Adam's jaw was rigid. He shot Circenn a furious gaze. "She wouldn't accept it. Now leave it."
Circenn closed his eyes. Why had his mother refused the potion if Adam had offered it? Would Lisa refuse?
He would not allow her to do so, he resolved. Never would he permit her to die. Gone were the vague feelings of guilt for his thoughts of making her immortal. After what Adam had just told him, he knew he could never endure losing the union they shared. A child! She carried his babe, and the bond would swell to include their son or daughter.
Live through Lisa's death? No. But in recompense for taking her mortality he would give her the perfect future with her family. It would be his way of making amends.
* * *
Circenn materialized at dawn on the day of her graduation. Swiftly he scaled the wall surrounding the Stone estate. Swiftly he punctured the wheels on the small machine to prevent it from moving. Then he regarded the bigger machine irritably. Which one is a Mercedes? he wondered with a scowl. Moving quickly, he punctured those wheels, too. But what if they changed the wheels? What if they had new wheels somewhere in their keep?
He glared at the keep, then he glowered at the machines for a long moment, holding them personally responsible for hurting his woman. He struggled against an intense desire to creep into the home and peer down at the sleeping eighteen-year-old Lisa he hadn't yet met.
"Stay away from her. You are so dense sometimes, Circenn," Adam's bodiless voice mocked. "You still don't understand the power you have. Why are you trying to harm the machines, when you can simply make them go away? For that matter, why did you appear outside the gate and climb the wall, when you might have appeared within the gates?"
Circenn frowned. "I am unaccustomed to this power. And where would I send them?"
"Send them to Morar. That should be interesting." Adam laughed.
Circenn shrugged and focused his newfound center of power. He closed his eyes and visualized the silica sands of Morar. With a small nudge, the machines disappeared.
If they landed on the isle of Morar with a soft woosh of white silica sand, only one mortal was there to see it, and she hadn't been surprised by anything in quite some time.
* * *
"Our cars have been stolen!" Catherine exclaimed.
Jack peered over his newspaper. "Did you look for them?" he asked absently, as if a Mercedes and a Jeep could be overlooked.
"Of course I did, Jack," Catherine said. "How are we going to get to Lisa's graduation? We can't miss her big day!"
* * *
Circenn tugged the cap low on Adam's forehead, stepped back, and grinned. "Perfect."
"I don't see why I have to do this."
"I doona wish to risk being seen, nor dare I trust myself to see her. I doona know that I could restrain myself, so you must do it."
"This uniform is ridiculous." Adam tugged at the crotch. "It's too small."
"Then make it bigger, O powerful one," Circenn said dryly. "Quit procrastinating and call their number. Tell them the cab is on the way."
"But they didn't call for one."
"I'm counting on whoever answers to think someone else must have."
Adam arched a brow. "You're good at this."
"Call."
Sure enough, Catherine assumed that Jack had called and ordered a cab to arrive at precisely 9:00 A.M. When it appeared, Jack assumed that Catherine had called. In the fuss over filing stolen-car reports with the police and the insurance company, neither thought to ask the other.
* * *
"What's next?" Adam asked, rubbing his hands.
Circenn shot him a dark look. "You seem to be enjoying this."
Adam shrugged. "I have never before manipulated in such fine detail. It's quite fascinating."
"Cancer. She said her mother was dying of cancer," Circenn said. "We doona even know what kind. I suspect this is not going to be as simple as making two machines disappear. We must find a way to prevent her from catching this disease, and from what I've read, they doona seem to know what causes it. I've been flipping through these books all night." He gestured to the medical books scattered across his desk in the study at Castle Brodie.
Adam picked up several and scanned them. THE CINCINNATI PUBLIC LIBRARY was stamped on the spine. "You pilfered from the library?" Adam said with mock dismay.
"I had to. I tried to borrow them but they wanted papers I didn't have. So I went back when they were closed, and a security guard—they protect their books even in the future—nearly attacked me before I'd finished finding what I wanted." He sighed. "But I'm no closer to discovering how to prevent the disease. I must know what type of cancer she had."
Adam thought for a moment. "Are you up to some more nocturnal raiding? I believe there are no more than a half-dozen hospitals in her city."
"Hospitals?" Circenn's brow furrowed.
"You really are a medieval brute. Hospitals are where they treat the ill. We will go to her time and steal her records. Come. Sift time, and I will be your faithful guide."
* * *
"She has cervical cancer," Circenn said softly, glancing over his shoulder at Adam, who was reclining on the desk in a private office at Good Samaritan Hospital. "Listen to this: The diagnosis was severe dysplasia. Over time it became advanced invasive cancer. They refer to something called cervical intraepithelial neoplasia" His tongue felt thick over the strange words, and he pronounced them very slowly. "The notes indicate Catherine might have been diagnosed in time to prevent the cancer had she had something called a Pap test. The notes indicate that Catherine told the doctor her last Pap test was eight years before they diagnosed the cancer. It seems cervical cancer is caused by a type of virus that is easily treated in the early stages."
Adam fanned rapidly through the textbook he had plucked off the desk. Locating an applicable entry, he read aloud: " 'Pap screening test: a cancer screening test developed in 1943 by Dr. George Papanicolaou. The Pap test examines cells from the cervix, or the mouth of the womb, located at the top of the vagina.' " Adam was silent for a long moment. "It says a woman should have a Pap test annually. Why didn't she?"
Circenn shrugged. "I doona know. But it sounds as if we go back a few years, we should be able to prevent it."
Adam arched a brow. "How can we fix this? Just how do you intend to get a woman who obviously hates to go to the doctor to go see the doctor?"
Circenn grinned. "A little gentle persuasion."
* * *
Catherine thumbed through the mail, hunting for a letter from her friend Sarah, who was in England for the summer. She tossed aside two fliers, snorting indelicately. Recently she'd been receiving a rash of junk mail dealing with one thing—gynecologists and cervical cancer.
Have you had your Pap smear this year? one banner screamed.
Cervical Cancer is preventable! a bright pink flier exclaimed.
They were all from a nonprofit organization she'd never heard of. Apparently some do-gooder who had money to burn. She tossed them in the wastebasket and resumed flipping through the mail.
But something nagged at her, so she retrieved the last flier. She must have received fifty of those things over the past month, and each time she threw one away, she felt a peculiar sense of deja vu. She'd even received a call from a doctor's office this week, offering a free exam. She had never heard of any doctor offering free Pap tests before.
When was my last checkup? she wondered, fingering the flier. At nearly sixteen, Lisa was ready to start having annual checkups. It might be a bit difficult to persuade her daughter to have her first visit when Catherine wasn't faithful about making and keeping her own appointments. She regarded the pamphlet thoughtfully. It said that cancer of the cervix was preventable—that a routine Pap smear could detect many abnormalities. And that women in all age groups were at risk.
Decisively, she plunked down the pamphlet and called her gynecologist to schedule appointments for herself and Lisa. Sometimes she and Jack tended to be irresponsible a
bout things like checkups and life insurance and servicing the cars. She'd not seen her gynecologist because she felt perfectly fine. But that was like saying the car didn't need service because it was running perfectly fine. Maintenance was different from repairs. Preventive medicine can save your life, the pamphlet said.
Life was good, and Catherine certainly didn't want to miss one moment of Lisa's growing up. She had grandchildren to look forward to one day.
Perhaps she should have Jack look into some life insurance, while she was at it.
* * *
CHAPTER 30
"you are certain this will work?" circenn worried.
"Yes. We will remove her from Morar while she sleeps and return her to her new future. I've done this before; however, this is the only time I have allowed the person to retain dual memories. Are you certain you wish her to recall the other reality? The one where her father died and her mother is ill?"
"Yes. If we take it from her she will not know me. She will have no memory of our time together. Without those memories she would be a different person, and I love her precisely the way she is."
"Then let's do it," Adam said. "She will be very confused at first. You will need to get to her quickly, to help her understand. Once she has been returned, race to her side. She'll need you."
* * *
Lisa was drifting when she heard the voices.
"You must do it now, Circenn."
Circenn, my love, her dreaming mind purred.
I'm coming, Lisa.
* * *
Lisa woke from a sleep that felt drugged. Her pillow smelled funny. She sniffed it: jasmine and sandalwood. The scent brought tears to her eyes; it reminded her of Circenn, the way the faint smell had always seemed part of his skin. Another scent overpowered it swiftly: frying bacon. She kept her eyes closed and puzzled over that thought. Where was she? Had she stumbled down the beach and in her delirium found a house and a bed?
She opened her eyes cautiously.
She looked about the room, seeking traces of the fourteenth century—her first thought was that she'd blessedly traveled back to Circenn. But as her gaze skimmed again over the pale blue walls, her heart thudded painfully—she recognized this room, and had thought to never see it again.
She dropped her disbelieving gaze to the bed in which she lay. A four-poster of blond wood with a frothy white canopy, she'd adored this bed in their home in Indian Hill, a lifetime ago.
She shot straight up in bed, trembling violently.
Had she finally, irrevocably lost her mind?
"M-Mom?" she called, knowing full well no one was going to answer her. And because no one would answer her she felt safe tossing her head back and wailing it.
"Mom!"
She heard the rush of feet on the stairs, and held her breath as the door opened. It seemed to inch inward in slow motion, as if she were watching a movie and the door opened frame by frame. Her heart tightened painfully when Catherine stepped in, a spatula in her hand, her brows drawn together in an expression of concern.
"What is it, Lisa? Did you have a bad dream, darling?"
Lisa swallowed, unable to speak. Her mother looked precisely as she would have looked had the car accident never happened, had the cancer never taken her. Eyes wide, she feasted on the impossible vision.
"Mom," she croaked.
Catherine looked at her expectantly.
"Is, um… D-Daddy here?" Lisa asked faintly, struggling to comprehend this new "reality."
"Of course not, sleepy-head. You know he leaves for work at seven. Are you hungry?"
Lisa stared. Of course not, sleepy-head. So normal, so routine, as if Catherine and Lisa had never been separated. As if Daddy had always been alive and the tragic past that had torn their family apart had never happened.
"What year is it?" she managed.
Her mother laughed. "Lisa!" She reached out a hand and tousled her hair. "It must have been quite a dream."
Lisa narrowed her eyes, thinking hard.
Downstairs, the doorbell chimed, and Catherine turned toward the sound. "Who could that be this early?" She glanced back at Lisa. "Come down for breakfast, darling. I made your favorite. Poached eggs, bacon, and toast."
Lisa watched her mom leave the room, stunned. She fought the urge to leap from her bed, wrap her arms around her mother's departing knees, and hang on for dear life. Her mother's knees were unscarred and strong. Joy flooded her. She must have died, she decided, on that strange beach in the stranger land. Was this heaven?
She'd take it—whatever it was.
Snatches of conversation floated up from the foyer. She tuned them out, studying her room. She'd kept a calendar on her desk and was itching to know "when" she was now, but before she could move, her mother called up.
"Lisa, darling, come down. You have a guest. He says he's a friend of yours from the university." Her mother's voice sounded excited and oh-so-approving.
University? She was in college? Oh, this was heaven. Now all she needed was Circenn to make it complete.
Lisa leaped from the bed, tugged on her favorite white fluffy robe (astonishing that it was hanging right on her bedpost where she'd always hung it!) and hurried down the stairs, wondering who could possibly be calling for her. As she rounded the curved staircase, her heart thumped hard in her chest.
Circenn Brodie arched a brow and smiled. Simultaneously, a wave of love hit her, sent along their special bond.
Lisa nearly whimpered, overwhelmed with pleasure, disbelief, and confusion. He was wearing charcoal trousers and a black silk polo shirt that rippled across his muscular chest, from which he was dusting a light misting of rain. His hair had been trimmed and was pulled back in a leather thong. Expensive Italian boots made her blink and shake her head. She'd never seen him in such fitted clothing and could only imagine the stir he must have caused strolling around in the twenty-first century. Clothing didn't make this man, he made the clothing, molding it with his powerful body; six feet seven inches of rippling brawn. She briefly envisioned him in a pair of faded jeans and nearly swooned.
"Mrs. Stone, would you mind terribly if I took your daughter out to breakfast? We have some catching up to do."
Catherine eyed the magnificent man standing in the doorway. "No, not at all. Why don't just come in and have some coffee while Lisa gets dressed," she invited graciously.
"Wear jeans, lass." Circenn said, his gaze intense. "And your 'you-knows,' " he added in a voice roughened by desire.
Catherine glanced back and forth between them, taking in the tender, passionate look from the tall, elegant man in the doorway and the startled yet dreamy expression on Lisa's face. She wondered why Lisa had hidden the fact that she was in love, and from her own mother, at that. Not once had Lisa mentioned a boyfriend, but Catherine decided that perhaps she hadn't spoken of it because it was the "real thing." When Catherine had first met Jack, she'd told no one about him; she'd felt that talking about it might somehow debase the private sanctity of their bond.
Lisa still hadn't moved from the base of the steps. She couldn't breathe; she was riveted by him. How had this come to pass? How was Circenn Brodie standing in the doorway of her Indian Hill home, talking to her living, healthy mother, while her living, healthy father was at work, when she'd left him seven hundred years in the past?
The dream flooded back over her: We must do it now.
"What did you do?" she asked weakly.
"What did he do about what, Lisa?" Catherine asked curiously.
"We have much to discuss, lass," he said tenderly.
"Is that a brogue I detect?" Catherine exclaimed. "I've always thought Scotland was such a romantic country. Jack and I have been discussing going for summer vacation this year."
Circenn moved to Catherine, raised her hand to his lips, and brushed her knuckles with a kiss. "Perhaps you could visit my home when you come," he said. "I would be pleased to welcome Lisa's parents into my keep."
Lisa had never seen Catherine so fl
ustered. "Keep?" she exclaimed. "Don't tell me you have a castle. Oh! I'll just get that coffee," she said with a breathless laugh. As she turned toward the kitchen, she glanced back at her daughter, who was still standing frozen at the foot of the stairs.
"Lisa, did you hear him? He wants to take you to breakfast, although the way he's dressed, I'm not certain jeans would be appropriate, darling. Perhaps the beige dress with those strappy sandals I like so much."
Lisa nodded stupidly, just to get her mother out of the room. Then she realized that she was encouraging her healthy mother to leave the room. She flung a startled look at Circenn and mouthed, Just a minute, don't move, then flew across the foyer, catching up with her mother as she entered the hall.
"Wait!" she cried.
Catherine turned around and looked at her quizzically. "You're acting very odd today, Lisa." She smiled, leaned near to Lisa's ear, and whispered. "I like him. Oh my! Why didn't you tell me about him?"
Lisa threw her arms around Catherine. "I love you, Mom," she said fiercely.
Catherine gave a startled and pleased little laugh—just the kind of half-breathless sound of joy Lisa remembered from before Jack had died, in the other reality.
"I don't know what this is all about, Lisa, but I love you too, darling. Only tell me your next words aren't going to be 'and I'm sorry but I'm pregnant and running off to get married,' " she teased. "I'm not ready for an empty nest."
Lisa's hand flew to her abdomen and her eyes widened. "Uh… Oh! I should get dressed." Leaving her mother with raised brows and a very intrigued expression on her face, Lisa fled the hallway before she could think much harder about the possibility her mother had raised.
* * *
CHAPTER 31
lisa glanced around the suite, bevildered. after she had slipped on lacy you-knows, jeans, and a blouse, Circenn had efficiently navigated traffic and driven them downtown to The Cincinnatian, where he'd reserved a suite. She was stunned by how capable he was, how quickly he'd adapted to and taken control of her modern-day world. But then she remembered that the man was a born conqueror and warrior, and the twenty-first century, while overwhelming, was just one more challenge for him, and he would master it with the same aplomb as he'd mastered his own century.
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