by Amy Vansant
For a moment, it was as if time stood still.
The child’s expression opened like a hibiscus in the morning sun—eyes wide, jaw slack. The ice cream arced into the air until gravity snatched it and spiked it to the ground with a splat.
He wailed like a racing ambulance.
Fiona walked on, chuckling.
Still got it.
Chapter Two
Present Day
Chilly beneath his hospital gown, Brochan pushed open the door to the men’s room and entered. The pain from the gunshot wound beneath his arm no longer nagged. He guessed it had something to do with the large needles the doctor had stuck into his flesh. Or maybe the pills they’d given him. Or maybe the additional pills he’d taken after they left the room.
If two pills made him feel good, he’d guessed six would make him feel even better. They’d told him to wait before taking more, but how come? It didn’t make any sense. Surely the more healing magic the better. They didn’t have pills where he’d come from—his most recent memory, eighteenth-century Scotland—but he imagined the little bullets worked akin to balls of medicinal herbs.
Whitevur. They worked. He felt pain-free and maybe a touch giddy.
He needed to be at his best.
Tonight he’d be with Catriona. Tonight he’d ask her—
Broch stopped his forward momentum. He felt the grin on his mug melting, like the gelato he’d left on the counter of his new Hollywood apartment before he understood that frozen desserts required constant refrigeration.
In front of him in the men’s room, a slight, blond man stepped toward a sink embedded in the wall.
Ah ken the back o’ that scrawny man’s heid.
He was sure of it. What was his name?
Pete.
Catriona called him by that name. Sometimes she called him Dr. No-See-Um.
That wee man spent a nicht wi’ Catriona.
Broch felt heat rise in his cheeks—a strange mixture of anger and embarrassment. He felt much the way he had while watching Pete leave Catriona’s apartment, much too early in the morning.
The wee man was so close now he could reach out and snap his twiggy neck. Anger bubbled in his chest as Pete struggled to unbutton his trousers.
Why had that one been at Catriona’s apartment overnight? The Lilliputian couldn’t even find his wedding tackle with both hands.
Brochan felt a growl starting in his throat.
Pete turned and Broch watched the color run from the man’s face, the doctor’s eyes bugging as wide as skipping stones.
“Holy—”
Broch strode forward. “Hello, Pete.”
“Hey, Broch, right? Did you just growl?”
Did I?
Pete stared up at him, Adam’s apple bobbing. He coughed a dry, raspy honk. “Fancy meeting you here. How are you feeling? I, uh, heard you were shot helping Catriona with a job?”
“Aye. Ah ate all the pills. ’Tis all guid noo.”
Pete frowned. “You ate all the pills?”
Broch waved away the tiny doctor’s question as if he were erasing it from the world. “Nevermind that. Ah’ve bin meanin’ tae speak tae ye—”
Pete dropped his gaze to his navel and began to rebutton his trousers. “Actually, now isn’t a great time...”
Broch laid a hand on the doctor’s arm, marveling at how dainty the man’s shoulder felt in his hand.
Lik’ a marble ah cuid throw...
He couldn’t let Pete leave yet. He needed answers. He knew Catriona wouldn’t like him menacing her friend, but at the moment, he found it hard to care. He felt...free. Light on his feet.
“Are you okay?”
Broch glanced down from the spot he’d found himself staring at on the ceiling. The doctor peered back up at him, head slightly tilted, as if he was watching something he didn’t quite understand.
Broch refocused. “Dae whit ye’ve come tae dae. Ah’m nae aff tae hurt ye.”
With a grimace, Pete worked his way down the buttons of his pants once again and resumed waiting for his river to run.
“It’s a little uncomfortable with your hand on my shoulder, big guy,” he mumbled. “I didn’t think I had a shy bladder but I think you’ve done it.”
Broch removed his hand. He’d lost track of time, remembering how Catriona had yelled at him when he’d attempted to relieve himself in a sink. Pete, like him, didn’t seem to think it should be a problem. He did like that about Pete.
“Catrionia tellt me nae tae dae that in a sink.”
Pete’s head swiveled from the death glare he’d locked on his business. “What?”
“Whit ye’re daein’ in that sink. She tellt me nae tae dae it.”
Pete glanced down. “You mean the urinal?”
Broch stared at him.
“You’ve never seen—” The corner of Pete’s mouth hooked to the right as he squinted at Broch. “This is a urinal. You’re supposed to pee in it. That’s what it’s for.”
“It’s nae a sink?”
“No.”
Broch studied the urinal in front of him.
Alright then. It is an odd shape.
He lifted his hospital gown to find his own equipment and relieve the pressure on his bladder.
Pete quickly looked away. “Jeezus.”
“Whit?”
“Nothing. I’m just realizing God’s got a sense of humor.”
“Whit's that suppose tae mean?” He looked down. “Is thare somethin’ wrong wi’ it?”
Pete laughed. “Wrong? No. Unless you’re exhausted from carting it around all day, which I imagine is possible.”
Broch squinted at him. “Yer saying it’s tae big?”
“Too big—” A strange smile curled at the corner of Pete’s lips. “You mean for Catriona? She hasn’t, uh, tried it on for size yet?”
Broch felt his flash of anger return. “Na. She’s a proper lassie.”
Pete snorted a laugh and Broch stabbed a finger at him.
“Ye better watch yer geggie.”
“My geggie?”
“Yer mouth. Afore ah batter it shut.”
“Oh. Er, Sorry.”
Broch stared down again. “Bit dae ye think... Ah, mean, is whit ye’ve git more tae a wummin’s liking?”
Pete grimaced. “Ah. Great. Thanks for pointing out mine is different. Couldn’t just let me pretend?”
Broch opened his mouth and then shut it. He wanted to know if everyone in modern day had rigging like Pete, but Catriona had told him not to tell anyone about his time travel. If she wanted Pete to know, she’d have told him herself.
The room spun a little to the left so Broch closed his eyes and shook his head to clear it.
He began to relieve himself. “Nevermind.”
They fell silent and Pete found his own relief. As he did, he looked up at Broch.
“If you’re asking me if carrying Thor’s hammer between your legs might scare her, though... It might.”
Broch sucked in air, a tiny whine rounding out the end of his gasp. It was the sound a wee lassie might make, but he didn’t have time to wonder how it had escaped his lips.
“Ye think?”
Pete finished his business. “What I have here, is basically a perfect penis.”
“It is?”
Pete nodded. “Yup.”
Broch looked at Pete and then himself and found few similarities.
“Och.”
Pete adjusted his drawers. “You can get someone to fix it for you though.”
“Howfur?”
“Get it cut down.”
Broch gasped again and slapped his hand over his mouth, surprised by his squeal a second time.
Howfur ah keep makin’ that noise?
“Cut it aff?” he asked.
Pete moved to the mirror and fixed his hair. “Yep.”
Broch continued to gape, unable to wrap his mind around Pete’s suggestion.
Pete leaned back to slap him on the arm. “Anyway, good talk, b
ig guy.”
Pete left the bathroom, whistling as if he didn’t have a care in the world.
He didnae. He and his perfect penis.
Whistling. As if he’d told Broch to cut his hair, not his—
Broch stared down.
“Cut it aff?”
Chapter Three
Catriona stared at the closed door of Fiona’s house, willing for it to open almost as much as she willed for it to stay sealed.
Forever.
She sighed and tapped her fingertips on her thigh, debating the pros and cons of hopping from the truck and pounding on Fiona’s door. She deserved an explanation. The woman couldn’t dump a ton of strange and upsetting information on her and then expect to skip to the safety of her home.
Catriona dropped her forehead to rest on the steering wheel.
Do I really want to know what she meant?
If she listed the things that had happened to her in the last month, Catriona felt confident any sane person would agree she’d been through more than any normal human should have to bear in thirty days.
Of course, I’m not exactly normal. That’s half the problem, isn’t it?
Spotting a strapping Highlander’s kilted butt on the set of Parasol Pictures’ studio lot hadn’t seemed like a big deal at the time. Her job as a “fixer” for the Hollywood studio had thrown her into a million odd scenarios—from fist-fighting aliens to coked-up children’s icons.
Plaid-wrapped background talent wandering away from some in-production Braveheart knock-off should have been a cakewalk.
Instead, the apparent background talent turned out to be an actual Highlander, thrown through time to her doorstep like the world’s strangest Amazon package.
Brochan. No last name. Just Brochan-call-me-Broch-will-respond-to-Kilty.
Why had that giant man landed at Parasol? Couldn’t he have spun through time and space and landed in New Jersey? Australia? Anywhere other than her lot?
Her adoptive father, Sean, served as the closest thing to a logical answer to that question. Her borrowed dad was Broch’s real dad.
Oh, and Sean had come through time, too. Decades earlier.
It made sense that Broch had been drawn to be reunited with his father somehow. That part of the story was so logical she’d nearly found a way to swallow everything else. Why not? What did she know? Maybe people came spinning through time every day and she was the last to know.
But right when she’d been ready to wrap her brain around Brochan’s appearance, Sean dropped the bombshell that she, herself, might be from another time as well.
She had no memory of being in any other time. Maybe she’d been drinking white wine in whatever time period she was supposedly from. White wine was usually the culprit when she couldn’t remember an evening.
She did have a very Scottish name. Catriona. Scottish spelling. And she’d arrived with the name. Sean didn’t rename her after he’d found her as a child. Brochan claimed to remember her in his past, though it had taken him a while to put together that memory puzzle.
Maybe ancient Scotland sprang a leak.
She lifted her forehead from the steering wheel and rubbed at it, feeling the dimples of the faux leather pressed into her flesh like inverse braille.
Fantastic.
She glanced back at Fiona’s door.
And then there’s Fiona.
Catriona had hoped to never see Fiona again. The woman had a strange effect on Broch, and the witch had already tried to drug and seduce the Highlander once.
Catriona smoldered at the memory.
Then, out of nowhere, Fiona calls her for a ride from jail. Like Uber didn’t even exist. Like they were friends.
Why did I pick her up?
Catriona sighed. She knew why. The woman was mysterious. Catriona thought she’d be all smooth, draw Fiona into a conversation, tie her in verbal knots, make her admit she drugged Kilty...
Instead, Fiona hopped in the truck, smirky and confident, and told Catriona she’s her sister.
Blech. Like this month couldn’t get any worse.
A ringing pierced the silence and Catriona jumped, clutching at her heart.
For the love of—
She fumbled in her pocket and retrieved her phone to inspect the caller I.D.
Luther. Sean’s best buddy and a fellow fixer for the studio. She answered, happy to be distracted from her thoughts.
“Hey, Luther. Nice timing. You just about stopped my heart.”
Luther didn’t bite, and instead barreled into the reason for his call like the efficient person he was. “Where’s your father?”
“Sean’s at the hospital with Broch. Broch caught a bullet from a crazy lady, but he’ll be fine. Through and through near his armpit.”
“His arm or his latissimus dorsi?”
“Whatever, you old gym rat. If he was built like me and didn’t have those muscly wings under his pits the bullet would have missed him entirely, so you big beefy guys can suck it.”
Luther chuckled. “You sound in a good mood.”
“Oh I’m just giddy.”
“Well, we have a situation at the studio I was hoping you could look into.”
Catriona rolled her eyes. All she wanted to do was go home and get some sleep. Maybe she’d get lucky and wake up in some new time period, far, far away.
“What is it?”
“There’s a woman claiming Colin Layne knows where her missing sister is.”
Catriona winced at the sound of Colin’s name. She’d briefly dated the Parasol Pictures actor, before he’d grown too famous for a peon such as herself. “Doesn’t Sean usually deal with A-Lister problems?”
“I’m thinkin’ this needs a woman’s touch. The missing girl is Cari Clark—she works for us on and off. Bit parts. Her sister Violet’s threatening to go to the police unless someone lets her question Colin.”
“Think it’s a ruse to meet Colin?”
Luther clicked his tongue. “Maybe. But I checked around and no one has seen Cari for a few days. She missed a fitting. And the sister doesn’t sound like a nut.”
“Okay. I’ll talk to her. Got a number?”
“Got an address. Maybe you go, check things out. She wants Colin to go to her house.”
“Of course she does. Hit me.”
Luther rattled off an address in the Silver Lake neighborhood of L.A.
“That’s a pretty hoity-toity area for a rabid fan. Usually these people don’t have much going on in their own lives.”
“She’s got plenty. She’s a thoracic surgeon.”
“Really?” Catriona considered asking if the thoracic was located anywhere near the latissimus dorsi but decided to let it go. “Okay. I’m on my way.”
Catriona disconnected. With one last glare at Fiona’s door, she shifted into gear and returned Sean’s truck to the hospital.
She jogged to the waiting room to update Sean on the situation in Silver Lake. He still sat, still waiting for Broch in the same threadbare chair, reading an actual magazine with a perfectly good smart phone in his pocket.
He listened to her story and then weighed in. “Go ahead and take care of Cari Clark before whatever this is gets too far ahead of us. I’ll wait for Broch.”
She nodded. “See if you can get hold of Colin for me? Squeeze him for a little information?”
“Wouldn’t you be better at that?” asked Sean with a wink.
Catriona glowered at him. “Don’t even.”
Sean chuckled. “Sorry. I’ll give him a ring.”
Spinning on her heel in an exaggerated snit for comic effect, Catriona summoned a car to take her to the Parasol Pictures studio lot so she could pick up her own Jeep. From there, she drove to the address Luther had provided her.
Fans found infinite ways to finagle introductions to studio talent, but the really persistent ones usually turned out to be teenagers, women with thirty cats, or guys who built doll versions of celebrities from mannequin parts purchased online. A female tho
racic surgeon living in an expensive neighborhood didn’t fit the mold.
Catriona parked in front of a well-appointed Spanish bungalow. Letting herself through the unlocked front gate, she entered a landscaped courtyard and knocked on the large, ornate front door, so massive it made her knuckles hurt, if only because she believed they would.
A middle-aged woman answered wearing a beige sweater set and khaki shorts, her hair hanging in smooth, neat ringlets that brushed the top of her shoulders. Around her throat hung a delicate gold cross and on her left ring-finger balanced a large diamond.
Catriona grunted huh aloud without meaning to.
She doesn’t look crazy at all.
She inhaled a surreptitious sniff.
House doesn’t smell like cats.
“Is that lavender?” she asked aloud.
The woman’s hand fluttered to her throat as she scanned Catriona from head to toe and back again. “My perfume, yes. Can I help you?”
“Are you Violet?”
“Who’s asking?”
That’s a yes.
“My name’s Catriona Phoenix, I work with Parasol Pictures. They said you wanted to talk to someone?”
Violet frowned. “I wanted to talk to Colin Layne.”
“Okay. We take your concerns seriously. But you have to understand not everyone requesting an audience with our actors has legitimate needs. Can I talk to you first?”
With a sigh, the woman relented and took a step back. “Fine. Come in.”
She turned to walk towards her living room and Catriona followed, closing the door behind her.
“I’m Dr. Violet Clark.” The woman took a position in front of her sofa and offered a hand to shake. “Please. Have a seat.”
Catriona sat and studied her hostess. A pretty, mocha-skinned woman of means, nothing about her or her professionally decorated home rang any warning bells. If anything, she seemed too perfect. That didn’t bode well for Colin. Maybe he had done something wrong. Cari had probably run off to nurse an aching heart.
“Would you like some coffee?” asked Violet.
“No. I don’t want to take up more of your time than I need to.”
Plus, I should probably get back to the hospital where a recently shot Highlander is waiting for me.
“So, why do you want to talk to Colin?”
