by Rysa Walker
“Why not?”
“He says that they’ll recognize him. That we’ll have a better chance of getting the key if I go in alone.”
Trey raises his eyebrows. “But you don’t believe him.”
I shrug. “Kiernan may be right about that. He’s been in their face for several weeks. He was wearing a truly stupid-looking mustache tonight as a disguise and stayed near the back of the theater, so I think he’s trying to avoid Houdini’s people connecting me to him. It’s more . . . it’s just . . .” I let out a long sigh of frustration. “I can’t put my finger on it, but something’s wrong, Trey. He’s different. Not just older, but . . . fundamentally different.”
“So you don’t think it’s the same Kiernan? Are you thinking this is like a different version of him, from some other timeline, or . . . ?”
“I guess that’s not impossible, but no, I don’t think so. There’s this scar on his forehead that’s the same—I mean, it’s older now, and faded, but the same spot. It’s more that his personality is different.”
I try to think of some way to phrase this diplomatically, in a way that won’t hurt Trey’s feelings, but I’m exhausted, and nothing is coming to mind, so I just blurt it out. “He was in love with me before, Trey. It was obvious in everything he did and said, in the way he looked at me. And while I’m glad he’s moved on, it’s like he can’t bear to be around me. Like he hates me.”
Trey shakes his head. “Nope. I didn’t get that at all. And in case you didn’t notice, I was paying pretty close attention when he was around. I think a more obvious explanation is that it bothered him to see me here, in London with you. And maybe he’s pushing you away to keep from getting hurt even more.”
I consider this, and on the surface, Trey may be right. Still, I can’t shake the feeling that something deeper is going on. I just hope it’s not what Julia thinks.
“Okay,” Trey says. “Enough about Kiernan. When is your meeting with Julia?”
“Tomorrow morning. Nine o’clock.” My voice very clearly conveys my lack of enthusiasm.
“I’d happily go with you, if not for the fact that I’ll be somewhere over the Atlantic,” he says. “My flight leaves at eight thirty, and even with the time zone difference, I’m still not scheduled to land until early afternoon.”
“You’re not going to get much sleep. And even if you were back in time, they’ve only given me coordinates. I don’t have a physical address. But I’ll make it clear that you’re included from here on out.”
“What about Tilson?”
“I don’t know if he’ll be at the meeting or not. All I know is Julia had his name, along with Charlayne’s, and said that she pulled them both into the group to make me feel ‘safe and cozy.’”
“No. I was wondering about the sample. Did you get a chance to talk to Katherine and Connor about getting it to him?”
“Remember? The walls have ears—our computers could be bugged as well. We’re going to have to resort to scribbling notes to each other.”
“Not good. I’ve seen your handwriting.” I dig my elbow into his ribs and he laughs. “Just . . . tell Katherine and Connor that I’m not pushing Tilson. I didn’t give him any specific information about what we needed. I think he can be trusted—I mean, you heard him at the barbecue . . .” He shakes his head, and I know the dual memory is bothering him.
“Yeah. And I also didn’t hear him. Let’s just try not to think about it.”
“Works for me. Anyway, what I mean to say is that if Tilson is with Julia and you decide you don’t trust her . . .”
“Then what? We put an ad in the paper: Scientist needed to analyze dangerous substance. No Cyrists allowed?” A yawn hits me, and I cover my face with my hands and nestle into that curve between his shoulder and his chest that seems tailor-made for my head. “You were right to call Tilson. He’s our best bet. And if he was telling you the truth about meeting me in the 1990s, then I’m pretty sure the die is already cast.”
BETHESDA, MARYLAND
September 10, 9:00 p.m.
I woke up a few minutes ago on the couch in Trey’s hotel room with my head on a pillow rather than his chest. We must have both crashed there, because the bed was undisturbed, aside from the missing pillow. I have a vague memory of him getting up, but that’s it. A little note was leaning against a water glass on the coffee table:
Didn’t want to wake you, but had to leave early to catch the first flight back to DC. Love you—will call when I land at Dulles. Trey
So I gathered up the dress I wore to the Hippodrome and jumped from 8:22 a.m. London time back to 9 p.m. last night, Bethesda time, really wishing that Trey could have taken the same shortcut.
I was really tempted to jump back to morning so that I’d be on the same schedule as the rest of the world. But I have several hours of work to do before I meet with Julia, and I’d rather be on time. If she’s under a key, would she have a double memory if I missed the meeting but jumped back in order to attend? I’m not sure, but thinking about it gives me enough of a headache that I’d prefer to just avoid the problem if possible.
I change out of the clothes I borrowed from Trey and walk down the hall to the library. A profuse blue light fills the room, both from the keys at the center and from the lighted tubes that run up the walls between the bookshelves. I don’t know how it works, but this contraption of Connor’s keeps the keys in a state of perpetual activation and magnifies the CHRONOS field so that we’re theoretically safe without a key anywhere in the house and most of the yard. I say theoretically, because it’s really more of a backup system now. I wear a key even in the shower, and I suspect that Connor and Katherine do the same. The device here in the library emits a faint hum that I rarely notice unless the room is quiet, like it is now. It’s enough to keep Daphne out, despite the fact that there are always lots of tasty crumbs under Connor’s chair.
Connor is at the computer now, focusing closely on the screen. He has his headphones on, so he doesn’t hear me come in. I’m pretty sure that he’s playing one of his strategy games until I get closer and see the spreadsheet he’s looking at.
I toss the formal dress from 1905 onto the chair next to him. He glances up, removing the headphones.
“Did you decide to do a bit of shopping in London?”
I give him a wry smile. “Does this look like something I’d buy? Your great-grandfather picked it out. I just need you to stash it with the other costumes for a while.” I nod toward the screen. “What’s this?”
He slides a bit to the side, and I pull up Katherine’s chair so that I can see. “It’s an updated—well, partially updated—version of the spreadsheet Trey’s father put together with summaries of the various Cyrist financial holdings. It’s . . . kind of puzzling.”
“How so?”
“Well, the existence of this—” Connor breaks off. He just stares at me for a minute, then mutters a curse under his breath. “Come on. I need some fresh air.”
I give him a baffled look and follow him downstairs, through the kitchen.
When I see the patio door, Connor’s motivation hits me—he can’t talk because of the surveillance.
I follow him into the backyard. I’m still barefoot, and the grass is wet, so I’m guessing we had an early evening shower. The bench swing is covered with droplets, too. Connor wipes the seat with the bottom of his shirt, and we both plop down.
“This is a pain in the ass,” he says softly. “I’ve ordered something that will counteract any conventional means they’re using to monitor the house. I’m going to check the post office box in the morning and see if it’s arrived. Anyway . . . what I was about to say. The existence of this Fifth Column kind of had me hoping that Cyrist International would be weaker. That they’d have been doing something from the inside. I mean, that’s sort of the point of a fifth column, right?”
I nod, and he goes on. “But from what I can tell, the Cyrists are stronger than ever. I’d say maybe ten percent larger, in terms of memb
ership, and maybe twenty percent richer. Their revenues exceed the GDP of some countries—decent-sized countries at that. Unlike a lot of other religions, that wealth is fairly concentrated at the central level.”
“And you’re wondering why that’s still the case, even after the Fifth Column?”
“No,” he says. “I’m wondering why it’s even more the case than before. That doesn’t make a lot of sense to me.” He shrugs. “Anyway, I take it you found your mom? And Trey found you?”
“Yes to both. But the situation with Mom is complicated. Where’s Katherine?”
“She went to bed a little early, but I doubt she’s asleep yet. I’ll go get her.” He pushes himself up off the swing. “There’s coffee, if you’d like. The weak froofy stuff you and Harry seem to enjoy.”
I snort, following him. “It’s not weak. We just prefer something that won’t eat a hole in the mug.”
Ten minutes later, I’m back on the swing with my coffee and a banana muffin that’s too stale to be very good, but I’m hungry and didn’t want to rummage around for anything else. Daphne comes bounding across the lawn, followed by Katherine, and Connor, who’s carrying a couple of chairs from the patio.
Daphne puts her head in my lap, along with one damp, grass-covered paw, so I use petting her as momentary excuse to avoid looking at Katherine. This is the second time in the past few days that I’ve come back from a mission with a sense of failure—first, failing to get the keys from Abel and Delia and now not convincing Mom to come back to DC. I can only hope that there will be a silver lining to this cloud as well, although Connor’s comment about the current strength levels of Cyrist International has me wondering whether that first silver lining is real.
This entire Fifth Column thing could be a trap. Maybe it’s Julia who can’t be trusted instead of Kiernan? Or maybe I can’t trust either of them.
I push all of that aside for now. Katherine is sitting across from me, holding the tablet and diary from my meeting with Julia in her lap, along with some papers and a green file folder with KATE’S HOMEWORK scrawled across the front in Connor’s handwriting. That brings a little smile to my lips, but it quickly disappears when I look back up at Katherine’s face.
“So,” she says, “when is Deborah coming home?”
“I told her everything. She’s not coming back.”
Katherine’s expression barely changes, but I can see the little light of hope in her eyes flicker out.
“She isn’t siding against us. It’s just . . . Mom thinks she can be of more use there, with Prudence, than she’ll be here. And she may be right.”
I spend the next few minutes recounting the events in Julia’s office, in London, my brief jump to 1905, and Kiernan’s odd behavior.
Katherine, who has been silent the entire time, finally speaks up when I get to the part about Kiernan. “Do you still trust him?”
“I . . . want to trust him. And I think I do, deep down. Were you able to pull up the video of Delia from the diary?”
Katherine shakes her head, looking a little embarrassed, and hands me the tablet and the diary. “I tried, but . . . I think the medicines interfere. Or maybe Fred himself.”
“Fred?”
“The tumor. I named it after the rabbiroo I had as a kid. Just like this tumor, he was a wicked little devil with a tendency to bite.”
Okay. I don’t really have a response to that, other than to ask what in hell a rabbiroo is. As that question seems likely to lead us away from the topic at hand, I just nod.
“No problem. I just thought you might be able to pick up something I didn’t, but the message was pretty straightforward. Delia said to trust my heart where Kiernan is concerned. Julia blames him for the death of her son—Max’s dad—so she’s not really seeing things in an unbiased fashion. And Trey thinks . . .”
I pause and glance at Katherine, unsure how she’ll react to me pulling in his assessment of the situation. But she just looks at me, eyebrows slightly raised, waiting for me to go on.
“Trey thinks we can trust him. He says he watched Kiernan the entire time we were at tea with Prudence, and he doesn’t believe Kiernan would do anything to hurt me. And yes, he’s basing that on just one meeting, but . . .”
“If anyone had an incentive to want you not to trust Kiernan, it would be Trey,” Connor says. “And he might be a better judge in this than you are, Kate. Trey isn’t comparing Kiernan to before. He’s looking at what’s there, what meets the eye now.” He wads up his empty chip bag and shoves it into his pocket. “I’m probably not the best judge either because I really don’t want to go back to thinking that my great-grandfather was . . . or is . . . an ass. So I hope Trey’s right.”
“Well, then,” Katherine says, “what’s next? Are you going back to Eastbourne to get the key from Houdini?”
I haven’t actually decided that yet, so I look up at the moths that are circling around the light by the garage door and take a moment to think it through. Maybe Trey is right and I should trust the inner voice that tells me Kiernan is still on our side. But I want more information about what’s been going on with the Fifth Column before I face him again. And I think I need a little more time to process the idea that, whether friend or foe, he’s no longer the person I knew. And the delay won’t make any difference to Kiernan, since when I do go back, it will be to the same moment that I left. He’s not standing around on the sidewalk waiting for me to arrive, although there’s a part of me that would be perfectly okay with that. Let Kiernan see how he likes being left hanging for a change.
“Not yet,” I say. “I’ll wait until after this meeting with Julia. Before I go, I want to dig into some of the files in the library—previous timeline stuff about Houdini.”
Katherine presses her lips into a tight line. “Do you think Julia will know you didn’t keep the promise about London?”
“I don’t know. She’s already annoyed at me anyway. I think she believed we’d just hand over the keys we’ve collected. On the video, Delia said they only have the one, so I guess that’s the one Max had last night. Let’s just say Julia wasn’t too happy when I told her we’d destroyed most of them.”
Connor is about to say something when a noise comes from his shirt pocket. It takes a moment, but I recognize it as the theme from Jaws. He pulls out his phone and glances at the screen, frowns, then puts it back.
“What was that?” I ask.
“The news alert I set up for when there’s a Cyrist-related event in the press. Nothing major—just one of Patterson’s judicial appointments confirmed by the Senate. What was I about to say?”
Katherine and I shake our heads, and then Connor remembers. “Oh. The medallions. I kept back two spares, like I said I would, if you think we’re better off with Julia under a key. If nothing else, it would be a peace offering in case she’s pissed.”
“Not a bad idea. But hey, if she knows about London and she’s angry, then she’s angry. Lying to her might not be the best foot to start out on, but she practically kidnapped me the other night, so she hasn’t been on her best behavior, either. Or maybe that is her best behavior. It’s kind of hard to say, when I know almost nothing about her.”
“I think I can help you there,” Connor says, taking the file folder and other items Katherine’s holding. “You can read the full file, but to sum up, Julia Morrell Waters is a big deal. Cyrist government liaison for two administrations prior to President Patterson—who’s now on her second term, by the way. Defeated the incumbent the first time she ran, instead of getting trounced. Waters is on the board of half a dozen foundations and frequent speaker at congressional hearings. She was also an ambassador during Patterson’s first term, but she’s retired now.”
I flip open the folder and pull out a picture of Julia, seated in front of an American flag. A tight semi-smile is the only break in her otherwise stern face.
I stare at the photograph, and again I feel a twinge of anxiety. I decide to give it voice and see what Katherine and Conno
r think.
“Here’s the thing that bothers me. Julia . . . she doesn’t seem like a nice person. Even her own mom kind of admitted that. Did you read the liability waiver she wants me to sign? Why would she include something to protect Cyrist International?”
“Maybe it was just a standard form?” Connor suggests. “One that she’s used for years, and she forgot to zap the Cyrist portion? You didn’t sign it, did you?”
“No! And I’m not going to. I’m not enlisting in her private army, and this isn’t a job. I just can’t help but wonder whether it goes deeper. Maybe she sold out? Maybe this Fifth Column thing is a trap?”
“Maybe,” Connor says. “Although it would be really, really dumb for her to leave the words ‘Cyrist International’ in the middle of that legal mumbo-jumbo if she’s working for them, wouldn’t it? She’d have to know that would put you on alert.”
“That’s true,” Katherine says. “Although, either way, it raises red flags for me, too.” She takes Julia’s picture from me and stares at it, like I did, as though a printout of an 8 by 10 photo could provide a glimpse into the woman’s soul.
After a moment, she shakes her head and hands it back to me. “Let’s look at this another way. If this Fifth Column is a trap, where does that leave us? From what Connor has told me, the Cyrists are stronger than ever, and we have no other allies. It won’t matter whether we walk into the trap or we wait until they bring the fight to us. Either way, the pooch is screwed.”
It’s such a totally un-Katherine-like thing to say that I choke on my coffee, trying to hold in a laugh. Connor doesn’t even bother to hold it in.
“What?” Katherine asks. “You disagree?”
“Nope,” Connor says, still smiling. “You’re right. If this is a trap, that pretty much sums it up.”
“Then why on earth would you find that amusing?” She shakes her head and looks at both of us before getting up to head back into the house. “You two have the strangest sense of humor sometimes.”