even if you don’t have those memories right now.”

  She turned to face me, silence filling the room for several long seconds while she absorbed everything I’d just revealed. “Well, I’m sure if I was there for you, it probably went both ways. You must have helped me out, too.”

  This was the perfect window into what I’d come here to talk to her about. What I needed to give her. “Maybe a little. You told me about your family. I think you needed to say it out loud. Probably to someone who understood that kind of loss and I did. In a lot of ways, you reminded me what it was like to be human again. To feel things. I hated you for that, but at the same time, I appreciated it.”

  Shock filled her expression. “I told you about them? I never tell—”

  “I know. But the circumstances were extreme. I know we’re not close in this version of 2009 and it’s weird to hear stuff like this from me.” The memory of Blake, looking so intense and determined, invaded my thoughts, hitting me hard. “But I promised someone I’d do this…”

  “Promised who?”

  I stared right at her, letting out a breath before saying, “Blake.” I removed the ring from my pocket, the one that had been the source of so much confusion for me. “I had this forever and I didn’t know it was for you—the J and H engraved in it—I thought it meant Jackson and Holly. But all along, I’ve had it so that I could give it to you. So you’d have a piece of your parents.”

  Kendrick’s mouth fell open, her eyes immediately tearing up as she took the ring from my finger. “My mother’s ring. How did you get this?”

  I laughed a little. “It’s a really long and complicated story. But that night, when you told me about your family, I remembered your saying that you wished you had your mother’s ring.”

  She quickly swatted away the tears from her cheeks. “Thank you.”

  The envelope with the letter from Blake addressed to her was in my other hand. I held it out for her to take and she did, looking up at me again with wide eyes, like it was a priceless, breakable antique.

  I left her alone to read the note and to grieve or remember or whatever it was Blake thought she might need to do upon seeing this ring and I went for a walk around the hospital, giving Holly enough time to finish her test and dress in her normal clothes again.

  “I’m completely unharmed,” she said with a shrug as we headed into the elevator. “Hard to believe, huh? Given the crazy brain explosion you had.”

  “You’re more resilient than me.” I took her hand and smiled. “Where do you want to go today?”

  “Take me somewhere you went with the other me, the younger one. I want to try out my new trick again. See if I remember.”

  I replayed moments with 007 Holly in my head before landing on a memory that we could easily recapture.

  * * *

  We stood in the exhibit area just past the lobby of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Holly spun around slowly as if trying to catch a glimpse of 007 Holly’s memory, while I watched her. She stopped suddenly and closed her eyes.

  “Were you wearing a hat?”

  I laughed, still amazed and horrified by this phenomenon. “Yeah, a Mets hat.”

  Holly flashed me a smile. “Okay, where to next?”

  “You don’t want to look around?”

  She shook her head and grabbed my hand, heading toward the exit even though we had just paid our admission to get in. Not that I cared in the least. I followed the same route through Central Park that I had walked with 007 Holly.

  When we reached the playground where 007 Holly had scared me to death by climbing on the swing set, I waited for her to jump up there and do the same thing, but she just stood in the grass, looking from the ground to the swing set.

  “I don’t get it,” she said finally. “How is remembering this going to make me insane and suicidal?”

  It was a rhetorical question so I didn’t answer. I’d seen it with my own eyes so there was no doubt to be had. Instead, I tried to remember exactly what I’d felt lying in the grass with 007 Holly. That moment where I turned the entire world off and let myself be happy. That’s exactly what I needed to do right now. Not allow the crushing pain of leaving Dad and knowing what it would do to him, losing me and Courtney at the same time. This was different than the grieving I had needed to do when I returned to Courtney’s hospital room in a half-jump to be with her in those last hopeless moments.

  I had to keep reminding myself that this wasn’t hopeless. Until this morning, when Adam and Chief Marshall put their giant brains together, life was hopeless. What would happen after we left tomorrow morning was a solution. I had to keep telling myself that over and over.

  “I’m starving. Wanna get something to eat?” Holly asked, breaking me out of my trance.

  I pulled myself together, flashing her a smile. “Yeah, sure.”

  * * *

  By the time we made it back to my place, it was nearly eight at night and Dad and Courtney were sound asleep in the TV room, a movie blaring in the surround sound. I wondered for a second if Dad had already been drugged but then I shook the thought from my head because I needed to focus on the solution and incapacitating Dad was an inevitable part of the solution.

  I didn’t want to see anyone else tonight. Just Holly. I pulled her by the hand into my room and locked the door behind us. Not that I’d planned what we’d do in my room with the door locked, but I knew what everyone else would assume and they’d most likely leave us alone.

  She kicked off her flip-flops, her white summer dress swishing as she drifted around the room, picking up my things and studying them. “How many days do you think we’ve spent together? Like … if you added them all up from all the versions of me.”

  I sat down on the end of my bed, watching her move. “Hundreds.”

  She turned to me and lifted an eyebrow. “Really?”

  “Maybe it only feels like hundreds. Probably over three hundred.” I dug through my mind, adding and calculating as much as possible. “Well, I met the first version of you on March 15, 2009, and I didn’t leave to meet another version of you until October 30, 2009, so that’s seven and a half months. Then I spent about six weeks with the seventeen-year-old you, then a few days with the original version of you. And I’ve known this version of you fifty or sixty days, I think.”

  “What do you think would have happened with that first Holly if she had
n’t been shot and you hadn’t jumped to 2007?” She had set down the trophy she’d been studying and turned fully toward me.

  I shook my head. “I don’t know. That day changed me. Both good and bad.”

  “But if it hadn’t happened,” she pressed. “If it hadn’t changed you?”

  This was something I’d never thought about much before. I don’t think my mind could ever get past the need to undo Holly’s getting shot.

  I let out a deep breath. “I think we were either on the verge of breaking up or becoming something more.”

  She laughed. “Isn’t everyone?”

  That got me to laugh. “I’ve completely lost sight of what everyone is doing or anything that’s considered normal. I’ve kissed three versions of you in separate timelines. That’s a far cry from normal.”

  “But seven months of knowing the first me? That’s a long time.” Holly returned to viewing the items on my trophy shelf. “You don’t have to answer this if you don’t want to. If you do, I swear I won’t judge you or be mad or anything.”

  I scratched the back of my head, wary of ruining this evening. “Okay, what?”

  She kept her back to me. “I know you were a commitment phobe during that stage of your life and you and that version of me didn’t really establish your relationship or call it anything, but did you … were you with anyone else while you were dating that Holly?”

  I almost smiled with relief. “No.”

  “But you didn’t tell her that? You didn’t actually come right out and say that she was the only one you were with at the time?”

  “No,” I admitted. That had been a bit of sore spot between Adam and me because I think he knew the answer to that question and he also knew that Holly had worried at times and he wanted me to tell her and I couldn’t bring myself to say those words. It was too personal, like laying my heart on the table for her to take. It scared the hell out of me. I didn’t understand why we couldn’t just be together and not worry about all those details. And now, it was so hard to believe that was the kind of drama that had occupied my life. I’d take that life back in a heartbeat.