Not now! she told herself. She inhaled. Slow breaths. And she released the tension. It took three tries before calm reasserted itself.
Then she pushed off the wall and moved into the bedroom suite. Carefully not looking at the bed, she moved through to the ensuite and took a shower. Her body relaxed under the water and she thought it would be easy to stay here. The thought of speaking to Winter and Sebastian drove her to get out. They might have answers. They might have clues which would help her understand.
When she came out of the bathroom, Veris was finishing dressing in fresh clothes. His hair was damp, which made the blond locks appear golden. His skin was damp. He had showered downstairs.
He turned to face her, as he fastened the last button on the sleeveless shirt. His gaze was steady. Taylor recognized the mask in front of his eyes. He was not letting her see inside.
It made them even. Taylor didn’t want Veris to see the chaos churning in her. Her utter helplessness made her feel weak. She needed answers before she could look Veris in the eye, with her guard down.
Above all, she wanted to know why. What had they done? Had they driven Brody away?
Veris pulled the heavy leather jacket out of the closet and shrugged into it, as Taylor stepped into jeans and pulled on a sweater. She grabbed her coat and slid her arms into it.
Then she moved diffidently toward Veris. “I don’t know if this will achieve anything at all,” she told him. “They may hate us for any part we have played in this.”
Veris shook his head. “We’re doing something. It’s a start.”
Taylor slid under his arm. With Veris, it was better to jump with his arm over her shoulders, than try to jump with her arm around him. She looked up at him. “Step at a time,” she said.
“I don’t know,” he said, pain breaking in his voice. “Let’s take this step, then see where we are.”
She nodded and jumped.
Nial’s apartment was empty. There was no sign of humans, or even quasi-humans living in it. No pheromones. No traces of skin or hair. Nothing.
Veris glanced at the view, then turned his back on it and quartered the room. “Three days at least since anyone human was here,” he said.
Taylor nodded. That was her sense of it, too. “I’ll jump us down to the alley behind the building, then we can circle around and talk to the doorman—Benny. He adores N—” She cut her words off quickly. “He likes the three of them. A lot.”
Veris nodded and held out his arm.
They jumped and moved around to the sidewalk, then to the front door. Taylor had met Benny a few times. In size, he was a Clydesdale among ponies, although he was a gentle man and a good doorman.
Benny beamed when he saw Taylor. He remembered her, because he was good at his job. “Miss…Taylor, yes?”
She nodded. “This is my…friend. Veris.” Her heart thudded. “We were hoping to speak to Winter and Sebastian. They’re not answering their phones and they left no word…” She trailed off, for Benny’s face fell.
Veris cleared his throat. “What do you know?” he asked, and his tone was mild.
Benny glanced around. The lobby was empty. He shook his head, his expression troubled. “It’s not my job to pass on gossip or talk about my tenants, you understand?”
Disappointment touched her. “I do understand,” Taylor said.
“Only, they didn’t leave word with me, either,” Benny added. “I’m worried, too. Did they say anything to you?”
The iron band was back around her chest. “They simply stopped calling,” she said. “Abruptly,” she added. “About three days ago.”
Benny’s concern grew. He nodded. “That was when I last saw them. Three days ago. They came out of the building…they were very upset, the two of them. They were doing their best to hide it only they were upset. Gazes not staying on anything. Glazed, liked they’d been stunned, you know?”
“I do know,” Veris said.
Taylor’s heart fell.
Benny pulled out a notebook and a pencil stub. “If I hear anything, I can call you. Just give me your number.”
Taylor gave him a brilliant smile. “We’re unreachable at the moment. I’ll swing by in a few days and check, okay?”
She caught Veris’ hand and moved back out to the sidewalk. He said nothing as they traversed the side of the building and moved into the alley.
Taylor looked around for observers. A lone newspaper sheet floated and dipped along the alley.
She shivered.
“Home,” Veris said softly, dropping his arm over her shoulder. “Please.”
It was still pre-dawn on Martha’s Vineyard. They didn’t turn on a light. They didn’t need one.
Taylor resisted the temptation to sink into the armchair she had been sitting in for days. Instead, she walked in a tight little circle in front of the dead fireplace.
Veris leaned his elbow upon the mantle shelf.
“We can’t get answers from them until they return to the apartment and we can find them there,” Taylor said. “I know some of the places they like to go—there’s a cottage in Ireland. Only, that’s a place for comfort. If they’re upset…”
Veris rubbed his forehead. “No, they wouldn’t go there if they’re upset,” he breathed. “We’ll just have to wait and check later.” He dropped his hand. “Can you find him on the timescape?”
Her middle jumped. “Brody?”
Veris twitched, as if his middle had leapt as hers had, at the mention of Brody’s name. “I thought…if we knew where he was, if we know he’s okay, then…it might help.” His tone was almost apologetic. Veris was humble. The props had been kicked out from under him.
Her, too. They were both fumbling forward.
Only, Veris was right. Knowing where Brody was and that he was okay would help paint a tiny corner of the black canvas in her mind. It wasn’t an answer, yet it was a fact she could hang onto.
Taylor put both hands on the mantle and hung her head. She reached for the timescape. When she had first learned how from Marit, she had needed to sit and concentrate—meditate, really. Now she could scan the timescape with her eyes open, although she couldn’t speak or hear anything while she was doing it, for she wasn’t really here. Just her body was. This time, though, she closed her eyes.
The timescape was familiar, which was a shock. She realized she had been braced for it to have radically altered, just as her life had gone through an upheaval. Only her timeline was such a miniscule, irrelevant thread on the timescape, her massive upheaval would have barely registered.
She reached out blindly across the familiar dark scape, looking for bookmarks, for anything which beckoned or drew her attention. She looked for Brody, who must surely stand upon the timescape in glowing neon.
Taylor opened her eyes once more. “He’s not there,” she whispered.
“Not at all?” Veris said, his tone sharp. “That isn’t possible, is it? He must be somewhere—the version of him in alternative worlds…could he have crossed, somehow?”
Taylor swallowed. “Neither of them is a jumper,” she pointed out. “And I can’t imagine anyone in the family who is a jumper taking them to an alternative world. Besides, which world would they go to? They wouldn’t go back to Nial’s. Sebastian and Winter are there.”
Veris rubbed his forehead once more. “Perhaps you’ve just missed spotting him?”
“Everyone I know stands out, Veris,” she said gently. “I can see Sydney and Marit and the twins, Liberty and Rafe and Alex. Remi and Neven and London in Brittany, and the baby—I can see them with my eyes open. You, too. Brody is gone.”
Veris gripped the shelf. “How is that even possible?”
“I don’t know,” Taylor breathed.
Veris laughed. It was not a humorous sound. “Of course he found a way to hide from me. Us. He knew we would look.”
The bitterness in his tone made the band around her chest tighten even more.
“This is just Brody taking a break, isn’t i
t?” she asked him. “Despite everything he said. You always come back to each other in the end. No matter what you said when you left, you always came back.”
Veris didn’t answer at once and the silence stirred her heart back into sluggish beating. Taylor didn’t try to school it back to silence. She didn’t have the energy for it.
She needed to feed, she realized. First, though, she needed Veris to answer. She needed the reassurance. It would give her a slender hope that this was one of their occasional hiatuses. They had been together for nearly a thousand years. More than once each of them had gone away—searching for adventures, novelty, lust. They sought different lives for a while.
Yet they always came back to each other, renewed and committed.
Veris didn’t move. His grip on the shelf didn’t slacken. “There have been others. Of course there has. Even I’ve had my head turned. It never lasted, though. It couldn’t. The others…they weren’t Brody, in the end. They didn’t know me the way Brody does. The way you do. Brody said the same, every time he came back. Only…” Veris sighed. “He never, ever said he didn’t love me anymore, when he left.”
The terror tried to rise in her throat.
Taylor relaxed into it, letting the tightness go. She turned away.
“Where are you going?” Veris asked.
Taylor stopped. She put the words together carefully. “I can’t do anything about Brody right now. We have three kids who are probably scared into next Tuesday, wondering what is going on. And there is no food in the kitchen to feed them when they do come home. I’m going to make a grocery list.”
Veris considered her for a moment. Then he pushed himself away from the mantel. “I’ll help you.”
They were halfway through the grocery list—Veris writing items down as Taylor called them out as she went through the pantry and the fridge—when the thought occurred to her with a physical jolt.
Taylor turned to consider Veris, the fear trying to swamp her once more.
“What?” he asked simply.
“Was Brody the linchpin, Veris? Now he’s gone, will you be going, too?”
Veris’ gaze dropped to the notepad. “I don’t know,” he said quietly.
Taylor’s breath shuddered through her. It was not the answer she had hoped for. It wasn’t the answer she dreaded, either.
Veris looked up at her. “Neither of us is functioning properly. I can’t seem to think beyond picking an ice-cream flavor.” He touched his chest. “It’s black in here.”
Taylor nodded. “Yes.”
“So let’s just be kind to each other for now.”
There was nothing she could say in response. After a long moment, Taylor went back to clearing out the fridge.
Chapter Seven
When the house was fit for human habitation once more, Veris sent a text to Marit and the twins, inviting them to come home and talk.
Thirty minutes later, they appeared in the sunroom, each carrying a tote or pack.
Marit hurried over to Taylor and hugged her, and Taylor realized with a start that Marit was taller than her. When had that happened?
Alannah and Aran threw themselves at Veris, both clinging to him. Alannah was crying and Aran’s eyes were bright and glistening.
Marit pulled Taylor over to the sofa and sat her down. Marit put herself on the middle cushion, her denim-covered leg underneath her.
“Come and sit with your mother,” Veris told the twins. “Come on.” He shepherded them to the other sofa. When they were about to sit, though, Aran took Veris’ hand and tugged.
Veris settled between them.
Alannah’s mouth trembled as she looked at Taylor. “Athair has left, hasn’t he?”
Taylor swallowed. How could she do this to them? How could Brody? “Yes,” she made herself say.
“For how long?” Marit asked.
“We don’t know,” Veris said.
“But Athair has done this before,” Aran said. “You’ve been together nine hundred and ninety-one years. He goes away and comes back. So do you.”
“It’s not that simple, Aran,” Taylor said.
“Why not?” he demanded. His voice cracked and shifted to a high note which made him sound young and scared.
“No, it is that simple,” Veris said. He picked up Aran’s hand. “No matter what happens between Brody and me and your mother, he will come back to you and Marit and Alannah. I promise you he will. He’s upset, that’s all. We all are.”
“You’re upset, Far?” Alannah said, her voice small.
Veris swallowed. “Yes,” he said, his voice flat. Controlled.
Alannah threw her arm around his neck and hid her face against his chest. Her shoulders shook.
Veris’ gaze met Taylor’s.
Marit rested her head on Taylor’s shoulder. “I know he’ll be back, Mom,” she said gently. “He loves you. He just has to remember that.”
Taylor hugged her. She didn’t know if she could speak of the doubt which gnawed at her. She kissed Marit’s hair. “Thank you, Marit.”
Dinner was a trial.
The empty chair where Brody usually sat at the long narrow table was like a missing tooth, drawing Taylor’s gaze and making her heart twist.
Veris was silent, when he usually dominated the table. He would stir and bring himself back to the present when someone asked him a question.
The twins and Marit absorbed the fractured stresses and their conversation was strained, too.
Taylor sighed with relief when the meal was over, the dishes were done and the twins escaped to their rooms to spend the evening catching up with friends.
Veris put the kettle on, to make coffee for Marit.
“I can do that,” Marit said, coming back into the kitchen from the sunroom. “You make shitty coffee anyway, Far.”
Veris shook his head. “It keeps me busy.”
Marit sat on the stool on the other side of the counter, examining him. “How did you stay busy, other times?” she asked.
Veris grimaced. “There was always another war or battle to sign up for.”
Marit strung her hands together. “This time, you’re anchored, though.”
Veris reached for her hands and stopped their nervous twisting. “You’re not anchors. No one is an anchor. I don’t want to hear that again.”
Marit’s smile was closer to a grimace. “Only, we’re stopping you from doing what you normally would do.”
“So?” Veris asked, his brow lifting. “This time it is different. That doesn’t make it bad. It just makes it different. I’ll adapt. That’s something I’ve got good at. A thousand or so years makes anyone good at adapting.”
“You’re the most stubborn man in the universe, Far,” Marit said. Yet the corner of her mouth lifted.
Veris went back to spooning coffee into the French press. “Then I’ll stubbornly adapt.”
He finished making the coffee for Marit, while she watched. When Veris pushed the mug toward her, Marit didn’t reach for it. Instead, she lifted her brow with an expression which stole Taylor’s breath, for it was pure Brody.
“Are you going to ask, Far?” Marit said.
Veris met her gaze. “Would you search if I did ask?”
“Have you looked?” Taylor asked her. Marit was the strongest jumper in the family. She had mastered navigating the timescape before anyone else became aware of it, before even Alex had stumbled into it. If anyone could find Brody there, Marit could.
Marit put her hands around the mug. “I looked, already,” she admitted, her gaze on the mug. “I’ve been looking for two days. I can’t find him.” She lifted her chin. “It doesn’t mean he’s not there,” she added. “It just means I can’t find him. There are other people I can’t find on the timescape.”
Veris glanced at Taylor. “He found the way to hide,” he said, his tone dry.
“Who else can’t you find, Marit?” Taylor asked curiously.
Marit shrugged and sipped her coffee.
“Wh
o?” Veris added.
Marit wiped the rim of the cup with her thumb. “Him. The man.”
Him. The man in Marit’s future, who she waited for.
Veris scowled. “You’ve been looking for him?” Abruptly, he was the over-protective father. The wandering, humble, wounded man was gone. All his instincts flared up between one microsecond and the next. “You said he was somewhere in the future. You’ve been fucking around with the future, Marit?” His eyes blazed.
Marit smiled sunnily. “No. He will appear on the timescape when it’s time. So I watch for that.” She reached over and patted Veris’ big hand, where he gripped the towel. “Breathe, Far. It’s going to happen one day and you can’t stop it.”
Veris shook his head. “I can always lock you up and throw away the key.”
Marit’s smile broadened. “No, you can’t.”
Veris glared at her.
“Far, you haven’t been able to hold me down since I was four and found the timescape. Breathe again. You’re turning pink.”
He was.
A thought occurred to Taylor, stealing her attention from the confrontation between father and daughter. “Marit, can you see Nial on the timescape—I mean, here, in this world?”
Veris’ building indignation evaporated. His scowl vanished. With stiff movements, he put the coffee away.
Marit glanced at Taylor, her expression both surprised and troubled. “Nial? What has he got to do with this?”
“Can you just look, please?”
Marit’s gaze shifted back to Veris. Her puzzlement vanished. Her eyes widened. “Oh…” she breathed, almost soundlessly. Then her forehead puckered. “Nial?” she pressed her fingers to her forehead, as if it ached. “Oh, I should have seen…” She glanced at Veris and cut herself off. “Let me look,” she said and closed her eyes.
Veris watched her with the fixed attention of a cat stalking prey and for the first time Taylor wondered if they were wise to search for either Brody or Nial. What would they do if they found them? What would Veris do?
For despite his airy assurances to Marit that he was highly adaptable after fifteen centuries of experience, when Veris was threatened he reverted to his old Northman instincts.
Kiss Across Tomorrow (Kiss Across Time Book 8) Page 6
