Now and Forever

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

Copyright 2012 by
Barbara Bretton.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions.

Cover and eBook design Copyright 2012 by Barbara Bretton

Table of Contents

Copyright

SOMEWHERE IN TIME

TOMORROW & ALWAYS

DESTINY'S CHILD

Author's Note

About the Author

Somewhere in Time

Book 1 – Crosse Harbor Time Travel Trilogy

by

Barbara Bretton

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

Copyright 1992, 2012 by
Barbara Bretton. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions.

Chapter One

Near Philadelphia

Zane Grey Rutledge downshifted into second as he guided the black Porsche up the curving driveway toward Rutledge House. Gravel crunched beneath the tires, sending a fine spray across the lacquered surface of the hood and fenders. He swore softly as a pebble pinged against the windshield, leaving behind a spider-web crack in the glass. A pair of moving vans were angled in the driveway near the massive front door and he eased to a stop behind one of them and let out the clutch.

He didn't want to be there. Rutledge House without his grandmother Sara Jane was nothing more than a haunted collection of faded bricks and stones.

"One day it will all matter to you," Sara Jane had said to him not long before she died. "I have faith that you'll see there's nothing more important than family."

But he didn't have a family. Not anymore. With Sara Jane's death he had moved closer to the edge of the cliff. The lone remaining Rutledge in a long and illustrious series of Rutledges who had made their mark on a country.

Lately he'd had the feeling that his grandmother was watching him from somewhere in the shadows, shaking her head the way she used to when he was a boy and had been caught drinking beer with his friends from the wrong side of town.

He leaned back in his contoured leather seat and watched as the treasures of a lifetime were carried from the house by a parade of moving men. Winterhalter portraits of long-dead Rutledges, books and mementoes that catalogued a nation's history as well as a family's.

His fingers drummed against the steering wheel. He'd done the right thing, the
only
thing he could have done, given the circumstances. Rutledge House would survive long after he was gone. Wasn't that what his grandmother had wanted?
 

"Mr. Rutledge? Oh, Mr. Rutledge, it
is
you. I was so afraid I'd missed you."

He started at the sound of the woman's voice floating through the open window of the car.

"Olivia McRae," she said, smiling coyly as she prompted his memory. "We met last week."

He opened the car door and unfolded himself from the sleek sports car. "I remember," he said, shaking the woman's bird-like hand. "Eastern Pennsylvania Preservation Society."

She dimpled and Zane was struck by the fact that in her day Olivia McRae had probably been a looker.

"We have much to thank you for. I must tell you we feel as if Christmas has come early this year!"

He shot her a quizzical look. She was thanking him? In the past few days he had come to think of her as his own personal savior for taking Rutledge House and its contents off his hands.

"A pleasure," he said, relying on charm to cover his surprise.

"Oh, it's a fine day for Rutledge House," she said, her tone upbeat. "I know your dear departed grandmother Sara Jane would heartily approve of your decision."

"Approve might be too strong a word," he said with a wry grin. "Accept is more like it." Bloodlines had been everything to Sara Jane Rutledge. No matter that the venerable old house had been tumbling down around her ears, in need of more help than even the family fortune could provide. So long as a Rutledge was in residence, all had been right with her world.

Although she never said it in so many words, he knew that in the end he had disappointed her. No wife, no children, no arrow shot into the future of the Rutledge family

"Just you wait," Olivia McRae said, patting his arm in a decidedly maternal gesture. "Next time you see it this wonderful old house will be on the way to regaining its former glory."

"It's up to you now, Olivia."

"We would welcome your input," the older woman said. "And we would most certainly like to have a Rutledge on the board of directors at the museum."

"Sorry," he said, perhaps a beat too quickly. "I think a clean break is better all around."

The woman's warm brown eyes misted over. "How thoughtless of me! This must be dreadfully difficult, coming so soon after the loss of your beloved grandmother."

Zane looked away. Little in life unnerved him. Talk of his late grandmother did. "I have a flight to catch," he said. No matter that the plane didn't take off until the next afternoon. As far as he was concerned, emotions were more dangerous than skydiving without a chute. "I'd better get moving."

Olivia McRae peered into the car. "You do have the package, don't you?"

"Package?" His brows knotted.

"Oh, Mr. Rutledge, you can't leave without the package I set out for you." She looked at him curiously. "The uniform."

"Damn," he muttered under his breath.
The oldest male child in each generation is entrusted with the uniform,
Sara Jane had told him on his twelfth birthday when she handed him the carefully wrapped package.
Someday you'll hand it down to your son.

He hadn't forgotten about the uniform. He knew exactly where it was: in the attic under a thick layer of dust, as forgotten as the past.

"You wait right here," said Mrs. McRae, turning back toward the house. "I'll fetch it for you."

He was tempted to get behind the wheel of the Porsche and be halfway to Manhattan before the woman crossed the threshold. For as long as he could remember that uniform had been at the heart of Rutledge family lore. His grandmother and her sisters had woven endless stories of derring-do and bravery and laid every single one of them at the feet of some long-dead Revolutionary War relative who'd probably never done anything more courageous than shoot himself a duck for dinner.

Moments later Olivia McRae was back by his side.

"Here you are," she said, pressing a large, neatly-wrapped parcel into his arms with the same tenderness a mother would display toward her first-born. "To think you almost left without it."

"Heavier than I remembered," he said. "You're sure there isn't a musket in there with the uniform?"

Mrs. McRae's lined cheeks dimpled. "Oh, you! You always
were
a tease. Why, you must have seen this uniform a million times."

"Afraid I never paid much attention."

"That can't be true."

"I'm not much for antiques."

"This is more than an antique," she said, obviously appalled. "This is a piece of American history . . .
your
history." She patted the parcel. "Open it, Mr. Rutledge. I'd love to see your face when you –"

"I will," he said, edging toward the Porsche, "but right now I'd better get on the road."

"Of course," she said, her smile fading. "I understand."

She looked at him and in her eyes Zane saw disappointment. Why should Mrs. McRae be any different? Disappointing people was what he did best.

He tossed the package in the back seat and with a nod toward Olivia McRae, roared back down the drive and away from Rutledge House.

He was almost at the Ben Franklin Bridge when he noticed the needle on his gas gauge was hovering around E. He whipped into the first gas station he saw and couldn't help grinning at the crowd of attendants who swarmed the sports car.

"Fill it," he said. "And it's okay if you want to check under the hood."