HIS MOVEMENTS WERE RAPID AND BRUTAL. BEFORE I could react he grabbed my shirtfront, yanking me the rest of the way down the porch steps, flinging me so hard to the ground I sprawled sideways, struggling for breath. Patricia flew to my side but two additional men converged on her from the alley. Fallon’s voice was lethal. He ordered, “Get that dumb cunt out of here.”
The two men hauled Patricia away, each one clutching an arm. I lay hunched on my left side but at the sight of her disappearing with them I rolled to hands and knees and tried to scramble after her. Fallon planted a foot on my stomach and stomped me to the hard-packed dirt. My fingers slipped over the smooth leather of his boot as I tried to shove it away.
“Who the fuck are you?” he asked, bending lower, increasing the pressure on my ribs. My eyes had adjusted to the dusky gloom and I saw him at close range. He was fair and blond, his face carved on an angular plane, almost angelic; no hint of what he really was etched upon the smooth surface. I couldn’t answer, even if I’d wanted to; I was afraid I’d lose consciousness before I could inhale a lungful past his crushing boot. But then he changed tactics, removing his boot and crouching beside me, using the gun in his right hand to swipe hair from my forehead. The metal was cold and unyielding on my sweating skin. He spoke lightly but the threat was unmistakable. “Tell me who you are, right now.”
I managed a partial inhalation, racing through what I knew about the Yancys, both past and present; and then, like the sharp, painful tip of an arrow shot from another time, I remembered something. A key piece in an intricate puzzle clicked suddenly into place.
“Franklin doesn’t exist.” My lips were so numb with what I’d just realized I barely managed to articulate the words. Immediately I recognized my mistake. Though it was swift, and concealed at once, I saw stun pass over his features.
He backhanded me with one smooth, economical motion; I didn’t even see his hand twitch before it made contact. Gripping my jaws, fingertips anchored against my teeth, he hissed, “What did you say?”
A bright flash, lightning over the lake, had burst across my vision; hazed with pain and fear, for seconds I saw nothing but a blurry water-color version of his face. His breath fanned my forehead; I was sure his next move would be to kill me and my mind presented and clung to an image of Marshall, waiting for me somewhere out there. And so I was afforded the courage to whisper, “You’re Franklin Yancy.”
Fallon’s face seemed carved of ice, frozen in an expressionless mask as he processed what this meant. Then he jammed the gun barrel against my forehead hard enough to dent the bone; his pale eyes were ablaze. “Who the fuck are you?”
I clamped down on my violent fear. It was far from true, but I choked out, “I know everything about you. I know when you die.”
I braced for quick retribution. But something unexpected replaced the fury on his face. He looked almost…satisfied.
“You’re her sister, aren’t you?” He spoke softly, regaining his composure inch by inch as he reached this conclusion. “That lawyer bitch who married Case Spicer, the one Derrick thinks he’s in love with. You’re her sister who disappeared, not just a past counterpart. Son of a bitch.” Fallon eased back a few inches. “Derrick refused to kill her, the useless fuck. He’s as useless as Dredd is, here.”
There were many things I could have said in that moment but I heard myself beg, “Tell me the way back.”
An increase in the volley of noise from the front of Rilla’s saloon refocused his attention. He rose without a word, yanking me up by an elbow. As he stalked around the side of the building he kept the gun tight against my ribs and murmured in my ear, “I intended to split your skull right here but I’ve changed my mind. Keep your mouth shut and I’ll let you live another day.”
Our wrists were tethered with short lengths of rope, handcuff-like, before three men with pistols escorted Patricia and me, the two of us riding double on one of their horses, toward the Yancy train cars under Fallon’s curt order. I felt like I’d been hit by a Mack truck, my mind muddy with all the information I’d been asked to absorb since Miles died; one thought, however, leapfrogged all the others, taking immediate precedence.
Fallon Yancy can jump through time. He must have at least some control over it. Holy fucking shit. Tish and I should have known – all the clues were right there.
The passenger cars had been reattached to the main engine, ready to transport us eastward. I took frantic stock of the area as Patricia and I were summarily hauled in the direction of the depot, terrified that Ax and Cole were watching everything from a distance. Of course they were – far more than fifteen minutes had passed and they would realize something was wrong. I prayed they wouldn’t dare to act, outnumbered and outgunned; I sent a desperate plea to them with all my strength.
Stay put. Please, stay put. You’ll be killed and that would finish Patricia.
The saloon was in ruin behind us. Someone had shot Rilla; I caught a glimpse of her heavy body sprawled across the floor, with Lucy and several of the other girls surrounding her, crying and calling for Doc Turn. I was dizzy with unreality, attached to my physical body by only a tattered thread. Of course a group of criminals could waltz in the front door and shoot to kill; there was no law left in Howardsville. I held fast to Patricia as our horse was led through town; her head drooped against my shoulder, her face decorated afresh with blood. I’d seen one of the men strike her when she fought to struggle away from him. I kept a tight lid on my fury, leaning closer to her to whisper, “It’ll be all right.”
It was an outright lie and I knew she knew it, but she said nothing. Fallon Yancy, a dust-colored hat settled low on his head, rode just behind Patricia and me, using us as cover. Fallon surely assumed I had an accomplice and recognized that this person was somewhere out there, watching; therefore he wasn’t taking any chances. Fallon was no one’s fool; he knew no shooter would dare to take a bead on him, not when Patricia and I were in the same line of fire. It was all I could do not to peer over my shoulder at Fallon; I could feel his incinerating gaze centered on my nape as he debated what I knew and how to extricate this knowledge from me as swiftly as possible. I swept the horizon once more, sensing Ax out there.
Don’t try anything. Oh God, please. If you die on us now, I’ll kill you, Axton Douglas!
Celia, I thought, with equal desperation. I prayed she would get to Birdie and Grant, as she’d promised. And then, my mind rotating like an out-of-control carousel, I thought, Blade! He’s still tethered at a hitching post, waiting for me.
An almost-full moon had risen to glow over the town. I stared at it like a crazy person, my sense of reality floundering between past and present. I saw my oldest sister Camille, her golden-green eyes darkened with sorrow as she stood on the dock, resting her cheek on our mother’s shoulder. I saw Mom’s beautiful face, pale with strain as she stared across Flickertail Lake, Grandma and Aunt Ellen close by, all of them dying a little more each day that I was gone with no word. I saw Aunt Jilly pressing her fingers to her temples, trying with everything in her to establish a connection. I saw Tish, curled against Case’s chest as she cried for me; my family, the women who loved me, unwilling to give up hope. And Marshall. The strength of my love for him superseded all else. I refused to believe he would somehow cease to exist in the future, that the Rawleys would simply vanish into vapor. I would die before letting that happen.
A single shot fired from a rifle jerked our spines and sent everyone scrambling for cover. My heart dropped like a falling stone. We were no more than a block from the depot, on the outskirts of town, and blood bloomed, thick and red, between the shoulder blades of the man riding in the lead. He fell from his saddle and struck the ground with a solid thud; his horse quickstepped, crow-hopping to avoid tripping over the body.
“Stop!” I screamed.
Fallon’s men returned furious fire and high-pitched ringing filled my ear canals. I battled the fantasy of heeling the horse and doing my best to get us to the safety of Axton and Cole. But safety was only an illusion – we’d be caught in the crossfire.
Fallon yanked the horse’s lead line from my hands, bringing the animal against his own mount, so close our knees brushed.
“How many?” he demanded.
Before I could blink, let alone answer, Axton and Ranger appeared from the north, Axton riding without holding the reins, a rifle braced on his shoulder.
“NO!” I screamed, my voice muted by discharging guns.
Axton fired, dropping another of our captors, and then wheeled Ranger to the side, seeking cover to reload – I saw Cole positioned at a right angle, firing the shotgun, covering Axton’s advance while Fallon’s men raced for the shelter of the train cars. Instead of following, Fallon halted his horse, and therefore ours, with a brisk, vicious movement.
Time became a slow-motion sequence, a surreal step-by-step.
Calm as a summer afternoon and just beyond my reach, Fallon leaned to the right and aimed square at Axton’s midsection.
Patricia was screaming Axton’s name, struggling against my hold.
I lunged toward Fallon but I was too late. The last thing I saw before hitting the dusty ground was Axton flying backward, unseated from Ranger – being skinned alive would have hurt me less than the sight. I rolled to avoid stomping hooves, my bound wrists inhibiting all movement. Fallon dismounted in a hurry, dragging Patricia from the saddle; having taken quick stock of the situation, he abandoned both horses and used us as cover instead, the gun held to Patricia’s head. Awkward, stumbling with our wrists tethered, Fallon all but dragged us the remaining yards to the train cars. There, he herded us like animals into the second-to-last car, a dark and stuffy space; our exit was cut off by the muffled thump of a slammed door.
Patricia flew for the window, ripping the shade from its moorings. Dark blood had flowed from her nostrils, painting her lower face in an obscene pattern of stripes.
“Axton,” she sobbed, hands spread like starfish against the small glass rectangle. I joined her at the window, sick with panic, but could see nothing but chaos. No sign of Axton, Cole, or their horses.
“Oh God,” I whispered, trembling, tears blurring my sight. I could not bear to acknowledge what was probably true – that Axton had just been killed before our eyes. “Oh God, please no.”
“He’s right outside…” she moaned, tripping over her skirts to reach the door, yanking at the handle. She slammed her fists on its surface, clawing at the impenetrable iron. Both of us lurched forward as the train chugged to sudden motion. The cars inched at first, gaining steady momentum along with Patricia’s hysterical screaming. Terrified she would hurt herself I clutched one of her arms and held fast, cursing my bound wrists.
The whistle on the engine issued an elongated moan and before we knew it, Howardsville was behind us.
The train sailed through the night with a clickety-clacking rhythm. Once I’d managed to calm Patricia, settling her on the bed in the sleeping compartment, I located a box of matches in the drawer of the nightstand, refusing to think of being in a similar train car the night Mrs. Mason was killed. With the light of several subsequent, fumbling strikes, I found a candle, lit its wick, and then proceeded to search for any sort of food. There was none, and no water; our wrists were bound with rope and I had to go the bathroom. But these seemed like trivial concerns in the face of everything else. I finally returned to the sleeping compartment at the sound of Patricia’s quiet weeping. I joined her on the bed and we grasped hands, our bodies rumbling along with the rapid tempo of the steel wheels.
“He’s still alive,” she breathed. “I can feel it.”
I tucked my chin over Patricia’s soft, loose hair and whispered, “I believe so, too.”
Oh Axton, sweet Ax, please be alive out there. Oh God, please be alive. I can’t bear it.
Time, and many miles, passed before I finally said, “Patricia, I need to know everything you do about Fallon.”
She issued a shuddering sigh. In the dimness the uninjured parts of her face were few and far between; blood and bruises bloomed in dark patches across her skin. The rope around my wrists scraped as I lifted both hands and touched her hair.
“Please, tell me. I have to know everything.”
“He is a beast,” she said, grit and steel uniting forces in her tone. “I wish to kill him with my own hands. I wish to cause him colossal pain before he departs this earth.”
“I couldn’t agree more but I need you to focus.” I rallied my determination. “Please, Patricia, it’s more important than you know.”
I felt her shoulders lift with an indrawn breath. “He is the sort to send others to conduct his criminal enterprises. I am stunned by his appearance here in the Territory.” She sounded at least partially in control but then choked on a sudden harsh moan. “Ruthie…what if –”
“Stop,” I commanded; now, more than ever, I had to be strong. “I know it’s hard but we can’t think like that.”
She nodded, gulping back a sob.
“When and where was Fallon born?” I pressed. “Do you know?”
“October of 1853, in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.”
I had no idea how to frame a question that asked what I needed to know – if the Fallon Yancy who’d appeared in Howardsville tonight was the same person born that October. Was he an original part of this timeline, or another altogether? Franklin Yancy didn’t exist, but did Fallon? Who was he, really?
“Have you ever been given reason to believe Fallon was lying about his birthdate?”
“Ruthie, what is it? Please, I beg of you to tell me.”
“Would you know if…”
“If what?” she insisted when I trailed to a halt; she’d gained a slim margin of control over her emotions. “Please explain. Please trust me with your questions.”
“I do trust you.” I paused, absorbing the warmth of her fingers locked around mine. “It’s just that…I don’t know if you can believe what I would tell you.”
“I shall believe anything you tell me. How could you think otherwise?”
I thought of Tish, who never hesitated, who always spoke her mind. Gathering all my courage, I whispered, “I remembered everything about my past the night Miles was shot.” Hot tears welled, blurring the outline of Patricia’s earnest face. “You see, I was born in Chicago, in the month of January…in 1991.”
There was a moment of silence as I sensed Patricia grappling with this statement.
I rushed to explain. “I’m not crazy. I know it seems that way, but I promise you I’m not. My entire family is there, in the future. I haven’t seen them in all these months. I haven’t seen Marshall since that night…” And just like that my composure plummeted, deteriorating fast, my voice breaking like dead branches. “I left him in our apartment…in the middle of winter. We had such a bad fight…he thought I believed he wanted me to go…”
How could I have been so selfish? How could I have disregarded his concern? I knew very well he’d been jealous of my ex-boyfriend, Liam, but that didn’t mean Marshall lacked trust in me. I’d let my pride blind me, refusing to see what truly motivated his anger was simple fear. Faye Rawley, his beloved mother, had died in a car accident the autumn of Marshall’s eighteenth birthday, creating a jagged hole of vulnerability within him. And even knowing this, I’d left our apartment without a final word, without even saying good-bye, propelled by self-righteous anger, when I should have turned around and run back inside, straight to his arms.
Remembrance stormed my senses – the sound of his warm, husky voice, the love in his eyes, the scent of his skin and passionate strength of his embrace. Our wedding was supposed to have been last June and I pressed my thumb to the bare spot on my ring finger, imagining the engagement ring Marsh had given me the night he proposed, a family heirloom diamond he’d had set with garnets, my birthstone. I remembered making love with him, the immediacy of him wrapped between my legs, the easy, teasing way we’d always had, the endless, heated hunger he never failed to rouse. How had I gone so long without him? How would I continue?
“Marshall,” I wept, repeating his name, ambushed by despair.
At long last I fell silent, rendered hollow and withered. Patricia had not released her tender hold on my hands. When she spoke my body twitched, even though she whispered her question.
“Dear Ruthann, you mean to tell me you’ve not yet been born?”
“You don’t believe me,” I whispered miserably.
“I believe you, I promise. I am attempting to reconcile your explanation with what I formerly understood about the laws of the universe. What I mean is, how is it possible you were born in the twentieth century but exist now in the nineteenth?”
I wagged my head side to side, exhausted and aching. “I wish I could tell you how it happened. The first time I felt pulled by the past, I’d touched letters that were written by Cole’s mother, Una Spicer.”
“Letters? What letters? When were they penned?”
“1882,” I whispered. “Una wrote them from Montana Territory, in 1882.” I sat up and so did Patricia, facing me on the narrow bed. “I want to tell you everything but I don’t know where to start. There’s so much.”
“Then we are fortunate it is a long way to Chicago,” she whispered, squeezing my hands.