Out of Time (Lovers in Time Series, Book 1): Time Travel Romance

by Marilyn Campbell

  His chest constricted and it was all he could do to draw in a small breath. And when he managed that his stomach nearly rebelled.

  This wasn't the way it was supposed to be. He was the one who was supposed to die, not her.

  "Why?" he cried to heaven. "How could you let this happen to her?" Suddenly a rush of tears flowed from his eyes. "Why would you spare me and take her?"

  For a few moments, he gave into his grief then tried again to get through to God. "I know I haven't always been what You might have wanted but she was so good. You performed some kind of miracle before to bring me to her. I'm asking You to perform another one now. Let me switch places with her. Let me be the one lying here with a bullet in my chest. Let her survive!"

  He waited for the miracle but nothing happened at all.

  He knew he had to get out of there, had to do something but he couldn't think past the tornado in his head. After a few seconds he was able to move enough to get a sheet to cover her. A dark smear automatically appeared through the sheet but at least he was no longer looking at her death face.

  "What am I supposed to do without you, Kelly? You were so sure that I had to go back and fix things. How do I fix this?"

  By going back.

  His head jerked from side to side. He would have sworn he'd heard Kelly's voice. It wasn't just a memory of words she'd spoken before. She was trying to tell him something!

  "What?" When he heard no response, he tried to gather his mental faculties to figure out the answer on his own.

  If he could get back to 1965, to before Ginger's murder, he could alter history. He could change things so that Kelly would never have been investigating that case because it wouldn't have happened. And then there would be no reason for anyone to want her dead.

  It seemed simple but how was he supposed to get back there? Kelly only said they'd know when the time came. He rose and walked away from her to try to clear his brain a bit more. Pacing back and forth, he forced himself to be analytical.

  He got here by electrocution. It must be the answer for a return trip as well. There was no lightning streaking down from the sky. No high tension wires in the neighborhood. He didn't see an electric chair sitting around. They were lucky they had a generator in this primitive—

  He abruptly stopped pacing in front of the bathroom. The answer was right in front of him. It had to work. Urgency filled every cell in his body. He had to be gone before Dillard, the FBI or a Klan clean-up crew arrived.

  As quickly as possible he turned the water on in the copper tub. He remembered laughing at Kelly's single electric lamp with the fifty-foot extension cord that allowed her to move it from one end of the cabin to the other but he wasn't laughing now.

  He removed the lamp shade and switched the light on and off to be certain it was working then he unscrewed the lit bulb and turned the power back on. Carrying it into the bathroom, he allowed himself ten seconds to reconsider what he was about to do.

  He had no doubts. If there was even the slightest possibility that this could ultimately save Kelly's life, it was worth the risk. At the last second he remembered the square of paper in his pocket and moved it into the space between his teeth and cheek. He lowered himself into the tub and turned off the water.

  Pressing as much of his body as possible against the metal sides, he took a deep breath and plunged the top of the lamp into the water.

  * * *

  "Good morning, Atlanta! It's seven a.m. and we're going to start our rush hour this beautiful Friday morning with the number one hit that's rockin' the nation, I Can't Get No Satisfaction by the Rolling Stones!"

  As Mick Jagger wailed out his complaint, Jack rolled over and turned off his new clock radio. As much as he liked the music when he was wide awake, he wasn't sure it was that much better than a jangling alarm first thing in the morning.

  His mouth seemed dryer than usual and when he started to yawn, he realized there was something tucked in his cheek. He retrieved a tape-covered square of folded paper and squinted at it. What the hell was this?

  He set the wad on his nightstand and started to sit up but was surprised again by how bad his body felt, as though he'd been doing heavy labor all night.

  A whip coming down on his back. Running. A woman covered with blood. A copper tub. Electrocution!

  Jack bolted upright and looked around his bedroom. He'd made it! He was back. What had the radio announcer said? It was Friday morning and the Rolling Stones were at the top of the chart.

  Quickly, he got out of bed and put on the boxer shorts he'd dropped on the floor last night. Seconds later, he'd retrieved the morning's newspaper from in front of his apartment door. Beneath the Atlanta Journal banner was a confirmation of the date—Friday, July 9, 1965.

  Now that he was sure he'd arrived in time to make a difference, he set the paper down on the sofa and went to the bathroom.

  There, he received his second surprise. The image reflected back at him in the mirror had his old haircut. He dipped his head down and examined the top of his scalp with his fingers. It was perfectly healthy. A glance down at his calf told him the same thing. He no longer bore any sign of having been electrocuted. He turned and checked his back. No whip slashes.

  But, of course he wouldn't have any of those things, he reminded himself. They hadn't happened yet.

  He thought about his boxer shorts being exactly where he'd left them and how everything in the apartment looked exactly the way it did... before he went to sleep last night.

  Could he have dreamed that he was electrocuted? The longer he was awake, the less real it all seemed. He sat down and tried to run through the sequence of events as he remembered them but the images in his mind were no longer as clear as they were when he first woke up. Just like in a dream.

  He had a call from Ginger. Found her murdered. Was arrested. Sent to the electric chair. Traveled forward in time.

  What?

  He saw the technology of the future. And learned that cheeseburgers could kill you and that Ronald Reagan and a negro, no, an African-American man, had each been elected President.

  What?

  Kelly. Beautiful Kelly. She looked like Ginger only she was all the things Ginger wasn't. She was truly the woman of his dreams.

  Exactly.

  Jack scratched his head. He had never had a dream that seemed so real or was so complete in every detail or that went on for so long. In the dream, nearly two months of time passed between Ginger's murder and his execution then there was the week with Kelly...

  If it had all been real, including his traveling through time, then he had to prevent a murder tonight or at least see to it that the real guilty parties were arrested. On the other hand, if it had only been a weird dream, he couldn't afford to do anything about it.

  He could see how it would go now. He'd notify the police about some Klan members planning to rape and murder one of their wives. They'd act on his tip but nothing like that happens. Everyone would think he was just trying to get revenge against the Klan for what they did to him a few months ago. He'd get fired or burned on a cross. Or both. Every way, he was screwed.

  There had to be some way he could know for sure whether it was real or a nightmare. Then again, perhaps it was a little of both—a premonition of danger. He tried to remember what he had done during the day on July 9th in his dream. If there was some event that he could accurately predict before it happened, that would be enough to convince himself that he had to risk warning the authorities. Unfortunately, his recollection was that he stayed in his apartment working on an article all day until he'd received the call that sent him racing up to Charming.

  His gaze fell on the newspaper. Could he predict something printed inside before reading it? Probably... but since it was The Journal, he might have seen it or heard about it in advance.

  He needed an outsider to supply unquestionable proof but he couldn't very well walk up to Reid O'Neill or Junior Ramey and ask if they were planning on committing any crimes that night.r />
  He stopped and repeated the thought he just had. How did he know about Junior Ramey? Oh yes, that article worte. But another article popped into his head, one dated six months after his execution, about Junior Ramey being the real serial rapist. His brain was overloaded with contradictory information.

  Get back to figuring out a way to sort it out. Who else could he contact? Suddenly a name came to him. Hannah. He had no way of knowing who she was or her connection to the O'Neill's prior to his strange dream. Hadn't he told that to Kelly when she first asked him about the housekeeper?

  Had he actually talked to a Kelly about a Hannah or was that in the dream?

  More than likely, she lived somewhere near Charming and the number of coloreds—blacks—Again he stopped to question where that correction had come from but it wasn't proof of anything. Anyway, the number of her people was limited in that area. It couldn't be that hard to find a mulatto named Hannah, even if he didn't know her last name. As insurance, however, he decided he'd better take the entire stash of cash he kept on hand for "greasing his way to the truth".

  Minutes later, he was dressed and thinking he could grab some sausage biscuits and coffee on the way to Charming, then realized that wasn't possible in 1965. He slowed down long enough to make a breakfast to go. The delay was just enough to get him to recall the wad he'd taken out of his mouth.

  Carefully he sliced open the taped sides and unfolded the paper. The feminine handwriting was immediately familiar but the writer's name at the end—Kelly Kirkwood—set off fireworks in his head, instantly sorting all the muddle into clear thoughts. He quickly read her concise account of what had happened to him and the intimate relationship they had. Her plan had worked, he thought. Her letter convinced him that he hadn't simply had a realistic dream. It had all happened.

  In the next instant, he recalled their conversation about how time travel worked. There was no duplicate of himself in the apartment, so no paradox worries. It appeared that Kelly's choice of theories could be correct. His return to this moment, with his memory of the original time-line in tact, meant there was a chance he had just created a new time-line. And if that was true, he could actually change the outcome!

  He really might be able to make sure Kelly didn't end up with a bullet in her heart in the future.

  Jack let go of the last remnant of doubt about why he'd been saved, why he'd traveled forward in time and why he was now back to the day when everything went wrong. He refolded Kelly's letter and put it in his jeans pocket for safekeeping. He had to believe he'd have a chance to hand it back to her.

  Though he no longer needed to locate Hannah to confirm that it wasn't a dream, she was still the person he most needed to contact.

  He grabbed his car keys and wallet and was headed out the door when he stopped again. Quickly he opened the wallet and took out all the various business cards and slips of paper tucked inside. To his great relief, he still had the FBI Special Agent's card. The man's name was Carl Hastings. Well, at least he'd been right about the H.

  Now that he was in a hurry, he missed the superhighways that Kelly had introduced him to but at least he was getting an early start.

  Logic took him to Buford first and polite questions led him to the areas where he might find a woman with light brown skin. Luck led him to a grocer who knew Hannah.

  "Y'all got laundry fo' her t'do?" the grocer asked, obviously looking for an explanation as to why this white man was in his store.

  "Yes," Jack replied, quickly improvising. "I've never brought it to her myself but the housekeeper was sick today and now I'm afraid I've gotten lost."

  The man was satisfied with the story and gave Jack directions to Hannah's house.

  It wasn't much more than a shack but it had clean curtains on clean windows. When no one answered his knock, Jack went around back where he could see about a mile of clothesline stretched back and forth between poles and enough laundry twisting in the warm breeze to clothe a small army.

  A young woman was forcing a wooden clothespin over a wet sock.

  "Hannah?"

  She turned around and Jack was facing a pretty, teenage version of the Hannah he'd met at O'Neill's mansion. The way she looked him up and down before speaking was also recognizable. "If y'all have laundry that needs doin', I'm all filled up for today. People usually brings their baskets by six."

  "That's okay," he assured her with a wave of his hand and a friendly smile. "I don't need you to do any laundry for me. I just need to talk to you for a few minutes."

  "Talkin' don't get my work done. 'S'cuse me."

  She ducked under a sheet and he followed her. After she bent over to get another wet item out of a basket on the ground and took two clothespins out of her apron pocket, he leaned over and picked up two more pieces.

  She was clearly horrified. "You crazy, mister? What you think you's doin'?"

  "I thought if I helped, we could talk."

  She snatched the things away from him and dropped them back in the basket. Her gaze darted from side to side as though she was afraid someone had witnessed the crazy white man in her yard and would blame her for the indiscretion.

  "Sorry. How about if I paid you?" He pulled out his wallet and extracted a ten dollar bill. "You don't even have to stop working while we talk. Okay?"

  She must have decided this offer was much more reasonable because she stopped hanging laundry long enough to tuck the money into her apron pocket.

  "I know this is going to sound a little nutty but I had a dream last night, actually it was more of a nightmare and you were in it." The only way he could tell she was listening was because her frown deepened. Hopefully she was superstitious enough to believe in dreams. "Anyway, I think it was a premonition of something bad that might happen tonight and I have to stop it. Unfortunately, I'm not sure if I can trust the dream unless I can prove that some of the other things that were in it are true."

  "Mister, you sho' talk a lot without sayin' nuttin'."

  "What I have to ask you is very personal and it's really none of my business but someone's life may depend on your answer." He recalled the tidbits Ramey had revealed about Hannah and hoped he had drawn the right conclusions. "Do you have a, uh, personal relationship with Beauregard Ramey?"

  Her eyes widened in shock then narrowed. "You say you had a bad dream 'bout me? Was it somethin' to do with him?"

  He gave a nod and waited for her to make a decision.

  She turned, walked into her small house and came back carrying a light-skinned baby. "After I came to be a woman, he started payin' my mama to send me up there with his laundry. We was dirt poor and I was the oldest of six. At first he just asked me to help put his clean clothes away then he... offered me some pin money to do... other things fo' him."

  She rocked the infant from side to side before continuing. "When the baby started showin' he sent me away so's his wife wouldn't know. But he wasn't a bad man. He bought this house fo' us and kept sendin' money 'round. An' he sent me lots of customers to make sure I didn't ever have to sell myself or my daughter the way my mama had to." She took a slow breath and returned to her chore. "Did ya get your money's worth or ya be needin' somethin' mo'?"

  He'd probably gotten much more than his money's worth but the next part was even more important than her confirmation. "I'm sorry but I do need something else." He took his wallet back out and handed her another ten dollar bill. "Sometime tonight, Ramey, or one of his friends, might come to you and order you to make a phone call to a man named Jack in Atlanta. He'll tell you to cry and say that your husband has beaten you and beg Jack to come rescue you immediately."

  Jack could see that she was back to thinking he was wasting her time. Suddenly the baby girl let out a squeal and a thought popped into his head. "You making that call for him is so important, he might even threaten your daughter's future to force you to do it."

  The fear that filled Hannah's eyes told Jack that she knew Ramey was capable of doing that and that she was incapable of refus
ing him. Perhaps he had already used that threat before. "It's me that he wants you to call. You have to do as he says but when you hear the phone ringing on my end, I need you to pretend that I've picked up the phone, even though I'm not going to be home."

  Although it didn't seem possible, her expression tensed even more.

  "Can you do that? For your daughter's sake, can you convince him that you're talking to me? Because I can assure you that you won't be happy with what's in store for you and your daughter if you can't do that."

  She repeated what he'd asked her to do and agreed to make the pretend call after he handed her another ten dollars.

  "Remember," he said, walking away. "Your daughter's life may depend on your being a good actress."

  He knew that was a stretch but he needed to be positive that she would follow through. Based on Ramey's comments, the timing of Ginger's murder and Hannah's getting her permanent live-in position in O'Neill's house, Jack felt certain Hannah had been the one who'd called him. On top of that reward, he figured Ramey would have used the child's life as a threat to guarantee her silence indefinitely. And from her reactions, he guessed that he had figured correctly.

  As he drove away from Hannah's house he considered calling Ginger and warning her but he couldn't take the chance of altering anything else about tonight. He knew the general timing of the evening's events. If he called her, she might say something to her husband about it or she might go visit her mother so that she wouldn't be home alone. Either way, the original plan to kill her and frame him would not necessarily be canceled, only changed or moved to another night. A warning to her could result in everything occurring differently.

  Then he would be right back where he started—not having any idea of what was coming or when. No, he knew the only chance he had of making things right was to let as much of it play out as it had originally, then throw a monkey wrench in at a crucial moment.