He glanced at her journal and his face went completely white.
Maybe even whiter than her normal skin color.
After a moment he swallowed hard and nodded. He then opened his journal and slid it toward her and there, in it, was almost the same calculations.
She could tell, at a glance, that he had been working to figure out a way to stay with her in this timeline.
“I also work for Bonnie and Duster Kendal in the year 2016,” he said. “Only clearly in a very different timeline.”
“Shit, shit, shit,” she said softly.
It was all she could think to say.
And Brice said nothing.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
August 22nd, 1901
Brice’s Timeline
ANOTHER TABLE OF three men came in for lunch and sat close, so Brice and Dixie couldn’t talk much at all.
For a few minutes, Brice was happy about that. It gave him some time to get his wits about him.
In another timeline, in an infinite number of timelines, actually, Bonnie and Duster had hired Dixie instead of him to help them with the math problems concerning the lodge.
So that meant she was as smart as he was about math.
Good looking and a math brain. How was that possible?
Somehow they were going to need to figure out together how this happened. In all his work with Bonnie and Duster’s math over the last year, he had never seen anything like this being possible.
Actually, at the moment, he wasn’t even sure what “this” was. They were both from a future, but from futures in different timelines now together in just this timeline.
Across the table from him Dixie sat silently, clearly lost in her thoughts as well.
They both ate lightly, only picking at their food. Normally he enjoyed the grilled chicken and potatoes, but he only ate a little of each and sipped his iced tea.
Finally, as the lunch neared the end and it was clear that the three men close to them were not leaving anytime soon, Brice had to do something.
He took his journal and wrote in it “Lost River Suite. Sixth floor, south corner.”
He slid it open so she could see his note.
She nodded and he took the journal back and closed it.
She took another bite, then took her journal and wrote it in and slid it so he could see.
“Avalanche Creek suite. Sixth floor, north corner. Join me after lunch when the hall is clear.”
He nodded and smiled at her and for the first time during lunch she smiled back.
A few minutes later she stood and thanked Brice for a lovely lunch.
He stood and bowed to her as Duster had trained him to do.
She turned and left, moving toward the lobby and the staircase beyond.
He waited five minutes, sipping his tea, then stood and left, his journal in his hand.
He managed to walk up the six flights and since the wide, carpeted halls were empty in both directions, he knocked lightly on the suite with the brass tag Avalanche Creek on the door.
Dixie opened the door and smiled at him.
Damn he loved that smile of hers, and everything about her, even her short height.
“Mr. Lincoln,” she said, nodding and indicating that he should enter.
“Ms. Smith,” he said in return, smiling as he went past her. Her suite was almost identical to his, only with woman’s clothes hanging in the wardrobe that he could see through the bedroom door.
She closed the door and he turned to face her.
“Holy crap,” he said, “you have any idea what’s going on?”
She smiled. “We’ll figure it out. But first we need to get some basics out of the way.”
He nodded as they stood about five feet apart, staring at each other.
“My real name is Dixie Smith,” she said, “born in Phoenix, Arizona in July, 1988.”
Brice nodded and followed her lead. “My real name is Brice Lincoln, born right here in Boise, Idaho in May of 1988.”
“I have a doctorate in theoretical math from Princeton,” she said.
“I have a doctorate in theoretical math from Harvard,” he said.
“I was hired by Bonnie and Duster Kendal just over a year ago, moved to Boise to work for them, and this is my first long trip into the past.”
Brice nodded. “Same exact thing. Did they show you the lodge and the remains of Roosevelt under the lake?”
“They did,” Dixie said, smiling. “That damn road in there scared hell out of me.”
“Yeah,” Brice said, laughing, “and the one going up to the mine above Silver City was no joy ride.”
She laughed with him on that and then they both stood there smiling at each other.
Damn he found her attractive.
Beyond attractive.
“Then there is one more thing we need to get out of the way,” she said, “before we get down to the brand new math problems our presence here together has seemed to have uncovered.”
“What’s that?”
She walked forward and pulled his head down to her height and kissed him.
He was so shocked at the incredible feeling that it took him a moment to finally kiss her back.
And then, after a few minutes of kissing, he picked her up and carried her into her bedroom and quickly discovered how really impossible women’s clothing of 1901 actually was to remove.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
August 22nd, 1901
Dixie’s Timeline
AFTER A QUICK and intense session of making love (once they got her out of her clothes) they both lay on her feather bed, naked, panting in the warming afternoon heat.
His body was amazing, clearly a runner as she was, and clearly in shape. And as they made love, they fit together perfectly. Never, ever, had she felt anything like that before.
She hadn’t been a prude, but sex and relationships hadn’t really been much of her life before this.
Now she wanted to just roll back on top of him, even in the warmth, and make love to him again and again.
He was just staring at her body as well and she liked that. She hadn’t had a man do that before, just lay naked beside her and stare at her.
“You know,” he said, “you have one of the most perfect bodies I have ever seen.”
“Seen a lot of them, have you?” she asked, laughing.
“A few in real life, more on beaches, and a bunch in magazines. You outclass them all.”
She rolled over and kissed him, then said simply, “That was a sweet thing to say.”
It was. Not only was he smart and amazingly good looking with a smile that would kill, but he was sweet. There had to be something wrong with him.
“It’s the flat truth,” he said. “And for the last few days I’ve been double-checking all the math that Bonnie and Duster did to make sure that if you were from this timeline I wouldn’t cause problems doing exactly this.”
She laughed. “I was doing the same thing. Seems we now need to take that math to the next level and see what this is going to do to our original timelines.”
“Boy, do you have that one right,” he said.
“Did you have a job offer before Bonnie and Duster hired you?” Dixie asked.
“I was looking at Cal Tech,” he said. “And they seemed to be looking at me as well.”
“So was I,” she said, nodding. In fact, until Bonnie and Duster came swooping in with an insane offer of money to do research with them, she had almost said yes to the Cal Tech job.
“How much do you want to bet our alternate selves in our original timelines are teaching there?”
He shook his head. “No bet.”
“How in the world did Duster and Bonnie not see each other before they left?”
“Duster left the day I first saw you in the restaurant,” Brice said. “We had only been here two days and spent almost no time in the hotel.”
Dixie nodded. “Bonnie left two days earlier and I spent two days in this room befo
re getting enough courage to go downstairs to eat.”
“Well, that explains some of it,” Brice said. “But you don’t think they did this on purpose, do you?”
“I don’t see how they could,” Dixie said. “But communication between timelines might be possible, I suppose.”
“Now that’s yet another math problem as well,” Brice said.
Dixie knew that their entire situation was a giant mathematical puzzle. And with luck, together, they would figure it out.
He just kept staring at her white skin, her body, while running his fingers through her long hair. She loved that he was doing that. She didn’t feel exposed at all, lying there completely naked in front of him. That was not something she had ever done with any other man in her life.
She was learning all sorts of new things about herself.
“Maybe together we can figure out why they could remember two timelines after the lodge,” she said.
“Maybe,” he said. “But there’s one thing we have to do first.”
“And what’s that?” she asked, giving him a serious look, but hoping what he was going to suggest.
“This,” he said.
He leaned in and kissed her breast, which sent shivers through her body. He then lifted her over and on top of him.
She giggled, feeling him getting quickly aroused under her.
Thirty minutes later they both decided they needed a cold bath.
Together.
And that, of course, led to more that needed to get out of the way before they could get to work.
Plus a lot of water on the floor.
Finally, by dinner, after a short nap, they were actually ready to get to work.
And both starving and facing the reality of the 1901 time period once again.
How could they eat together and talk freely?
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
August 22nd, 1901
Brice’s Timeline
BRICE LOVED THAT they were both still naked and lying on the big feather bed as they talked about what to do next. Figuring out dinner turned out to be more difficult than they thought. They both wanted to eat together, but not down in the hot dining room. This time of the day it would be far, far too uncomfortable to eat there.
And more than likely it would be too crowded, so they wouldn’t be able to talk freely either.
In fact, Brice had found it too hot to eat in any restaurant close by in the evening since the temperature was in the nineties each day at least.
“I have a standing dinner order,” Dixie said, “to be brought to my room at 6 p.m. I’m sure you could have an order brought to your room as well, and then we just eat in here.”
Brice climbed out of bed and got his pocket watch from his vest. It was five.
He turned back to her and flat couldn’t speak. She was just laying there, her hair spread out on the pillow, her legs slightly open, her wonderful body comfortable being completely nude in front of him.
He stammered for a moment and then said, “If you don’t cover up some, we’re not going to make dinner at all.”
She laughed and reached down and pulled a sheet up over herself.
“That better?”
“No, not hardly,” he said. “But at least I can think a little.”
She waved the sheet, flashing him, then laughed and pointed to him.
“That naked body of yours isn’t helping the situation either.”
“Sorry,” he said and grabbed his cowboy hat and put it over his crotch. “That better?”
She laughed that wonderful laugh of hers and then said, “Dinner. That’s the topic.”
“Oh, yeah,” he said, forcing his mind back on food instead of climbing back in with that wonderful woman naked in bed. “I’ll get dressed and go down and order something to be brought to my room also at 6 p.m. that I can carry easily.”
“Did you bring running shorts, or boxer shorts with you?” she asked.
“I did,” he said. “I’ve been wearing them in the evening and to bed.”
“Bring those with you as well when you come back with dinner,” she said. “It gets warm in here until the sun goes down and the evening breeze kicks up. We might as well be 2016 comfortable.”
“I agree completely.”
He managed to get dressed while she watched from the big bed, then he kissed her long and hard before finally pulling away and heading toward the door. He picked up his journal and pen and then with only one look back at the naked woman in the bed, he eased the door open to check if anyone was coming from either direction.
Both halls were empty, so he went out quickly and headed for the staircase. Ten minutes later he had his dinner ordered. It would be delivered at 6 p.m. in his room.
It felt very, very odd to be in the room alone, even though that was how he had spent most of the time since Duster had left. Suddenly Dixie was in his life and he wanted to be with her.
He forced himself to sit at his desk and start the process of figuring out the math behind how they could meet in a timeline.
He knew that in an almost infinite number of timelines he was doing the same thing right now.
There had to be something about the crystal cave that allowed this to happen, something about the physical nature of a timeline being expressed in a crystal that altered the math calculations.
But that didn’t calculate out either.
Almost before he realized it there was a knock on his door and dinner had arrived.
He asked the waiter to just leave it on the tray. He might be eating with a friend and the waiter nodded and just left.
The steak smelled wonderful and the potato looked perfectly cooked. He had also ordered a full pitcher of iced tea with ice in the pitcher and a glass full of ice.
He put his journal and pen on the tray with his food, wrapped up a running shirt and running shorts and stuffed them inside his suit coat pocket and picked the tray up, balancing it carefully as he opened the door.
Again the wide, carpeted hallway was clear and he headed down the hall.
A moment later he was back in Dixie’s room, unseen as far as he knew.
Her dinner had been delivered as well and was on the table in the round corner of her room. Since her room was on the north corner of the building, no sun was beating in as it did in his room. Her windows were open letting in a soft evening breeze that smelled of hot sagebrush.
Since her dinner had been delivered, she had changed into running shorts and a sports bra and had pulled her hair back and tied it away from her face.
He put his tray on the table and then turned and kissed her.
And she kissed him back and pressed into him.
When they finally broke apart, she looked him right in the eye. “You were only gone an hour and I missed you. How is that possible?”
“I don’t know,” he said after kissing her again. “But I felt the same way. So I’m not going to question it. I just want to enjoy every second of it.”
“And that’s a plan I really like,” she said.
He went into the bedroom and took off his suit and vest and shirt and pants and put on his running shorts and tee shirt.
He went back into where she was already sitting at the table. She looked up and smiled as he walked barefoot toward her. “We’ve traveled back to 2016 and haven’t left the room.”
He laughed. “Sure looks that way.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
September 25, 1901
Dixie’s Timeline
FOR OVER AN entire, wonderful month, they continued the same routine they had set up the first day. Dixie flat loved every minute of it, every day of it.
They slept the nights together in her room, and she felt wonderful cuddling against him every night, her naked body against his.
Then at sunrise, Brice went back to his room and met her an hour later for breakfast in the dining room.
They went back to her room after breakfast and worked on timeline math until lunch. They seem
ed to just think the same with the math and he was the first person who could talk to her at the same level professionally.
And that was wonderful.
Then they had lunch together in the dining room, sometimes working, sometimes just making small talk if anyone sat too close to them.
Then they spent the time together for the rest of the afternoon working and ate dinner together as well in her room.
The days were wonderful and not once did she get tired of having him with her. They talked, worked, laughed, and made love.
They made a lot of love, actually. Neither of them seemed to be capable of keeping their hands off the other one. And Dixie didn’t mind that in the slightest.
He had become a part of her, something she would have said impossible a month before.
And they had made progress on the math as well.
Both of them were convinced that the limited aspects of the physical nature of the crystal cave caused the ability to cross over timelines as had happened with the lodge, and that had happened to them.
Brice had assigned a random limited number of two hundred million to the crystals within a hundred paces of the table to plug into the equations they were coming up with.
It worked, which shocked Dixie.
By simply assigning a set number, all their math suddenly made sense.
They had their equation.
They had the answer. Granted, it was a very complex answer, taking almost two pages of each of their journals just to write out in small symbols.
And they would need to check it on a computer when they got back to 2016.
But they both knew it was right.
They were both almost giddy with excitement. The trip for both of them had been completely successful.
They had also figured out mathematically a way to use crystals not attached to the wall as a form of time travel machine outside of the crystal cave. Those crystals were detached from the wall and stacked when Duster’s great-great-grandfather had broken through into the crystal room. Both Dixie and Brice remembered seeing the stack of crystals, each one representing a timeline, sitting near the door.
Smith's Monthly #12 Page 16
