“Are ye expecting another?” Catie asked, just as the toast popped up, forcing Evie back to the present.
She loaded the toast with butter and jam, gave Catie two slices on a flowery china dessert plate and sat across from her.
“Yes. This one isn’t killing me as much as Mags tried to in the beginning. You’ll get to meet Mags as soon as Sam gets here. Poor man probably thinks the house is flooding the way I hollered for him to get home.”
“Sorry to put ye out,” Catie said, nibbling her toast half-heartedly.
“Eh, it’s not a bother. I’m desperate to hear how you got here.” Evie leaned in eagerly, hoping she wasn’t about to get another outburst.
Catie frowned and tilted her head to the side. “Lord Ashford brought me,” she said. “How did Lachlan do it?”
“He got sent here accidentally by an awful woman—”
“A witch?”
“Well, yes, I guess. I mean, the spell is witchcraft, I suppose, but I wouldn’t necessarily consider everyone who uses it a witch. Lachlan uses a spell, and you wouldn’t call him a witch, right? And what about your Lord Ashford?”
Catie put her toast down. “Lachlan uses a spell? How? Can he get us back home?”
Evie put down her toast as well. Catie seemed awfully interested in the use of spells, as if she didn’t know anything about them, which couldn’t be possible. “How did you get here?” Evie asked forcefully.
“There’s a house in London,” Catie said with a shrug. “We stood in the corner of a bedroom and then we were here.”
“Did you have to, um, cut your finger or say any words?” Evie leaned so far over the table, her hair dipped into the sticky jam on her toast. She swept it behind her shoulder, never taking her eyes off Catie.
“No,” she said impatiently, wanting her own questions answered. “Is that how Lachlan did it? Or that Piper woman did it for him?”
Evie flinched at the way she spat out Piper’s name, but let it slide for the moment. There would be plenty of time to make her see Piper wasn’t an evil brother-stealer. If there was another way to travel without spells or bloodletting, she wanted to know about it posthaste.
“Catie, this is important. Who is Lord Ashford?”
Catie let out the longest sigh Evie ever heard. “I dinna know. He wasna meant to help me. It was Miss Burnet who came from this time, and he was going to help her get back.”
“Miss Burnet?” Evie asked, more confused than ever. “Someone from this time was in the eighteenth century? How did she get there, do you know?”
“No. I only know because I, ah, stole her letter and tricked her into missing the proper time, then tricked Lord Ashford into thinking I was her.”
“Dear lord,” Evie said, looking down at her empty plate. It was still morning, and she was pregnant, but she could have used a drink nonetheless.
Sam flew into the house with Magnus swinging in his carseat. Everything was madness, trying to explain who Catie was and why she was there, which Evie still didn’t understand. Catie was enamored by little fat Mags and he was delighted to have someone new fawn over him. She offered to take care of him if they wanted to go out for dinner, and Evie almost got sidetracked by the tempting offer.
“Whoa, wait. Let’s get back on track here.” She pushed Sam into the seat next to her. “Sam, listen. She says she got here from a house in London. London.”
“I dinna understand why that’s so important,” Catie said, crossing her eyes at Magnus and making him giggle his delightful baby laugh.
“We thought it was tied to the land around the castle,” Sam said.
Evie jumped up and got a piece of paper and a pencil. “We need to make a list of everything we know so far,” she said, nerdily excited. She looked expectantly at Catie. “You said you didn’t have to do a spell of any kind.”
“Definitely not,” she said, affronted. “We just stood there. Oh, Lord Ashford was verra particular about the timing. It had to be just so. He almost didna get to stay and help me get to Scotland, because of his schedule.”
Evie looked up from her paper. “Describe Lord Ashford,” she demanded. She glanced wildly at Sam, who narrowed his eyes at her. “Did he have dark hair, around Sam’s height—”
“Aye, silver grey eyes, verra aristocratic.”
Evie bounced in her seat. “Kind of rude, always checking his pocket watch like the white rabbit?”
“Wasn’t written yet in her time,” Sam interjected at Catie’s befuddled look.
“Oh, well, he was an annoying character in a children’s book, who was always late.”
“I wouldna say rude, just a bit gruff,” Catie said. “But he looked at his watch quite a bit, aye. He had a wee book he referred to as well. I thought it had to be his schedule.”
Evie stood up and paced in a circle, she was so happy to have someone corroborate her story. “The mysterious man, Sam,” she said giddily. “It has to be him.” She turned to Catie. “We went to another time, after yours but before this one, and I met him! No one believed me, but he was there, and he just disappeared. I’m not crazy.” She sank back into the kitchen chair and tried to settle down. She hadn’t realized how worried she was that she really had imagined him.
“No one doubted you, Ev,” Sam said, patting her knee.
“Everyone doubted me,” she said, then shook her head. “Even though it stands to reason that we aren’t the only ones who can do it, I always thought it was just through spells.”
“Ye say when ye met Lord Ashford in this other time, he disappeared?” Catie asked. Magnus fussed and squirmed and she got up, pacing and patting his back. Evie and Sam exchanged appreciative looks at her expertise with infants. “Wherever ye were, there must have been a portal there.”
“A portal,” Evie breathed, feeling weak at the word and what it might mean. “You walk into it and go to another time?” She grabbed Sam’s hand and he looked concerned she might fall over. “I wonder if it’s still there, if I poked around the inn …”
“Don’t you dare,” Sam warned. “With your luck it would work and I’d never see you again.”
His tone was light, but the heavy hand on her wrist told her he was deadly serious. She shivered, wondering how many people might have slipped into these odd portals like the unlucky Miss Burnet.
“I think it’s trickier than just poking around,” Catie said. “He stayed with me to help me get a rail ticket, but said something about having to spend a fortnight in 1875 to do it.”
“Bloody hell,” Sam said. “Who is this bloke? A time traveling crime fighter?”
“More like time traveling bonehead,” Evie said, still bitter that the man hadn’t helped her rescue Piper. “He lost one woman in time, then brought the wrong one back when he didn’t even remember what she looked like.”
Catie giggled. “Well, we both have blonde hair,” she said.
Evie sighed and got back to the list. “So far there’s spells and portals. We used to think it was only the castle grounds, but it clearly works in London. Where were you again?”
“Belmary House. It’s a grand house that still stands, but it’s all closed up now.”
Evie got on her phone and looked up Belmary House with shaking hands. It took two tries to type it in correctly and several old news items popped up. “Oh my gosh, an actress went missing there a few months ago.” She looked at Catie, who stopped in her tracks.
“Elizabeth Burnet?” Catie asked, going pale.
“The very same.”
The doorbell rang and Catie jumped, quickly handing Magnus over to Evie. “Ah, that’ll be for me, sorry.”
“How does anyone know you’re here?” Evie asked incredulously.
Catie looked guilty and held up her phone. “I used the texting, if that’s all right with ye? Shane’s going to take me to lunch since he has the day off.”
Evie marveled at how easily she picked up the technology of the day.
“Shane Brodie?” Sam stood up and glared in t
he direction of the front door.
“It’s okay, he works at the estate,” Evie told him, suppressing a smile at his protective nature.
“Aye, I know the lad, Evelyn. That’s why I’m concerned.” He turned to Catie. “Isn’t he a bit old for you?”
“He’s only two years older than me. I was about to be betrothed in my own time. I think going to lunch willna ruin me.”
Evie clapped her hand over her mouth to keep from laughing at Sam’s face after Catie’s teenagerly retort. She’d never seen him go quite so red. He opened his mouth to say something more but Catie was already heading for the door, tossing her hair over her shoulder. She swung it open, her face turned radiantly pretty by the first smile Evie had seen on her.
The tall redhaired boy Evie sometimes saw around the estate waved at them and took Catie by the hand, leading her to his beat up old car. As soon as the front door closed, Evie and Sam raced down the hall, pressing their noses to the window to watch them drive toward the village.
“Is this okay? Should we have let her go?” Evie asked.
“Certainly she’s old enough to make her own decisions,” Sam said, nervously adding, “Isn’t she?”
“I don’t know,” Evie wailed, pacing down the hall to the living room.
Sam followed, settling Magnus in his bouncy seat. He sank onto the comfy sofa and pulled her down next to him. Evie rested her head against his shoulder.
“So now we have a teenager living with us,” Sam said. “How did that happen again?”
“She seemed so upset over there, and you know how I get when I’m pregnant.”
“Aye, you’re always pregnant these days,” he teased, resting his hand on her still flat belly.
She sighed and covered his hand with her own. “Yes, how did this happen again, actually?” she mused.
He laughed. “Well, if you can’t recall, perhaps I’m doing something wrong.”
“You do all right,” she told him, snuggling closer and making faces at Mags. “Having Catie around will be good practice for the future. Mags will always be an angel, I’m sure of it. But this second one will probably be our little demon child. Second children are notorious bad seeds.”
He flicked her forehead, then dropped a kiss in the spot. “That’s not cool. You know I’m second born, and I’ve never caused any trouble.”
They sat watching Magnus gum the toys attached to his bouncer. She began to have second thoughts about the wisdom of inviting Catie to stay, and letting her leave with Shane didn’t seem the best idea, either.
“Maybe we shouldn’t have let her go with Shane,” she said.
“How could we have stopped her?” he asked. “I’m sure it’ll be fine. Fairly sure.”
“Should we call Lachlan?”
Sam swallowed hard. “No,” he said. “I don’t think we should call Lachlan. I’m not overly fond of that kid. but I don’t want to see his neck get broken.”
Chapter 9
Things looked brighter for Lizzie the next day. For one, it was literally a bright, sunny day outside, something she hadn’t seen since they crossed the Scottish border almost a week earlier. After going to bed the night before heartsick and ashamed at Quinn dismissing her like she was little more than a booty call, she spent the morning in her borrowed gown, looking out her bed chamber window and forming a plan.
Of course, she had been silly to think one little moment (or big moment— she got distracted for a while remembering every delicious detail) of passion would make Quinn forget her betrayal.
He didn’t know she’d changed, that she’d fully decided the only life she wanted was one that included him. And he wasn’t the sort of simpleton who would be fooled by sex, either. She had to show him by other means that she loved him.
She sighed heavily and rested her head against the window pane. She did love him. During the frantic trip up here she’d been distracted with worry about their impending death at the hands of Solomon Wodge, but now that they were relatively safe, she knew nothing had changed.
Her fingers were sore from sewing up her torn dress, and it was nowhere near finished, but she’d refused the help of a maid, wanting to improve all the skills she would need to continue living in this time. Or Quinn’s time, which was still technically in the past. How they had managed to jump only seven years forward, she didn’t know, but it probably had to do with Oliver’s lack of witchcraft skill and haste in casting the spell.
Oliver! Oh, goodness, she’d completely forgotten him. She jumped up, done mooning for the moment, her determination to win back Quinn’s love and trust fully cemented, even if she didn’t have a rock solid plan yet.
In the hallway, she looked left and right, not sure where Oliver would have ended up. She prayed they were nice to him last night. She knocked lightly on the door where Bella said she could be found and a girl opened it, her face flushed. She let Lizzie in, and Lizzie saw Bella looking even more frazzled than the maid.
“Come in,” Bella said, rocking a toddler who was limp and sweaty. A moment later the boy let out a terrifying cough that wracked his little body, then he fell back into his mother’s arms, screaming inconsolably as if he was in great pain. After the spasm passed, Bella wiped away tears and looked at Lizzie. “This is Callum. He’s been coughing all night, and burning with fever. It came on fast, and doesna want to break.”
Lizzie took a step closer and placed the back of her hand on the boy’s clammy forehead, pulling it away rapidly. That was what a fever felt like, and Lizzie felt a prickle of fear for the baby.
“My husband is from your time, or thereabouts,” Bella said, laying Callum on the bed and smoothing the damp strands of hair from his brow. “He has great faith in the medicine of your time. Ye dinna know anything about it, do ye?” she asked hopefully.
Lizzie shook her head. “No, I’m sorry. It could be pneumonia or bronchitis?”
She thought of something from a television show she’d seen when she was young and pulled up the light muslin shirt the baby wore. His belly and chest had a red, splotchy rash on it and her stomach lurched. Bella looked at the rash and gasped.
“That’s new,” she said, her voice cracking.
She told the maid to run for the physician as fast as she could, and the maid collided with Quinn on her way out the door. She squeaked past him, skidding in the hallway in her hurry.
“Pietro told me ye’d be with the lad,” he said, looking straight past Lizzie to Bella. “Is he no better?”
“I fear he’s worse,” Bella said. “Please, can ye fetch Pietro for me. The physician will be up soon.”
“I’ll go with you,” Lizzie said, following Quinn to the door, with an apologetic glance at Bella. “I have to find Oliver.”
“The lovely English lad?” Bella asked. “I popped out for a trice earlier to grab a bite of breakfast and saw him in the dining hall.”
Quinn walked fast and she had to trot to keep up with his long legs. He looked down at her when she reached his side and smiled quickly before looking away again. So, it was going to be like that? Fine. She took a silent deep breath, and grabbed his arm.
“I think Callum might be really ill,” she said. “Something dangerous in this time.”
He stopped and gave her his full attention. “What?”
“Well, of course I’m not sure, but I think the doctor will confirm it’s scarlet fever.”
He paled, then shook his head. “Ye say dangerous in this time. It isna dangerous in yours?”
“Well, I suppose it can be if it’s left untreated,” she said with a shrug. “But not usually. Not really.”
He groaned, and rolled his shoulder. “We must pray ye’re wrong and he doesna have it,” he said, holding his elbow with his other hand.
“Oh, it’s very likely I’m wrong,” she assured him, hoping she was. “I only remember the symptoms from an old program on the telly.” He looked at her blankly and she waved it off, reaching to pull aside his shirt to check his bandage. “Has anyone
looked at this yet for you?”
He took a step away from her, eyes widening. “No, but it’s fine. I checked it myself. Ah, in the mirror.”
“Don’t be daft, Quinn. Let me look at it.”
She rested her hand on his shirt, feeling the electric rush of desire just from touching fabric that touched his body. She was a mess. When she looked at his face, she saw his eyes were shuttered and cold.
“The bandage can wait. I must find Pietro, and ye should find Oliver. We’re going to try again today.”
“Quinn, that’s madness. You need to rest.”
She spoke to his back. He was already halfway down the hall and turning to go downstairs. Her determination faltered when a tiny voice inside her whispered that maybe he was truly done with her. Maybe last night had meant less than nothing to him, and there was nothing she could do to convince him she loved him, because he no longer loved her. If that was the case, there was no reason to wait any longer to try the spell again.
Stiffening her spine, she told her self-defeating voice to stuff itself.
“Miss Bur— I mean, Lizzie.” Oliver turned the corner from the stairwell. “I was looking for you, and Quinn said I might find you up here.”
“Hello, Oliver,” she said, patting some color back into her cheeks. “Are they treating you well?”
He shook off her question to dive right into the heart of their problem. “Quinn said we’re to try again today? Are they giving him quantities of whiskey as a painkiller?”
Lizzie laughed despite her self-pitying mood. “He’s not drunk, I’m afraid. We have to find a way to get him to rest at least another day. I’d say we just refuse to go, but I think he’d leave us behind.”
“He’d leave me behind, certainly. But I don’t think he’d go without you.”
She raised her eyebrow in blatant disbelief and when Oliver only smiled knowingly, she shook his arm and begged him to tell her why he thought that.
“Because he’s a gentleman, and he said he would help me get home, no doubt,” she said.
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