by Summer Devon
It was Wimble.
Impossible. He’d already paid the man off.
But apparently the butler considered himself still on duty for Jazz. “Sir. I recall you wished to know when a man of a particular description visited our household? Missing some fingers? I believe his is with us now. Friendly enough, but very odd.”
Jazz’s insides congealed. He tried to gulp air that didn’t seem to fill his lungs.
Wimble leaned closer. “I took the liberty of coming here by carriage. Would you care to accompany me?”
Jazz waved a hand. “Of course, lead on. Let’s go.”
Wiping his face on his sleeve, he followed Wimble into the spacious well-sprung carriage belonging to the wealthy young Mrs. Peasnettle. Jazz closed his eyes, but that didn’t help at all. Damn alcohol.
Come to think of it, why was he riding pell-mell to her house? He knew Steele wouldn’t hurt her.
No, it occurred to him that Steele wouldn’t hurt the baby. That was the only certainty or they wouldn’t be here.
He didn’t even know what Steele was doing or if he had the agency’s best interest in mind. Jazz had no guarantees about anything and no way to check any of it.
Wimble opened the door silently and Jazz slipped down the familiar hall behind him. Candles glowed in the parlor. Through a crack in the door, Jazz saw the footman who stood at attention near the fireplace. Not a perfect chaperone but better than Eliza alone. Steele sat on one of the more uncomfortable chairs facing the hall, obviously watching the doorway. He looked up when Wimble entered the room.
“Will madam require more refreshment?” Wimble asked, only slightly out of breath. “I beg your pardon for leaving without your permission, but I hope that Charles provided sufficient service? I have fetched a bottle of brandy from around the corner.”
Eliza began to speak again…when Steele broke in. “I know you were gone long enough to get White. Where is he?”
Jazz sobered up, fast. Of course it had been a trap.
“Excuse me, sir?” Wimble was a very good actor.
“Would you dismiss your butler and footman, ma’am? I would like to continue our conversation. Miss Wickman, you must understand that—”
“Excuse me, sir, I am Mrs. Peasnettle. But if you insist…Wimble, Charles, you may go.”
Wimble retreated from the room and, of course, left the door open. Charles the footman followed Wimble as he walked down the hall away from Jazz without looking back, his head held high. Jazz hoped he wouldn’t sneak back too soon.
Steele spoke. “Miss Wickman. Please don’t dissemble for my sake, ma’am. I know the truth.”
“Y-you do?” Too bad Eliza wasn’t a good actor as well.
“Yes, and I will destroy the man. I can’t allow him to remain alive. Please, ma’am. You must stay seated.”
There was a gasp from Eliza and a thump. She must have tried to get past Steele.
Jazz moved closer, ready to leap into action, but stopped when Steele continued speaking, serious, polite and determined. All the reasons Jazz had liked him during that brief DHU training. “I hope I haven’t hurt you? Good. I thought to spare you the knowledge but perhaps it’s best you know some of the details. Before you judge my mission, you should know the damage White has done. He was directly responsible for the deaths of many people. Thousands perhaps.”
“Oh. So many.” She gave a soft whimper.
Jazz could picture how she sat, hands clasped in her lap, trying to hold back her anxiety. What the flip was Steele telling her this for? The man had a pretty odd idea of protocol and what need-to-know meant. He wished he could barge in the room.
What the hell. He strolled instead.
“Good evening, Mr. Steele,” he said cheerily. “You are looking for me? Good evening, Mrs. Peasnettle.”
Without asking for permission from Eliza, he took a chair near Steele. The baby wasn’t in the room. Good. If only Eliza was closer to the door he could push her out to safety.
Eliza clasped her hands tight in her lap and looked at Jazz with a peculiar mix of fear and something else. She gave him a tight smile and said, “No need for introductions.”
“None.” Steele still watched her and ignored Jazz. “As I explained earlier, ma’am, I am from the government from the country where Mr. White is also from and where he committed these crimes. I consider him a fugitive.”
She gazed at Jazz with steady eyes. “Jas?”
He tried to think of something to say that wasn’t a lie. “I don’t believe Mr. Steele is here in an official capacity.”
Steele looked at him for the first time. “Why are you so sure of that, Mr. White?”
“Mr. Allen said something before I left.” He was being circumspect, using the director’s name, but Steele apparently had lost his sense of caution.
“The young idiot doesn’t know every covert operation in the agency, White. I have been dispatched by others. We don’t need your type returning as a hero.”
“You want to make me a martyr instead?”
Eliza was on her feet. “Enough. You have no right to threaten my friends, Mr. Steele.”
“Please don’t worry, Mrs. Peasnettle. You are only interested in me, correct, Mr. Steele?” Jazz stood slowly, so Steele wouldn’t pounce, and turned to his former teacher. “We should take this discussion outside.”
Eliza started forward, her eyes widened. “No, no. Stay. I hope you would explain what on earth you’re talking about. At least I assume it’s something on this earth.”
Jazz couldn’t help smiling. Oh how he’d miss Eliza. Time to say goodbye to her, but at least he’d be able to say it in person.
“No, we needn’t trouble you any longer. Your servant, ma’am.” He wished he could embrace her, but he didn’t want Steele thinking of their intimacy. More than that, he wanted Steele out and away from Eliza as soon as possible.
Steele gave an elaborate correct bow to Eliza. “I am sorry to have disturbed you, but I had to draw White out and reveal the truth to you. I knew you had a spy in your household. Are you aware that Wimble the butler has been passing messages to him?”
“Naturally I know.” She put her hands on her hips. “I am not an idiot, sir.”
She began to move toward Jazz, but he held up a hand, palm out. “Please, stay here. We need to go outside. Please, Eliza. You need to take care of Maggie.” That should make her stay put.
Steele nodded, without taking his gaze off Jazz.
Jazz walked past her and down the steps, Steele close behind. Jazz couldn’t help that last glance over his shoulder. Eliza stood in the doorway. Steele held a pistol pointed at his lower back. Big surprise.
The two men strolled from the house, as if they were nothing more than two visitors who’d lingered a trifle longer at a lady’s home than was strictly polite.
“There.” With his free hand, Steele pointed through the thickening mist toward the lot near the end of the street shrouded in fog. A fire had destroyed an old wooden structure and a new brick building was under construction. The half-finished walls surrounding the worksite blocked the moon and the curious stares of potential passersby. Someone had dug out a deep pit. An outhouse? A foundation?
Whatever its purpose, it was the perfect place to hide a body. Steele would probably have to come back and destroy all traces of Jazz, but a DHUy like him would know how. Or maybe he wouldn’t because the agent had always known this was the time and place.
Well, she-yit. What would be the point of those other attacks? Playing Jazz like a fish. Or maybe baiting the bear. Trying to instill fear and pain. Didn’t seem like a very professional attitude, Jazz thought. But he never did understand the DHU and he hated the agency at the moment.
Steele walked at Jazz’s side and clutched his upper arm. “She will be married soon. She should have met him by now, but you have been disturbing her thoughts. I think I know, White. About what happened in Spain.” The moonlight was hazy, but it was strong enough so Jazz could see Steele’s twist
ed expression, probably reflecting disgust and hatred. Jazz realized he didn’t actually care what the man was feeling.
Steele must have wanted him to panic. He dug powerful, hard fingers into Jazz’s arm and prodded his side with the pistol. “You will never return and you’ll be considered a deserter from the agency. I’m going to kill you.”
Jazz wondered if the ale and whatnot still sloshing through his system contributed to his calm. “Eh, no big surprise. I wondered why I was stuck here after I gave in my instructions. I’ve been waiting and watching. What a da’ pain it’s been. Why haven’t you gone after me before? Hey, more to the point, why did you keep going after me when you knew it wasn’t time?”
Steele ignored his questions. “I am on a mission, White. There may be no heroic Truthies, not while I have breath in my body. It’s spitting on the graves of all those who died.”
“Okay, right, I get it. Shut up all ready.” Jazz was entirely tired of bearing his sins. He hadn’t chosen to take them on, after all. And he especially didn’t want to bother arguing innocence or guilt at the moment.
And there was that other thing. Time to clear it up. “What did you mean you know about Spain? Are you talking about me? I was the protector. Nothing else mattered to the agency.” Not officially, he added silently. “I asked the director and he wouldn’t answer. Why you? Why? I fear the worst.”
“And what’s that?”
“You’re the father.”
The hand on his arm squeezed hard. Steele knew the truth. Had he spotted some resemblance to her father in Maggie’s face? Or perhaps Steele’d gotten it from Eliza before Jazz appeared. Jazz picked his words carefully. “I’m stuck here so obviously you’ll get your way, Steele. I’m right, aren’t I? I don’t return? And I’m your enemy—no one else is. Do you understand?”
Please God, don’t let the man be fool enough to punish Eliza for consorting with a Truthie. The baby would live, obviously. But Eliza. Those small bits of history could shift, change, create another future. He wouldn’t know because the CR wasn’t part of any web.
Steele’s breath was harsh. “I understand,” he repeated. “You’re the enemy. No one else.”
Jazz almost sagged with relief. The man hadn’t promised to leave Eliza alone, but this was more than Jazz thought he’d say.
They stepped over a low brick wall surrounding the construction.
“I’m going to fight you,” Jazz said. “But you don’t care because of course you already know I’m not going to survive. White will die here.”
Steele gave a small huffing breath. Triumph. His teeth gleamed in the dark. “Ah, you aren’t as clueless as I thought. That much the director told me—there would be no return for you. I have to be sure.”
Did that mean the scheming little twerp of a director sent Steele to kill him? Jazz supposed so. “Goddamn agency,” he muttered as he looked for loose rocks around his feet, something to grab and throw. A fair fight while he was in his right mind seemed only…gentlemanly.
He talked as he scanned the area. “When no one but you looked at me during that first da’ agency meeting I thought it was because I was a Truthie. Nah, because they’d send me off to die and they all knew it, even before they fetched me from my cozy safe home.” Jazz paused. “No, wait. They didn’t know it, eventually they would know it.”
He laughed, actually amused. “Language is a bugger for time travelers,” he said. “Never can get the damn tenses right.”
Something gave a tiny gurgle. Both men whirled around.
Eliza had followed them. Blast the woman, Jazz thought, she was a better sneak than actor.
“Jesus Lord.” But it was Steele who spoke, not her. “I’m going to have to kill her too.”
His words changed everything.
Jazz hadn’t known if Steele came from the agency proper, or some secret wing of it. With Steele’s strange mutterings about what happened in Spain and the repeated unnecessary attacks on Jazz, Jazz had suspected the man was cracked. But now he understood. How Steele had traveled and what he’d planned was no longer of any importance. Steele’s mission was only in his poor warped brain. He was not acting for the DHU but hell, Jazz didn’t even care if he was.
Screw the fair fight. He bit down hard on his lip to cause real pain, the first step in an almost forgotten process. The way it always began, back to the original berserkers. Pain and blood.
Blood trickled into his mouth and from the nearly blocked section of his own warped mind, he summoned the Truthie’s war cry. Destruction. Perhaps the alcohol he’d drunk helped him fetch it up. Leave thought. Act. Be death.
He twisted from Steele’s grip and allowed the long-repressed frenzy to take control of his body and mind.
A hand cut to Steele’s throat along with a sharp side-kick at his arm and the gun jerked up. Jazz’s other hand whirled around and grabbed the gun as it started to fall. Steele was knocked to the ground. A whomp, a groan, a sickening thud and it was over.
More to kill. More. His body and brain clamored, begged him to stomp on the man’s throat.
No. Jazz slammed down a wall in his mind, the one he’d been taught to build years ago. I am not death. Stop. Wake up.
And he did. Shivering and dizzy, he came back. He slowly straightened from a crouch he didn’t recall going into and looked around.
Eliza had dropped to the ground, smart woman. She’d remembered the lessons for self-preservation he’d taught her in Spain. As she rose to her feet, something in her hand caught the moonlight and Jazz realized she held a sharp carving knife she’d carried out with her.
They panted for a moment without speaking. Jazz pulled out his CR with shaking hands and squatted by Steele. When he rested it on the man, the CR registered a heartbeat. “He’s alive.” His throat felt raw as if he’d been screaming the war-cry of a Truthie. He wondered if he had.
Eliza walked to him, silent in her slippers. She stood over Jazz, swaying slightly.
He licked his own blood from his lip. “How much did you hear?”
“Not so very much. Enough,” she whispered. “Time travel. I see. What you did to him and the man in Spain. Madame Blanro. It’s all true.”
Jazz looked up at her. “Yeah.”
She held out her hand, but not to help him to his feet. She obviously wanted the CR. He almost turned off the disguise and handed it to her, but he shook his head and dumped it back in his pocket. Too much.
Eliza sank down to kneel by him and looked at the too-still figure of Steele. “You and this man. You talked about me, Jas. Now you must tell me why and you owe me truth.”
Jazz hauled Steele up by an arm. “We can’t sit around out here, Liza. May I take him back to your house?”
“Only if you tie him up.”
Jazz grunted and pulled the limp figure over his shoulders in a fireman’s carry. He stumbled as he stepped over the wall. Steele was a big man.
“You’re very calm, Liza. Are you all right?”
“I’m… I’m… Yes.” She wiped the back of her hand over her mouth. “God help me, I think I rather knew the truth in the back of my heart.”
“I thought the phrase was back of the mind?”
“Usually, but in this case it was my heart.”
It might have been one of their discussions as they tramped through Spain—familiar and nightmarish at the same moment. As they walked across the square, a yellowish fog swirled around their legs. Even as Wimble opened the door for them, the fog grew thicker.
Jazz went into the dining room and dumped the unconscious Steele on a chair while Eliza fetched rope. He tied Steele with a great number of random, not-very-competent knots. Obviously bondage was not one of the skills he’d been left with.
He went to the side table and poured some port into a crystal tumbler. “Come on, Steele, time to wake up.”
The man groaned as the wine touched his lips. One of his eyes was swollen shut. After he made another small noise, he went limp again.
Jazz knelt
by Steele again. “There is something wrong.”
They quickly untied him. “We should summon Mr. Grace,” Eliza said.
Jazz nodded. The surgeon might have something useful to say. Jazz had studied childbirth, not head injuries.
He and Charles grabbed Steele’s arms and legs and carried him up the stairs while Wimble went to fetch the doctor. Eliza followed them into the spare bedroom and she and Jazz stood near the bed. Charles was at attention in a corner of the room so Jazz contented himself with shifting close enough to Eliza to catch her lovely scent enhanced by the perfume of some flowers she’d tucked into her hair. Had she been wearing them all this time? That’s what he should have paid attention to when he thought he had only minutes to live. Not Steele or his revenge. The flowers in Liza’s hair. He’d remember that for next time.
“I read your note,” she told him in a low voice.
He’d forgotten he’d written to her. “Note?”
“Telling me goodbye. I had planned to come chivvying after you this evening but was detained when your friend came to visit.”
“Chivvying after me?”
“As a hound runs after a fox. You promised, Jas. Twelve months. Yet when I read that note I understood you’d break your promise to me.”
He rubbed his face. “I thought I had to. I mean, some of what Steele said is true. I am beholden to…to the agency.”
“To the future, I imagine,” she said in a flat voice. “I am still uncertain which of us is insane.”
At that moment, Maggie began to cry. “Your daughter is hungry,” she said as she turned to leave. “I’ll go feed her.”
Mr. Grace’s heavy footsteps sounded on the stairs. “You again?” he asked Jazz, who met him at the landing. “You do make free with Mrs. Peasnettle’s home.” He stuck out a hand and Jazz shook it.
Maggie’s cries were louder.
“Am I here to attend to the infant?” The doctor frowned as he unbuttoned his frockcoat.
No, nothing that horrible, Jazz thought. I’ve only brutally attacked another man. “Your patient is in here.” He led Mr. Grace into the bedroom.
The surgeon stopped outside the door for a minute and cocked his head. He smiled down the hall toward the room where the baby and mother were. “Good. Her lungs are excellent. That’s a fine, lusty cry of hunger.”
