Time's Enemy: A Romantic Time Travel Adventure (Saturn Society Book 1)

by Jennette Marie Powell

  Mulroney’s had two walls of TVs, cheap beer, and the servers knew when to be chatty and when to leave a guy alone and keep the beer coming.

  Not that the price of the beer mattered, because Tony also remembered he’d made good money in the stock market. Not anything like Keith Lynch, but he’d made enough to set himself up for a nice retirement. At the time he hadn’t known why he’d bought the stocks... intuition was too mild a term. Compulsion was closer, like some kind of benign possession. Later, it had made him sell his investments and buy the apartment complex where he now lived—right before the market tanked.

  Himself, from the future. “My God,” he whispered. He’d relived the past to ensure his financial security. Had Lynch experienced the same kind of intuition?

  Come on, Solomon. Keith just had good business instincts—and so did Tony. Lynch only gambled with larger stakes.

  After several misses, Tony managed to jam his key into the keyhole and stumbled into the apartment. He flung his coat down and dragged himself down the hallway and through the first door, only to bump into his computer desk, then bang his elbow on a file cabinet. Swearing, he lurched out of his home office and found the bedroom.

  He woke thirteen hours later (what’s up with that?), fully clothed. Thankfully, it was Saturday, so he didn’t need to worry about work. The first thing he did was turn on the TV, to the news, where the reporters were talking about a guy in Texas who’d found a live grasshopper as big as his hand, a species thought to be long extinct. The ticker at the bottom of the screen read March 21. With the correct year.

  His fingers twitched on the TV remote, and he couldn’t stop jiggling his foot.

  He had to do something, get out of the sterile apartment with its neutral, brown carpet and bland, off-white walls that the department-store paintings his mom and sister had bought did little to liven.

  Unable to come up with a better idea, he took the ten-minute hike through the woods behind the apartment complex to Mulroney’s, where he went straight to his usual barstool, three down from the waitress rails, next to... Bernie from the bagel shop?

  The memories slid into place, like a movie he’d already seen or a book he’d forgotten he’d read before. One of those small-world things, he and the deli owner had become friends. Or bar buddies, at least. The comfort in routine shaved away a bit of Tony’s unease.

  “Tony, my man!” Bernie said. “Where you been? I was about to come lookin’ for you, not like you to stay away.”

  Tony tipped his head from side to side as he slid onto his barstool. “I’ve been busy.”

  He’d just ordered a beer when a whoosh of vinyl announced someone taking the barstool on his other side. He glanced over. Mandy, another regular, known at Mulroney’s as Randy Mandy for her habit of taking guys out to the parking lot for a quick roll in the back of her minivan. He quickly turned back to Bernie.

  “Hi Tony,” the woman said. She scooted forward in her seat. Tony didn’t remember ever introducing himself to her, but he mumbled a hello to be polite, keeping his gaze focused on the TV above the bar.

  The bartender set a beer in front of him. Before he could get his wallet out, Mandy leaned forward and dropped a bill on the bar. “I got his.”

  “Thanks.” Tony lifted his beer, then pretended to be engrossed in the game, responding to Mandy’s pointless chit-chat just enough to be polite.

  By halftime, he couldn’t take any more. He searched for help, but Bernie’s half-full beer sat in front of an empty barstool. Must’ve gone to the john. Tony hurried to the men’s room, more to get away than because he had to go.

  Bernie exited the restroom as Tony reached it. “Here, you might need this.” He pressed something into Tony’s hand.

  Tony uncurled his fist. A condom. He started to say something, but his friend had already headed back to the bar.

  Tony returned to another beer and a smiling Mandy. Bernie whispered in his ear. “You can thank me later.”

  Tony snorted. “I don’t think—”

  Bernie kept his voice low, although Mandy had turned to converse with another woman sitting a few seats down. “Come on man, time to get back in the saddle.”

  As soon as the game ended, Tony made an excuse and bolted for the door. As he walked out, movement caught his eye.

  At the strip mall’s other end, a woman with blunt-cut, blond hair walked a German Shepherd.

  The dog lady? Tony squinted. Yep, it was her. She’d gotten a hair cut since the time he’d seen her at Bernie’s, after he’d returned from Mexico.

  The memory filtered in. In his changed past, he’d still gone. Alone. So had Dora. He’d still fallen, still had that (big stone knife) horrible nightmare.

  He touched his neck, drawing his finger around the scar.

  Violet had spent the most time with him in those early, hazy days in the hospital. But to his surprise, Dora had volunteered to remain in Mexico when the others returned home. They had been married for sixteen years after all, she’d said.

  The dog lady made a chirping sound at the shepherd, and slowed by the pet shop, still several stores down from Tony. Something about her reminded him of someone he knew, but he couldn’t pinpoint who. Then he remembered the collar, from the little Yorkie that had jumped out of her handbag. “Hey!”

  She lifted her hand in acknowledgment, then walked into the store.

  He ran down the sidewalk, almost barreling into a guy coming out of the laundromat.

  In the pet store, he checked the aisles for dog beds, toys, and food. All were deserted. He raced down the next aisle, even though it was all fish stuff, then scanned the rest of the store. The only other shopper was an elderly lady buying birdseed.

  He hurried to the checkout. “I’m looking for a woman who just came in—tall, with short, blond hair, walking a German shepherd...”

  The girl at the register shook her head, brows pressed down, and pointed to the birdseed woman, who was pushing her cart out the door. “She’s the only person who’s come in since my shift started an hour ago.”

  Tony rushed out the door. Had he been mistaken? Maybe the dog lady had walked around the building. He ran to the corner of the strip mall, then around back, but no one was there.

  Defeated, he trekked through the woods toward home.

  What was the deal with the dog lady? Who was she, and how did she just... disappear? And who did she remind him—

  He stopped in the middle of the trail. Her hair, that was it. It was the same shade of blond, the same cut Bethany had worn when—

  Bethany. A chill raced down his body. He’d gone back two years and changed the past. Why not try for three?

  When Tony arrived at the house near the Ghetto, a strange sense of déjà vu settled over him.

  He’d been there before. A vague memory filtered into his mind of stopping there, not last spring, but the year before. He hadn’t known why he came, and hadn’t gone inside.

  This time he knew why he’d come to the Saturn Society house. To learn about time travel. To learn how to go back three years and save his daughter.

  After leaving Mulroney’s, he’d sat in his apartment for over an hour, trying to jump back three years. But nothing happened.

  As if the one time had been a fluke.

  Everly hadn’t answered his phone, so Tony had decided to take him up on his “stop by anytime” offer.

  Time travel. He snorted. Part of him still didn’t want to believe it, yet the recent events were making it harder and harder not to. He stopped on the sidewalk in front of the house.

  Oh, for crying out loud. Supposedly it was a research organization, nothing more.

  The place looked deserted. According to the web site, the organization was huge, with offices—or houses, rather—all over the world. If Everly was gone, maybe Tony would try the Columbus location.

  He forced himself to climb the three steps to the porch and strode to the front door. He paused as he reached for the doorknob and read the brass plaque beside it.


  THE SATURN SOCIETY

  DAYTON HOUSE

  EST. 1914

  He peered at the door’s frosted glass top panel. A light he hadn’t seen from the street glowed inside. He gripped the doorknob and turned it with more force than necessary.

  The door opened without a sound. Tony’s shoes tapped on the marble tile. A banker’s lamp atop an antique mahogany desk in the foyer was the source of the light. The computer monitor beside it looked out of place.

  A young woman with Ben Franklin glasses and stubby, black ponytails yanked her granny-boot-clad feet off the desk as she lowered the paperback novel she’d been reading. “Can I help you?” She spoke loudly, as if he stood across a large room instead of right in front of her. A brass placard beside the computer identified her as Taylor Gressman.

  “I’m here to see Chad Everly.” Tony gazed around. The place reeked of old money, with its expensive-looking, burgundy and forest green striped wallpaper, dark wood chair railing, and elegant landscape paintings in ornate frames. “He told me to stop by.”

  Her face slackened. “Oh, crap. Chad’s away until— hey, you’re the guy who was in the papers a few weeks ago, aren’t you?” Her blue eyes gleamed behind her glasses.

  Tony’s mouth tightened. “Yes.”

  “I knew it. I knew from that line on your neck.” She leaned forward, squinting. “Did they really cut off your head?”

  Tony took a step back. “I— I don’t—”

  “You don’t remember? That happens a lot. Well, I know Cha— Mr. Everly does want to see you.” She rose, tossing her book onto the desk. “Crappy book. They didn’t have a clue what it was like back then.”

  Tony drew his head back slightly. Did she?

  “Tell you what, you can wait in the conference room, and I’ll see if I can get hold of him.”

  She led Tony up the stairs, down a long corridor, past a restroom, then by a bigger room that reminded him of a hospital ward. Although he saw no medical equipment, four sheet-covered cots flanked the wall in a tidy row. His pace slowed. He hung back to get another glimpse. Did they conduct research on human subjects here? “What’s that room for?”

  “That’s our recovery room. Every Society House has one—”

  “Recovery?” Muscles knotted in his stomach. “From what?”

  “From time travel.” She led him to another door at the end of the hall, across from an odd little alcove with an old, rotary-dial phone on a waist-high shelf.

  Realizing he must look like a moron, he shut his mouth.

  She tipped her head down and peered at him over her glasses. “Don’t you get, like, totally wiped out when you go to the past or come back?”

  That was a good way to describe the fatigue that had fallen over him as soon as he’d gone back two years, when he’d noticed Dora’s suddenly-different clothes. Mexico had been worse, although he’d attributed that to his injuries. “I guess so.”

  “So when you go back in time, or come back to the present, do it here and we’ll take care of you. Handy, huh?” She opened the door opposite the alcove.

  “You mean this is something... other people can do?”

  She gave him a patronizing expression, like she was explaining something to a small child. “Well, yeah.”

  Tony followed her into the room. She motioned to the round, wooden table in its center and four accompanying, straight-backed chairs. “Have a seat.”

  “So, uh...” So many questions. “When I go to the past, how do I come back—” Tony began.

  “Unnnngh!” A groan came from the hallway.

  “Oh crap.” The woman jumped for the door, but not fast enough to keep the moan’s source from Tony’s view.

  “Unngh! Uhhhh!” The man lurched around the doorframe, his vacant eyes unfocused, his mouth slack. Wispy, gray hair covered his almost-bald head. “Huhhhhhh-uhhh!” A string of spittle slipped from the corner of his mouth.

  Tony recoiled. Good God, what kind of research did they do?

  Taylor grabbed the man’s gnarled hand. “Come on Fred, let’s get you back to your room. It’s almost time for Jerry Springer.” She dragged him away. More groans, higher-pitched. “I’ll be back,” she called to Tony, pulling the door shut. The moans grew more insistent as they faded.

  Pressure built in Tony’s chest. Was that what happened to their research subjects? He folded his hands at his waist, gripping the left tightly with the right. Maybe he should leave. He could sneak out while that girl was taking care of Fred—whoever he was.

  No. He’d come for answers, and he was going to get them. The suspicion that the girl was up to something was only him not wanting to admit that there was something to this time travel stuff. If she tried to pull anything funny, he could force his way past her if he had to.

  He studied his surroundings. It wasn’t much of a conference room, lacking the lush appointments of the entryway. Scratches marred the table and credenza along the side wall. The desk lamp on the latter did little to illuminate the windowless room.

  He took a chair, hoping the woman would return soon. There wasn’t so much as a year-old copy of People to read. Above the credenza hung a silver relief image of the planet Saturn, flanked by three stars. Above it, a banner proclaimed Learn—Observe—Preserve.

  Across the room, an institutional wall clock broke the expanse of wall where the bricked-in windows were, and beside it hung a plain calendar turned to March of the current year. The only other decoration in the room was a trio of framed, old-fashioned photographs on the wall opposite the credenza. In one, a stolid gentleman in a derby hat handed a paper to a white-haired, black man in similar attire. The middle photo showed the exterior of the house, before the two second story windows had been bricked over. In the third, two men posed in front of a frame building with “Goodwin’s Smoke Shop - 140 Harrison Street” painted on the plate glass window. An antique car stood in front of it. Someone had scrawled a date in spidery, old-fashioned script across the bottom: 26 February, 1913. The little store must’ve been what was there before the Saturn Society house.

  “Hey Chad, it’s Taylor,” the woman said from down the hall, her voice loud enough Tony didn’t have to strain to hear. “I wanted to let you know that Tony Solomon just showed up. I’m going to go ahead and give him the test, so call me when you get this... bye.”

  She appeared a minute later with a sheaf of papers in hand, and sat in the chair across from Tony. “I couldn’t get hold of Chad, but I know he’ll want me to go over this stuff with you.” She slid the papers across the table, along with a pen.

  Tony picked up the top sheet. The heading read “Saturn Society,” with “Membership Application” below it. “What is this Saturn Society, anyway?” He flipped through the papers. “I’d never heard of it until Everly came up to me in the parking garage.”

  “Not surprising. We keep a low profile.”

  “What hap- who was that man who came in here a few minutes ago? Is he—”

  “Don’t worry about him.” She dismissed Tony’s question with a wave. “He’s... a ward of the Society. Nothing to concern yourself with.”

  Tony frowned at the door, then at Taylor. “I thought this was a research organization.” The more he thought about it, the less scientific the place looked.

  Taylor chewed her lower lip. “Well... sort of. That’s our public face, so we can do stuff like own property and have bank accounts.”

  “You don’t research time travel, then?”

  “We do it. As for research, we keep records and stuff, like what we see when we go into the past, what happens there. Ways we die, how we heal—”

  “You what?” He stared down at his hands. Could his sacrifice and death have been real? “You mean... I really died? This shit’s for real?”

  “As real as you and me sitting here.”

  “You can do this?”

  “Sure. Though the farthest back I’ve ever been is 1927. Way cool. I tell you, people back then knew how to party—”
>
  “How far back can you—can other people go?”

  “Depends on the individual. Some people can go back centuries, others only decades.” She crossed her legs, bumping one of his. “There’s a limit, of course. Something to do with the expansion of the universe—jump back too far, and the earth’s orbit will have been different enough that you’d warp into empty space. If your destination isn’t habitable, you don’t warp at all. Prevents us from warping inside of a wall or a mountain, stuff like that.”

  “Habitable” wasn’t a word Tony would use to describe the world of the ancient Mayans, though perhaps if one weren’t being sacrificed... “So you warp into the same physical location you are in the present?”

  “Exactly.”

  “What about the future?”

  She pressed her lips inward. “Can’t be done.”

  “How do you know?”

  She turned her hands palms-up. “How can you go somewhere when you can’t visualize it? Sure, we get visitors from the future every now and then, but they don’t tell us much. Don’t want to take the chance they might change something, you know.”

  “But surely someone’s tried.”

  “A lot of people have. Most of them don’t go anywhere. The few who managed to jump never returned.”

  Which didn’t worry Tony. He wasn’t interested in visiting the future. All he wanted to do was warp into the past a few years and keep Bethany from getting in that car. “So how many people are in this organization?”

  The girl’s eyes rolled up to her left. “Maybe nine or ten thousand, world wide. Several hundred here in the United States.”

  “How long has this organization been around?”

  She settled back in her chair, as if relieved he’d finally asked an easy question. “The Society was founded back in the fifteenth century. By Spanish missionaries in Mexico, I think, but no one’s sure since most of the records from back then were destroyed by the Church, and most of us now aren’t powerful enough to go back that far.”

  “Powerful enough? What do you mean?”