I’m not exactly falling because I can still feel my feet beneath me, but there’s wind and shouting and my stomach upends.
Then time blinks and I’m standing in the middle of Quincy’s, the rank odor of sweat rising around me. Boston is telling me it’s more than a feeling through overhead speakers, and I’m trying to find my footing just as a gloved fist slams through my periphery.
I don’t have the clarity to duck and the blow lands square on my jaw, knocking me back.
What the—I round on my assailant and swing hard.
It’s an uppercut that snaps his head back and he drops like a stone.
“Seriously, Rem. What was that?”
I clear my head and Burke—the young Burke, with the soul patch and hair, his body lean and defined, gets up. “I thought you wanted to play it easy.”
It’s then I remember the fire, the explosion.
My Porsche, Burke at the wheel. I desperately hope that I’m going to overwrite his death.
“Easy? Then what was that?” I say, trying to buy myself time.
“You let down your guard.”
“I…” And probably he’s right, so I grind my jaw.
He lowers his hands. “You’re still recovering from that stab wound, dude. Let’s call it.”
Stab wound.
I crane my neck and sure enough, there’s the wound, a bright red pucker, on my hip where Ramses Vega’s knife slid in behind my kidneys, just missing major organs.
I haven’t a clue when I’ve returned to, although my healing wound is some indication that at least a few weeks have passed since my last visit—Chronosync?—over Memorial Day weekend.
Which means I haven’t returned to the time of Ashley’s death.
I’m back in 1997. In my twenty-eight year old body, with the moves and the muscle and the ability to whip Burke’s sorry backside if I can I untangle my brain.
He’s grinning, and I’d really like to clean his clock, so I straighten.
“Call it?” I want to take the body I’ve missed out for a spin, so I advance on Burke. “Not yet.”
I know his moves now, having sparred with him for two decades. Know his tells, the way he feigns left, hits right, and then again. I block his blows and land one in his gut.
Burke is all about longevity. Me, I like slick footwork, body movement and I’m not above covering up to avoid punishment, at least long enough to look for an opening.
Burke loves his power shots. Which means that I have to be on my game or he’ll knock me out with a precision punch. I’m more of a pressure guy—lay out the hammer blows until Burke tires. I’m all uppercuts and hooks.
Burke is playing nice with me, I know, because he’s avoiding the body shots.
But I’ll also take a shot to land one, and it’s not long before we’re both breathing hard, sweating and hurting.
I grin at him. “Nice to see you again.”
He frowns, then, “Ready to tap out?” Sweat drips off his chin.
Yeah, might be, because it’s now I realize I’m really hurting. I bend over and grab my knees.
Look up at him.
Burke comes at me again, but he lacks the finesse of his older version and I duck under his arm and grab him around the waist, tackling him down to the floor.
We both roll away, stare at the piping that laces the ceiling, our chests rising and falling.
“What is this, mutually assured destruction?”
I look over at the voice and my heart nearly leaves my chest.
Eve is standing with a friend, and while it’s the friend who’s spoken, it’s only Eve I see. She’s carrying a backpack over her shoulder, her kinky auburn hair long and tied back, wearing a pair of jeans and a tee shirt and she’s so pretty, so young, and smiling at me and everything inside me wants to crawl over to her and kiss her.
Instead I nod and push myself up to a sitting position. “Hey.”
She smiles back, but there’s a hesitation in her eyes. “Hey.”
Burke has climbed off the floor. “Hey Shelby.”
Right. Shelby Ruthers. He dated her for a long time, but eventually she broke his heart with another guy at the station. She’s a blonde, curvy and tall, and works in dispatch. If I remember correctly, she worked patrol for three years before applying to investigations. A few times.
“You boys are here early,” Shelby says and I glance at the big clock hanging over the office.
6 am. Is that early? Burke and I had a standing 5 am date for a while, before we got old and moved it to post-work.
I look back at Burke. “What’s the date?”
He frowns.
“July 2nd,” Eve says.
Gretta Holmes. Waitress found dead in an alley outside a diner, killed early in the morning on July 2nd, 1997. One of my cold cases, although Booker had updated it, put it in the Jackson file.
I’m not sure how it happened, but her case has brought me back in time. I hear Meggie’s voice. “I think it’s not a matter of fixing, but of creating a rewrite you can live with…”
Maybe I don’t have to catch Ashley’s killer. I just need to reset, overwrite, get on the right timeline, whatever.
I don’t know how it works, just that if I do this right, I get my family back.
Which maybe means solving Gretta’s case, if I want to reboot my life.
“We gotta go,” I say to Burke. According to my sketchy memory, Gretta died of a head injury. Not the MO of the Jackson killers, but maybe Booker knew something.
“Go where?” Burke climbs out of the ring, and Shelby smiles at him and we so don’t have time for this.
But what, exactly, am I going to say? I know there’s a murder going down, I feel it in my bones? “I need some coffee.”
Burke looks at me. “Really?”
It’s now I remember that our last big case was the coffee shop bombings, so maybe he’s a little skittish. I circle back around with, “I found this great breakfast place, but we have to get there before the specials sell out.”
He’s still looking at me like I’ve lost my mind, so I climb out of the ring and head for the locker room.
But not before I turn to Eve for another look. Wow, I’d forgotten how she could blow me away. Somehow, I manage a cool, “You look great, Eve. It’s nice to see you.”
She offers a smile, as if surprised, and I wonder what the idiot twenty-eight year old me has been up to in my absence.
‘C’mon Burke!” He’s still flirting with Shelby. She’s not worth your time, I want to say, but maybe in this world she is, so I just grab him by the arm and yank him toward the locker room.
We have lives to save.
I’m yelling at him from the shower to hurry up and Burke’s annoyed and not just a little confused when he slides into my Camaro five minutes later.
I’m in a suit again. Clearly, I need to write a note to my younger self to loosen up.
Wow, sweet ride, how I’ve missed you. Right now, my Porsche is sitting in my father’s barn waiting for me to check the timing belt. She’s running with a hiccup, so I’m guessing the belt has jumped a tooth.
But the Camaro will do. I punch it as we head down Hennepin Avenue to Lulu’s.
1997. Not so long ago, but subtle changes have taken place. In my time, the football stadium is gone, replaced by the shiny metallic US Bank stadium of the Vikings. Now, the puffy white covered dome stands in the middle of the city.
I take highway 55, get off at Lake Street and curse the lights that could be costing Gretta her life.
Although, she might already be dead.
We pull up to Lulu’s, a 1950’s diner on the corner of 41st and Lake. A tattoo parlor sits dark across the street, and next door, barks from the animal clinic suggest the dogs have heard something.
Lulu’s sits alone in a weedy parking lot, a gleaming metallic building that conjures up Richie and the gang hanging out at Arnold’s diner. I get an image of the Fonz as I park the Camaro.
She’s around here, somewhere, and if my memory is correct…
“Did you hear something?” I say over the top of the car.
Burke has gotten out, running a hand over his suit. He raises an eyebrow. “Like? My ears are still ringing.”
Oh. I might have played Seger a little too loud, but frankly, nothing pumps the blood more than tracking down a killer to Old Time Rock and Roll.
Or, the fact that I’m settling into a life—my life—like a pair of Levis.
“I thought I heard…” I walk over toward the dumpsters, set at the edge of the lot in front of a wooded area of trash and debris.
She’s here. I remember now, and—
“Burke!” I’ve spotted her.
She’s wearing yellow pants, tennis shoes, and a jean jacket and is sprawled face down, as if she’d been running, tackled and left to die. Her brown hair is in a puddle around her, soaked in blood.
I crouch next to her and turn her over.
A massive red and purple hematoma lifts from the side of her head, and a cut has opened, bleeding into her face. She’s not breathing. I wipe her mouth with my sleeve and start CPR.
Burke is beside me, calling for 9-1-1.
I’m still compressing, offer her two breaths, and back to the compressions. CPR has been updated since 1997, but I don’t remember the early training.
“How did you see her?” Burke says, but I can’t answer.
C’mon, Gretta!
I check her pulse. Nothing.
Sirens bruise the morning air and a few people clutter the parking lot, voyeurs to the tragedy in the weeds.
I focus on Gretta. She’s still not breathing and I fear—know—the worst. But the fire department has arrived, and with them the rescue squad and a couple of EMTs take over as I back away.
That’s when I see it. A twenty dollar bill in her grip. Victim number one? Well done, Booker.
Gretta is young. Eighteen. The only daughter of a couple from the upscale neighborhood of Edina. I dread having to talk to them again—but this time, at least, when I tell them that we’ll solve the case, I’ll be able to keep that promise.
I hope.
Burke keeps the crowd away, but a woman pushes past him, her hands over her mouth.
I remember her now. Teresa Birch. She wears a full sleeve of tats down her arms, dresses in fifties attire—this morning a hot pink dress—and wears her cherry red hair in victory rolls. Hard to forget. Especially when, in a time before, she offered to give me free breakfasts for life, wink, wink.
I get up and walk away, watching the EMTs do their work. They can’t call it until they get her to the Hennepin County Medical Center, but I’ll bring in the CSI team and get them started. I know she hasn’t been here long.
Someone saw something. In fact, her killer might be standing in the crowd. Which I face and stare down. A few businessmen, construction workers, a couple women.
It starts here. Now.
A Ford escort pulls up, and my body stills as Eve slides out. Shelby emerges from the other side, holding a radio.
Eve walks over to the edge of the crowd, looks at the EMTs working on Gretta. Eve’s face is drawn, a frown tangling her expression. Then she meets my eyes, such a sadness in her expression it nearly steals my breath.
It’s the same look she gave me last night.
And with a jolt, I know.
I’m not here for Gretta.
I’m here to save Danny and Asher. Because in less than forty-eight hours, they die.