The Horse Soldier: Beginnings Series Book 10

by Jacqueline Druga

She giggled and stepped to the Jeep. “Robbie, have you seen Johnny?”

  “Nope.” Robbie sniffed, rubbed the back of his hand under his nose and worked. “You’re wearing perfume.” He sneezed. “Shit.”

  “Are you allergic?” She asked.

  “Bev, every Slagel I know is allergic to perfume.” Robbie sneezed again and held out his hand. “Step back near the door and air out.”

  “Johnny too?”

  “I uh . . .” Robbie rubbed the tickle in his nose. “I guess. Don’t know.”

  “Oh, I’ll wash it off then. Have you seen him?”

  “I said no.” Robbie dropped the tool. “Fuck. I hate this shit.” He rolled his eyes when he heard her giggle.

  “You’re cute.”

  “Yeah I am.”

  “I have to find Johnny.”

  “Then look for him,” Robbie said.

  “I have been.”

  “Have you tried the cryo -lab? It’s feeding time.”

  “I did. Andrea hadn’t seen him.”

  “No.” Robbie grunted as he made an adjustment. “The cryo -lab, not the clinic lab.”

  Bev tsked and gave attitude. “I did check there. Andrea said he wasn’t there.”

  Robbie stopped working. “At the cryo -lab?”

  “Yes.”

  “Andrea was in there?”

  “Yes.”

  “Go uh . . . check again. I’m sure that’s where he is.”

  “O.K.” Bev shrugged. “If you see him, you’ll tell him I’m looking for him. Right?”

  “Yeah sure.” Robbie swayed his head after Bev’s ‘thank you’ and watch her leave. He hesitated before going back to his work, speaking to himself in wonder. “Andrea in the cryo-lab. Andrea isn’t supposed to be at the cryo-lab.”

  ^^^^

  “Fuckin door.” Johnny punched in his code, shook the cryo -lab door and banged it with his foot. “Shit.” It wouldn’t open. “What is going on?”

  “You’re just being delayed in your wait for me.”

  Bev’s voice startled him and Johnny jumped a foot in the air and back. “What are you doing down here?”

  “Looking for you. Having trouble?”

  “It won’t take my code, not that it’s any of your business.”

  “Johnny,” Bev laid her hand on his back. “Don’t be this way to me. You’re making me feel really bad . . . and used.”

  From the keypad, Johnny shifted his eyes to Bev and raised his eyebrows.

  “Johnny.” Bev spoke his name softly and slipped between him and the door. Her hands went flush on his chest. “I was really, really nice to you yesterday.” Her hand ran down his chest and to the front of his jeans. “Feel like returning the favor?” She bit her bottom lip.

  “I feel like feeding the rabbits.” He stepped away from her and grabbed his radio, ignoring the disappointing glare Bev gave him. Johnny placed his radio on all call. “Dean. Dean you there. Dean come in. Ellen. Dean, anyone. Hello? Dean. Ellen.”

  Bev smiled and touched him again.

  “Quit that.” Johnny told her. “Dean?” He released the button. Static. “Shit.”

  Andrea’s voice came over. “Johnny, Dean’s home. Ellen’s processing the new guys. Try Dean’s phone. He must not have the radio on.”

  “Thanks Andrea.” Johnny turned off the radio.

  “Why are you looking for Dean?” Bev giggled. “Wanna bring him in too?”

  “Yeah right.” Johnny said. “I need his code or the rabbits don’t get fed. And my phone’s above.”

  “If I tell you how you can get a working code in less than ten seconds, will you be with me tonight?”

  “You know how to get me a code in ten seconds. One that works?” Johnny asked.

  “Yep.”

  “You want me to call Danny. That’s it.”

  “Nope.”

  “Henry?” Johnny guessed at the ones he knew had codes.

  “Nope.”

  “Not Danny or Henry?” Johnny laughed. “There’s no one else.”

  Bev gave him a snide look. “Bet me.”

  “Ten seconds?”

  “Yep,” Bev spoke seductively.

  “You’re on. Ten seconds? I’ll do you if I can get a code in ten seconds,” Johnny said snidely.

  “Radio Andrea. Use hers.” Bev said like the Miss Know-it-All she acted like.

  “Ha!” Johnny scoffed in a make fun manner. “Andrea doesn’t have a code.” Johnny started to walk away. “Sorry babe.”

  “No, Johnny, I’m sorry.” Bev walked by him. “If she doesn’t have a code, how else was she in here this afternoon? See you later.” Bev walked backwards, wiggled her fingers, turned around again, and walked away.

  Johnny picked up the radio. There was no way Andrea had a code. No way Dean would give her one for the simple fact that he didn’t want Andrea going in the lab without his knowledge and then lecturing him on the sanctity of life. Johnny kept repeating, in his mind, the phrase ‘no way’. Bev had to be wrong. She had to be. Johnny hoped with all his might she was, mostly because he didn’t want to be faced with the possibility of welching on a bet for the first time in his life.

  ^^^^

  Her pouting mouth was closed tightly as Maura folded her arms and tried not to look at Joe who sat in her living room with her.

  “Are you listening to me?” Joe asked.

  She nodded.

  “Maura, it is . . .” Joe stopped when Gemma set down a cup on the coffee table for him. “Thanks Gemma.”

  Gemma took a moment, worry crossed her age -filled face as she watched Joe on the couch with her adopted daughter. “Joe, please don’t badger her.”

  “Badger her how, Gemma? Christ.”

  “Joe!” Gemma scolded. “Do not use that tone around her. Please.”

  “All right. All right. I apologize.” Joe looked back at Maura. He began to speak but stopped when he saw Gemma still standing there “Gemma, do you mind?”

  “I would prefer to stay,” Gemma said.

  “I would prefer you didn’t,” Joe told her.

  “I don’t like you alone with her, Joe.”

  “Like I’m gonna molest her. Get the hell in the other room and leave us be. Go.” Joe pointed.

  Gemma looked offended, but listened. She guessed there was some safety in Joe. “No badgering.” She pointed and walked out.

  “Yeah, yeah.” Joe returned to Maura. “Now, where were we?”

  “What is molesting?”

  “Um . . . it means uh . . . ask your mother what it means.”

  “O.K.” Maura spoke so timidly. “I will.”

  “You do that.” Joe told her. “Now, back to what we were discussing . . .”

  “I can’t tell you. I can’t. I can’t. I can’t.”

  “You can. You can. You can.” Joe insisted. “The game is so important. Please?”

  “So is trust.”

  “I trusted that you would tell me.”

  “Reverend Bob trusted that I would keep his secret.”

  “And I’m trusting you will tell me.”

  Maura didn’t even look in debate. Joe’s beckoning wasn’t making a dent. “I can’t. The Bible says we should be trustworthy. Those who can be trusted will be given more. Book of Matthew.”

  Joe huffed. “The Bible.” He stood up. “Well let me give you something to think about little girl. The Bible also states, ‘Those who harbor secrets that ill effect others shall be those who burn in eternal damnation . . . Proverbs.” Joe moved to the door, opening it. “Ponder on that and then talk to me.” He gave a firm, serious nod and walked out, pulling the door closed with him. Perhaps it wasn’t right to lie to Maura, to give a bogus passage, but he needed his information. And if manipulating her fear in the Bible was the way to do it, then it couldn’t have been all that wrong. Maura was young, she would get over it.

  CHAPTER

  TWENTY-THREE

  Beginnings, Montana

  The brotherhood of etiquette was breached in Dean
’s mind as he walked into Jason’s lab unannounced and uninvited. But yet Dean did go into Jason’s lab as requested by Joe. The first thing he did was put into motion the plan to cover his ass if Jason came into the lab. With him, he brought the Withers folder tucked with in his lab jacket. He looked around Jason’s lab for the familiar stack of folders that he always saw Jason carry about and Dean slipped that folder right in with the rest.

  “There.” Dean let out a breath feeling highly uncomfortable. “Now . . .” He rubbed his hands together. “Where the hell do I begin?”

  Before he could answer in his mind, the door to Jason’s lab opened and Dean’s heart dropped as he thought how it was just his luck to be busted so soon.

  Henry walked in.

  “Henry.” Dean ran his hand through his hair. “What . . . what are you doing here?”

  “Joe sent me up to help you.”

  “I don’t need help.” Dean walked, obviously clueless to the Regressionator.

  “Oh really?” Henry moved to him. “You know about pulling up the history?”

  “And you do?”

  “I know more than you do, Dean.”

  Dean scoffed in laughter.

  “I know you’re a dick.” Henry stepped into Dean’s way and to the Regressionator.

  “A dick?” Dean stopped laughing. “Where do you get off calling me a dick Henry?”

  “Where do you get off trying to piss me off.”

  “How do you figure?” Dean asked snidely.

  “What? You’re gonna deny it?”

  “Deny trying to piss you off? Yeah.”

  “Then what do you call shoving Danny’s favor slip in my face?”

  “I call it, trying to make you feel bad.”

  “And you think you’re not a dick.” Henry said and faced the time machine.

  “I didn’t say I wasn’t a dick Henry. I just wanted to know where you got off calling me a dick. When you started this whole ball rolling.” Dean’s tone heated.

  “I asked for an understanding with Ellen!” Henry argued loudly.

  “And I turned you down and you got pissed!”

  “I got pissed because of your attitude about it.”

  Dean tossed his hands up. “What attitude! You gave me the attitude first and then went down to Bowman to start trouble.”

  “The reason I went to Bowman early and what happened when I was there, are two different things.”

  “That is such bullshit and you know it. You went there to start trouble and get me worked up.” Dean pointed at Henry as they stood face to face. “You Henry went down there with every intention of being with my wife.”

  “She’s my friend!”

  “And you want more!” Dean’s face and loudness of his voice began to match Henry’s. “And because you can’t have more, you stomp like a child and decide you’re just going to take it!”

  “I never went down there with any intentions of taking her from you! I went down there to be with her.”

  “Be with her!?” Dean moved dramatically as he argued. “And you can stand here and tell me you went there without intentions of starting trouble. I told you Henry. I told you no! I have my reasons. She is my wife! If I don’t want to share her, I don’t have to. Not you. Not anyone, can make me do it. And out of respect for our marriage, you should not push the issue! But you did.”

  “You wanna know what your problem is Dean?”

  “Yeah, Henry tell me what my problem is.”

  “I’ll tell you.”

  “Tell me.”

  “You have it in your little man mind . . .”

  Dean’s laugh interrupted Henry. “Look at you trying to be Frank. Talk like him. Act like him. Have Ellen like him.”

  “Shut up and let me finish.” Henry’s pointing finger came awfully close to Dean who had stepped closer to him. “You’re afraid!”

  “Afraid of what?”

  “Afraid of doing the same things you did before that caused Ellen to turn to someone else. And you know what Dean. You will. You’ll repeat your mistakes, because you’re too selfish not too.”

  “Fuck you Henry.”

  “Fuck you Dean.”

  “And I am not here to fight with you.” Dean turned to the computer of the time machine. “I’m here to find out information and leave. So why don’t you go.”

  “No, Dean. Why don’t you go. You’re way out of your league.”

  “Me!” Dean reached for the keyboard. “Who’s the scientist?”

  “Who’s the one that sets up everything for your scientist ass?” Henry moved into the keyboard. “Now step aside. I’ll do this.”

  “I’ll do it.”

  “Quit letting your pride get in the way. Let me do it. I know what I’m doing.” Henry placed his hands on the keyboard.

  “And I don’t?”

  “No.”

  “Move Henry.” Dean moved Henry’s hands and laid his on the keyboard.

  “No you move Dean.” Henry nudged Dean slightly.

  “You move.” Dean stepped into Henry and laid his hand on the keys pushing Henry’s away.

  “Dean.”

  “Henry.”

  “Move.” Henry grabbed Dean’s hands. Dean quickly retracted his hands from Henry and moved them to the keyboards again, when Henry reached for his hands, Dean smacked Henry’s.

  Henry gasped and smacked Dean’s hands back, within seconds the struggle over who would get to the keyboard became a game of hostile Patty Cake between the two grown men.

  It was the one word Joe always used to bring about order. Unfortunately, it wasn’t Joe who spoke it in the quantum lab. “Boys.” Jason stepped inside.

  So startled Dean and Henry were, that they spun around, faced Jason, placed their hands behind their backs, and looked as guilty as two ten year old boys who were busted reading a dirty magazine in a drugstore.

  Jason took a step further in, clearing his throat. “What’s going on? Why are you guys in my lab?”

  Moving an inch away from Henry, Dean spoke up. “I came up to look for the Withers file.”

  “You did?” Jason nodded. “Why didn’t you ask me where it was when I saw you twenty minutes ago?”

  “I saw you twenty minutes ago?” Dean nudged Henry when he heard Henry tsk. “You know what? It didn’t dawn on me until I needed it which was ten minutes ago.”

  Jason looked at Henry. “Henry, why are you in my lab?”

  “Helping Dean.”

  “Helping Dean?” Jason question. “Helping Dean look for a file?”

  Dean let out one single snicker. “Good one, Henry.”

  “Like you did any better.” Henry whispered.

  Jason ran his fingers over his thin mustache and spoke calmly. “Now that you two proceeded to lie badly, what is going on?” He didn’t receive an answer. “How about I take a wild guess?” He walked to his main computer of the time machine. “You are trying to get in here? Why?” Still no response. “Wanna take a trip? I thought you boys learned?”

  While Jason was speaking, Dean and Henry both let their minds work separately and both of them thinking they had an explanation, started talking only it was at the same time as the other.

  Jason closed one eye in a wince at the meshed together voices. “Hold it.” He held up his hand. “Using logical deduction, obviously you don’t want to dismantle or vandalize my Regressionator because Henry knows this computer is not the link to do that. And Dean, you obviously aren’t looking for a file seeing how my files are over there.” Jason indicated to the stack. “Now, what is in this computer that you two want to get to. A bet? No.” Jason shook his head. “I think it’s something in here. Now seeing you aren’t planning any trips, I’m gonna gather it’s information on one of two things contained in this computer. You either wanna see the programming or you wanna see the history. I’ll make you a deal. I’ll give you one. I’ve got nothing to hide. You tell me, history or programming. Which is it that I give you?”

  Henry and Dean looked
at each other and then to Jason, speaking at the same time. “History.”

  “Here.” Jason laid, a homemade book down in front of a sitting Henry and Dean. “This is the log. It coincides with everything in that print up, and even though you know the history is only printed up until the safeguarding of the time machine, my notes do go further.”

  The long table Dean and Henry sat at was covered with papers. Dean pulled the log book to him. “These are all you time trip notes.?”

  “Yes and some that Forrest logged as well. It’s stuff I don’t put into the computer.”

  “Thanks.” Dean put the log book between him and Henry as they reviewed. Test trips, real trips, trips Dean and Henry didn’t know about.

  “Thank you for this,” Henry said.

  “I have nothing to hide. You have any questions, just ask away,” Jason told them.

  Dean raised his eyes to Jason. “You do know we can’t tell you why we need this information. We can only hope you won’t say anything to anyone.”

  “I haven’t yet,” Jason stated.

  Henry looked at him in wonder. “What do you mean, you haven’t yet? We’ve only been here a half hour.”

  “I haven’t said anything about my thoughts which I think are the same as yours. That’s why you’re wanting to view it. I have to say, I thought Joe would be the one to finally come up here.”

  “What are you talking about?” Dean asked.

  “The possibility that there is someone working on the inside for the Society.” Jason said. He noticed the immediate pale expressions. “What? You don’t think that crossed my mind. It did. What makes me think it is the way that one trip back in time went. The one on March 6th, where I went as the constant. I got shot. Frank, Robbie, and Greg were chased. It was so much like a set up, I got curious.”

  “And why didn’t you say anything?” Henry asked.

  “Because I know the fingers would point at me,” Jason explained. “Just like now. I was frozen with the Society scientists, however, if any of you would stop to think. That trip I joined, if I was with the Society, why didn’t I just return alone, look frazzled, and act as if all went wrong?. No one would be the wiser. No one. It was after that trip that I thought someone set us up. Someone used the time machine.”