Aching for Always (9 page)

Oh, for God's sake.

But it wasn't fear, exactly. It was . . . She searched her brain for the root cause, and an image of Carter Fee, her fifth-grade desk partner, popped into her head.

Omigod, I have a crush on him!

That was just ridiculous, all evidence of heat on her cheeks to the contrary. She was an engaged woman—practically a married woman. She did not have crushes on men she'd barely met. Heck, she didn't really have crushes at all. The last one she remembered was Carter, and it had upset her so much she'd punched him in the shoulder anytime he did so much as look at her.

She peeked around the corner.

The man stood with his back to her, his head tilted as if checking the wind. He was well dressed, but there was a certain untamed wildness to the dark curls flapping at his collar and the way he held his shoulders open and at the ready, as if he were a marauding Viking ready to charge.

A blond woman with cheeks like Cameron Diaz and legs to match stepped out and walked to his side. She wore a pair of formfitting navy sailor pants—very on trend—and leaned in when she spoke. He listened intently, and they both swept the alley with careful looks. They seemed an odd pair to be running a tailor shop. Joss couldn't quite put her finger on why. Perhaps because they were both attractive—not that attractive people didn't run tailor shops, of course—but attractiveness combined with an air of being hyperalert made Joss think they were doing something illegal or having an affair or both.

*  *  *

The click of Fiona's heels behind him roused Hugh from his dark reverie.

“Have you eaten?” she asked, leaning in so close he could smell the scent of her hair. “You've been up half the night.”

“I'll eat later. We need more on Brand. The company isn't enough.”

Brand hadn't ventured far from his escape hole. After a few careful questions of a local militia man this morning, they were directed to something called the Carnegie Library, where they'd learned Brand Industries was located in the tallest building in the town, the iron and glass one that towered over the head of the alley like a Moorish man-o'-war. Hugh had spent a good part of the morning walking the building's perimeter and observing what he could.

“I can take that,” Fiona said. “A nice publican down the street offered me whatever help I needed last night.”

Hugh made a private cough and returned his gaze to the sky.

“At least we know where the passage is,” she said, “and that it can be traveled safely.”

“Where
one
of the passages is,” he corrected. “There's more than one.” The men who had returned from the past via that small cave on the islet had not traveled to the past the same way. Of course, Fiona would not be aware of that.

“I suppose you're right. We only know of two travelers, Phillip Belkin and Alfred Brand—well, five now if you count you, me and Nathaniel—but there must be more. And they couldn't have all come by way of the islet.”

Hugh knew there was at least one more traveler, a man named Collingswood. There would have been a seventh as well, a man named Spears, if he hadn't been shot and killed. But he held his tongue.

“Where would Brand keep the map?”

Hugh had been pondering that himself. And despite what he'd told Nathaniel, he did try to maintain a careful level of skepticism when it came to Fiona. He believed her story, backed by the man called Phillip Belkin, that not only had her family's fortunes been reversed by Brand's theft of the map but history itself had been rewritten because of it. Nonetheless, there was a blind passion to her quest that made him uneasy, and he knew only too well how dangerous blind passion could be.

He looked around to see if anyone was watching, then bent his head. “A locked room is my guess,” he said in a lowered voice. “The building is secured by an officer of some sort, though it seems he serves as a mere checkpoint. Brand Industries is located on floors thirty-six through fifty-eight.” He shook his head, amazed at his own words. Fifty-eight floors! Who could imagine such a marvel? “There are additional guards up there. That's the place we need to search.”

“Perhaps he destroyed the map,” she said. “Wouldn't that have been wise?”

“It's possible, but I'm hoping Brand is worried enough about what would happen to the reversal he'd created in our time by taking the map to leave well enough alone. The last thing he would want is to undo all his hard work.”

“So you think Brand knows of another passage?”

“Aye.” He turned to Nathaniel, who was making his way toward them, bleary-eyed, biting a stray thread out
of the length of yellow silk in his hands he called a “tie.” “He must. If he traveled from his time here to our time through the time passageway that ends on the islet, he would have died of exposure or thirst. Why, there couldn't be above a handful of ships a year that pass it.”

“So there's another passage here, the one that allowed Brand to travel
to
1682?” Nathaniel said.

“Aye. Remember, Brand first landed in 1682. He found and courted his wife. They had a child. He stole the map, which changed everything from the year 1684 on. Then he returned to his own time and discovered everything had changed there as well.”

“Aye. He'd made himself a rich man.” Fiona spat.

“And it took you more than twenty years, until 1706, to figure out what he'd done, with the help of Belkin.”

Nathaniel nodded. “And that's when she hired you?”

“Aye,” Hugh said. “So we have to assume that there is another passageway. It may not be here. It may be in some other town. But the fact Brand lived here both before and after traveling back in time suggests the other passage might be nearby as well.”

“Did he stumble on it, do you think, or did he run into a traveler from whom the secret was prized, as Fiona did?” Nathaniel asked.

“Actually, he found
exactly
the same man Fiona did—Phillip Belkin. At least, that's what Belkin told us. This was when Brand was in England after he acquired the map. He told Belkin he couldn't go back to Pittsburgh the same way he came. Why? We don't know, though Belkin's guess was that the passageway Brand used to get to the past was too dangerous to attempt a return trip. Bel
kin says Brand was hunting for another way back to his own time. Belkin told him about the islet. Brand hired a captain with a ship, and you know the rest. How Brand first got to England from Pittsburgh, though, is uncertain. We'll probably never know for sure.” He held up a hand as Nathaniel looped the tie around his neck. “I can do this.”

“It's not like a stock,” Nathaniel said. “More like a noose, at least according to the directions I found with the pattern. There,” he said, tightening the silk at Hugh's neck. “You are wearing something called a ‘half-Windsor knot.'”

“Good Lord,” Hugh said, maneuvering his finger along the narrow space between the fabric and his Adam's apple. “It
is
like a noose. Is it meant to be a punishment of some sort?”

“Every picture I've found seems to show men wearing one. So, no, not unless the lot of them are criminals.”

“Wouldn't surprise me in the least.” Hugh stretched his neck in either direction. “Nathaniel, you've done an excellent job with the food and clothes, as have you, Fiona, with the money and shoes.” He eyed the lethal-looking pattens she sported, with heels as high as a loaf of bread. “But we need a little more on Brand. See what more you can find out about his schedule and work habits.”

Fiona nodded.

“And, Nathaniel, hit the cot. You've been up all night sewing. We'll need you fresh for later. I'm going to figure out the habits of the tower dwellers. There's got to be a way in. What is it, Fiona?” He saw her eyes flicker up the alleyway.

“I thought I saw a flash of something. Probably just a bird. Let's head in. I'm getting cold.”

*  *  *

When they went back inside the shop, Joss padded the rest of the way down the alley. She was just nearing the entrance when a weird throb went through her and she stopped.

She froze. Remnants of yesterday's inexplicable events? No sparks had appeared, but she'd felt the same odd lurching in her gut—like the urgent pound-pound-pound of a boat speeding through the waves. With some trepidation, she stepped back to see if it would happen again. The street shook like it was under artillery fire, and flashes of images went through her mind's eye. She jumped back to safety. She was not imagining it. Where she had seen the sparks accumulate on the invisible dome the day before, there was still a force of some kind.

A pedestrian chatting on his cell approached her. She pulled out her phone, as if she were checking for messages, to watch him pass. Ten feet before he reached her, she saw his face contract for an instant, as if he'd been bitten by a mosquito. He kept walking, though, and when he was just a few steps past her, he flinched again. He turned around, confused, but saw nothing and continued on his way.

She wasn't the only one who was feeling this.

She put her hand out carefully, wondering if she could find the perimeter of this odd, invisible dome. And, indeed, a few inches beyond her she found a wall of moving air. She inched forward. There was a faint humming that increased the closer she brought her head, ramping quickly to a stronger screech. She closed her eyes and brought her face into it.

Immediately, the images returned. Vivid and con
fusing, one replaced another in the tiniest fraction of a second—a huge rocky mount against a raging sea, a baby crying, an ancient pistol firing in the dark and Joss herself from the evening before, at the head of the alley, walking through a shower of sparks to—

“Can I help you?”

Joss leapt about a foot. It was the blond woman, regarding her closely. She must have slipped outside without Joss seeing. The woman was even more gorgeous up close, with gold cat eyes, long legs and a body that could stop a
Superman
preview at Comic-Con. She had a British accent, too, though not nearly as warm as Tom James's. More Sienna Miller than Maggie Smith.

“I was, um, listening. I thought I heard a wolf howling. Strangest thing.”

“A wolf? Here?” The woman put her hands on her hips. With her spike heels, her eyes were about a foot over Joss's head.

Joss chuckled nervously. “I guess it was just me. Say, I was wondering if I could see Mr. James. I'm having a certain tailoring issue with my skirt.” She shook the hanger as if presenting evidence.

The woman's gaze went from the hanger to Joss's hips with an expression that suggested taking the skirt
in
wasn't going to be the fix.

“He's not here, and we don't do that sort of work anymore. New owners.”

Joss considered. Pushing too hard would raise a flag—and a place that could toss up an invisible dome was not exactly one to be trifled with. On the other hand, she really didn't care for Sienna's attitude.

“I see. Well, you don't mind if I pick up the blazer and slacks I left here, do you?” she said, summoning an instant lie.

The woman rocked on her Space Needle heels. She didn't believe Joss any more than Joss had believed her.

“The stock is gone,” the woman said. “I apologize. Everything was gone when we bought the business. Did the former owner not leave you a forwarding address?”

“No. But that's okay. I'll just grab a cop,” Joss said, carefully emphasizing the last word. “A lot of times they know the emergency numbers to call for this sort of thing.”

“A cop?”

“Yeah, you know”—Joss pointed a finger and cocked her thumb—“bang-bang?”

The woman's eyes flared, and she reached for something at her back.

The door opened so hard the knob made contact with the brick. Tom James or whatever his name was gave the woman a meaningful look.
“Fiona,”
he said sharply. “That will be enough.”

Fiona, eh?
That was the name of a double-crossing whore if she'd ever heard one. The woman probably cheated at checkers, too. Joss gave her a smile.

Fiona's hand returned to her hip and she flounced off.

“What can I do for you?”

Joss looked up into James's face. He was a good four inches taller than Rogan and ruggedly handsome, where Rogan's looks were Wall Street-by-way-of-Andover classic. Specks of green, gray and sky blue swam in James's eyes like a northern sea, and he regarded her with what could only be described as careful interest.

“I-I—” She held up the hanger, feeling her breath catch. “A skirt. I have a skirt.”

He looked at the garment, his scarred brow lifting in an arch. “A brushed brocade. I saw something like this in Malay once. Very handsome. Would you like to come in?” He tilted his head toward the shop.

The interior was spotless and precisely laid out, two square rooms separated by an entry hall in which an ancient counter stood. There were baskets of notions along its length, and a brass cash register that might have made change for Woodrow Wilson. To her right, bolts of cloth lined the walls: wools in browns, blacks and grays; cottons in whites, pinks and blues; silks in myriad patterns and a rainbow of colors. To her left, in the room that was barely visible behind a half-drawn curtain, she spotted a short raised platform in front of a large half circle of mirrors. It was a fitting room, and yet nothing suggested that any in-process work was going on here. Somewhere in the back of the house, a man and a woman—Fiona, by the sound of it—conversed.

“Now, what can I do for you?” James asked.

If he recognized her, he didn't show it.

“I, ah . . . I think I might have fallen out there.” She gestured toward the alley.

“What? Just now?” He frowned.

“No, last night.”

“Oh. But you are well?”

“Well, yes, but—”