Distant Dreams

by Jenny Lykins

  She had no doubt now that she had somehow traveled to 1830. Since the moment she stepped out of the ship’s cabin, she hadn’t seen one single modern convenience. No telephones, no lightbulbs, no cars, no motorboats. The sky held no sign of airplanes. Indeed, the very air smelled cleaner, perfumed with the scent of ocean and flowers and whiffs of freshly scythed grass instead of car exhaust and cigarette smoke.

  And she had no doubt that the emerald and diamond ring stuck on her finger was the key to how she’d gotten to the past. Why else would Alec have recognized it? The ring was even responsible for keeping her a virtual prisoner at the home of a man who was far too charming for Shaelyn’s comfort. The last thing she needed was to fall for a guy from 1830. Talk about a different time zone.

  She shook off that rollercoaster feeling just the thought of his grin caused and concentrated on getting the ring off. Once it was off, she had a feeling that she would return to 1999.

  What were they thinking in her time? Had anyone even noticed she was gone? Had Pete gone looking for her and found nothing more than her tee shirt and jeans and cowboy boots?

  A tingly shock raced up the back of her neck. Pete wouldn’t find her clothes and boots because she’d had them on when she “traveled.” The memory of the ship pitching with such violence and the vertigo she’d felt after slipping on the ring came rushing back to her. The cabin had smelled fresher, looked lived in. The clothes had been Alec’s fiancée’s.

  If she hadn’t been convinced before that the ring had caused all this, she was now. She redoubled her efforts, wincing at how sore her finger had become from all the tugging.

  She sat atop a large boulder jutting from the sand and stared out at the islands dotting the horizon. She didn’t know how long she sat there, hours maybe, before she got that creepy feeling that someone was watching her.

  The tide had come in while she’d stared out to sea, and the shore was a good twenty feet behind her now. Alec stood at the edge of the water, his mood obviously different from when she’d left him. The glaring hadn’t returned, but he looked decidedly uncomfortable.

  She stood up on the rock she’d perched on and scanned the water. No way around it, she was going to have to wade back to shore. After slipping off the old-fashioned shoes that were a tad too big, she hiked up her gown, threw it over her arm, sat back down, and inched her way off the rock.

  “Stay there,” he called, but the water lapping around the boulder drowned out anything else he said. Shaelyn, of course, ignored him, then lowered her head as she picked her way across the slippery rock bottom.

  “I told you to stay there!”

  When he grabbed her arm she started so violently she lost her balance. Alec grappled with her, both of them thigh deep in the water, and then she went down, dragging him with her. She came up laughing, he came up sputtering.

  “Blast it all! I told you to stay put! I would have carried you to shore.”

  “Oh, really! I was doing fine until you started helping.” She laughed and raked a handful of clinging, spiderweb hair from her cheeks, then automatically reached up and smoothed an inky, dripping spike from his forehead.

  The moment her fingers touched his face, she knew it was a mistake. His angry gaze softened, and they stared at each other while cool waves tugged at her skirts. His eyes gentled more than she would have ever dreamed they could, and her fingers ached to trace the outline of a jaw that would do a sculptor proud. Don’t kiss me, she thought. I don’t need to make this complicated.

  Would his kiss taste as good as he looked?

  His head slowly bent toward hers, and against her better judgment she lifted her face to meet him.

  A moment of confusion lit in his eyes, then he jerked upright and plowed his fingers through his dripping hair as he spoke to a point above her left shoulder.

  “You should get out of that wet gown. You’ll catch your death.” Without waiting for a comment, he grasped her elbow and guided her toward shore.

  Shaelyn stumbled on her hem until she yanked her arm back, wadded the fabric in her hands, then trudged across the submerged rocks alone, numb with rejection.

  She didn’t need this. She didn’t need to be stuck in the past, with this man who ran hot and cold toward her. She didn’t need to have this big, empty feeling in the center of her chest.

  She needed to get home.

  “Shaelyn, wait!”

  Alec took her arm again just as they reached the shore. Shae dropped her sodden skirts and pasted a neutral, inquisitive look on her face before turning around.

  He bowed his head and massaged his brow before speaking. “I’m sorry about…” He shook his head. “I came out here to tell you that my solicitor will be back from Boston in three days. I’ll apply for the annulment then.”

  She nodded, then turned back toward the house, ignoring the little drop her heart had taken.

  “I’m sorry I’ve put you through this.” His words stopped her and she turned back once more. “I had no right to do what I did.”

  Shae sensed this was a man who did not often apologize. It touched her that he chose to do so now.

  “I’ve never thought to ask,” he continued. “You must have family or friends you were meeting. They must be worried.”

  She studied the rock-strewn beach while she shook out her dripping skirts. How could she tell him the truth?

  “No. No one,” she said, then looked up to meet his gaze. “I have no one here.”

  He seemed uncomfortable with the honesty of her statement. After tugging on the wet collar of his shirt and searching the sky for a moment, he swung his gaze back to her and gave her a hesitant grin.

  “I could be your friend. After all, I am your husband.” He shrugged like a little boy in trouble. A devastatingly handsome little boy who made all the little girls’ hearts flutter.

  A smile of her own tugged at her lips while she ignored the butterflies that grin caused.

  “You have a point, I suppose. I could use a friend right now. After all, I’m getting an annulment. And I’m not going anywhere until I get this ring off my finger.”

  “An unreasonable blackguard surely, who has put you in this position.” Alec took her arm and they started back down the beach.

  Shaelyn shook her head and shrugged with a smile. “And a confused one. The poor man isn’t even sure what his name is.”

  He cringed at that, then laughed. With the sound, her heart rose back in her chest, and for the first time since the carriage ride there, she had a lightness to her step.

  “Can I ask you something?”

  He helped her over a large cluster of rocks. “I am an open book.”

  She waited until she had solid footing before posing the question.

  “Why did you do it? Why did you marry someone you didn’t know?”

  Alec clamped his hands behind his back and stared at the rocky shore as they walked.

  “I’m afraid you’ll not think better of me when the story’s told.”

  “Hey, you don’t have much to lose,” she teased. He swiveled his head and stared down at her until she gave him enough of a smile to ease his conscious. He drew in a deep breath and let it out.

  “I was trying to kill two birds with one stone, so to speak. Give my father another branch on the family tree of heirs, and free Charles to marry the woman he loves.”

  Shaelyn listened, astounded at Alec’s story. If she had not already concluded that she had somehow traveled to 1830, she had no doubts about it now. Arranged marriages, fathers joining businesses via their children, creating business dynasties.

  If not for the death of Alec’s fiancée, he would already be a married man and Charles still would have been free to marry whomever he wished. At least Shaelyn could thankfully see no connection with her appearance there and the cause of Phillipa’s death. Would anyone who slipped that ring on travel through time? Apparently not, if Phillipa had worn it. If Shaelyn managed to get the ring off her finger, would she go back to her own ti
me? And if so, would the same amount of time have passed? Would she remember where she’d been? How many other people had experienced time travel?

  Her mind spun with more questions than she would ever have answers to. But one thing she felt instinctually was that the ring had brought her to Alec; that another woman might have slipped the ring on in 1999 and never felt the vertigo, never opened her eyes in another time, never felt more than pride at the beautiful, antique diamond and emerald jewelry adorning her hand.

  Alec’s hand steadied her arm as he helped her over another patch of large rocks. She glanced up at him to smile her thanks, then froze.

  Wave after wave of dèjá vu washed over her like the ocean washing over the rocks on the shore. She’d been here before, seen this picture of Alec, lived this moment in time. She’d heard the water lapping against the beach, seen the clouds skimming across the sky. Alec’s face would turn to her, smile, then turn serious. He would ask her if she was quite well.

  “Shaelyn, are you quite well?”

  She blinked and studied his face more. She’d dreamed this. His was one of the faces in the dream that always left her crying. Alec’s face, and Charles’. And Alec’s parents. These were the faces in her memories. Memories of people she’d never met.

  “Shaelyn, are you well?”

  In the distance there would be a cry of a bird, and the sun would come from behind a cloud to glint off Alec’s softly blowing hair like sunshine on black, rippling silk. His golden eyes would catch the light and come alive with sparkles.

  Blood roared in her ears when the bird called out. A dizzying tingle crept from the pit of her stomach to the top of her head when the cloud blocking the sun scudded across the sky, lighting his eyes with an inner glow, bouncing black diamonds off ebony strands of hair.

  The dèjá vu passed then, the sense of precognition gone. But she knew now that she’d been destined to live through this. From the moment of her birth to unknown parents, fate had guided her to this moment in time. And all she could think about was the tortured anguish that drove her from her sleep when the dream came and left her aching with an emptiness that tore at her soul. Would she relive all of her bouts of dèjá vu now, here in the past?

  She looked away from Alec and continued their walk.

  “Tell me about the ring, Alec.” She tried to keep her voice calm, conversational, with no trace of the apprehension tumbling in her chest. “Was it new, or is there some history to it?”

  Alec took her arm as he guided her toward the path away from the beach. That simple touch soothed her soul and eased the roaring in her ears.

  “The ring most certainly isn’t new. However, no one knows the true story behind it. It is said to be an heirloom handed down from Celtic ancestors. The last owner was a great aunt who, kindly worded, was more than a little eccentric. She used to spin tales about the ring having powers, changing lives. No one paid heed to her words. She was never the same after her husband disappeared. I would not be surprised to find that she acquired the ring from a jeweler, then fabricated the Celtic ancestors and all the other stories from her poor deranged mind.”

  Shaelyn tried to stop her hand from trembling as she splayed her fingers to look at the ring. The setting wasn’t particularly feminine. A man quite possibly would have worn the ring on his little finger, especially in the days when men wore white makeup, rouge, and beauty patches. Had the great aunt’s husband come from another time, taken the ring off, and returned to his time?

  She tugged again at the circlet on her finger.

  “Don’t.” Alec stopped her by taking her hands in his. “Your finger is red and swollen. You’ll do more harm than good. There is no rush now. I know you had no intentions of stealing it. This whole debacle is my doing.”

  She let him continue to labor under that misconception for the time being. Now wasn’t the time to explain exactly when she’d put the ring on.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  “You have put me in a pickle, Alec Christopher.” His mother sat across from him with her teacup daintily hovering at her lips. He noticed more silver strands threading her jet black hair, but her skin still looked as youthful as a girl’s. “If she attends the masquerade ball, do we introduce her as your wife? And, if so, how do we explain the annulment later? Do we introduce her as a family friend? Do we simply not invite her? Your father, of course, insists she not come. This is a pickle, Alec Christopher.”

  Alec tossed back the last of his tea and wished it was something stronger. Masquerade balls. With everything else, with the latest shipment to meet, he now had to worry about a masquerade ball. But he could little complain. He’d brought the mess upon himself.

  “Excuse me.” Shaelyn stepped into the room, pink staining her cheeks, looking fresh and touchable in a gown of palest blue in some summery, wispy fabric. She must be making the contents of Phillipa’s trunks available to herself, since he knew she’d sent for no other clothing. He would have to order her more garments, or make sure she sent for her own. He would send for a seamstress immediately. “I...I overheard the conversation as I was coming down the stairs.”

  His mother made a little apologetic squeak and suddenly found it necessary to pour another cup of tea.

  “Anyway, I thought I could solve your problem for you. You don’t have to invite me. In fact, I’d rather you didn’t. I don’t know anyone. I...well, it would just be simpler for everyone if I wasn’t there.”

  “I didn’t mean to imply that you are not welcome, dear,” Jane insisted. “It is just so...confusing. And Mr. Hawthorne is being so fussy about the whole matter.”

  When Shaelyn smiled, a fist squeezed Alec’s heart.

  “Shaelyn, we will bow to your wishes, since I am the one who put you in this awkward position,” he offered. “If you wish to attend, you shall attend. If you would prefer not, we will not expect you to - ”

  “Well, the newlyweds. What a charming picture.”

  Griffin marched through the parlor doors, slapping his riding gloves against his palm. A long-suffering Martin followed him.

  “Mr. Elliott is here to see you, sir,” Martin intoned, determined as ever to observe propriety.

  “Thank you, Martin. Show him in,” Alec returned with the same degree of formality. If he didn’t know better, he would have imagined a twitch to Martin’s lips before the butler left the room.

  One glance at Griffin told Alec that his friend had already somehow gleaned the turn of events taken in Alec’s fiasco of a marriage. Oh yes, the heavens had most likely gone for centuries without so much to keep them amused.

  “Mrs. Hawthorne and Mrs. Hawthorne.” He seemed to stress the name when he bowed toward Shaelyn. “May I compliment the two of you on your loveliness this morning?”

  “How kind of you, Mr. Elliott,” Alec’s mother said with a smile.

  Shaelyn merely gave him a distracted nod. Somehow her lack of interest pleased Alec. Women always threw themselves at Griffin, waxing poetic about his lovely blue eyes and shiny dark hair or some such twaddle. That Shaelyn hadn’t fallen under his spell no doubt tweaked at his friend’s self-confidence. Not that Griffin’s confidence could be dented with anything less than a kick from a Clydesdale.

  “Alec, I have some business to talk over, and there is no sense in boring the ladies.” He bowed to the women, winked roguishly at Alec’s mother, then strode toward the library.

  Perhaps not even a Clydesdale’s kick.

  Alec excused himself and followed Griffin, trying to put Shaelyn from his mind. No doubt his friend had news of the next shipload of smuggled goods.

  The moment the door closed behind him, Griffin dropped into a chair and cast a lazy gaze at Alec, but the look did little to hide his true concern.

  “Your father will have your head over this if he ever finds out.”

  Alec lowered himself into the leather chair behind the desk.

  “At this moment in time, I am not all together certain that he isn’t welcome to it. What news have you?”<
br />
  Griffin pulled a crisp piece of vellum from within his coat and unfolded it.

  “The shipment is to be unloaded at the next dark of the moon. Really Alec,” he tossed the scrap of paper onto the desk and assumed his casual rogue facade, “are you not tiring of this little game? If you mean to continue, we should at the very least devise a name for you, so that you can gain a reputation. Let me see,” Griffin tapped his temple with his forefinger, “Robin Hood has been taken. So has the Swamp Fox. I know!” He snapped his fingers. “The Black and White Puffin!”

  Alec had to force the deadpan stare at Griffin’s outrageous suggestion. But only Griffin would have the audacity to suggest he call himself after the silly-looking bird that lived along the coast.

  “Actually,” he picked up the piece of paper from his desk and scanned the message, “if you even suggest that again, you shall be able to call yourself the Black and Blue Puffin, from the beating I will give you.”

  Griffin cocked an eyebrow at him. “Indeed? Which means that you would then have to settle for being known as the Severely Bruised...something or other.” He waved his hand like the dilettante he loved to pretend to be. Obviously tiring of the banter, he leaned forward and pointed at the message.

  “You have less than a week to sail to Maryland and meet the shipment, then get back here in time for your parents’ ball. You’ll not be able to explain your way out of missing the event.”

  Alec rummaged in his desk for the almanac, found the date for the new moon, then calculated in his head.

  “If we leave tonight, we should be back in time enough not to raise questions.”

  “And what of your new wife? Will she not find the disappearance of her dear husband suspicious, especially when he fails to slip between her sheets to warm away the chill?”

  Alec resisted the urge to throw something at his friend.

  “Do not play the fool with me, Elliott. It’s obvious that you are well aware of the turn these events have taken. I would like to know, however, how you came by such knowledge.”