First, he drove to the lab, where he used the singularity device to travel back to 1936 and purchase another of the rare copies of the first comic book to feature Superman. This, he sold to a dealer in Wellesley, who provided a cashier’s check for $69,000 at a local credit union. Still well below the comic’s value, but Khan didn’t have the time to drive to Orlando and sell it for top dollar. Not to mention he suspected it would be far more complicated to deposit a check for several hundred thousand dollars than one for $69,000. At the same credit union where the cashier’s check had been drafted, Khan proceeded to open an account.
This took from 3:30 until 5:16 p.m. (after the credit union was technically closed). But by the end of that time, Khan was set up with his new account, temporary checks, and a debit card (which was also temporary—a chip-enabled card would arrive by mail in seven business days). He accepted the card and then asked what the maximum amount of cash he could withdraw today might be.
By 5:32, he was on his way back to Littlewood’s with $1,500 in his wallet. He snatched a suitcase and started packing for his trip to Santa Barbara, and by 10:45 that night, he was seated in economy class on a red-eye flight from MCO to LAX, having paid $948.48 in cash for the privilege of sitting behind a baby who seemed likely to cry the entire flight. Fortunately, Khan had taken Littlewood’s Bose noise canceling headphones (which Littlewood must have forgotten) and placed them in his carry-on.
And then, before he was forced to put his (also “borrowed”) laptop into airplane mode, Khan sent an e-mail to one Jesús Torres, JD, demanding the immediate cessation of proceedings to sell his estate because he wasn’t dead. As a matter of fact, after an extended stay at a health retreat overseas where he’d had . . . work done, he was on his way home, looking at least ten years younger and feeling like a million bucks. He almost deleted the last remark, but it amused him to leave it there. He was about to get his hands on an estate worth several million, which did rather have the effect of making one feel like a million bucks.
47
· JILLIAN ·
Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, 1903
She had set an alarm for midnight, to wake her in plenty of time for a visit to the attic and a change of clothes. It took Jillian much longer to choose something to wear because she didn’t know which of Aunt Beverly’s dresses looked the most “1903.” In the end, she decided it didn’t matter so long as she covered everything with her aunt’s full-length “motoring” coat, double-breasted and with gathers at the top of the sleeves. She dressed warmly underneath, in a dark wool skirt, smooth in front and pleated behind, with a matching bodice. With the motoring coat on top, she felt as padded and broad shouldered as a suited football player. She descended the attic stairs, estimating she was wearing around twenty pounds of clothing—maybe more. Her great-greats were made of sturdy stuff.
As was Everett . . .
Jillian had decided against driving; she was full of nervous energy, and it was only half a mile to Khan’s estate. The dark colors of her costume made her feel invisible as she left her lighted drive for the unlit road to Khan’s.
Once she entered the key code for the gate, ground lighting took her up the drive to the main house. The walk felt endless. She kept a nervous lookout for vehicles or lights in windows that would indicate someone was around, but the estate was empty. No one was here to interrupt her or catch her or stop her.
She entered the basement and crossed to the podium computer screen, where she keyed in her destination. Perhaps, she mused, it was impossible for anyone to catch or stop or interrupt her. If she had “already” been to 1903, her success was assured. This was like the moment where she’d decided to fly with Wilbur Wright. She’d chosen to step on that plane in 1908 based on the knowledge she would, in her future and Wilbur’s past, be brave enough to ask for a ride.
This was the right thing to do. She felt it in her bones.
At this moment she realized she’d forgotten to leave a warning about Khan in her note. She gasped, but then the roar and spark of the machine drowned everything out, overwhelming every thought. Her limbs froze, and she felt the familiar transition from warmth to inferno to the absence of sensation, followed by the dizzying fall into another time.
As she crashed into 1903, muscles frozen, she tumbled face forward, taking a mouthful of sand. A strong wind was shrieking over her, bringing with it the salt-tang of the ocean. Jillian wondered if the wind had assisted in toppling her facedown into a sand dune. While she was waiting for her muscles to start working again, she heard someone calling, asking if she’d been hurt. Her eyes fluttered open, revealing a face close to hers, revealing . . .
Everett.
“Allow me to assist you, if you please,” he said, looking at her with concern.
Those eyes. He took her breath away.
“I saw the wind tumble you clean over,” he said, reaching for her. “They say it’s blowing at nearly thirty miles an hour.”
Before she could object. Everett had hauled her to her feet and was brushing sand from her jacket. Just as suddenly, he stopped.
“I shall leave the rest to you,” he said, looking away from her chest.
Jillian quickly brushed sand off the top of her motoring coat.
A moment later, he was holding his hand out to her. “I’m Everett Randolph.”
“Jillian Applegate,” she said, shaking.
“Acquaintance of the Tates, I take it?” asked Everett.
“Something like that. I’m a bit, um, turned around. Can you direct me to the flying machine?”
“Say, that’s where I’m heading back to now.” Everett grinned as though it was the greatest of coincidences that they should both be heading the same direction.
Glancing at the miles and miles of sand, Jillian couldn’t imagine anyone would be here for any other reason.
“Are you a follower of the Wrights?”
Jillian smiled softly. “You could say that.”
“It’s tremendous, what they’ve managed so far,” said Everett.
Just then, Jillian made the mistake of turning her face into the wind and got sand in her eyes. As she gasped at the sting, Everett offered his arm along with some advice.
“Blink like anything, and don’t look into the wind unless you first shade your eyes.” He demonstrated, using his hand to shelter his eyes.
She accepted his arm and tried “blinking like anything,” which did help, making it possible for her to use her eyes again. They ascended a dune of four or five feet, and there, on the other side, Jillian saw Wilbur and the man who must be his brother, Orville. To one side of the Flyer stood a group of men with fishermen’s caps and long, droopy mustaches.
The Wright brothers appeared to be conferring beside the engine at the rear of the craft.
“They have to set the ignition before they start the propellers spinning,” said Everett. Jillian could hear the excitement in his voice, see it in the way he was rising on his toes, as if hoping to catch a gust of wind and soar himself.
“I think this is the day,” said Everett, continuing. “If anyone can fly, it’s these boys.”
Jillian hid a smile. Everett now was no older than she was herself, and the “boys” were nearly her father’s age.
The engine caught, sounding so much like the engine that had taken Jillian into the air in 1908 that she felt a rush of longing to soar in the Flyer again, made bittersweet by the knowledge she wouldn’t. Not today, not ever.
Wilbur ran down toward the cluster of men—surfmen from the Life Saving Station, if she remembered right. In that unhurried manner Jillian remembered, Wilbur Wright set up his camera, giving instructions to one of the men to work it. And then, Wilbur turned back to the craft. A moment later he was running alongside it as it glided along a narrow rail down the gently sloping dune.
Jillian’s heart was racing as if she were running, too. It was 10:35 in the morning on December 17, 1903, and she was about to see history made before her eyes. On impulse, she grabb
ed Everett’s hand, squeezing it tightly. He looked at her in surprise, and then the lazy smile she remembered so well crossed his face.
Flushing, she turned away just in time to see the Flyer lift slowly into the air.
“Look, look!” she cried to Everett, pointing.
He turned, and his hand gripped hers even more tightly. He called out, “Will you look at that! Just look! Look at him go! He’s done it! The Wright brothers have done it!”
Within a handful of seconds, the craft touched down again, skidding to a halt as Wilbur ran to catch up to his brother. The surfmen were whooping and clapping, and Everett and Jillian dropped hands to clap along with them, caught up in the thrill of what they’d witnessed.
“It’s the future,” Everett bellowed to the skies. “We’re seeing the future!”
Jillian nodded fiercely, replying, “I know!”
And then Everett turned, and his eyes, shining and clear, fixed on hers. Jillian felt the recklessness of the moment, how it pulsed with the wild thrill of the flight and of having someone beside her to share it, and when Everett’s eyes dropped to her mouth, she didn’t even think twice. She leaned forward and kissed him.
48
· JILLIAN ·
Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, 1903
The kiss was as brief as the flight that inspired it, and just as pure, just as perfect, just a heart beating in time with hers, just a memory for each of them to carry always.
Breathless, Jillian felt Everett pulling away from her, ending the kiss.
“Forgive me,” murmured Everett. “I . . . I believe I forgot myself.”
She felt a momentary shock at the way he brushed it aside, but then she realized he was being polite. He was apologizing. And anyway, she knew the truth. She knew what the kiss had meant to him.
“Think nothing of it,” she said, knowing he would not take the advice. Knowing better than he did what the moment would mean to him. She wished . . . Oh, but she wished . . .
“Shall we add our congratulations?” Everett asked, indicating the cluster of men who had finished hauling the craft back to the rail.
Jillian, nodding, went with him.
Two of the men of the Life Saving Station made room for her, staring at her as though she were some heretofore-unknown species of waterfowl.
A boy several years younger than Everett was asking Orville a question. “Did you feel scared?”
“Too cold to feel anything,” murmured one of the surfmen.
“Scared?” Orville smiled at the boy who’d asked the question. “There wasn’t time.”
“May I offer my congratulations?” Jillian said as the brothers eyed her and Everett.
“I shall thank you as though you have,” said Wilbur, a hint of a smile playing at the corners of his mouth. He was as understated, as soft spoken, as she knew he would be in years to come. Wilbur turned to Everett. “Good day, Mr. Randolph.”
“I do not believe we have met?” said Orville to Jillian.
“Jillian Applegate,” she said, extending her hand. And then, using a story her research suggested they would swallow, she added, “I’m staying with my father, who is a sportsman. I overheard something of your ventures when I visited the mercantile two days ago.”
“Oh, yes, when folk gather hereabouts, they do love to predict our failures,” said Wilbur.
“We like to disappoint them every now and again with a bit of success,” added Orville.
“Did you enjoy the sight?” Wilbur asked.
“Oh, yes!” replied Jillian.
“I think Miss Applegate would like to fly herself,” added Everett, grinning at her.
“There’s nothing I’d like more,” Jillian said softly.
Wilbur nodded as if nothing could be more natural.
She knew the next words she had to speak—the question 1908 Wilbur said she had asked. “Would you take me up?”
“No room and not safe,” replied Orville curtly.
“Some other time, I think,” said Wilbur, more politely. “And now, if you’ll excuse us, Miss Applegate, we had best take advantage of these calm winds.”
The men laughed at this, and Everett leaned over to explain. “It was blowing to seventy miles an hour a few days back.”
Jillian addressed the Wright brothers. “I must be leaving in any case. Father expects me for lunch.”
“It’s four miles to the nearest station,” said the younger boy, looking doubtfully at her.
“Then I’d better get moving,” replied Jillian.
“But . . . you’re a girl,” said the boy.
Jillian bristled. “A girl who summited Mount Whitney and Half Dome. I think I can manage four miles.”
The boy gawked at her and then turned tail, chasing after a dog.
“It was a pleasure to meet you, Miss Applegate,” said Wilbur.
“Likewise,” she said softly, but the brothers were already conferring with their heads together, and she didn’t think they’d heard. Her heart pinched with a strange sort of ache. She wanted to tell them they would do great things, and not to give up in years to come when people would hint they were frauds, but she said nothing. There was no need, because history had already shown her they wouldn’t give up, that they would achieve greatness.
“Goodbye,” she murmured to Everett, but he didn’t respond. He probably couldn’t hear over the howling wind. He was leaning in to hear the brothers’ conversation, one hand resting gently on the lower of the two wings. Jillian turned to seek out a place where she could hide before she disappeared. She had fourteen minutes left. How had so much happened in ten minutes? Well, she’d done what she came for, and she hoped it would be enough.
As she walked away, her heart throbbed with the pain of what awaited Everett in fifteen years, and she wanted to turn back and warn him. But what good would that do? No doubt he had people in his life who would warn him. It wouldn’t matter who warned him; she already knew how his story ended.
An overwhelming ache swelled inside until it seemed to fill every pore. Just as her eyes began to blur with tears, she saw a wooden shelter a hundred yards away. The Wright brothers’ camp. In spite of what she’d said to the younger boy who accused her of being a girl, she had no interest in wandering the dunes in the driving wind. Her face stung with cold where tears had made trails down her cheeks, Lumbering against the blowing sand, she reached the camp cabin and wrenched the door open just wide enough to get inside.
The door slammed behind her. Inside, it was quiet. The place was neat as a pin, with tins of food lined along a shelf in a cook’s space. All the labels faced out at precisely the same angle. There was a workbench—two, actually—and one camp bed made up with military precision. Overhead, she saw a sort of loft, an area of the visible rafters where additional lumber had been placed crossways to form a kind of sleeping platform. A sturdy looking ladder led to the “upstairs” area.
Sinking onto a stool, she exhaled heavily. And then she let her tears spill more freely. She cried for Everett, for all the brave pilots who would leap at the chance to fly and then lose their lives in the coming Great War. She cried for herself, born a century too late for a happily ever after with the ambitious, eager, valorous man she’d fallen for.
She was just drying her eyes when she heard someone singing “The Star Spangled Banner” outside. Loudly. And not well. But with enthusiasm. The voice seemed to be approaching, not receding.
She looked for a back door exit, but there was none. She glanced up to the loft. She could hide up there. Hoisting her heavy layers, she hauled herself up the ladder and had just ducked between two sleeping pallets when the door slammed shut.
“Whee-ew!” said a man’s voice.
It was Everett.
“Miss Applegate?” He called her name softly a second time. “Miss Applegate?”
She lifted her head a fraction of an inch to see him, and as she did so, she sent a small pillow tumbling down from the rafters, at which point she whispered a word her
mother called unladylike and that she suspected was just as unladylike in 1903.
Everett found her.
“You can’t be here,” she murmured, half to herself.
He tipped his head to one side. Slowly, irrevocably, the lazy smile she knew so well spread across his face.
49
· JILLIAN ·
Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, 1903
“You really can’t be here right now,” said Jillian, with a glance at her watch. She had less than four minutes before 1903 spat her out like a cherry pit.
“And yet, here I am,” said Everett. He grinned at her. “Like a bad penny, as they say.”
Did they say that in 1903? They must. Jillian felt her stomach contracting. She had to get him outside. Or herself outside. Outside needed to be happening in three minutes for someone.
Everett swung himself up onto one of the rafters, where he sat and balanced himself, legs crossed like he was ready for yoga.
“I wanted to ask if I might call on you and your father,” Everett said, his comfortable smile now replaced with a softer expression.
“Oh,” she said, looking away from those sky-blue eyes, those dark lashes. “Oh, I see.” What was she supposed to say to his request? Did polite girls say yes or no in the 1900s? She needed to say whatever would get him out the fastest. No, she needed to tell him the truth, that she couldn’t receive him as a caller.
“What do you say?” he asked. His voice was low. Gravelly. Vulnerable, the way it had been in 1908, the day he told her he’d been in love with her for five years. The day he’d told her he would remember her kiss till his dying breath.
She squeezed her eyes tightly shut. “I can’t,” she said. “I’m very sorry.” She opened her eyes just enough to watch through her lashes.
His eyes, his beautiful eyes, were cast down.
“I see,” he said at last. “I just thought . . . I thought it meant . . . Never mind.”
A Flight in Time (Thief in Time Series Book 2) Page 20