Through The Leaded Glass (35 page)

Kate slipped the bag straps off her shoulders,
taking care not to wake the dark-haired wonder in her arms. She
placed a soft kiss on her daughter’s crown and slid to her feet. If
they weren’t going anywhere, Emma should nap in her
crib.

The stray white cat that’d adopted them meowed
from beneath Emma’s window. Kate looked out and made a shoo-ing
motion with her hand. The cat, proving once again how uncanny
animals can be, seemed to nod at her and walk off.

A detour to the kitchen followed the trip to
the nursery. She opened her side-by-side and pulled out a
soda.

She couldn’t even be mad at Alex for throwing
the window at her. He’d done what she hadn’t been able to do out of
love for her.

She took a sip of the soda and propped her
feet up on the glass coffee table. That would be on its way out
shortly. Glass tables and toddlers didn’t mix, even if it was
tempered glass.

The cat meowed behind her. Kate almost dropped
her drink as she turned to see Blizzard, as she’d named him,
staring in the window with his beautiful green eyes, swishing his
tail as he sat in the crook of the barren Japanese maple. Why the
cat had picked her house she didn’t know, but he was a gorgeous
animal, well-behaved and affectionate when he chose. For the price
of a can of cat food he ensured her home was mouse-free which was a
pretty good deal on both their parts.

Kate sighed and took another swig. Sure, she
could sit here and wallow in self-pity the rest of the day, but
that wasn’t her style. Besides, in the whole scheme of things, yes,
losing Alex sucked, but it wasn’t as if she’d watched him die.
They’d had their time and he had lived out his life.

Or had he?

Kate sat up, putting her feet on the floor and
the soda on the table.
Had
Alex lived or had Frederick
succeeded in what he’d planned?

Kate fumbled for the bag next to her. One of
those paperbacks she’d bought in that new bookstore in town,
Heavenly Books, was a about fifteenth century English
history.

She pulled the bag onto her lap and unzipped
it. She tossed a few of her favorite authors onto the floor, a
sacrilege at any other time, but the history book was, of course,
at the bottom.

A box of tampons hit the cushion beside her as
she pulled the book free. The Bayeux tapestry, so
not
fifteenth century, graced the cover. Her fingers still shaking,
Kate turned the pages until she came to the table of contents.
Edward IV, Richard III, The Wars of The Roses, The Tudor
Age.

Kate turned to the page detailing Henry’s
victory over Richard, the debate over whether or not Richard’s
crown had actually been found under a hawthorn bush, the aftermath
effects to the country…

The Marston name popped up, but nothing about
how Isobel spent her final days. Wexham was mentioned. Frederick’s
death in battle and there… Alex.

Lord Alexander Traverse, Earl of
Shelton, defied the king’s edict to re-marry, instead promoting
such outlandish ideals (at the time) as prohibiting the practice of
blood-letting, and advancing a pre-contemporary version of
cardio-pulmonary resuscitation. While mocked at Court, within
Henry’s presence, Lord Shelton was accorded great reverence. Dying
at the age of fifty-five, he was succeeded by his only son,
William.

He’d survived Frederick. Thank God.

Kate sat back, resting the book in her lap.
He’d never married. That spoke volumes across the century markers.
And William had lived, too. Frederick hadn’t won.

God, she missed him. It’d only been three
months, but she felt every one of those five hundred years between
them. Maybe she could go to England, see where he was
buried.

She closed her eyes and laid her head against
the back of the burgundy sofa. Soft gray light of a damp winter day
filtered in through the slats of her blinds. Blizzard meowed softly
outside the bay window.

If only she could see him again. One last
time. Just to say goodbye. To tell him she’d love him forever and
that, hopefully, some day, some time they’d meet up
again.

Yeah, like that would happen. She had about as
much chance of seeing Alex again as Blizzard had of
talking.

“
Oh I wouldn’ know ‘bout that,
lass.”

Kate’s eyes shot open. Who said
that?

She sat up. She’d heard someone. Practically
right next to her. Or…
behind
her?

Slowly, Kate turned, expecting to see, well,
someone there, just outside the window.

But there was no one. Just Blizzard sitting
there swishing his tail, an odd cat grin on his face. Kind of like
the one he had after finishing his favorite salmon
dinner.

She shook her head and turned back around. She
was imagining things. Could grief do that to a person?

“
Sure, why not? I’m sitting here
holding conversations with myself, why not imagine other
participants?” She wrapped her hands around her waist. “God, I’m so
lonely.”

There, she’d admitted it. She missed what
she’d had with Alex. The camaraderie, the friendship, the spark.
She wanted that spark again. Missed it. Craved it, if she were
honest with herself.

She wanted a husband, a soul mate. A family
and all it entailed.

She picked up the book and snapped it shut. It
was over. Alex was gone and there wasn’t a damn thing she could do
about it. Moping wasn’t going to send her back.

She tossed the book onto the coffee table. It
landed with a small clatter in the box with Calista’s
necklace.

The stones kept clattering.

Kate reached out to stop them when she noticed
the book.

It was… moving.

The air was moving too. Twisting, twirling,
right in front of her, the off-setting taupe stripes of her
wallpaper on the other side of the room looking like caramel candy
being twisted around an apple at a harvest festival.

Emma! She had to get Emma.

She jumped up, grabbing the sofa arm to stay
upright and realized…

The air wasn’t twisting around
her
. It
was swirling in the middle of her living room, right where two
figures shimmered into existence.

Alex.

William.

“
Kate?”

Oh my God… “Alex!”

Kate launched herself into his arms and
suddenly there was a flurry of kissing, crying, and skirt
tugging.

Kate pulled out of Alex’s arms and looked down
into William’s grin.

“
Up, pease.” He held up his
arms.

Kate hugged him to her. “Oh, William, I’m so
glad to see you.”

“
Me, too, I hope.” Alex cupped her
cheek.

“
Most definitely you, too.” She had
to blink away the tears because she didn’t want to miss one moment
of looking at him ever again. “You are real, right?”

There went that eyebrow she’d missed. “Need
you ask?”

“
Yes. I do. How did you get
here?”

Alex held something in his hand. “This.” A
glass unicorn.

She took it from him. “Where did you get
it?”

Alex looked around the room and spied the
sofa. “Shall we sit? I find that traveling through time does
something to one’s legs.”

“
Tell me about it.”

She found a few of the toys she’d bought for
Emma and set William on the floor in front of them. That glass
table was so going in the garage first thing in the morning. She
grabbed hold of Alex’s hands and turned to him on the sofa, her
knee resting over his. “So tell me everything.”

Alex smiled and ran his hand over her hair. “I
still can’t believe this is possible. That it happened. I’ve missed
you.”

They glanced quickly at William, who was
discovering the joys of pop-up games, then gave themselves over to
about thirty seconds of some serious getting
reacquainted.

But William didn’t need that kind of education
just yet, so they eventually pulled apart, though not without some
heavy breaths and reluctant sighs.

“
The man who brought me the
window?” Alex explained when their pulses had returned to a
somewhere-in-the-vicinity-of-normal range. “He had the unicorn in
his cart the day I met with him. After you disappeared from the
cave and Frederick was killed, I remembered it and his odd reaction
when I’d almost touched it. Seeing what the man could do with a
window, I had a feeling the unicorn might work for me.”

“
Wait a minute. Frederick was
killed? How?”

Alex’s face went grim. “Your disappearance. It
wasn’t something he’d counted on, nor had even thought of,
obviously. I had the element of surprise and knew he wouldn’t let
me out of the cave alive. It was either him or me. I decided it
should be him. Hell, had he lived, my son would never have been
safe. Not to mention any of the people of Shelton.”

“
Especially the women.”

“
Yes.”

“
So you went back to the window
maker and he gave you this unicorn? So why didn’t you show up weeks
ago? I returned to the exact place in time when I’d
left.”

“
I couldn’t leave immediately,
Kate. There were things I had to take care of. Promises to be kept.
Shelton to ensure.”

“
Oh, Shelton. Who’s going to
inherit it now that you and William are here? I read in the history
book that you were supposed to have lived until you were
fifty-five.”

“
History book?”

“
Uh hmm. Right here.” She handed it
to him open to the page she’d looked at earlier. Calista’s necklace
had stopped vibrating.

Alex read the words then smiled at her. “Kate,
it says nothing of my death here.”

“
What? Let me see that. I must have
given you the wrong page.” She turned the book around. “Why are you
smiling?”

“
Read.”

Lord Alexander Traverse, Earl of
Shelton, was known as one of Henry’s more peculiar friends, though
well revered by those in his home, regardless of his penchant for
going against modern day medicinal practices. He eschewed the use
of leeches and openly taught a pre-contemporary version of
cardio-pulmonary resuscitation. But it was his final request to the
king that will forever mark him either a lunatic or a man of great
generosity. History, having lost account of him after this final
act, has no definitive answer.

“
What are they talking
about?”

Alex’s smile grew wider. “I’m not a lunatic.
Keep reading.”

Alexander Traverse was said to have
lost two women he loved. History finds record of his wife, Jeanne
de Breven, who died in childbirth with his second son, but no
record exists of the mysterious Lady Katherine, though there are
reports that her ghost is said to haunt Shelton to this
day.

Kate laughed. “Maybe I should take a trip over
there and see if I run into myself clanking chains through your
great hall.”

“
Read, Kate.”

When Lord Shelton defied the king’s
edict to re-marry, he did so in such a way as to keep his word to
the king. Henry wanted the Shelton lands to be united with the
neighboring Marston ones. Said to be quite beautiful, widowed Lady
Marston was also endowed with enough land to make rich landowners
vie for her hand, and it’d been widely believed that her hand was
promised to the earl of Shelton.

But it wasn’t Alexander Traverse
who would unite the two estates. He petitioned King Henry to make a
neighboring baron, Nicholas Caversham, his heir. Singularly unheard
of with a son in existence, nevertheless, somehow Alexander
Traverse received the king’s blessing on both the transfer of the
earldom and the betrothal of Lord Caversham to Lady Marston. It is
here where Lord Alexander Traverse disappears from history, and
Lord Caversham became Lord Shelton.

Under his ownership, the joined
lands flourished, and Lady Marston’s daughters from her first
marriage made advantageous marriages, all strengthening the grip
Henry had on his new kingdom by his many alliances.

Kate closed the book. “You did it. You kept
your promise to the king.”

Alex nodded. “And to Nick. Henry was insistent
that Shelton and Marston lands be united, but I couldn’t betray my
friend.”

“‘
La grandeur d’un homme se
mesure à la parole tenue
,’” Kate said, moving closer to him.
“You truly are an incredible man, Alex. One who stands by his
word.”

“
And by his woman.”

Coming up for air a few minutes later—thankful
that the Mattel company really could keep kids occupied—Kate
mock-punched Alex on his chin. “I’m
not
your woman. I am my
own woman.”

Alex kissed her nose. “That you are. And I’ll
always be your man, Kate. I give you my word.”

M E M O R A N D U M

TO
: Raphael, Archangel

RE
: HEA, Case
#ATKLT10704931240654314634.A5