Time's Divide (The Chronos Files Book 3) (24 page)

And usually he could. Squirming your way out of handcuffs and straitjackets when you’re suspended by your ankles requires some pretty rock-solid abs. But this time, his appendix was inflamed—or maybe it’s because he’d screwed up his ankle in a trick and was reclined on a couch when it happened, so he couldn’t brace himself properly. There are half a dozen different versions and at least as many theories. But it’s the same half-dozen versions in both timelines.

Houdini went on to do the show that night, despite a raging fever. They eventually rushed him to the hospital and removed the appendix. He seemed to be getting better, but then he died early in the afternoon on Halloween.

Same injury, same chain of events. Both timelines . . . at least until now.

“Can you tell me exactly what happened?” I ask.

“I can tell you what he told me. Two guys in their twenties came up to him in the lobby at the Prince of Wales Hotel. He was reading his mail, and one kid asked if it was really true he could take a punch to the gut without flinching. Like always, Harry says yes. The guy punches him. Then he leans over and says real quiet that he’s gonna punch him so hard it’ll kill him if he doesn’t hand over the key.”

He’s here because he wants to see a lynching.

It’s Kiernan’s voice I hear, explaining why Simon was in 1938. And there was something about Cincinnati once. I never got the full story, but Simon enjoys landing in the middle of chaos.

I’m guessing the guy who was supposed to hit Houdini that day—a guy named Whitehead in most of the stories—never got the chance. Simon quite literally beat him to the punch.

“But Houdini didn’t give them the key?”

“He didn’t
have
the key! I made him stop wearing the thing after we left the hotel in Eastbourne. It wasn’t even in Montreal with us. I told him I couldn’t stand the idea of him going onstage with it. I even went back to the restaurant to give it to you that night . . .”

Bess halts in midsentence, realizing she’s revealed something she shouldn’t have.

“I mean, I
thought
about doing that, but . . .”

I pull out my medallion, and she dives toward me, grabbing for it.

“No! You have to bring him back.”

“I can’t. I’m really sorry.”

Bess claws at my arm, trying to get the key, and I push her backward. I don’t want to hurt her, but when she comes back again, her fist is cocked, ready to punch me.

Flipping a tiny, middle-aged woman gives me zero joy, but I have no choice.

“I’m sorry,” I repeat as I roll her over and pin her against the carpet. “Are you okay?”

The string of curses she slings at me suggests that her mouth and brain, at a minimum, are still in working order.

Feet are pounding up the stairs. Apparently Bess screaming is something Marie is accustomed to, but maybe not the loud thump of a body hitting the floor.

Bess hears the footsteps, too. “Marie! Call the police!”

The footsteps pause and then retreat. Almost immediately, Bess realizes she’s made another mistake.

“No, wait! Marie! Help!”

The footsteps continue fading out. Either Marie didn’t hear that last bit, or she’s tired of running up and down the stairs.

“Bess, your husband dies on Halloween, 1926, in both timelines. I can’t change that, and I need the key.”

“I won’t be there to give it to you! I’ve changed my mind—”

It takes me three tries to lock in the stable point because Bess wriggling beneath me keeps jarring my arm and breaking my focus. Finally I lock in on the 1905 dress that belonged to Other-Kate right where I left it, flung over the footboard of my bed.

“I really
am
sorry,” I say one last time, and then I blink out.

E
ASTBOURNE
, G
REAT
B
RITAIN

April 26, 1905, 10:13 p.m.

I’ve only been in the hotel lobby a few minutes when Bess Houdini bursts through the front door, walking quickly toward the restaurant. The maître d’ halts her at the entrance, just as he did me earlier. She plants a palm in the center of his chest and shoves him back. He sputters, reaching after her, but she dodges his hand.

The man is about to follow her until he notices me and steps forward to block my path. I decide I like Bess’s approach and simply push him aside.

It feels good. Should’ve done that the first time.

I reach Bess just as she finds the still-uncleared table where Kiernan and I ate.

“Mrs. Houdini!”

She turns toward me. It’s strange to see her face again this soon, twenty years younger, minus the tear streaks and pain of bereavement. In her right hand is a silver chain holding the medallion.

“There you are! Take this thing before my husband changes his mind. He’s a sentimental old fool, but I’ll buy him something else.”

I take the key and stick it in my pocket. “Thank you.”

“I don’t want anything that’s con—”

The maître d’ steps up behind Bess, putting his hand on her shoulder. “Ladies, if you’d be so good as to follow me.”

Bess whirls around and pokes her finger into his chest. It’s a bit like watching an angry Chihuahua turn on a greyhound. The guy actually flinches, holding his hands in front of him to ward her off.

“We have no intention of being
so good
,”
she says, poking his chest a few more times for emphasis. “Go away and let us finish our conversation.”

The man slinks off without a word, and Bess turns back to me, giving an eye roll.

“As I was saying before, if I’d known the thing had any connection to the Cyrists, I’d never have asked Davenport for it. Those people gave me the willies even when I was a girl, with all that talk about the Chosen and The Way and everyone else dying.”

“You have very good instincts,” I say and begin moving toward the exit. Now that I have the key, all I want to do is get out of here, especially knowing that Simon has an interest in it, too.

But Bess grabs my arm. “Last year my mother-in-law consulted a medium before we set sail for Europe. The spirits said my husband is in no any danger for at least two decades. Is that still true?”

I wonder for a moment if this psychic has a CHRONOS key, because that’s pretty darn close. “I’m not a psychic, Mrs. Houdini.”

She gives me a knowing look. “I saw your face earlier. I’m not asking you when he dies. I don’t want that much information. Just tell me if the spirits were right.”

I can give her that much.

“The spirits were right.”

∞15∞

N
EAR
D
AMASCUS
, M
ARYLAND

September 12, 10:24 a.m.

Jeans. T-shirt. Skechers on my feet, the really comfy ones that I’ve worn so often they’re starting to look raggedy. A mostly empty frappuccino in the cup holder.

Traffic has thinned out now that we’re north of Gaithersburg. The air doesn’t quite have the autumn crispness I love yet, but there’s a slight hint of it in the breeze coming in through the windows. And Trey’s playlist is close to perfect. No deep lyrics or brooding music, just up-tempo tunes by the Arctic Monkeys, OK Go, Frattellis, Vampire Weekend, and a few neo-punk songs I don’t recognize. He also has some eighties classics that make me suspect Trey and my dad would do just fine on a road trip.

That, of course, pulls my mind out of the little cave of oblivion where I’ve been trying to entrap it and back to the fact that Dad is currently driving home from Delaware. That’s good because I really want to see him, but bad because I felt like he was safe at Grandma Keller’s.

I give my head a brisk shake. If I focus hard enough, maybe some fairy godmother will take pity on me and let me stay in this moment. Even if I don’t think it could actually happen, it’s nice to imagine all my worries drifting upward and fading away like soap bubbles.

Although, to be fair, stranger things
have
happened pretty much every day for the past few months. An hour ago, I was in 1926, fighting with Bess Houdini. This time tomorrow, if not sooner, I’ll be in 2308. I’d say that leaves fairy godmothers who grant wishes entirely within the realm of the possible.

With that thought firmly in mind, I focus on the warmth of Trey’s hand against mine, the music, the blue sky outside my window . . .

And then Trey’s fingers tighten around my hand. Again. Almost painfully, as though a stray thought has sneaked into his head. Am I doing the same thing to him each time I lose grip on my all-too-slippery inner bliss?

“It’s not working, is it?” I say. “Beautiful day, great music, you here next to me, and I still can’t clear my mind for more than thirty seconds or so before it goes running back into Nightmare Land.”

Trey’s mouth tightens. “I just keep seeing that video. Wish I could accept Connor’s argument that it’s not you, but . . .”

“I’m not even sure Connor believes it’s Prudence. He’s just contrary.”

“Mostly because he’s worried about you. And Katherine.”

We’re silent for a minute and then he asks, “So . . . this meeting we’re going to? Who’ll be there?”

“Not really sure. Why?”

Trey gives a small chuckle. “A lame attempt at changing the subject to something slightly less worrisome. And I would kind of like to know how many Cyrists will be around. I’m not even sure I trust the Cyrist Light version.”

“Me either. Tilson will be there, obviously, since it’s at his house.”

“Actually, it’s a plot of land
near
his house.” He nods at a scrap of paper in the console between the seats. “The jet pack apparently isn’t something they like to test too close to buildings. Something about the lack of precision.”

Lack of precision.
And they were planning to have me use it to jump inside a building, or at least the ruins of a building. The weight of Pru’s key in my pocket is suddenly very comforting.

“I’m guessing Max, Charlayne, and Bensen will be there,” I continue, “since they all seem to have been involved with previous tests of the jet pack. Julia.”

I stop for a moment. At least, I
hope
Julia. It hadn’t even occurred to me until this minute that she might not be there. If she’s not there, I need to track her down and let her know about getting the key from Houdini, because that’s going to change the entire focus of this meeting. Learning to use the jet pack is no longer a priority.

Trey turns off I-270 onto a local road. I pull out my own CHRONOS key, the one Max used when he transferred the meeting coordinates, and bring up the stable point so I can see if Julia is there.

Trey’s right—the location is a big, open field that looks like it was once farmland. Not a tree in sight, just gently sloping, slightly rocky hills. No one’s there yet, so I push forward to 10:57 a.m., a few minutes before we’re supposed to arrive, and scan the area.

At first, I only see cars—two sedans and a white minivan with the tailgate open. Charlayne and Bensen are in the back, fiddling with some sort of harness.

I pan right and see Tilson talking on his phone.

Max is off to the left, with his arm draped around a blonde. Her head is tipped up toward him. Must be the girlfriend Charlayne mentioned.

My opinion of Fifth Column security plummets to a new low. They escorted me and Trey to meet Julia at a secret location, in a car with dark-tinted windows, but Max’s girlfriend is invited to watch me make a fool of myself as I try out the jet pack for the first time?

Then she turns toward the stable point, and I see her face.

I’m so surprised that I nearly blink myself into the location. That wouldn’t have ended well, since I’m currently moving at about forty miles an hour.

“Trey, pull off and call Tilson.”

“Julia’s not there?”

“No, but Eve Conwell is.”

Trey is silent for a moment. “Maybe . . . she’s Fifth Column?” He doesn’t remember Eve as well as I do, but his voice sounds doubtful. “I mean, I know her dad’s a Templar, but maybe that’s changed, too. Maybe they’re New Cyrist?”

“Trey, that was Eve’s dad in the video. Patrick Conwell was the man who dragged me back into the temple.”

His hands tighten on the wheel. “My phone’s in the console. Tilson was the last call I made.”

“I think I’m going to need to set a local stable point after you call him. And that doesn’t work so well in a moving car.”

About a half mile down, I spot a small garage and convenience store combo off to the right. Two patrons are at the gas pumps, so Trey drives around and parks facing the trees.

I pull out my phone. “I need to do a little cyber-sleuthing. Call Tilson. Tell him you’re running late. Ask who’s coming. Make it sound like you’re a little nervous about meeting everyone. If he mentions Eve, try to feel him out. See if you can find out how long she’s been around. And if Julia isn’t going to be there at all, see if he knows where she is.”

He grins. “And I should do all this without being obvious?”

“If Tilson suspects you’re prodding for info, I’m not too worried. I trust him more than any of them. As much as I hate to say it, maybe even more than Charlayne. I mean . . . I don’t think she’s a bad person, but she has mixed motives. All of them do, except Tilson. And maybe Ben, but he’s with Charlayne now, so . . .”

“Like
with
with?” Trey asks, and I realize I haven’t filled him in on that bit of info. When I nod, he says, “Way to go, Ben.”

Trey starts dialing, and I pull up the browser on my phone. Wikipedia shows that the Sixteenth Street Temple is still the regional headquarters for North America, led by someone named Frank Morton. I can’t remember if Kiernan ever mentioned that name, but the picture leaves no doubt that he’s one of my Cyrist cousins. He looks like Pru, if she had short hair and a square jaw. And he’s older—even older than Older Pru. And yes, I know he was born from a surrogate who knows when, but that fact is still disturbing.

Trey asks Tilson about Julia as I click through a few links trying to locate Conwell. He’s no longer a high-profile televangelist, just the minister of a smaller congregation in Alexandria that converted from Orthodox to Reformed Rite in 1972. The church website says Conwell was appointed in late 2012, after the sudden death of the previous minister.

I half follow Trey’s conversation with Tilson while searching, but he fills in the details when he hangs up. “Julia might be there later. He hasn’t talked to her since last night, but he said she had a meeting scheduled earlier this morning at . . . did he say
Langley
?”

I laugh. “Ben’s code name for the headquarters building in Silver Spring. Cyrist Interfaith Alliance. CIA.”

“Oh. Ha.” Trey rolls his eyes and continues, “As for Eve—Tilson says she’s been with Max as long as he’s known him, but he’d only seen him a few times before this year. He says Eve can’t use the key.”

“Kiernan says otherwise, although she has less luck with it than he does. When you talked to Tilson about the dual memory—about meeting him before at the barbecue, did you mention anything about Eve? Or Patrick Conwell? Or where the party was held?”

“I doubt it. I barely remembered the names. I guess it would have made a bigger impression on the version of me that got chased by Dobermans, but I’m pretty sure I just said it was held at some Cyrist’s house. Oh, and Tilson sounded really suspicious by the end. Ben and Charlayne were there when he was talking to me, so . . .”

“It’s okay. I don’t think Tilson would say anything to Max. They didn’t look like the best of pals. And Bensen definitely won’t.”

Which leaves Charlayne, who’s never been a stellar secret keeper. I mean, she never leaked anything that I told her, but we were besties, and she dished plenty of dirt on others when I knew her at Roosevelt High.

My forehead is starting to tighten, so I stretch my eyebrows up to relieve it. Then Trey turns my face toward him and gives me a long, deep kiss. For the next minute—or is it five?—my mind empties of everything except his hands, one wrapped in my hair and the other at the small of my back, and his mouth on mine. The sound of his breathing fills my ears, and I close my eyes, shutting out everything that isn’t Trey.

When he pulls away, the rest of the world gradually comes back into focus.

“What was that for?”

“You were looking like I was feeling. Stressed, confused, maybe a little bit whack.” He presses his lips against my hair. “We both needed to reboot. So, what’s the game plan?”

“Find Julia and tell her what I know.”

Trey starts the engine, but I grab his hand. “No, just me. It’ll take forever to drive there, and we don’t have the time. I have a stable point set at Langley.”

Trey’s gray eyes darken. “Okay. That may be the quickest route, but I keep seeing your face from that video in Rio. I don’t want you going alone.”

“I won’t be . . . exactly.” I give him an apologetic look and unzip my backpack, pulling out the Colt.

“That’s still alone. Just alone and armed.”

“Better than alone and unarmed, right?”

He sighs. “I can’t talk you out of this, can I?”

“Unfortunately, no.” I slip Prudence’s key out of my pocket and into the backpack. I still have my own medallion and a spare tucked into the band of my bra. I’m just a little leery about taking Pru’s key with me, especially when I don’t know who Julia might be meeting.

I pull up the current time at the Langley stable point. The chair where Charlayne sat yesterday morning is empty now and the room is dim, with just indirect sunlight coming in through the windows. I skim backward in one-minute increments for one hour, and then another, but I never see lights come on. I try again, going back as early as 7 a.m. The room gradually grows dimmer and dimmer as less sunlight illuminates the rows of cubicles. Still no sign of anyone coming into the building.

There must be another entrance. I was hoping to catch Julia coming in so I didn’t have to walk around looking for her, but apparently that’s not going to happen.

I check the stable point I set in the conference room when I jumped back after dumping coffee on Senator Ellicott, but the room is completely black. It’s much closer to the break room, however, and Charlayne said Julia’s offices were nearby. Since I’m not sure which is creepier—jumping into a room with rows of (probably) abandoned, dimly lit cubicles or jumping into a pitch-black conference room—I opt for proximity.

Trey’s eyes are dubious as I double check the safety and tuck the Colt into the waistband of my jeans. I give him a quick kiss and open the car door, setting a local point outside. “I won’t make you worry long—back in ten seconds.”

The conference room that seemed pitch-black is now illuminated by the blue glow of my medallion. A song I liked as a kid about the blue canary in the outlet by the light switch runs through my head, and I hold back a nervous laugh.

Then I see a faint blue glow at the opposite end of the room, and it’s all I can do to hold back a scream.

When I duck behind one of the conference chairs, the glow disappears, too. Feeling foolish, I cautiously lean back out. Sure enough, it’s my own key reflecting off the whiteboard. I clutch the back of the chair for a moment to give my heart a chance to work its way back down from my throat, then head for the door.

Before I step into the hallway, I tuck the key back into its leather holder. That reflection scared the hell out of me, but it also reminded me that if anyone with the CHRONOS gene is roaming around the building, having this key out in a dim room is the equivalent of a big red arrow pointing out my location.

And again because that reflection scared the hell out of me, I draw the gun, holding it by my side.

The building is quiet, except for a faint hum from the break room. It’s probably the fridge. As I turn down the corridor toward the offices, I see a shaft of light coming from a cracked door two rooms down.

I tap lightly. “Julia?”

No response. I push the door open to reveal a sparsely furnished office. Julia is behind the desk, slumped forward across the keyboard.

The coppery tang of blood hits my nose before I see the pool spreading onto the carpet. I suspect it’s too late, but I reach out to check for her pulse. When I do, my knee bumps the edge of the office chair, and her body shifts toward me, throwing me off balance.

Which, as it turns out, is a very good thing.

I don’t even hear the shot until it hits the wall, sending specks of plaster in all directions. Crawling under the desk, I jerk the cover off my key. A cool wetness soaks through my jeans as my knees press into the bloody carpet. Julia’s body slides out of the chair, and as it does, I catch my first glimpse of her face. If the shot to her neck wasn’t fatal, the one to the head definitely was.