Into the Whirlwind (43 page)

She blanched. It wasn’t that she wasn’t happy, she was merely terrified he would shatter into a million pieces if she wasn’t there to protect him. Not that she could say such a thing. “I only wanted what was best for you. Although, my goodness, you look so fine. . . .” He looked healthy, with clean clothes and the beginnings of a new beard that was neatly groomed and clipped close to his face. There was a lump in her throat, but why was she getting weepy over Declan McNabb? Apparently he was doing much better without her hovering over him, but that was how it should be, shouldn’t it?

“The clock looks grand, Mollie. Really grand.”

“It was Alice’s doing. She must have drawn twenty different designs. We presented four of them to the bankers, and they were very impressed.”

Declan nodded. “It was good to see you all again. I didn’t feel right barging in, since I didn’t have anything to do with that clock. But will you tell everyone how fine I think the clock is?”

“Of course!”

He shifted awkwardly on his feet. “I wanted to let you know that I took your advice. About going back to church. I can handle crowds better these days, and I’ve learned a lot from being there. I don’t know if I’ll ever be whole again . . . but you were right about there being worse things than death. Living in fear all the time . . . that was worse. Learning about Jesus and hope has helped with that.”

“Move it, people,” a voice growled. Behind her, a line of men were angling wheelbarrows full of mortar down the street. Declan grabbed her arm and guided her farther down the sidewalk.
“There is a pretzel vendor a few blocks down, if you’ll let me buy you one?”

He still seemed so tentative, and she smiled broadly as she followed him. They found a bench and Mollie began pulling apart the warm, salty dough. Richard did not approve of eating food with bare hands, so it had been months since Mollie had indulged in the salty treat. She quickly devoured one, then purchased another. Alternately nibbling and throwing tidbits to the pigeons, Declan said he had taken a job as a clerk in a bank, reconciling accounts at the end of the day. If all continued to go well, he planned on enrolling in an accounting program in September.

“It was what I wanted to do before the war,” he said. “That single year when I studied accounting was the best time of my life. Zack Kazmarek said he would write a letter of recommendation when the time is right.”

Just the mention of Zack’s name was enough to make her catch her breath. “I didn’t realize you were in contact with Zack.”

Declan tossed a few more hunks of pretzel to the pigeons. “When we were in Milwaukee, we struck up a friendship. He seems like a good man.”

She cocked her head. “Milwaukee?”

“It wasn’t all about business,” Declan said. “There was plenty of time when we were stuck on the train and we got to talking. And then again on the way—”

“Milwaukee?”
Mollie pressed. “Are you talking about the time when you went to catch Jesse Coulter? That Milwaukee?”

Declan looked confused. “Yes, that Milwaukee.”

“I didn’t realize Zack went with you.” She felt confused and disoriented, but Declan was matter-of-fact.

“Zack planned everything. He had a contact at the Milwaukee police who helped us track down the Coulter gang.”

“I thought Colonel Lowe did all that.”

Declan shook his head. “Colonel Lowe was there, but Zack led the operation.”

She felt light-headed as she turned her attention back to the pigeons. Declan kept talking, outlining the details of how the mission had been organized and executed. She had never asked for details of the raid; she’d just assumed it was something Colonel Lowe had organized. It was the kind of thing at which he excelled. He had never lied to her or exaggerated his role in Milwaukee, she had simply never asked for any details.

And Zack—immediately after Richard had told her of Jesse Coulter’s capture, she had gone to Frank’s grave, and Zack had followed her. Instead of thanking him, she had called him a stray dog.

She shot to her feet. “I need to go see someone,” she muttered, scurrying down the street and leaving Declan on the street bench with the pigeons.

She was breathless by the time she arrived on Zack’s street. It was insane for her to go running back to Zack when she had to shop for Matilda’s fancy Fourth of July celebration, but this was something that couldn’t be put off. She could buy the peaches later, but if she didn’t see Zack today, she would shrivel up from shame and become useless to the world.

Hopping off the streetcar, she picked up her skirts and scurried down the tidy avenues. Would he even see her? It would be impossible for her to sleep until she removed this horrible weight of guilt that had settled over her chest. Zack went to Milwaukee and hunted down a band of murderers on her behalf, and she hadn’t even thanked him! No, in her generosity, she had banished him from her sight, but not before she had made it clear to him where he ranked compared to Colonel Lowe.

She skidded to a stop across the street from his townhome. Three horse-drawn wagons were lined up before his house, where the front door was wide open. Laborers were carrying boxes and crates to the overflowing wagons.

Was he moving? The volume of material mounded in those wagons looked like enough to supply an entire wagon train heading west.

Butterflies warred in her stomach as she crossed the street and was about to mount the steps when an impossibly beautiful blond woman scampered down. Mollie’s lips pressed together. The woman’s smooth hair swung freely down her back, bouncing as she descended the stairs with a stack of books in her arms. Mollie touched the pile of hair she had twisted into a tight bun at the nape of her neck. Zack probably loved that woman’s hair.

Anna? Anka? She was the girl Mollie had seen Zack with that day in the park. Whatever her name, Mollie hoped she was as pretty on the inside as she was on the outside. Zack deserved a fine woman.

“What are you doing here?”

She startled. Zack was standing at the top of the stairs, a crate in his arms. The collar of his white shirt was open, and his skin was tanned by the summer sun. Her mouth went dry.

Zack carried the crate down the stairs, handing it to a laborer who loaded it into a wagon. He brushed his hands as he turned back to her, curiosity, but no anger, in his eyes. “Mollie? What do you need?”

After a struggle, she found her tongue. “I just . . .” She wanted to weep at his feet because of what he’d done for Frank. For sacrificing on her behalf and never asking for a word of thanks. A man jostled her out of the way as he came down the steps with another oversized crate, and she felt dizzy. It was hot, and
her skin felt prickly, and Zack looked much bigger and more imposing than she’d remembered.

He grabbed her arm. “Come inside,” he said gruffly. “You look about ready to pass out from the heat.”

What in the name of all that was holy was Mollie doing here? It had been almost a month since he’d seen her. Ever since the great and glorious Colonel Lowe had accompanied her to present her Copernicus designs to him, Zack had not set eyes on Mollie.

He led her toward the dining room, which still doubled as his office. Lifting a stack of insurance paper work from a chair, he gestured for her to sit, then grabbed another chair and sat opposite her. He wished to the bottom of his soul that she would simply stay away so he wouldn’t have to shrivel into a helpless sap the moment she showed up.

Mollie’s fingers were long and delicate as she fiddled with them in her lap. Those fingers could coax pieces of metal wire and screws into a magnificent timepiece, but today they made her look as nervous as a hummingbird. Whatever had sent her flying across town to him didn’t look like good news. His hands clenched. Heaven help him, she was going to tell him she was marrying Colonel Lowe. The golden boy who walked on water. She was finally going to marry him, and then the tortured fantasies he’d nurtured over her would have to be snuffed out once and for all. He picked up a pencil to roll in his hands, anything to stop him from breaking something in half.

“What’s going on, Mollie? Whatever it is, just say it—I won’t bite your head off.”

He held his breath, dreading her next words. Finally, she met his eyes. “I came to thank you for what you did in Milwaukee.”

That
took him by surprise. It looked like she wanted to say
more, but tears pooled in the bottom of those magnificent blue eyes, turning them into a shade of violet. He wanted to lunge across the table and sweep her into his arms, rock her like a baby over whatever it was that had her so rattled.

Instead, he forced himself to stay calm. “Forget about it, Mollie. It was nothing.”

“Zack, I didn’t know it was you! I didn’t know you had anything to do with catching those men, but Declan tells me it was all your doing. I never knew. I thought Richard did it all.”

He stopped fiddling with the pencil. “Did he say that?”

“No! I never asked, I just assumed it was his doing.”

He bit back a bitter laugh. “The fair-haired colonel can do many things, but navigating back alleys isn’t one of them.”

She dropped her chin. “I’m so sorry about that day at the graveyard,” she whispered. “So ashamed—”

“Forget about it,” he said again. “It’s ancient history.” His chest squeezed, and this conversation was giving him a headache. She was here because of a guilty conscience, and there was only so much he could take. “Look, today isn’t the best day to talk. I’ve found a space where my mother can store Poland’s national treasures. It’s going to take the better part of the day to load it all up, so unless you’ve got something else to say . . .”

She swiped her nose. “No, there is nothing. But I still feel—”

“Zachariasz?” Anka popped her head inside the door. “Mother say eat. Pierogi. Pierogi on kitchen.”

“Not now, Anka. Later.”

She looked confused. Anka could speak English better than she could understand it, which wasn’t saying much. He stood and held up both hands, fingers splayed. “Ten minutes. Tell my mother ten minutes.”

She mimicked the motion back. “Ten minutes,” she said with
a broad smile and mangled English. Before leaving, Anka drew the pocket doors closed.

Mollie cleared her throat. “She is very lovely. I think she is the lady I saw you with in the park last spring?”

“Yes. That’s Anka.”

“She seems perfect for you. Very Polish. Very pretty.” She rose to her feet. “Well, I wish you and Anka all the best.” She paused, staring over his shoulder.

Zack froze. He didn’t even need to turn around to know what she was looking at.

“Is that my . . .” She drifted forward, reaching out for the green paisley scarf draped over the coatrack. If he had known she was coming, he would have hidden the blasted thing in the attic.

She laid her hand against the scorched, stained scarf, curiosity brimming in her eyes. “Why do you have this?”

He looked away, unable to lie about that scarf. He could pretend her visits didn’t rattle him, he could let her jump to inaccurate conclusions about Anka, but he could never lie about that scarf. That scarf was precious to him, and he’d never let it go.

“I kept the scarf because when I look at it, I remember that night,” he said simply. “Mollie, you were amazing during the fire. A warrior. A valkyrie. If I live a thousand years, the memory of you dashing through the blazing streets, that scarf wrapped around you . . . I don’t ever want to forget it.”

Her eyes widened, but as she turned away there was a droop in her shoulders. “I’m not that woman you just described. I was petrified down to my toes. I’ve spent the past nine months trying to get back to my orderly life with no exploding buildings or walls crashing down around me. I want the comfort of my timelines and schedules. I want to turn the clock back to October seventh of 1871 and have the entire Chicago Fire Department standing guard outside Mrs. O’Leary’s barn so none
of it would have happened. I just wish things could go back to the way they were before.”

Zack let his gaze trail to the green scarf. If the fire had never happened, he’d still be working at Hartman’s, looking forward to every one of Mollie’s visits, but never doing more than signing off on her quarterly invoices. Decades would pass, and he never would have seen the true strength and glory of this woman rise to the surface.