by Jenny Lykins
“Now what,” Ty asked, rummaging for her gown.
“The corset cover,” she answered, still a little breathless. Once she fumbled the buttons through the holes, she moistened her lips. “The petticoats, please.” She kept her back to him, fearing that her face matched the color of his car.
He shoved three petticoats around from behind. She stepped into the first one, tied the tapes, then settled the other two over her head and around her waist.
“Now the skirts.”
He gathered them up and dropped them over her head. She secured them at her waist, then fluffed them to cover the petticoats.
The bodice appeared in front of her, dangling from his fingertips. That simple, intimate gesture sent a fire raging through her blood. She swallowed hard, fought the heat rising in the back of her neck. Goodness, how could something so innocent cause such havoc with her insides?
She slipped into the bodice and he automatically set to work on the miniscule buttons. The warmth of his fingers burned through the fabric. She jerked, then leaned her head back with a sigh at the soft touch of his lips against her neck. “All through,” he whispered. He pressed against her back, his arms sliding around her waist, his hands wandering upward. A scorching, ache pulsed through her as his hands cast a magical spell. She turned in his arms.
“Car coming,” Daniel yelled from the edge of the woods.
Ty cursed. When Callen echoed his sentiments, his eyes widened and he laughed.
“Such language, Mrs. McCall,” he teased.
She let her hands meander along the warm firmness of his body.
“It’s all your fault,” she whispered.
Their teasing ended when the crunch of tires on gravel grew louder.
“Better climb in the car, troublemaker.” Ty opened the door for her. “If anyone sees you in that dress, they’ll hang around forever and have you posing for pictures.”
He rolled down the windows and shut the door, then she watched him through the thick foliage as he strolled out into the clearing and propped himself on a concrete bench. Dan walked the perimeter of the columns again.
The family of five stayed about fifteen minutes, which felt more like an hour. The minute the car disappeared down the drive, Ty yelled for Dan, sprinted to the car, grabbed his own duffel bag, then helped Callen maneuver through the undergrowth.
Dan stood aside while Ty put a shoulder to the center of the column base and shoved. When it grated open, he turned and looked at his brother, whose eyes had widened in surprise.
“Dan, I don’t know how many of us can pass through here at one time. If the three of us can’t pass, I want you to take Callen back to Memphis while I go alone.”
“No!” Callen gasped, but Ty stopped her.
“I stand a better chance of finding Connor than you do, sweetheart. When I find him, I’ll bring him back, call you on the cell, rent a car. Something. He knows me. He won’t be scared.” He looked Callen in the eye. “It’s our best chance. Agreed?”
She swallowed hard, closed her eyes, then finally nodded.
“Okay, then. Let’s try this. Dan, hold Callen’s hand.”
Callen offered her hand, and when Daniel took it, Ty took her other hand, then pulled them into the small chamber. The three of them barely fit.
“Ty, you’ve gotta be—”
“Quiet, Dan. Keep holding her hand and close the panel.”
The moment the panel slid shut, Ty opened the one opposite. When the familiar smell of stored food and damp earth swirled into the chamber, Ty whispered “Yes,” and Callen let out a choked sob of relief. Ty stepped out and pulled Callen with him. She had to give Dan a tug to get him to move.
“Holy sh—”
“Shh!” Ty clamped his hand over Daniel’s mouth. “We don’t want anyone to know we’re here yet,” he whispered. “Stay quiet, don’t make any noise when we climb the stairs, and when I take off, you follow me without stopping for anything. Understand?”
Dan nodded.
“Ty,” Callen whispered, “the kitchen should be empty right now, unless Magnolia has started supper.”
“We’ll run for the overseer’s cottage.” He turned to Dan, a dark outline in the gloom of the cellar. “At the top of the stairs, we’ll run out the door on the right.” Dan nodded. “We’ll head straight down the path, and the cottage is just on the other side of the garden.”
Dan nodded again, then Ty led them through the cellar, pointing at barrels and crates so they wouldn’t trip over them. At the top of the stairs he pressed his ear against the door, then ever so slowly opened it and peered out.
Had this been what he’d done that first night, Callen wondered, when she’d mistaken him for Tylar? Had this been how he felt, his heart pumping wildly?
“Now!” he whispered.
The three of them slipped silently through the door, across the kitchen and porch, then onto the path. Callen’s heart stuck in her throat as they raced through the gardens, then into the overseer’s cottage. Not until Ty closed the door behind them did her heart start to beat again.
In the days before the war, the plantation had bustled with so many people, they would never have been able to run to the cottage unnoticed. Now, so few remained, the grounds seemed all but deserted.
Daniel turned a full circle in the small parlor, his eyes as wide as dinner plates. He stared out the window at the house that had minutes earlier been nothing more than eerie, free-standing pillars, then he flopped into a chair and poked at it, as if to make sure it was real.
“Man, what a rush!” He looked up at Ty. “I owe you an apology, big brother. How in the world did you get here the first time? How’d you find out about the column?”
Ty glanced out the window, then pulled Callen into the center of the room.
“I’ll explain all that later, Dan. Right now we have plans to make.” He paced the floor a few minutes, then finally turned to Callen. “We’ll stay out of sight until dark, then first things first. Is the minister who married you and Tylar still around?”
Her heart quickened. She could only nod.
“He wasn’t the guy—”
“No.” Callen shook her head. “That was Evan’s family minister.”
Good.” Ty turned to Daniel, whose look of awe had evolved to surprise.
“I hate to spring this on you like this, Danny boy, but would you be my best man?”
Daniel simply stared at them for a long, silent moment. He finally focused his gaze on Callen.
“Do you love him?” he asked, nodding toward Ty.
Callen took a deep breath and met Ty’s liquid bronze gaze.
“Oh, yes,” she whispered. “I have loved him forever.”
Daniel looked long and hard at his brother, then finally, with one single nod, he gave them his blessing. Callen didn’t realize she’d been holding her breath.
While they waited for dark, she went through Tylar’s old clothing in his trunk in the bedroom. Ty and Daniel both would need something less conspicuous, and she wanted to give the brothers some time alone. What a shock this day must have been for Daniel. First, to have traveled to the past, then to find that his brother planned to marry.
She knelt now beside the trunk and examined every piece of clothing with care. No matter how badly the war effort had needed clothing or bandages, she had refused to give up these few articles she had left of her husband. They would be all she could give to her son of his father.
His scent still lingered on the clothes, even through the light cedar fragrance of the wood. She held up a shirt and buried her face in it. How often had she done this same thing, sitting in this same room, swollen with his baby?
And now he was back. Unbelievably. Miraculously. How, she didn’t know. Nor why. But Ty was the same man, the same soul.
She breathed deeply of the fabric against her cheek. He even had the same scent.
She lifted Tylar’s wedding suit from the chest, then tears of joy sprang to her eyes at the dull ivory sh
immer beneath.
Her mother’s wedding dress. Her wedding dress.
She’d forgotten she had packed it away with Tylar’s suit.
She pulled it from the chest, shook out the folds, held the gown to her. How perfect! How utterly perfect!
More excited than ever – if that was possible – she hung the gown in the larger bedroom, then sorted through Tylar’s clothing, smoothing the wrinkles from his wedding suit, piecing together a set of trousers, coat, and shirt for Daniel. She basted a hem in the trousers for Dan so they wouldn’t be overly long.
Oh, how she wished her mother were here. The memory of their shared excitement formed a hard knot in her chest. That wedding, too, had been planned in secret, in defiance of a Windsor male.
Just then she heard the sound of a horse on the drive. Creeping to the window, she peered out in time to see Stephen fling himself atop his roan and trot down the drive.
“Ty!” She flew down the stairs, interrupting the conversation between brothers. “Stephen has just left. If we hurry and change, we can take the carriage before he gets back. Magnolia and Jacob will help!”
Ty turned and looked at Daniel. The boy glanced at Callen, rubbed the back of his neck in a gesture so like his brother’s, and said, “What are we waiting for?”
“I’ve clothing for you both upstairs.” She turned and started up the steps. “Reverend Johnson would not hesitate to question your manner of dress.” Though Ty and Daniel both had dressed in a more formal fashion, a person could not help but notice their odd clothing. “And I…I will need assistance, Ty, when you are through dressing.” Twice in one day, and still her face heated at the thought. “Daniel, your suit is the one on the left.” She slipped through the door of the larger bedroom, then turned back to Ty. “Just knock when you are ready.”
She could hear their masculine murmurs as she removed the gown in which she’d nearly married Evan. With that thought, she searched deep into the pocket of her skirts and removed the wedding ring that had come so close to shackling her forever to a man she didn’t love. She’d slipped the ring from her finger as soon as she could after Ty’s lady friend had glanced at it, then put it in the pocket of her gown so she wouldn’t lose it. Now she must remember to return the thin band of gold to Evan. Few families in this day and age could afford to part with anything of value, and Evan would surely have need of the ring some day.
With a few contortions, and a couple popped buttons, she managed to loosen the bodice enough to pull it over her head, then after removing her skirts she hurried to settle the muted ivory fabric atop her layers of petticoats. She had no hopes of securing the matching bodice. She simply slid her arms into the sleeves and held it to her breast, then tried to repair the damage to her hair while she waited for Ty to come and help her.
Within minutes he knocked quietly.
“Are you decent?” he teased from the other side of the door.
She didn’t quite know how to answer that. Her heartbeat doubled.
“C…ahem…come in.”
The door swung inward, and there he stood.
The sight of him sucked the very air from the room.
He was the image of Tylar nearly five and a half years earlier. Tears pooled in her eyes. Everything she’d dreamed of… Everything she’d prayed for…
His gaze traveled over her, no longer teasing, but raking her with heat. They stared at each other, and she had no doubt her eyes held the same raw hunger that shone from his.
Finally, after several long moments, he blinked and drew in a deep breath.
“Turn around,” he rasped, then his fingers set to work on lacing her bodice when she presented her back. “I’m getting good at this,” he whispered in her ear, his breath sending shivers tumbling down her spine. When his hands reached her waist and tied off the laces, his lips came down to caress the hollow beneath her ear. A little noise escaped her throat. He groaned. “You’ll be the death of me,” he growled against her neck. “And if we don’t get out of here, we’re going to have the wedding night before we have the wedding.”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Ty stood in front of the minister, holding Callen’s hand, his fingers the temperature of ice cubes.
Rev. Johnson had been shocked at the sight of Ty and Callen at his door. He’d murmured something about hearing rumors, then ushered them and Dan into his parlor. He’d asked with a bewildered look what he could do for them, then looked even more bewildered when Ty had said, “Marry us.”
Being as truthful as possible, Ty had told the minister and his wife that Stephen had legal, military documents stating that Tylar McCall was dead, and for everyone’s sake, Ty and Callen felt it wise to have Rev. Johnson perform another ceremony so there could be no question. And, since he, no doubt, had the record of the earlier marriage, then they surely wouldn’t need to go through all those preliminaries again. The only real lie had been that Dan was Ty’s cousin, since Rev. Johnson had known Tylar since his boyhood.
And now, here Ty stood, in 1867, with his brother, no less, marrying the woman of his dreams who just happened to have been born in 1840.
He bit his tongue against the ridiculous urge to laugh.
“…forsaking all others, as long as ye both shall live?”
He looked into her dark, luminous eyes, brought her hand up to kiss the backs of her fingers.
“I do,” he said. How easily the pledge came to his lips. Once he had run from relationships like a man running from thunderstorms, but now he stood here and welcomed the rain.
“And do you, Callen Marie…”
Ty smiled down at her. What he wouldn’t give for a camera, to capture this moment. Everything about her glowed.
“…as long as ye both shall live?”
“I do,” she whispered. The sound of those words ricocheted through him, hitting him dead on in the center of his heart.
“May I have the ring, please?”
Dan stepped forward and handed the minister the gold band that Callen had pulled from a ginger jar off the mantel on her way out the door.
“This ring is a symbol of eternity, with no beginning and no end…”
The words, so like the ones spoken at Windsor just a few days ago, held a whole new meaning for Ty.
And to think, he had nearly walked away…for her own good.
He took the ring from atop the Bible and held her hand in his. Before slipping it on her finger, he brought the gold circle to his lips. A kiss for luck, that this time their lives together would be perfect. When he slid the band snugly on her finger, she kissed the ring as well.
“Inasmuch as Callen and Tylar have…”
He would make this life of theirs perfect, and do whatever it took to insure her happiness. After Connor’s surgeries – that he would somehow manage to pay for - if she wanted to live in the past, he would find a way to support her. He had never felt so whole, with his brother on one side and his bride on the other.
She gazed up at him with that smile of hers. The most beautiful sight in the world.
“…vested in me, I now pronounce you man and wife. Again.”
Rev. Johnson smiled at his witticism. Ty’s stomach did a little flip. He took Callen in his arms and kissed her for the first time as her husband…in this life. She slid her arms around his neck, melting into him as his tongue found hers.
“Er…Ty?”
He glanced up at Dan, then lifted his head. Mrs. Johnson’s eyes looked like quarters while she made use of her little ivory fan. The minister’s lips twitched in an effort to remain solemn.
With his own lips twitching, Ty stepped away and winked at Callen.
“Reverand Johnson, thank you.” He pumped the man’s hand, then leaned over and kissed the powdered cheek of the minister’s wife. “This sets our minds at ease. Stephen hasn’t been himself, and he was never in favor of the first marriage.” Ty circled Callen’s tiny waist with his arm and pulled her to him. “We were separated so long. We just wanted to make sure no
thing ever comes between us again.”
“Can’t say as I blame you, son. I felt the same way about Mrs. Johnson.”
The diminutive woman made a little protesting noise, but her face glowed like a newlywed’s.
“Where the devil have you been, though, boy?” Rev. Johnson peered at him over a tiny pair of wire rims while he signed the papers proving their marriage legal; documents Ty had requested. “You been sick? Injured?”
Ty glanced down at Callen and gave her another squeeze. He’d prepared for this question.
“Doing a job, sir, that I really can’t discuss.” Again, this wasn’t a lie. He definitely couldn’t tell these people that he’d been a photographer in the twenty-first century.
Rev. Johnson nodded, his eyes lighting in speculation.
“Well,” Ty clasped the minister’s hand again, then took the papers and tucked them into his coat. “We really should head back. How much do I owe you?”
Johnson chuckled, pulling off his glasses and sliding them into his vest pocket.
“Well now, son, I wouldn’t feel right taking your money, seeing as how you already paid me once for my services.”
Ty liked this old guy. And thank God he didn’t want money, since the only things Ty had in his wallet were a couple of credit cards, that old daguerreotype, bills from the twenty-first century, and a driver’s license.
“Tell you what, Reverend, I’ll try to make it up in the offering plate.”
“You do that, son.” Johnson slapped him on the shoulder. “Excellent idea.”
Dan led the way out the door while Ty and Callen followed, the Johnsons wishing them well as the three of them climbed into the carriage.
“Now don’t you go disappearing on us again, son. I don’t want to have to marry you a third time.” Johnson chuckled. “I’ll get a reputation of not making them stick.”
Ty nodded with a smile, thinking of their imminent departure as soon as they found Connor.
“Believe me, Reverend, a third wedding ceremony won’t happen in this lifetime.” He glanced down to wink at Callen. Her mischievous grin hit him in the chest like a flaming ball of lust.
