Chasing Time

by Mia Downing

  I opened my eyes. “She had been crying, her face tear-stained and…I don’t know. Dirty? She had a bruise on her cheek, and when I asked about it, she said she’d fallen on the way home.”

  This Skye paled a little as she yanked her hand from the book to clasp it with her other on her lap. “How did she react to you being gone?”

  I closed my eyes again as I ran through the events again, cocking my head with confusion as I opened my eyes. “You know, she wasn’t as upset as I thought she would have been. I had expected her to scream and yell and cry. She hadn’t. She was almost…resigned.”

  “What did she say?”

  “That it was my right to choose, and she wanted to get going.” That had made me feel cheap and dirty. “She was emphatic that we procure the necklace immediately. She wanted to go to the point and jump ahead a few hours to make the low tide.”

  “And was that unusual?”

  “Very. The plan was to rest and wait until evening to go to the point. We never strayed from the plan if things were going right.” But given the questions my Skye was asking, it made me wonder if something more had gone wrong. “I didn’t feel well still, but she pushed hard to leave.”

  Her lips pursed as she thought about that. “Would she usually risk jumping with you not feeling well? And why jump from the point?”

  “She thought I felt well enough through the bond. And we can jump short distances from anywhere, just like I just did here. Longer distances work better with the guidance of a jump stone. Plus, you can’t be sure what is in a different location in a different time. Graves don’t change during time. But for example, the point is different now than it was in 1892. The beach doesn’t exist back then. If we jumped from the beach, we’d end up on a cliff or under water.”

  “Okay. That makes sense.” She gestured with a hand. “So how did she push you to go?”

  “Well, she had everything packed—we each had a bag—so we didn’t have to return. She wanted to get the necklace, then jump ahead again to a few days. She didn’t want to go right to the graveyard for the long jump, and she didn’t want to stop at the house.”

  I’d thought she’d packed because I’d shredded her soul, but looking back, her actions didn’t make sense. My Skye would have screamed at me; instead, she’d packed and made other plans that made no sense to me.

  “What was her reasoning for that?”

  I sighed, my brain aching. “She said it wasn’t safe to stay and jumping ahead would be safer. And that was all she said, no matter how I questioned her about it. She grabbed the bags and headed out, not even waiting for me. It was dawn. I scrambled to catch up.” I remember panting after her, trying to take the bags from her as she limped along the woods path that led to the point. “Wait. She was limping a little. She had said her boot was rubbing.”

  “Which foot?”

  “Right? Does it matter?” I touched my Skye’s pale cheek. I didn’t think she could get much more pallid, but she did. “You’re not looking well.”

  “It’s cold in here.” She shrugged, rubbed her arms in her dark-blue sweater as if to show me it was cold, and gestured for me to continue.

  I tried to refocus on that hazy, jumbled night. “Somehow, we made it to the point and jumped ahead to the low tide, just after dark. The necklace had been easy to procure…but it all feels like a blur. I don’t remember it. She just kept urging me on, reminding me it wasn’t safe. I thought she meant because we had a strict deadline with the tides, and things could get dangerous quickly.” But what had she meant?

  I shook my head. “After, we jumped ahead a few days then walked through the woods to the cemetery under the cover of darkness. And that’s when things went wrong.”

  “Wrong?” My Skye sat a little taller. “What do you mean?”

  I swallowed, afraid to go on, but I had to tell her how I’d failed her. How she’d come to be a fracture. “Someone was waiting on the path to the cemetery and jumped us with a knife. I sent her to hide at the mausoleum while I took care of that threat.”

  Her eyes went wide and round. After a moment, she said, “Wait. You—”

  “Don’t ask questions you don’t want to know the real answers to.” I’d killed a few bad men to save her life. I felt no guilt. I refused to start now.

  “Didn’t that change the timeline?”

  “No.” Bad men dying rarely changed the timeline for some reason. Maybe I just headed off what was coming for him quicker.

  But I had to get this storytelling back on track so I could just tell her and end the guilt. “So I headed to the back of the cemetery, and I tried to locate her through the bond. She was so much better at it than I ever was, but I suddenly couldn’t feel her and then…a gun went off.”

  My heart raced as the memory echoed in my ears. “I ran and found her near our jump stone, and a man lay nearby, dead. He’d jumped her, and she’d stabbed him. He’d shot her as he went down. So much blood, so fast.” I could still smell the tang of it, feel the sticky wetness as it drenched the front of her dress.

  I shook my head. “I had no clue what to do as I tried to stop the bleeding, but she begged me to jump, or we’d die. She didn’t say if there were more men coming, or what had happened to her. There wasn’t time. So I gathered her in my arms and jumped.”

  There. Finally. I sagged in the chair as the guilt oozed from me. I had thought writing the book would purge that from my system, but no. It felt good to finally admit my failures.

  I glanced at Skye’s stunned face. “I’m sorry.”

  “Someone shot her. What happened when you landed here?”

  “Jumping through time healed the bullet wound. I don’t know why. They didn’t teach us that.”

  Her hand went to her left hip, over her scar. “When I brought up my scar before, you never said anything.”

  I winced at the accusation in her tone. “I’ve tried to talk about that night. If you recall, you didn’t want to hear about it.”

  Her chest heaved with a deep breath followed by a long sigh. “True.”

  “I just wanted to save her life.” I grabbed her cold hand in mine, clutching it as if doing so would make her understand. “My thought was if we jumped to a more modern time, I could get her to a hospital. I didn’t know jumping with her injured would cause a fracture but would also heal the wound.”

  Her eyes closed for a moment. I wished I could feel her bond to see the depth of her emotions, but she’d shielded herself when I jumped earlier. But even shielded, she couldn’t hide the fatigue and sadness as she opened her eyes. “Before you entered the cemetery, could you feel the bond?”

  “It’s not something I search for, so I don’t know. And not being well, my senses were dulled. But I know I couldn’t feel her when I searched for her after I heard the gunshot.”

  Her teeth worried at her bottom lip in that familiar way, the one that said she had a problem to solve. “But she’d written this letter and put it in the secret box. That implied she’d broken the bond earlier since she packed your stuff and made you leave. That doesn’t really line up with the facts.”

  “No.” I rubbed my chin, the beard still unfamiliar under my fingertips. “So why would she do that?”

  “I guess you’ll get some answers in a week.”

  “Speaking of that…” I wanted her to go so badly. Please, please don’t send me away.

  Pursing her lips, she shook her head. “You gave me way too much to think about tonight. I can’t give you an answer yet.”

  “When?” The pressure of time weighed heavily on my shoulders, replacing the stress of telling her the truth. Wasn’t that the way? Admit to one guilt, and more would take its place.

  She shook her head again. A few coppery strands had escaped her ponytail to frame her pale face, and she looked younger and more vulnerable than ever. “I need time, Marek. You’ve given me a lot to think about with very few options. I feel trapped.”

  “I’m sorry.” I didn’t want that. Not at all. I want
ed her to experience the joy I felt to be bonded to her, to love her, not feel trapped and terrified by the bond and all that I brought with it.

  Squeezing my hand, she rose from the chair. With a sad glance at her hand covering mine, she let go. “Just promise me you’ll stick to the plan you have in place. You said the Ides of March, right?”

  “Yes.” My throat tightened. But if she didn’t want to go, I didn’t want to stay here until then.

  “You have to promise me that no matter what, you will wait until then to leave, okay? And if I go or don’t go, I’ll be here for you either way. Do you understand?”

  “Skye—”

  “Promise me.” It came out as a hoarse, desperate whisper, one that sliced my heart and made me bleed internally.

  I had no choice. I loved her. I’d promise her anything at this point. “Okay. I promise. I’ll leave exactly at one in the morning. How’s that for a specific plan?”

  “Good. I have to go home and think about this. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

  And before I could say anything or apologize, she fled.

  Chapter eighteen

  Skye

  I glanced at the clock for the millionth time—four in the morning. I couldn’t even blame this on the dreams. One had to fall asleep to have nightmares.

  After leaving Marek’s, I’d bundled into a warm coat and crept over to the cemetery. I’d sat on Ike Benson’s freezing-cold headstone that served as a bench and considered M.S. Storm’s stone with sad, fresh eyes. They’d used that stone to travel to countless decades and years, stealing God-knew what only for her to end up shot. She’d nearly bled out on the frozen patch of grass I stared at. If I chose to believe Marek, I bore the scars of that tragedy.

  By asking the right questions, I’d learned a lot from Marek. That poor, confused guy had blamed himself like a sacrificial cow for her. But if the dreams were right, Skye had suffered at the hands of someone else while he slept off whatever they’d given him. She’d cut her right ankle while slicing through those bonds; I’d felt it. And though I’d dreamed of her capture, I hadn’t seen what had come next. I had no clue what happened between there and her being shot other than they stole a necklace. That lack of knowledge scared me.

  Because what if that dream contained more lies?

  The old Skye had written that note, and for some reason, she’d hidden the missive and then lied through her teeth to the man she loved.

  And what about the bond she’d severed? Why would she do that if she knew the dangers that revolved around jumping through time? If she had severed it at the house before Marek had returned from the party, why hadn’t she fractured the other times they jumped at the point? Had her injury upped the fracture risk?

  It made no sense.

  This had been an unbelievable whirlwind since the fateful day I’d seen Marek loitering outside the bakery in October. The exhaustion lingered in my bones, making me feel as if I’d been run over by a time traveling steam roller. Somehow, Marek had plotted and planned all of this, right down to the very details of next week.

  I shifted in bed, turning away from the window. Was that all I was, a part of his plan? He said he had learned to love me, but wouldn’t I feel that in his bond? It had remained that brilliant yellow all along except for that short time after the letters when he’d been a dingy yellow gray. It had brightened after that, but he couldn’t have learned to love me that quickly. No one could.

  One thing I did know. I couldn’t just go on this fantastical journey to the past without being sure—of him, of me.

  Or I’d kill us both.

  Skye

  “Do you think I’m incapable of loving someone?”

  Really, I shouldn’t have blurted that out at lunch later that day when poor Grace was mid-sip of her soda. She spewed liquid across the bookstore counter, her eyes round with shock.

  We grabbed napkins, dabbing the liquid off the counter. Finally, she squared her slim shoulders, narrowed her eyes, and asked, “Are those Marek’s words?”

  “No!”

  She quirked a brow, eyes narrowing more. “Do I need to kill him?”

  “No! It’s not like that.”

  “Okay. Because if someone can’t understand how hard it must be for you to love someone after the childhood you’ve had, they deserve to have their balls removed with a rusty spoon.”

  I winced. “God, Grace. This has nothing to do with anything he said.”

  “Then why are you asking me this?”

  “I don’t know what I feel…for him. I don’t know if it’s love. I’ve never thought myself capable of that.”

  Grace’s eyes softened, and she sat back in her chair. “He’s a really great guy, hon, but I bet you’re scared.”

  “I’m terrified. All the time.” I shrugged, unable to find a way to put everything into words. I couldn’t tell her everything, but I could try to explain a little. It was time. “Remember I said he was leaving?”

  “Yes, I remember.”

  “Well, he leaves next week. He still wants me to go with him.” And I had no clue when or if we’d return.

  “This is normal. People in relationships tend to go on vacations and such together.” Grace’s lips twisted with the urge to ask more. But I knew her. She’d only take what I offered. “You need to figure out why this bothers you and go from there. As far as the love, give that time.”

  I didn’t have time, but I couldn’t tell her that. But while I stared at my ceiling all night long, I had come up with what I could tell her that wouldn’t sound too crazy. Because I had to tell someone, or I’d spontaneously combust.

  I blew out a breath that scattered some of the escaped strands of hair that framed my face. “I didn’t know how to tell you all this, because it’s freaky.”

  Grace rolled her eyes. “Just spit it out, drama queen.”

  “Marek knew me from when I was little. Before I was taken into foster care.”

  “What?” She sat a little taller so she could stare down at me with that scary, “what the fuck” look.

  I shrank in shame. This was probably one of these things I should have found the guts to tell her sooner. But damn it, I had no clue how to explain the madness of my life.

  She poked my arm with her green, dagger-like nail. “And you’re just telling me now?”

  “Grace…” I shot her a pleading look that dropped to include her sharp digit impaling my flesh. She needed to understand. “Please cut me some slack.”

  Yanking her finger away, her stern face softened. “Okay, okay. I’m sorry. Sometimes, I forget how damaged you are.”

  I nodded, owning that label for a change. I was damaged. “If I tell you this stuff, you can’t go after him with a rusty spoon or anything. Okay?”

  She raised her hands in surrender. “Okay. No spoon or anything.”

  “Don’t even talk to him.”

  She rolled her eyes so hard, I thought they’d get stuck that way. “Okay. Fine.”

  I drew in a ragged breath to help steady my breathing. Grace believed in fantasy and fairy tales and magic to some extent. She’d buy into this little bit of the truth laced with the lies that I had to feed her. “So, yeah, he had been raised with the people I was with…and come to find out, he was married to my sister.”

  “That’s crazy.” She shrank back on the stool in awe and shock. “Like, soap opera level of crazy.”

  “Well, that’s why I haven’t said anything.” I had forgotten how much Grace loved soaps. This would be easier than I’d thought. “And after she…died…he came back here, to his family home…and found me. On purpose.”

  She drew in a shocked breath. “So…he planned this. Buying books from you…meeting you…”

  “Yeah. I look a lot like her I guess.” I ran a hand through my coppery hair that was unlike hers.

  “You sure you’re safe?”

  “Safe?” I blinked, and a different kind of terror washed over me as I took in Grace’s stiff shoulders, her mouth frozen in a
n “O” of horror. Oh, God.

  “Yes, I’m safe. I’m sorry.” I held up a hand to ward off Grace’s crazy thoughts. “Unless he’s planning to kill me with orgasms, he’s not dangerous.” She also watched too many serial killer shows, too.

  “You sure?”

  “Yes. He never meant this to be stalkerish. He’s a planner. I make lists. He makes plans. He had that book to write, and he wanted to buy certain books for research…and he planned things so it would work to his advantage if he decided to take the next step in meeting me. And he hadn’t been lying when he said he wasn’t ready to date again.” Sorta. I shot her a pleading look. “So you have to give him some credit. It’s weird, but he is a nice guy. And I think he has most of my best interests at heart.”

  She arched a dark brow in suspicion. “Most?”

  I sighed. “I don’t know if going on a trip is in my best interests.”

  “And how long have you known all this about him?”

  “Don’t be angry.”

  She shook her head. “I won’t. I get it now.”

  “He told me after the first time…I slept over.”

  “Damn. No wonder you freaked out that week. And why you tried to go out with another guy.”

  Inside, I heaved a sigh of relief. She got it. “Yes.”

  “And no wonder you’re not head over heels. Who could be if they’re following in a dead sister’s perfect footsteps?” She shook her head. “So, now he’s going away.”

  “Yes.” This admission came easier. “I have no clue if he really loves me or not. He claims he’s learned to love me for who I am, but at first, I really think he got sucked into the hopes that I’d be more like her.”

  Grace snorted at that. “And you don’t trust him.”

  “No.” I sighed. “And you know it’s hard for me to trust. It’s taken me all these months to even tell you this, and I trust you with my life. My chocolate, no. But my life, yes.”

  “You’re smart not to trust me with the chocolate.” Her lips quirked at my weak joke. “So what are you going to do?”