Daring Time (38 page)

The stark white of the dress shirt he'd worn last night with his tux caught his eye. He lunged for it but before he could get it on a buzzing noise reached his ears. He paused, at first not recognizing the sound as the doorbell since he'd heard it only a few times when food was being delivered in the evenings.

Who could be ringing it at six a.m. on a rainy, cold Sunday morning?

It didn't matter. He needed to get going, he thought irritably as he tossed on the white shirt. He needed to go back so he could explain to Hope—

The buzzing continued in an insistent manner. Whoever was out there wasn't going to be ignored, he realized.

He swung open the front door a few seconds later. His irritation quickly segued to incredulity.

"Warren?" he greeted Alistair Franklin's driver. Warren stood on the wet front steps as raindrops fell across his round features.

"Morning, Ryan. I brought Alistair over. He was insistent upon seeing you this morning.

Wouldn't let me talk him into waiting until a decent hour no matter what I said," the stocky driver explained with a rueful grin. He hitched his thumb out to Prairie Avenue. A black Mercedes sedan was parked at the curb. " 'Fraid you'll have to go out to the car to see him. Since his stroke he has to use a wheelchair and it might be kind of hard to get him up these stairs—"

"No, that's fine. I'll go out," Ryan interrupted distractedly, his eyes still on the black sedan. Something about his elderly friend's strange visit on the cold, rainy dawn felt eerily familiar—
right
somehow, like Alistair and he had scheduled the appointment, long ago and Ryan had forgotten.

"Just let me grab a jacket and I'll be right out to see him, Warren,"

***

Jacob Stillwater entered the brilliantly lit ballroom, his eyes immediately finding his daughter where she stood by the enormous fireplace. He looked very distinguished and handsome in his formal attire as he came toward her, smiling. Hope's return smile never faltered despite the fact that it broke her heart to see the slight drag in his left leg. Her father maneuvered extremely well using the cane Dr. Walkerton had left for him, however. Hope consoled herself that very soon her father's limp would be hardly noticeable to those unfamiliar with his recent illness.

The fact that he'd experienced a stroke while she'd been gone from his side would likely haunt her until her dying day. Still, she found strength in knowing for a fact that her father would live and prosper for many years to come.

"Happy birthday, Father." She gave him a kiss on the cheek when he reached her. "I'm so sorry we couldn't celebrate it with the party I'd planned. But with only you, Mary and Mrs. Abernathy knowing I'm here—"

"Oh, posh. I'd rather just have a nice dinner here with you. I'm too old for a birthday ball, anyway. Certainly can't dance around on this old clunker," he said matter-of-factly, tapping his left thigh. He offered her his arm and they slowly made their way over to the table Mrs. Abernathy had meticulously laid for their supper.

Hope had requested that her father's dinner be served in the ballroom for several reasons.

First of all, the huge room usually stood empty and unused, making it unlikely that servants would disturb them. This was important since only Mary, Mrs. Abernathy and Jacob knew of her return to 1807 Prairie Avenue. That had been something she and her father had decided on the first evening she came back to her own time.

The second reason was because the grand piano was in the ballroom. She'd been working for several months now on a special composition for her father and she looked forward to playing it for him on a night that was poignantly special to both of them for more reasons than it merely being her father's birthday. Before they could take their seats, Jacob spoke.

"Show me again, dear, how they dance in the year 2008," Jacob said with a glimmer of amusement in his black eyes.

Hope laughed, the sound echoing off the walls. She obligingly walked several feet into the enormous ballroom while her father sat down at the table. She closed her eyes, perfectly imagining Gail and Ramiro moving in tandem to the unusual, exciting music.

She positioned her hands, picturing herself touching Ryan's broad shoulder while his big hand spread at the back of her waist. She began to softly hum a tune while she swayed to the music, occasionally inserting remembered lyrics.

Fly me to the moon and let me play among the stars, da da da ta da, ta da on Jupiter and
Mars . . .

The train of her blue satin gown and her petticoats swished behind her as she circled the ballroom floor in her solitary dance. She opened her eyes after several moments and looked over at her father, laughter curving her lips. He shook his gray head in amazed satisfaction as she came over to the table.

"Very unique and lovely. You were always as graceful as your mother on the dance floor." Jacob stood as she approached. "You know, I was thinking a good part of the night about something you told me about the future, dear. How is it that, do you suppose, these airplanes don't crash into those towering skyscrapers?"

"I'm not sure how they contrive it," Hope admitted after she'd puzzled on it a moment.

Her father moved to seat her and Hope put up her hand. "Wait. I have a special gift for you. Sit back down, Father."

She started over toward the piano, pausing when the light level in the ballroom seemed to magnify for a second and then return to normal. She experienced a prickling feeling on her neck and twisted around.

Her eyes widened in amazement. For a second she thought she'd been imagining the dance she'd never gotten with Ryan at the Field Museum so perfectly that she'd magically conjured him. He even wore his tuxedo. His greenish-blue eyes were trained on her but he didn't move or speak. Suddenly his dark brows rose as if in silent query.

"Ryan," she gasped.

"Hello." He glanced over at her father and nodded. Her father looked every bit as stunned as Hope felt. "I'm sorry for interrupting."

Jacob used his cane to stand slowly, his eyes never leaving Ryan's face. "Why .. . you're Ryan Daire, aren't you?"

Ryan glanced over at Hope. She didn't understand the trace of unease in his expression.

"Yes, sir. I am."

Hope's shock faded enough for her temporary paralysis to fade.

"What are you doing here?" she blurted out.

Ryan inhaled slowly. "I came to see you, of course." He glanced out the La Farge windows and his brow furrowed. "It's nighttime here. How long have you been back, Hope?"

"I've been back two days. This is my second evening," she answered as she came toward him. "How long ago did I—"

"Leave without a word?" Ryan finished the sentence for her. She couldn't interpret his expression, however. As she knew by this time, he could be impenetrable when he chose to be.

Even so, the sight of him literally stole her breath. It felt like an eternity since she'd looked into his singular eyes. He gave a small smile suddenly and she found herself relaxing.

"Since I'm not sure at what point you left, I can't say for certain. But it couldn't have been much more than three hours ago, by my time, anyway."

"Amazing!" Jacob declared. "Hope told me about this slight discrepancy between dates when one travels through time, Mr. Daire. Have you formulated a theory on why this occurs?"

Ryan shook his head. "I have no idea, Mr. Stillwater. I'm woefully ignorant on the mechanics of the whole thing. I am starting to realize it's not as much of a cut-and-dry situation as I thought." He met Hope's eyes. "Our being able to meet isn't just about the mirror. It's about this house ... or something."

Her father snorted. "My daughter had already figured that out, Mr. Daire. She realized the two of you had communicated in ways other than the mirror, and that while the mirror was a handy object on which the imagination could grasp, it wasn't the
source
of the magic. The true magic relates to the two of you."

Hope's cheeks flamed. She loved her father like mad, but his outspokenness could mortify upon occasion. She sensed Ryan's steady gaze on her and met it with difficulty.

"You didn't use the mirror to get here?"

He shook his head.

"How did you do it, then?"

He opened his mouth as if to speak and then glanced uneasily over at her father. "I just pictured you in my mind . . . Imagined you here, moving about a house that was filled with all the things I'd seen before, held your face in my mind, heard your laughter, thought of the way you walk ..."

His voice faded but he continued to hold her stare. She remembered what he'd said while they'd been in the elevator of the Sears Tower about her father.
You can picture him with
the clarity that only intense emotion can bring.
That's how she'd known how to return.

"Love."

Both Ryan and she started out of their mutual stare and glanced over at her father when he uttered the single word.

"That's the driving force behind the phenomenon. Oh, maybe that strange man, Mortimer R Chase, built some of his magic into this house," Jacob said with a wave of his hand,

"but clearly it takes something very special to mix with that magic in order to create the miracle of time travel."

"Father," Hope said excitedly as she neared him. "Perhaps this means you will be able to visit me in the year 2008?"

"Excuse me?" Ryan asked sharply.

Hope turned toward him. He didn't look impassive at all at the moment. He looked like he'd just been unexpectedly punched.

"Oh, I didn't get a chance to tell you, Ryan. There's so much that I have to explain."

But Ryan didn't seem concerned with all the other details. "You were planning on coming back to me in my time? Even after—" He drew up short and glanced uncomfortably at her father.

Hope stirred restlessly on her feet. She hadn't meant for Ryan to find out this way. She'd rather have prepared him first by explaining about the plans she'd made—the plans that hopefully would help him not to feel trapped by her presence in the year 2008.

"You know," Jacob began, clearly following his own line of thought versus the exchange between Ryan and his daughter, "I don't think it's best that I breach the barrier of time, dear. You know I'll always be with you in spirit. But some things just weren't meant to be. I'm afraid my existence in the year 2008 just doesn't seem .. . right."

"And it does seem right to you, Hope?" Ryan asked her intently.

She nodded her head solemnly. "That's what I was going to tell you when I returned later on tonight. My father and I have made plans, Ryan. You won't have to look out for me. I won't be a burden to you—"

"You weren't going to be a
burden
to me," Ryan interrupted, scowling. "I was worried that you might feel uncomfortable with the way we do things in my time." Once again he glanced at her father, clearly uncomfortable. "I didn't want to take advantage of you, Hope."

Hope's heart stopped and then resumed beating again in an ecstatic dance. "That was very kind of you to be concerned about me, Ryan. But I'd already decided to go back. I mean forward. Besides, I don't belong here anymore. They found my dead body yesterday, you know."

***

Ryan had experienced shock so many times in the past week that he would have thought the experience would lose some of its power. That was definitely not the case, however.

"What do you mean they found your dead body?" he demanded, feeling rattled.

"Well, it wasn't really her dead body, obviously," Jacob said.

"It was Sadie Holcrum's body they found in the river, Ryan. Remember the woman Jack killed in the Sweet Lash? The woman who helped kidnap me?"

Ryan came nearer to her and put his hand on her back, needing to touch her. The news that she'd been planning on returning to the year 2008 ... to
him,
had left him stunned.

He'd already known what he was going to do when he came back to find her, but the fact that she wasn't furious at him after finding those incendiary photographs, the fact that she'd decided to return to his time moved him deeply.

His fingers skimmed over the satiny smooth skin of her exposed back. She looked absolutely gorgeous wearing a formal blue satin gown with an ebony ermine border around the hem and over the shoulders. Once again he had to admit he'd been wrong about so many of his ideas concerning the culture of the 1900s, because the neckline of the dress was downright racy, displaying the creamy curves of Hope's beautiful breasts to jaw-dropping effect. The silver locket glittered on the flawless skin of her chest.

He blinked in shock, recognizing for the first time that she was dressed precisely in the manner he'd seen her on that first day he entered the mansion with Ramiro here in this very room . ..

"Ryan?" Hope interrupted his thoughts.

Ryan cleared his throat, forcing himself back to the present. "How do you know it was Sadie Holcrum they found?"

"Her face and body were damaged by being in the river for days," Hope explained sadly,

"And she appeared to have been badly beaten, which is just awful, because ..."

"It must have been done after she was dead," Ryan finished grimly. He suddenly recalled what Jack had said on their first meeting in the Sweet Lash when Ryan had asked him where Mario was.

He's taking care of some business for me. He'll be along.
Undoubtedly the
business
to which Jack had been referring was to beat Sadie's body until it was unrecognizable so that no one could trace her back to the Sweet Lash and Jack himself.

"When I arrived home the other day, I was surprised to find myself in my father's suite. I suppose since I was concentrating on him so greatly it makes sense that was where I would appear. When I ar-rived, my father was having a meeting with the detective—Connor O'Rourke."

"You can imagine my shock, Mr. Daire," Jacob spoke up, a wry smile tilting his lips,

"when I glanced up while in the midst of Mr. O'Rourke telling me they'd found a woman's dead body that generally matched Hope's physical description .. . only to look up and see my daughter standing on the far side of the room. I thought I was seeing a ghost."