by Janet Leigh
Geesh. The vegetable metaphors made me cringe. Everyone thought marrying Caiyan was a bad idea.
Jake leaned in close to me, and I could smell his Abercrombie cologne. The same cologne he’d been wearing since high school.
“Marrying Caiyan is a bad idea.”
“Why?”
“The guy’s unstable. You said so yourself.”
“I said I thought he needed a checkup.”
“He kills people and takes their stuff.”
“He defends himself and sometimes bad people die,” I said, crossing my arms over my chest. “Besides, he doesn’t do that anymore.” My inner voice donned her imaginary sword and slashed a Z in the air.
Jake cut his eyes at me. “Hard to change a carrot into a pea.”
“I like the glasses, but I don’t think they make you any smarter.”
“I don’t need glasses to see the facts.” He stood and threw his yogurt cup away. He left, passing Tina and Ace on the way out. Ace stuck his tongue out at Jake’s back as he entered the room. Tina carried a plate of sandwiches she placed on the table in front of me. Ace tossed three bags of Cheetos on the table.
“What’s with agent asshole?” Ace asked, tucking his dress under his behind as he sat down next to me.
“He’s worried about me accepting Caiyan’s proposal.”
“Worried or jealous?”
It was a good question. Things hadn’t been the same between us since I started dating Caiyan. I agreed I needed answers before I said I do, but maybe I would take Elvira’s advice. Being engaged wasn’t such a bad idea. I loved peas and carrots, regardless of how many potatoes tried to separate them.
* * *
Ace dealt the deck of cards. “You in, love?”
“Sure,” I said, throwing my Cheetos ante into the center of the table. We played a round of Texas hold ’em.
“I hope Gerry summons me soon,” Tina said. “I love Prague. The art, the people, the beautiful country, not to mention the Czech food. If he’s in a good mood he’ll call me early so we can enjoy the time.”
“Yes, I might be missing me party, but Florence is known as the Bohemian mecca. I hope Brodie summons me in time to have a little bit of fun.”
The thought terrified me. I hated going back to corsets and no indoor plumbing. At least if I went to 1933, I would have the benefit of toilet paper and drinking water.
Tina won the first hand. Ace the second. After about five hands, my Cheetos were running a little low. Ace picked up a chip and ate it.
“Hey, you can’t eat the bet,” Tina said.
“I’m hungry. Jake the enforcer only left us sandwiches.”
He played the ace of hearts and beamed at us. “My favorite card. It reminds me of me.”
Tina and I laughed. Then she played her hand and scooped up her winnings.
“How come you keep winning?” I asked her.
“Last month I was a dealer in Las Vegas. Gerry followed our brigand to the Horseshoe Casino and we needed to get close to him. I dealt, and Gerry played.”
“Are you and Gerry, you know, a thing?” I asked her.
“Are you kidding? He’s sludge. Besides, he’s practically married.”
“Really? He’s such a flirt.”
“They live together from what I hear, but I’ve never met her. When he’s had too much tequila he talks about her like she’s the love of his life.”
“Huh, I never would have guessed he’d be over it with a woman,” Ace said.
I raised an eyebrow at him. We played another round, and Tina won again. The clock ticked, and the hour passed. It made me uneasy. The time continuum was growing longer. The guys in the lab couldn’t explain why. Each travel we were returning a little later. Last month it was an entire day. Eli went apeshit because I hadn't called in at work. He blew up Jake’s cellphone concerned I had been left in the past.
“Do either of you know anything about Bonnie and Clyde?”
Tina shook her head. “I’ve never met them. I went back and had drinks with Bugsy Seigel, once.”
“I was in a shootout with Al Capone,” Ace said.
“Really?” I asked.
“Yes, we were chasing Mortas and he got in the middle of a mob having a difference of opinion—pissed my knickers.”
Tina and I broke into laughter. After that we took turns sharing our most embarrassing travel moments. We were having fun until Tina and Ace’s keys lit up, almost simultaneously.
Ace grinned. “Looks like I’m needed. I might make me party after all.”
Tina and Ace reported to the travel hangar, and I sat alone in the break room.
I thumbed through the file again. I knew most of the history of Bonnie and Clyde. The couple. I didn’t know about the red-light district in Fort Worth. I probably wouldn’t need to know because Marco would go back, trail Mitch who was probably trying to steal something stupid, and then take it away from him with a mild scolding and a trip to Gitmo. I would enjoy hauling Mitch’s arrogant tight ass to jail.
I didn’t want to sit here all alone, so I headed over to the travel lab to watch the defenders on the big screen. If anything, I could see where Marco landed and if Mitch was near him.
Chapter 13
Two WTF members no longer able to travel operated the travel lab. An old-timer named Al, who gave Albert Einstein a run for his money when it came to physics and time travel, and Pickles. Life had left its mark on Pickles. When I first met Andre, better known as Pickles, he was confined to a wheelchair due to a car accident. Thanks to a mistake I made while still a newbie at time traveling, he regained the use of his legs. It turned out for the better, but could have been worse, so much worse.
I stood outside the unmarked entry to the travel lab and motioned for them to let me inside. They had cameras, but only Jake and General Potts had access to enter without permission.
The door slid open, and Pickles stood on the opposite side.
“What is dat crazy dance you were doin'?” he asked me. His white teeth smiled wide against his chocolate skin, and his attire consisted of a Mighty Mouse t-shirt and jeans. Braided leather cords decorated his wrists and held the key gleaming around his neck. It was the only key I had ever seen not suspended by a titanium chain.
“I was motioning for you to let me in.”
“Really? I thought you was having a seizure.” He leaned on his cane as he moved aside and let me enter.
I gave him a playful shove to his shoulder as I passed. “Nice hair,” I said, admiring his latest set of dreads.
“You think? I was going for a Jason Momoa vibe.”
“Yep, I can see the resemblance, just don't go turning into Aquaman and swimming across Guantanamo Bay.”
“No problem there,” he said, tapping the titanium of his artificial leg with his cane.
Al lifted his head from his computer screens and waved at me from across the room. I waved back and walked over to view the giant screen in front of me. A trio of leather chairs sat center in the room. I relaxed back into the comfort of the soft leather. When the moon cycle was open, the travelers were tracked. The travel lab indicated the WTF employees with a blue blinking dot. The brigands were black. Any NATs—people without the gift—in the vicinity of a traveler were allocated with a red dot. Pickles came and sat in the chair next to me, balancing a small remote gizmo on his lap.
“Look at dat Gerry.” Pickles chuckled, clicked a button on his gizmo, and the giant screen in front of me zoomed in on the two blue dots in the center of Prague. “He always calls Tina before he captures his brigand. Dey go sightseeing.”
The dots were jumping up and down on the screen.
“Why are the dots bouncing around like that?” I asked.
“Dey are dancing.”
A giggle escaped my lips. Tina called Gerry sludge, but it seemed to me she enjoyed spending time with him. The thought of the two of them together having a good time depressed me a little more. I missed traveling with Caiyan. I missed the exciteme
nt of tracking a brigand, the adventure of visiting the past, and most of all I missed rolling around in the sheets with him in a faraway land.
“You here to locate your defender?” Pickles cocked his head in my direction, his question dissipating my melancholy moment.
“Can you find Marco?”
He nodded and hit a few buttons on the remote he carried. The big screen in front of me began to spin, making me a bit dizzy as the world rotated to Texas. It was Google Earth on steroids. The screen zoomed in and focused on a blue dot surrounded by several red dots.
“Where’s the brigand?”
“There’s no brigand.”
“But I thought Mitchell jumped?”
“We got a tail off Caiyan’s vessel, excuse me now Mitch’s vessel, but it landed in 1933 then disappeared. Mahlia landed with it then she jumped to Prague.”
“So, what is Mitchell after?”
“There’s some strange activity here.” Pickles pointed to the red dots. “Almost as if a NAT is wearing a key.” I made a mental note of the landing coordinates in case Marco needed me. When he summoned me, I liked to know my destination ahead of time. Marco’s blue dot blinked then vanished.
“What happened?” I asked Pickles.
Jake's voice boomed over the intercom located in the travel lab. “We have a transporter en route.”
“Der you go, Marco is returning.”
“But where is Mitch?”
Pickles shrugged and I made a beeline to the hangar.
Jake was standing by the door, and three suits were off to the right. The temperature in the hangar was cool to keep the magnets on the landing pads from having a friction overload. I pulled my jean jacket tighter around me as I stood next to Jake.
We tried to keep our distance from the landing pads in case the magnetic force that guided the landing vessels caused them to miss their mark.
A blast of air blew my hair into my face, and I struggled to push it aside. The roar of a highly tuned race car echoed in the landing room, and then there was silence. We stood against the far wall as Marco's Indy car appeared on the landing pad closest to me. The machine’s shiny red body reflected the harsh overhead lights, and I lowered my eyes to avoid the glare.
I sighed. He didn't need me after all. Jake and I waited for him to exit his vessel, but he didn't move. A knot fisted in my stomach and I ran toward his vessel. Jake grabbed me halfway. “Wait here, that's an order.” He nodded, and one of the suits held my arm. The remaining two suits went with Jake to the landing pad.
Jake climbed up on the landing dock, the suits following him. He peered into Marco's race car and called for the medics. I couldn't stay away any longer. I bolted for Marco, leaving the suit holding my empty jacket. I climbed up on the landing pad, afraid of what waited. Marco was fighting to regain consciousness. Blood covered his shirt. I released the breath I had been holding hostage. He was alive.
His eyes opened and he frowned at me.
“Have you been shot?” Jake asked Marco.
“Yes, as a matter of fact, I have been shot,” he groaned.
Jake informed him the medics were on their way.
“I think I can move my left leg. She shot me in the right cheek. The bullet went clean through, but it’s bleeding like a bitch. I hope she didn't hit anything important.”
“Did you complete the moon cycle?” Jake asked.
“Nope, it doesn’t take long to get shot at in 1933.”
Jake and I helped Marco out of his car. The blood soaked into his jeans and trailed down his leg to his foot. His socks and shoes were missing.
“What happened to your shoes?” I asked.
“Lost them in a card game,” Marco said as we assisted him off the landing pad.
The medics arrived with a stretcher and began doing their medic thing.
“Did Bonnie Parker shoot you?” I asked Marco.
“No, your aunt did.”
I stopped dead in my tracks. “My aunt?”
“Yes, Great-aunt Elma Jean Cloud shot me in the ass.”
“My sweet little old aunt?”
“She's not old and she's not so sweet.”
The medics began carting him away. He lifted his head and frowned at me. “Why is it every time I try and help your family, I get shot?”
I stood with my mouth hanging open.
Jake gave me orders to stay put as he trailed behind the stretcher, interrogating Marco along the way.
Chapter 14
I returned to the conference room and waited. I couldn’t stop my legs from shaking. Why would my aunt have traveled back to 1933? My inner voice was practicing her meditation techniques to try and lower my blood pressure. I flipped through a magazine. I didn’t care what the Kardashians were doing. I wanted answers. Pacing around the room, I drank a bottle of water and prayed Jake would hurry up and give me an update on Marco.
Jake came in as I was about to go bang on the door to the infirmary.
“How’s Marco? When can I see him? What’s going on? Why won’t you answer me?” The words vomited from my mouth.
“Jen, calm down.” He pushed me into a chair and sat down across from me.
“Marco’s going to be fine. He was shot in the gluteal muscle and the bullet exited out his upper thigh. He was lucky. The shot was clean and missed his femur by mere inches. He will probably have trouble sitting for a few weeks.”
I let out a breath. “Thank God. When can I see him?”
“The doctor is in with him now. First, we need to talk about what he discovered during his travel, and then you can visit him.”
“Marco said my aunt Elma shot him?”
“Yes, she did.”
“Why would she be traveling to 1933?”
“She’s not. It’s her time. She is seventeen years, six months in 1933.”
Jake was right. I hadn’t done the math. Everything I knew about my great-aunt was hearsay. I met her when I was nine. She was a sweet old woman with white hair and wrinkles. I learned later she wanted to teach me the ways of time travel, but Mamma Bea interfered and it never happened. She died when I was sixteen, and I inherited her vessel and her key. From what I gathered, she was more of a crusader than a gangster. If she was hanging out with Bonnie and Clyde, there had to be a good reason. I needed more information.
“Marco told me your aunt is ‘hooking up’ with Mitch. His words not mine.”
“What?” I shook my head. “No, that can’t be right. Elma falls in love with Marco’s grandfather.”
Jake rolled his eyes. The romantic adventures of my great-aunt were not on the list of his top priorities. “Marco told me he found all four of them at a saloon in Fort Worth’s red-light district. Mitch was in a poker game with Clyde Barrow, Baby Face Nelson, and some other gangsters. From what Marco could tell, your aunt Elma is smuggling moonshine and providing it to all the speakeasies in the Fort Worth area. Mitchell is back there hobnobbing with the locals and has his gangster on. Mitch has been going back the last few moon cycles to locate the famous duo. Somewhere along the way he met Elma, and they, well…Elma is his girl, so to speak.”
I had a visual of Mitch placing his smarmy hands on my petite aunt. My inner voice reminded me of his tight butt and defined muscular torso. Crap on a cracker!
“Did Marco find out why Mitch is back there?” I asked Jake.
“Yes. Bonnie Parker has a key.”
“A key?”
“A key he’s never seen before. We don’t know if she got it from a brigand, but my guess is Mitch is after the key.”
“Why hasn’t Mitch taken the key from Bonnie Parker?”
“From what Marco could gather, Bonnie and Clyde are difficult to find now that the law enforcement has pictures of them. During the shooting in Joplin, the Barrow gang left a camera behind containing the pictures we have on file of them. The newspapers published the photos, and rewards for their capture were issued. They are keeping a low profile to avoid arrest. Tonight was the first time Mitch met th
e pair.”
“How did Marco get the information?” I asked. This was a lot of intel for the short time Marco traveled.
Jake dropped his head. “I’d rather not go into the details.” Jake’s dimples winked out at me and I knew he had some vital information that got a grin out of him.
“Spill it.”
Jake held his hands up in defeat. “According to Marco, he discovered Mitch playing poker with Clyde Barrow. He told me Bonnie and Clyde got into a huge fight. Clyde wouldn’t allow Bonnie to play cards with the men. She met Marco at the bar and began flirting with him. Marco saw she was wearing a key.” Jake paused. He was trying to explain but couldn’t contain his smile.
“What?”
“Bonnie challenged Marco to a game of poker. Marco thought he could win the key from her. Clyde caught them together and threatened to shoot Marco.”
“Because Marco was playing cards with Bonnie?”
“Not only Bonnie, but Elma and two other girls from the saloon. They were playing strip poker.”
“Seems like Bonnie is a bit free with her affection.” The picture became clear in my mind. Marco was a good poker player. If he lost his shoes, Bonnie was most likely half naked.
Jake smiled as he watched me connect the dots. “Marco is positive she was trying to make Clyde jealous.”
“How did Elma shoot him?”
“Marco won a hand and asked Bonnie for the key. When she refused, he tried to take it. Bonnie screamed. Clyde came running and caught them together. Bonnie’s clothes were on the floor and Marco was on top of her trying to take the key, but before Clyde could grab his gun, Elma pulled a pistol. Marco took off toward the door. Elma shot him in the ass on the way out.” Jake gave a small chuckle.
“It’s not funny. He could have been killed. Why didn’t Marco tell her he was a traveler? She would have let him go, I’m sure of it.”
“He didn’t have time. Clyde began shooting, and before Marco knew what was happening a shootout between opposing gangsters was filling the walls full of bullets. He barely made it out alive. He swears he heard Elma call him a damn brigand on his way out the door.”
