[The Shifters Committee 01.0] Time Shifters

by Rebecca Foxx

  “No. No, I didn’t commit any crime.”

  “Ha! Well then you’re just like most of the men in here, aren’t you? Never committed a crime. Your head ever get to feeling heavy from lugging that halo around?”

  No,” he said in a grim voice that came through gritted teeth, “I’m not saying I’ve never committed a crime. I’ve done the usual things, driven home when I was too drunk, maybe stolen a pack of gum or even a six pack of beer when I was young. But this crime, this particular crime that I’m in here for, this is something I didn’t do. You can laugh all you want. I don’t care if you believe me. You aren’t the one who needs to believe me.”

  “So what are you planning on doing about it?”

  “What does anybody do about it? I’ll talk to my lawyer, go through the appeals. I’ll do what you’re supposed to do.”

  “And they’ll see that they were all wrong and you were innocent all along.”

  “Clearly you don’t buy it.”

  “Well according to you, I don’t have to buy it. You’ve got your fancy lawyer, right? That’s the only one you need to believe you, right? Why do you care if I don’t buy it?”

  “I don’t care” Michael said defensively, cringing inside at how clear it was that he did. For some reason, he cared a whole lot. He couldn’t say why with a hundred percent certainty, but his guess was that it had something to do with how many people had been so quick to believe the absolute worst out of him. It had been appalling, how fast everyone had turned on him.

  People who had sucked up to him for years, people who he had genuinely believed to be his friends, they had all gleefully joined in the witch hunt against him, more than willing to lock him up forever and throw watching parties when anything aired about his trial. That was a real thing. He wasn’t making that part up.

  The people in his office had actually gotten together and thrown parties, sometimes in the office and sometimes in the closest bar, to toast his misfortune. What kind of people did a thing like that? What kind of people took so much pleasure in the misfortune of a fallen brother?

  Except that he knew from experience that it was something a lot of people did. If he was being honest with himself, he had done it on more than one occasion himself. It was kind of the American way, wasn’t it? People loved to watch a person rise to prominence almost as much as they loved to watch that same person fall.

  “I think you do,” Alastair said, looking at him so closely it was beginning to make Michael feel a tad bit uncomfortable, “I think you care very much. Because it never crossed your mind that something like this could happen, did it?”

  “No!” Michael shouted, finally losing what little grip on his cool that he had left, “Of course it didn’t! What kind of innocent person walks around thinking that he might be falsely accused of corporate fraud? Only guilty people worry about a thing like that! I never did anything I shouldn’t have in my business. I took pride in my work, I still would if I wasn’t locked up in here.”

  “Than you really are innocent.”

  This last was delivered more as a statement than a question and the change in tone left Michael feeling suddenly very tired, tired and drained of fight. He sat down heavily on the dirty cot that was supposed to pass as a bed and nodded his head wearily before hanging it between his hands.

  He had fought so hard to prove his innocence and, in the end, it hadn’t mattered in the slightest. He had fought and they had locked him up anyway and as much as he talked about working with his lawyer on an appeal, in his heart of hearts he knew that wasn’t going to work, either. What would they do in an appeal that they hadn’t already attempted in his trial? What could they say that would change the minds of an entire country who had long ago decided his guilt? It seemed utterly hopeless. He might as well just begin to adapt, to understand that this place was going to be his home for the next ten years.

  “Ah, there it is.”

  “There what is?” Michael asked in a dead voice. He was rapidly beginning to dislike this man. He may have had all of the wisdom of a seasoned prison veteran, but this Yoda crap was starting to get a little bit old.

  “That face. That look. You’ve given up now, haven’t you? You’ve realized what it means that you’re in here. We are the forgotten people, you know, the ones that almost nobody cares to think of again.”

  “So there isn’t any hope, right? That’s the lesson I’m supposed to learn?”

  “I don’t know what you’re supposed to learn. I’m not god, am I? But I can tell you one thing. If I were you, I would start relying on my lawyer. They don’t give a shit about you, they only want to get paid. So I would stop relying on my lawyer and I would start doing some real, deep thinking. If the person you hired isn’t going to help you, then by god, you help yourself. You do whatever you can to find the person really responsible for the crime you’re in here for and if you’re really lucky, you enlist the help of someone on the outside. You take your future into your own hands and you bust yourself out of here.”

  Michael looked up quickly, feeling the most enormous amount of gratitude for this strange old man. What a moron he was never to have considered that option before! He could do that. He had the time for it, after all.

  And if he was lucky, if he knew his wife as well as he hoped and believed he did, she would be the person on the outside to help him. She would be the one to help prove his innocence and finally put an end to this nightmare. Kayla would be the one to bring him home.

  Chapter Four

  “Moira, will you just listen to me? Why are you so convinced that this isn’t possible? I don’t understand you, I really don’t. It’s like you want me to be married to a man locked up in prison. Is that it? Is there some reason you want him to be guilty that you just haven’t told me yet?”

  “No, Kayla, come on. That’s ludicrous.”

  “Is it? Because I don’t think so. You haven’t once given Michael the slightest benefit of the doubt that he didn’t do this thing. From the very beginning, almost from the day he was arrested, you’ve talked to me about my ‘options.’ I love you Moira, you’re my sister, of course I do. But I love Michael, too, and I took a vow.”

  “So you would choose a vow over me?”

  “No, it isn’t like that. It isn’t just the vow. I searched everything inside of me, I even tried to believe that he did this thing, and I couldn’t do it. For me, that’s how I know he’s innocent. And I have no desire to choose between the two of you. You’re the one putting me in that position. If you don’t want things to meet that end, don’t push me towards it.”

  “Ok.”

  “Ok?”

  “Yes, ok. You’re right. I guess I’m not being fair. I just love you and you’re so far away from me. I want to take care of you and I can’t. I guess it makes me a little bit crazy, but it isn’t right for me to behave the way I have. I’m just afraid for you, that’s all. I don’t know what you’re going to do.”

  “Don’t worry about that,” Kayla said with a grim voice and a little mirthless smile only she could see.

  “Uh oh, that sounds cryptic. What does that mean? What are you going to do?”

  “I’m going to prove my husband’s innocence. I’m going to get the proof I need to put the person who really did this behind bars.”

  “Kayla, sweetheart, I can’t tell you how happy I was to hear from you. I have to say, I wasn’t sure I would ever see you again after everything that happened. I’ve thought about it, about you, quite often.”

  “Do you mean you’ve been thinking about Michael?”

  “No, I mean I’ve been thinking about you.”

  “Well then, It’s a good thing I got in touch with you.”

  The man standing next to her at the swanky East Village bar gave her a smile that was beyond smooth and moved into her ever so slightly. The smell of his obviously expensive and trying too hard cologne washed over her like an assault and she did everything she could not to wrinkle her nose or otherwise indicate how unp
leasant she felt his proximity to be.

  The man was Sloan Jackman and he was Michael’s business partner. The two had known each other for close to a decade, had worked side by side in every capacity. Michael had always loved Sloan, had stood by his side when he went through a nasty divorce, holding his hand every time he fell apart.

  Kayla had never been nearly as fond of him as Michael was, but she had kept her mouth shut because she had always been told that badmouthing your husband’s friends was a very bad idea. But when Michael had been taken down, all of strange hunches about Sloan had been proven justified.

  After all of the times Michael had stood by him with, he turned on him so fast that thinking about it still made her head spin. So when Kayla had received those unexpected and urgent letters from Michael desperately insisting that it was Sloan, not him, who committed the crimes he was in jail for, she was more than ready to believe him.

  She just knew it was true, without any shadow of a doubt. Not only that, she was ashamed of herself for ever having doubted Michael’s innocence in the slightest and felt compelled to make up for it. The best and only way she could think of to do that was to help prove that he had not committed the crime. There was absolutely nothing she could think of that she wouldn’t do to get him freed, and that included spending time with Sloan.

  Being in this bar next to him, however, was a harsh reminder of just how much she disliked the man and she bit the inside of her lips to keep from saying anything that would jeopardize what she had come here to do in the first place. Pissing him off wasn’t part of that plan. Far from it, actually. She needed him to want her and want her badly, hopefully badly enough to do something that might trip him up.

  “So, what should we drink to?” he asked with a repulsive grin.

  “How about we drink to freedom?”

  “Ha! Freedom. I love it. It’s so naughty. Clever girl, I must say.”

  “I aim to please. Now what are we drinking?”

  “Martinis. That is still your favorite, am I right?”

  “Oh god, I can’t believe you still remember that! Is it from that one night?”

  “At Sullivan’s, yes! I can’t believe you remember. Those martinis kicked your ass. That’s when I discovered how flirtatious you get after a few drinks.”

  “Oh lord,” she said, covering her face with her palms to hide her total disgust at even the thought of him thinking about her in that way, “did I come on to you? How terribly embarrassing.”

  “No, don’t worry. You were the perfect picture of decorum. That doesn’t mean I wasn’t wishing it was me instead of Michael. Because believe me, I was. And now, just like your clever little toast stated, we’re free to do whatever we feel like. Now we get to see where things can go when we get to have a little fun.”

  “Absolutely,” she said, taking a large gulp of her drink, “I’m looking forward to it.”

  “So here it is, baby, the infamous bachelor pad. What do you think? Please tell me it’s good because I paid my decorator a fortune.”

  It was a lucky thing Kayla hadn’t had that last martini because if she had she might have told him exactly what she thought about his place, which was nothing good. Everything was black leather and deep reds and chrome bars stocked as well as the nicest bar in New York. The whole place was designed to get a certain kind of woman to drop her clothes to the floor, and it probably worked on some of them, too.

  The fact that Sloan didn’t realize she wasn’t that kind of woman was just further proof that he would never have been able to get her here had she not needed access to his most private records. Now she just needed to get him to let her make him one last drink, this one with a special extra ingredient.

  “Sloan,” she said in her best seductive voice, “would you be a doll and pick us out some music? I’m going to show you what a mean martini I make. What do you say?”

  “I say I’m a lucky man to finally have you in my place. Michael never did know how to handle you. Good thing I now I get to take my turn.”

  She smiled, unable to think of anything she could say that wouldn’t be nasty, and quickly moved behind the bar. She whipped up the drink in no time flat, adding the seriously strong sleeping pill she was relying on her to help her get what she needed.

  She was beyond nervous, knowing that it might not work, wondering how far she would have to take things with Sloan before he passed out, but there was no doubt in her mind that she was doing the right thing. She just had to get him to drink her little surprise, and the quicker the better.

  “Alright baby, here it is, my best tunes. What do you say? You ready to get a little dirty with me?”

  “Sure,” she said playfully, “as long as you drink this first.”

  “I don’t need anymore lubricant, do you?”

  “Aw,” she said with lip poked out, desperate to get him to just drink the damned thing, “but I made it just for you.”

  “Alright, sugar, I’ll drink it if that’s what you want.”

  To her extreme joy, he drank the whole thing in one giant gulp, tossing the glass aside as if it didn’t matter at all. She supposed with all of the money he had, it didn’t. He slid his hands over her full hips, her ample breasts, finally plunging them into her hair and pulling her head back roughly.

  She gasped, in pain, not pleasure, and he shoved his tongue into her mouth like he was going on some kind of an exploratory expedition. It was disgusting and she fought hard not to gag right then and there, but she got herself under control and steered the two of them towards the couch.

  True, he was pretty much the scum of the earth, but that didn’t mean she wanted him to crack his skull open and she knew he was going to pass out any minute now. She pushed him down onto the soft leather, kneeling before him suggestively and running her hands up the insides of his thighs. He laughed and closed his eyes, putting his hands back behind his head.

  “Michael Bends’ wife, holy shit. I’m going to fuck you better than he ever did and you’re going to know I was the better choice all along.”

  She grabbed his belt buckle and deftly unclasped it, running her hand along the very edge of his already prominent erection. He made a little murmuring sound, only something about this one seemed different. She looked at him again and saw that his head was beginning to slump to one side.

  It had worked. She checked his breathing and saw that everything was normal. It was, he was just out cold. She sincerely hoped that he would wake up with a mean hangover and sprinted as quickly as she could to what she hoped was his home office.

  Apparently lightning struck twice for her that night because the first room she ran into was the one she needed to find. She took every flash drive she could find and left quickly, ready to get as far away from Sloan and his crooked ways as she possibly could.

  Chapter Five

  “Kayla! Jesus, I can’t believe you came! When they told me I had someone here for a conjugal visit I thought it was some kind of a sick joke, you know? I never thought it would actually be you! You didn’t have to, you know? You didn’t have to come here. God, I can’t even stand the idea of you being in a place like this! Which isn’t to say I’m not glad to have you here because honest to god, I don’t think I’ve ever been so glad of anything in my entire life.”

  “Michael?”

  “Yes?”

  “Why don’t you just shut up for a minute?”

  Michael was stunned. In all of the years he had known Kayla, she had never spoken to him that way. Not even close. For a moment he thought she was just that furious with him, but the look on her face wasn’t angry at all. Honestly, she looked ecstatic to see him.

  The whole thing was very confusing for him. He was worried that whatever he did next was going to be the wrong thing. But then she was rushing towards him, the intoxicating scent of her perfume wafting towards him as she wrapped her arms around him, pulling his head in towards him in a move that was much more aggressive than her standard modus of operation. Michael was all for
it.

  The feeling of her lips on his was like heaven. It was even enough to make him forget that he was in jail, at least for the moment. Even being in a shitty place like this, he had never wanted Kayla more. Everything about her was like being home, the curve of her hips gliding beneath his trembling hands, the swell of her breasts pushing against his chest.

  She was too good for this place and he knew it, but he was too weak. Too weak to resist this one piece of happiness in a life that had recently been nothing but hard. Instead of telling her she didn’t have to do this thing he pulled her even closer, trying to take every part of her in all at one time, his senses so overwhelmed it was almost too much for him to take.

  His hands moved over her full, firm ass and up to the small of her back, over the nape of her neck and to the lobe of her ears, the secret spot he knew she couldn’t resist. Her body shuddered and she let out a gasp of pleasure, her head rocking backward and her hands moving over his chest.