TWICE A HERO

by Susan Krinard

  The corner of his lips twitched. "You'll never let me forget that, will you?"

  I hope in time we're both able to forget. She shook her head. "I have something to tell you about that. If you're ready to listen. If you can accept the truth this time, I'll give to you. I told you part of it before, when you couldn't accept it. Maybe enough's happened that now you can."

  He folded his arms across his chest and leaned back. "Go ahead. I'm entirely at your mercy."

  "The day I pushed you out of the way of that bullet in the jungle, I changed the course of history. You… you were supposed to die, Liam O'Shea, in the Petén in August of 1884."

  That pronouncement caught his full attention. "Of course," he drawled. "Your time travel again. That's why you refused to tell me my future."

  So he remembered that conversation. "Yes," she admitted. "I knew it could happen any time."

  "And you just happened to be there, my savior, when my fate came upon me."

  "You were the reason I came to the jungle in the first place, in my own time. That was why I had the photograph, why I recognized you." She braced herself. "You see, I was in the ruins to… make amends for something one of my own ancestors was supposed to have done. To apologize to the… spirit of the man he was supposed to have murdered."

  She could see the progression of thoughts behind Liam's mask of indifference, the gradual realization as he began to catch on.

  "I don't expect you to understand theories even I can't make sense of," she said. "When I found myself in the past—when I saved your life—everything changed. Because you were alive when you were supposed to be dead, you could go back to San Franciso and marry Caroline. I couldn't let that happen."

  He stared at her with eyes as opaque as silver coins. "Why couldn't you, Mac?"

  Her heart thumped painfully against the wall of her ribs. "Because my name isn't Rose MacKenzie. It's MacKenzie Rose Sinclair. Perry is my great-greatgrandfather, Caroline is my great-great-grandmother, and if they didn't marry, my family and everything they'd ever done would cease to exist."

  It took a moment for her to realize that the sound Liam was making was a laugh—deep, low, wrenched from his gut. "So everything you did was to save the future of the Sinclairs. But there's one thing I still don't understand. It would have been so much easier to let me die as I was meant to." He leaned forward, ignoring his wounds and the pain they must have caused. "Why did you save my life?"

  "Because damn it, I—" She lifted her chin. "I couldn't just stand there knowing a man was about to die and not try to stop it."

  Liam settled back slowly. His eyes closed—in pain, she thought. She'd pushed him too hard.

  But he smiled. "The Sinclairs are such a noble breed. Where would the world be without them? It seems I have only to thank you for your devoted care. I couldn't have survived without it, let alone ordered my own life, which you tell me shouldn't have continued beyond that day in the jungle." He snorted. "How heavy a responsibility I must have been for you, Mac. You sacrificed even yourself in the pursuit of it. My apologies."

  She curled her fingers around the arms of the chair until her knuckles hurt. "It wasn't a sacrifice, Liam," she whispered.

  "You did get some pleasure out of our… friendship," he said. "A pity I'm flat on my back, or we could give it a go one last time. For old times' sake, eh, Mac?"

  They stared at each other. Liam's breathing was ragged. She stood, pushing the chair back. "You need to rest now, Liam. I'm… sorry—"

  "You gave me my life. I told you I always pay my debts. Have I paid this one sufficiently, Mac?"

  "More than… sufficiently."

  "I'm relieved to hear it. I wouldn't want to leave anything undone. I'll be going out of town as soon as I can get out of this bloody bed."

  It didn't matter that she was going away herself; his announcement made her blood ice over like water in the Arctic. "You're leaving?"

  "The tongs have made San Francisco too hot for Chen and his niece. I can't be sure of protecting them any longer. But I have property in Napa, and I'm taking Chen to look it over."

  "You're giving them a new place to live?"

  "Land that's lying fallow. Maybe they can make use of it."

  "That's very kind of you." She meant it with all her heart.

  "I'm the very soul of kindness."

  "What will you do… after that?"

  His muscles tensed under their bandages and covering of sheets and blankets. "Sooner or later you'll have to give up your position as my guardian angel, Mac," he said. "It might as well be now." He turned his head away, dismissing her. "Do me one last service when you go downstairs and ask Chen to bring me a whiskey. My happiness will be complete."

  There was nothing more to be said. He shut her out completely, as once he'd rejected her in a tent in the steaming jungles of the Petén. Mac fled, trying desperately not to think or feel. She realized halfway down the stairs that Norton had remained at her side, as if sensing her distress; she buried her fingers in the wiry fur of his back as if it were a lifeline to sanity.

  Sanity was what she needed now. Sanity to carry out the very practical steps she needed to get home. Talk to Perry, get his pendant from him, arrange transportation back to Guatemala.

  Mac touched her jacket over the place where Liam's pendant rested between her breasts. The stone was always cold, not warm as hers had been in the jungle, just before the tunnel through time had sucked her through.

  If things went as she hoped, the pendant would warm again when she walked back into the tunnel. Once she had Perry's pendant, she'd have the tools she needed to make it work. If Fernando had told the truth. If the pendants were what had made the tunnel function. If it took her back to her own time.

  It had to. Once she left San Francisco for Guatemala, she couldn't look back. On the other side from Liam O'Shea she might have some hope of forgetting.

  Anything rather than stay here one instant longer than necessary.

  Norton trotted along beside her as she walked into the library where she'd left Perry and Caroline. Caroline was gone; Perry was absorbed in a book, a glass of butterscotch-colored liquid in one hand. He set down his drink as she entered.

  "Rose," he said. "What—"

  He jumped up and caught her by the arms as she lost her balance, leading her to the heavy high-backed chair nearest the fireplace. "Are you ill?"

  "No." Good grief, what a time to learn to swoon in grand old Victorian fashion. "I'm fine, really."

  "Indeed?" He hovered over her until she convinced him by sitting up and meeting his eyes.

  Dark Sinclair eyes. Not the eyes of a killer. That at least was resolved. Homer could rest in peace.

  "Yes," she assured Homer's grandfather, smiling wryly. "Let's just say it's been a very interesting day. I know it's a little early for a nightcap, but whatever you're drinking, I wouldn't mind having a sip of it myself."

  He was long past any surprise at her bluntness. He walked to a sideboard laden with glasses and bottles, poured her a small measure of amber liquid, and refilled his own glass.

  "Thank you." She took the glass, sniffed it, wrinkled her nose, and took a sip. When her fit of coughing had subsided, she cradled the glass between her hands, resolved not to try again but needing something to hold on to.

  "It's just not the same as a Dr Pepper," she said. "I have something to tell you. And something to ask." She glanced around the room. "Is Caroline all right?"

  "She's in the guest bedroom with Mei Ling." Perry settled back in his chair, crossing his legs. "She's found a cause of her own."

  "I have a feeling that she'll be good at whatever she decides to do with her life. And you—You'll let her make those decisions, won't you?"

  He laid his hand over his heart. "Your concern for Caroline touches me." There was not irony but warmth in his tone. "I swear to you that Caroline will have all the freedom I can grant her once we're married."

  Mac rubbed her foot along an intricate pattern in the
carpet with great concentration. "You've talked to Liam."

  "There seems hope for a renewal of our friendship," he said. He reached into his waistcoat pocket and pulled out a watch. A silver watch, battered and dented, that Mac recognized at once. "He insisted I take this back."

  The lump that hadn't left her throat for the past several hours made it difficult to speak. "I'm so glad. I… wish I had time to get to know you and Caroline better. I wish I could stick around for your wedding, just to see it all through to the end."

  He stilled with his glass to his lips. "Are you leaving us?"

  "Yes. I have to."

  "Why?"

  "I've… come to see that I don't belong here," she said. "This is not my world, Perry. It never was. I can't tell you more than that."

  Perry got up and strode to the sideboard. "It's Liam, isn't it? He blames you for all that's happened. The fool. I'll speak to him—"

  "No. Please. There's nothing you can do."

  His gaze was fixed on the row of bottles and glasses. "Then I was wrong to believe you loved him."

  So smooth and aristocratic, his voice, and so devastating his words.

  "I told you it wasn't something I can explain."

  He muttered something about damnable pride and idiocy. "I see. And what will become of Liam?"

  "He doesn't need a keeper. He certainly doesn't need me to babysit him." The glass in her hands was shaking, and she had to set it down. "I've done quite enough for him, don't you think?"

  Perry lifted his glass to her in ironic salute. "You would have made an admirable colleague in my old profession, Rose. I confess I don't understand you."

  "You don't have to. But if you feel I've done anything for you and Caroline, there's something I'd ask in return. It isn't much." She grasped the leather thong around her neck and pulled the chip of Maya stone from under her jacket and T-shirt. "You have a pendant like this one."

  A flicker of surprise crossed his face. "That's Liam's. One of those we—"

  "One of the two pendants you and Liam made four years ago," she said. "I want yours as well, Perry."

  "May I ask why?"

  She cupped the cool stone in her hand. "Call it a souvenir. You do have it, don't you?"

  "Yes. In my rooms."

  "Will you give it to me?"

  He inspected her as if he could wring the full story out of her by sheer concentration. "Very well, Rose."

  Thank God. "Then I have one more thing to ask. I need your help to arrange transportation back to the jungle as soon as possible."

  "Back to the jungle? Surely—"

  "I know what I'm doing, Perry." She stood up, testing her legs. They were prepared to hold her up now that the worst was past. "Liam has told me he plans to be out of town as soon as he's recovered enough to travel. I want to be gone by the time he gets back, whatever it takes." Her throat was aching, and she went on more briskly, "I'll need to borrow a little money. Just what I need to get back to Guatemala."

  Perry steepled his ringers under his chin. "I suppose I can't convince you not to go ahead with this madness."

  "No."

  "Then I'll do what I can to help, of course."

  "Thank you." She started for the door and paused. "I am glad to have known you, Perry. And Caroline."

  "It isn't farewell just yet," he said.

  But it would be very soon. In a matter of days she'd be beyond anyone's reach. Safe. With nothing more challenging before her than enduring a two-week sea voyage, tramping a couple hundred miles through the jungles, and trying to make a Maya time tunnel take her back to 1997.

  Simple.

  "I'll wait to hear from you," she said.

  She walked down the echoing hall to the great front doors, Norton loyally by her side. At the threshold she knelt before the wolfhound, rubbing his ears between her fingers.

  "Well, fella, this is it. I probably won't be seeing you again."

  The dog thumped his tail against the polished floor. Mac fought to keep the tears in check just a little longer.

  "I can tell you what I'm not going to miss about this time," she joked. "Long heavy dresses and corsets and institutionalized male chauvinism, to name a few. I can't wait to get back to Coke and feminism and nice, safe air travel and… Oh, hell." She flung her arms around the massive, shaggy neck. "I'm going to miss you, Norton."

  And your master most of all, her heart whispered. She gave the dog a final caress and left him looking after her as she closed the door between them.

  His bark reached her through the door. It became a howl as she strode away from the house, blindly following the route she knew would take her back to the Palace. Afternoon fog was beginning to roll in off the ocean, wreathing her in a chill that matched the lump of ice under her ribs.

  Soon—she had to keep believing it—life would be back to normal. No more crazy excursions for MacKenzie R. Sinclair. There was a small apartment, a quiet life, and a job waiting for her back home.

  And memories—more than enough to last her a lifetime.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Ye Gods! annihilate

  but space and time,

  And make two lovers happy.

  —ALEXANDER POPE

  THE DAILY DOWNPOUR was nearly over. It was smack in the middle of the rainy season, but Mac was almost grateful for the hard going. It had kept her from thinking.

  She leaned on her improvised walking stick and caught her breath. The mules stamped and shifted in the mud behind her, jingling their harnesses. Fernando soothed them with a quiet endearment and waited for Mac to signal them forward again.

  Thank God for Fernando. She glanced back at the Maya muleteer. Somehow she hadn't been surprised to see him show up at the door of her grungy hotel room in Champerico. It hadn't been mere luck that she'd been able to hire the one person in Guatemala she knew to guide her back to the ruins: Fernando had been waiting for her.

  Waiting for the pendants, the keys, he had asked her to return to the jungle. The keys he'd said would open the way back to the future. She'd shown the pendants to him, and he'd nodded and smiled and said nothing more, as if he'd always had utter faith in her ability to obtain them.

  He hadn't asked about Liam. Mac had the feeling he knew Liam wasn't going to turn up. Fernando had simply minded his own business and set about his job of getting Mac to the ruins in one piece.

  The Maya had done his job well. Their tiny expedition—Fernando, another muleteer, herself, and three mules—were nearly to the ruins. They'd passed through Tikal less than an hour before. Mac knew where they were; she didn't think she'd forget as long as she lived. It had all started here.

  And here it would end.

  The trail Liam had cut through the jungle had already become overgrown, almost indistinguishable from the rest of the forest. Mac batted at the slight indentation with her walking stick. It was still the path of least resistance, and she knew exactly where it led.

  She hitched up her loose cotton pants and adjusted her headband. No point in putting it off; in an hour she'd know. In an hour she'd either be back to her own time or…

  Forget that. There wasn't any "or." There was only forging on into the unknown. She straightened, lifted her chin, and waved Fernando ahead.

  The ancient, vine-covered buildings waited for her, tranquil and unchanged, as if they had known she would return. There were a few more leaves covering the crumbling walls, a little more undergrowth to wade through. But she was there.

  She went to the mules and began to untie the bundle that contained her backpack, a packet of food, and her faithful flashlight. She'd come to the past with so little; she was taking almost as little back. She had her old worn jeans and T-shirt packed into a roll hung to the backpack. She had the odds and ends she'd once used to try to convince Liam of her origins.

  All but the watch. She'd never gotten it back, and now it was too late. Hell, she could always buy another. And Liam couldn't change history with a single waterproof watch. She'd had enoug
h thinking about time to last her an eternity.

  An eternity without Liam O'Shea.

  "Bueno, señorita."

  She turned to Fernando, who regarded her with solemn attention. "Si. This is it," she said. She tugged the two pendants from under her loose shirt. Fernando's gaze rested on them a moment and returned to her face.

  "Vuelve a su casa."

  "Si, Fernando. I am going home." The pieces clicked as they touched each other, still nothing but cold stone under her hand. "If I understood you correctly, I need these to go there. I know you wanted them back—"

  He shook his head. "No las necesito, señorita. I ask one thing. When you are on the other side, you give las llaves back to the people."

  The people. His people, she thought. Like the guide who had led her to the ruins in the first place.

  Crazy thought. But if she couldn't find someone to return them to, she'd leave them in the temple. God knew she didn't want to mess with them ever again. There were too many questions, and her heart was too heavy to contain even a single answer.

  "I will," she said gravely. She pulled a leather pouch from her pocket and put it into his hand. "Gracias por su ayuda. I wish I could give you more."

  He didn't even weigh the contents or check the number of coins but simply held the bag and stared at her with something like sadness. Mac offered her hand and found his return grip firm and warm.

  She almost mentioned Liam, almost asked Fernando to tell him, if he ever came back to the jungle…

  No. It was over.

  "Well," she said, giving Fernando's hand a final shake. "Adiós, then."

  Abruptly he caught her hand again and put the pouch in her upturned palm. "Vaya con Dios."

  He gestured to his fellow muleteer, caught the bridle of the lead mule, and never looked back as he vanished through the green wall of undergrowth.

  Only then did Mac notice he'd left his machete beside her backpack. She picked it up and called after him, but if he heard he wasn't coming back. She thrust the blade into the soft earth at her feet. Maybe he thought she'd need it to protect herself from roving explorers.

  Like Liam O'Shea.