by Mia Downing
That memory belonged to her. And the sweet man beside me would know nothing about the violence of it. That was her burden.
I couldn’t go back and face that. I couldn’t risk his life.
He had to stay.
Chapter seventeen
Skye
March 7
I panted with the exertion of an orgasm and an after as Marek lifted his head from between my thighs with a wicked grin. After enjoying a homemade dinner he’d made just for me, he’d stripped me, laid me out on his kitchen table, and had “dessert” with a can of whipped cream.
“Good?” he asked as his fingers grazed my clit, increasing the aftershocks.
“You know it was good.” He’d felt the strength of the after. His ego just needed stroking. And right now, his bond blazed pure yellow, the edges tinged with green where the after lingered.
“Good. Don’t move.” He rose and left, leaving me on the kitchen table.
“Where are you going?” I didn’t think I could move. The bones in my limbs had dissolved to jelly.
Since my birthday, I’d given in to staying with him, though I insisted we stay at my place. Waking up to him every morning had changed me, had softened me in ways I’d never thought possible. It had also dredged up the most intense and darkest dreams I had ever experienced, ones I didn’t want to paint for fear it would bring them alive. Dreams that I’d been captured. Beaten. Shot.
The worst, though, was waking to an absolute fear of losing him.
The more I had these dreams, the more I feared where they came from. There were too many coincidences with what I dreamed ending up being something I’d found in his home and life—his tattoo, the vine pattern, their rings. I could explain them away, if I tried hard enough, as coincidences. I’d seen similar tattoos in Boston once. The rings… I’m sure other people had ones like those. So far, there was nothing in my dreams that I could connect only with him. I didn’t want these nightmares to be her memories returning. Some of this shit I’d dreamed could have led to making her cut his bond.
And I didn’t want to accept that I was a part of her, a woman I hated and yet envied. I wanted to be me, going to school and working at a bookstore and having a boyfriend who wasn’t a time traveler.
Rattled and unsure, I would melt against Marek as he slept, praying he’d keep the dreams away. But I’d bolt awake anyway and go paint what I could to banish the dreams until dawn arrived.
By mid-January, he’d been disturbed enough to ask why I was so exhausted. I finally admitted that I had always had nightmares, and they’d increased since his New Year’s decree of us sleeping together as a couple.
Upset, he’d backed off. Unwilling to backslide, I still let him sleep over at my house a few nights a week. During that time, the nightmares had lessened, but the other dreams intensified, ones that contained things that felt familiar and real like before I’d met him. Those things I could paint, things that weren’t a part of Marek’s life.
A small voice reasoned that I needed to trust him and show him the paintings. Maybe I’d find peace. I rejected that quickly. I’d never shared these paintings with anyone. I didn’t trust him to see them and not…I don’t know. I didn’t want to be judged again. I’d had enough of that. The idea made my eyes tear up and the fear swell, and I wasn’t huge on the emotions thing.
These stupid dreams had to be happening out of stress, because in a week, he’d be going back. That’s what my therapist would have said. Somehow, I had a week to change his mind, so this madness could stop.
But my current uneasiness focused on what Marek was getting from the other room. This dinner had to be a “buttering me up for something” event. I wasn’t stupid. The man loved to cook, and he loved to make me come, but getting both on the same night like this was suspicious.
He returned and placed something cold and rectangular on my bare belly. A flash drive.
“What’s this?” I picked it up and turned the black plastic piece over.
“My book is done as promised.”
“Really?” I sat up and tugged him between my spread legs, dragging his head down to kiss him in congratulations. “I’m so proud.”
A long finger trailed along the open fabric of my button-down shirt. “You said you’d read it before I submit it.”
I’d forgotten my promise. The smile faded from my lips as I pressed the drive back into his hand. “Marek, no.”
“Please?” He dropped a kiss to my cleavage as his fingers inched up my bare thigh to stroke the sensitive flesh he’d just laved with whipped cream. The pad of his thumb brushed my clit.
I groaned with fresh need. “You did that on purpose, giving me an orgasm before springing this.”
“I’m a smart man.” His tongue traced that special spot under my ear that always made me shiver.
“What does it matter what I think? I’m proud of you for stringing that many words together to make a best seller. This book will be just as big. But you don’t need my approval.”
“It matters to me.” That dark-blue gaze of his searched mine as he set the flash drive in my open palm. “Take it.”
Sighing, I nodded. “Okay. I’ll take it.”
“Now. Next part.” As he patted my thigh, he bent and handed me my pants. “Get dressed. This might take longer, and as much as I like you half-naked, it’s chilly. Meet me in the library.”
“Okay.” I didn’t like the sound of that, either. All too suspicious.
He left, and I slid into my panties and jeans, my stomach sinking with dread. The next part had to be a bigger push to get me to go with him. I wanted to run out the door and hide, but I literally pulled up those big-girl panties and trudged into the library.
As I buttoned up, I called, “Marek, I don’t know what’s going on, but I—”
He stood in the middle of the room, wearing his special watch and a determined expression that made me suck in a breath. I’d seen that stance before from a shadowy form…in my dreams.
I grabbed the table to keep from sinking to the ground as my knees wobbled with fear. “What are you doing?”
“I’m going to give you a demonstration of time travel. To show you it’s not dangerous.”
The panic welled around the pounding of my heart. “No! It’s not safe. You can’t jump yet.”
“It’s perfectly safe. I’ve been able to jump for a bit now.”
“Since when?”
He shrugged. “Mid-February?”
I’d been afraid he’d ask me to go sooner, and he hadn’t. He’d stuck to his deadline as he’d promised. Damn him, I didn’t want to give him brownie points for that. I gulped back the fear that crept up my throat and rippled over my skin. “No.”
He took two steps to my side and urged me into a chair. Clearing his throat, he knelt beside me, holding my numb hand. “I think you need to see how this works before you contemplate going with me. That’s how it started with our training, and unfortunately, you need the crash course. Okay?”
Numbness paralyzed my limbs as I stared at that damned watch. If I believed him, then this was going to get real. He was from the future. Hell, I was from the future. It boggled my mind.
“There’s no need to be afraid. I’ve done this hundreds of times.” He patted my hand and gave me an encouraging smile. “This part is easy. But first, we need to establish proof.”
With a quick step, he crossed to the bookcase and returned to the table with a green, cloth-bound book. Like a magician, his deft hands showed me a blank piece of paper and then slid it between the pages before he returned the book to the shelf.
Turning, he smiled again. “Now, I’ll go back in time, and there should be two pieces of paper in that book when I get back. One will be blank, and one will have writing. That will prove to your mind that this is all real, and at the same time, I can show you what to expect so it’s not terrifying. Okay?”
I blinked. And blinked again. “If you did this in the past, then why aren’t there two now?”
>
“Me adding paper to the book in the past will change the timeline slightly so you see two show up after. It’s not a big enough change to make time ripple, though. You can feel it when we screw with time too much. It’s like a roll of thunder.”
I swallowed and nodded as the numbness settled. I couldn’t stop this any more than I could stop a freight train on the wrong path.
He made an adjustment to the watch. “Now, I’m going to go back a few years.” He tilted his wrist so I could see as he spun a dial and rotated the glass of one watch face with fingers that were like a blur.
“I don’t think—”
He held up a hand. “You don’t need to know how it works. But I need you to see me do all this, to believe. Okay?”
I breathed a little easier as I nodded. “Okay.”
A few steps back took him to the center of the room, and he turned his wrist to show me something again. “This button, here”—he pointed to the one under the dial he had turned—“is what I push to initiate the jump sequence. That you do need to know, just in case. Once that button is pushed, it’s done. There’s no turning back. Get it?”
Mouth dry and unable to form words, I nodded.
“I’ll be gone for about five minutes—give or take. It’s not a long jump either way. You’ll see a white light that grows larger to encompass me before I go and when I return. If you weren’t gifted, you wouldn’t see it. Got it? You can do this.” I guess I didn’t look convincing, because he crossed the rug and dropped a quick kiss to my lips. “Trust me.”
I couldn’t even nod as he returned to the center of the room. He was going, and I couldn’t stop him.
“I’m pushing the button.” His finger pressed and…nothing happened.
I raised my brows as the tension released. He had to be joking about the time travel. It couldn’t be real.
He raised a finger in warning. “Don’t get bitchy just yet. Give it a second. It takes longer the farther from home you are.”
He’d barely gotten out those words when a bright light radiated from the watch and surrounded him. I made the mistake of blinking, and he was gone.
I shrieked and leapt from my seat, running to the spot he’d stood. I dropped to my knees and sank my fingers into the pile of the carpet, still warm, proving to me he’d existed. He’d been there.
Deep inside, the bond keened in anguish at not being able to feel him, vibrating at an excruciating frequency that stole my breath. The pain throbbed, heady and intense as I fought to shield again.
Once in place, my mental barrier blocked the pain and the noise, though my energy still churned from the inside. No wonder I’d learned to do that.
I had to get it together. He said he’d return. I forced air into my lungs in steady breaths. Remembering he said it wouldn’t take long, I staggered back to the chair and sat, staring at the spot in the rug, praying for his return.
I’d never felt so alone before, not in my entire life.
The big clock marked the passing seconds with deafening ticks.
Just when I thought I’d explode, a pinpoint of light brightened the room at about the same height as Marek’s watch. I leaned forward, the hairs on the back of my arms and neck prickling as that dot grew larger and larger. He appeared as a dark shadow first, back lit in blinding light. The light faded, and he stood before me in full color, grinning.
“Ah, that felt good. It’s been so long. You miss me?”
“How could you do that to me?” I rose, my legs shaky as I went to pummel his chest with my fists. “That…that was worse than any pain I felt as a kid. No wonder I learned to shield.”
Smile fading, he took a step back, his hands up in surrender. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t think of the consequences.”
“You just wanted to jump and show off.” Angry tears formed at the corners of my eyes, and I dashed them away. I marched back to the chair and plopped down, arms crossed tightly over my chest. “Why did you leave me bound to you all those years ago by that sliver of energy if it would hurt that much?”
Swallowing, he came to sit in the chair beside me. “I asked you to remove it entirely before I left.”
“Me? What the hell? I was two!”
“Men can’t break the bond.” He cleared his throat. “I’m so sorry. You still had the memories then, and you claimed you remembered how to break the bond entirely. I begged you to break it, and you said you had. It was such a small thread. It was hard to feel. I believed you when you said you’d done it.”
“I was two!” I dashed more tears away. I remembered being little and feeling the constant pain and the yearning, and then one day, after I learned to shield, it had stopped.
“You weren’t two in your memories. You were an adult, trapped inside a two-year-old body. You remembered everything—our past and what had happened in 1892.” He trailed a finger down my cheek, wiping away my tears.
“Why would I do that?” But the creepy feeling washed over me. I rubbed my arms, trying to shake away the terror.
“I don’t know. But I’m glad you learned to shield to protect yourself.” He kissed me gently. “You’re very brave.”
I wasn’t. Not at all, and I bet she had been. And that made me angry.
With a shaking hand, I waved him toward the bookcase. “Go get the book and prove to me you were in the past so we can get this over with.”
He did as asked and returned, wordlessly laying the green book on the table in front of me.
My hands still trembled as I opened the book and searched for the pages. I extracted two. Disbelieving, I opened the first to find it blank. But black ink had stained through the second.
“Open it,” he urged.
The shaking increased until my fingers fumbled, struggling to open the page. In black ink, he’d written, August 1, 1995. The light will carry me forward. I won’t leave you alone.
Two wet circles formed on the page. Angry tears. Hopeless tears because he’d leave me alone in a week. Damn him.
I raised my head, and something caught my gaze on the inside cover of the green book. I slid the book over so I could see it better. An inked pattern scrolled along the edge, a doodle I knew from a dream. I’d painted it last week.
I tapped the page. “Who did this?”
“She did.”
I nodded and withdrew my hand from another “coincidence.” I couldn’t meet Marek’s inquisitive gaze as he sat patiently and waited for me to say something. What could I say?
I raised my gaze to meet his hopeful one. “If I go back, what happens if I regain those memories and…merge with her like you had thought might happen? Or what happens if she’s there still, and I’m there? Because she ripped you to shreds.” And despite that, I’m still not enough.
The hope faded from the depths of his dark-blue eyes, and he raked a hand through his hair as he blew out a breath. “I don’t believe you’d both be there. From past events, the fractured party joined again with the original somewhere along the space between. But if you had the memories, I could find out why she did what she did.”
I nodded numbly. I’m sure he had questions, and he’d been in agony with no answers. “Fair enough.”
Shrugging, he said, “We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”
“That’s not like you to cross a bridge without a plan.”
“No. But I can’t plan for this. I have no clue what will happen.”
He said it with such certainty that I blinked in shock. This wasn’t the Marek I knew. “Doesn’t that scare you?”
“Yes. But what scares me more is not going. There’s only a small window of time to go back, and I think going back will correct something that will keep you alive. I told you that time ripples. When it does, things change in the future. I think we’re going to head off a huge ripple in time. I do believe this is curse-driven, but even if it’s not, I’m getting a warning that the timeline will change if we don’t go.”
He pointed to an indicator on his watch and leaned so
I could see. The dial that showed his energy level had shifted to full, but a small red line had appeared at the bottom of the dial next to it. “That’s a timeline warning. So I have to go.”
This night just got worse and worse. Unsure what to say, I nodded. I had bridges to cross, too, ones I was too terrified to confront.
I slipped my hand into my pocket, the flash drive cool against my fingers. He’d given me two books that scared me to the core—one held his truth, the other contained his hopes and dreams. He’d told me before that facing the full truth might help ease my fears. Maybe it was time. I could read the book, but reading about how much he loved her would be more than I could bear.
If he told me about that last night, maybe he’d be kind and omit all that.
I bit my lip as I contemplated his handsome face, loving the sexy, neat beard he’d let grow. He stared out the window at the darkness, a ship’s lights dancing on the waters of the cove. I didn’t want to lose him, but I would if I didn’t ask.
Before I could chicken out, I whispered, “What happened that last night?”
Marek
“What?” I jerked my head to stare at Skye with confusion as she sat at the library table. Hope grew as her words sank in.
“What happened that night?” she repeated.
I could barely believe she’d asked. I blinked at her, the green book at her fingertips. She traced that doodle with her finger, the one the other Skye had drawn years ago.
“You want me to tell you?”
“No, but I think it’s time I know.”
“Okay.” That wasn’t as hopeful. I nodded and ran a hand through my hair. “But I don’t know where to begin.”
“Maybe with after you went home, after awaking in Leah’s home,” she suggested. “What did she look like?”
I nodded, confused. This Skye hated anything to do with her original, so why would she want to know that? But I shrugged that off as I closed my eyes and tried to look at it from a different point of view, just as I had when I’d written my book. She appeared like a foggy dream in the reading nook, her legs tucked under her as she waited.
