Time Thieves (30 page)

“Greg. What’s going on here?” The commanding voice said it all. This man was used to being in control. To giving orders and having them obeyed instantly. He used fear to get his own way. Preyed on people weaker than him. He was despicable.

Her father stepped forward. “Tron, my apologies. I was just showing the new arrivals the layout – helping them to get settled.” He motioned to the rooms.

Tron’s lips quirked, but there was no humor in the movement. He motioned to the henchmen. Both men ran over to the fallen men. The one at Jed’s side said, “He’s out cold but alive.”

“So is Jordan.”

If she hadn’t been watching, Sari might have missed the slight relaxing of Tron’s shoulders. Now that he knew his sons were safe, fear subsided, only to be replaced by anger. Rage that someone dared to do this.

So this was the man responsible for keeping her father here.

She glanced up at Ward, but he was watching the man beside Jed. Of course. The men were on the ground. Vulnerable. She nodded slightly. Keeping her eyes on Tron standing so boldly and arrogantly in front of her, she waited and watched for him to make a move.

The first man grabbed Jed’s shoulders, trying to lift him up slightly so as to drag him toward his father.

“Greg, help him.”

Greg immediately walked over and picked up Jed’s feet. Ward quietly walked over and picked up Jordan’s feet, and they manhandled the boys to their father. They laid them down again on the floor.

One of the henchmen asked, his voice polite and subservient, “Where do you want them?”

“We’ll take them to their rooms in a moment. First I want to deal with these people.” Tron smiled, and something unidentifiable flickered across his face.

Ward caught just a flash. But it was enough. There wasn’t going to be any easy answer. Options. What were the damn options? None. He moved back as if to rejoin the group, then spun and lashed out in a high kick that slammed Tron in the middle of the chest.

Gasps sounded. Then all hell broke loose. He didn’t have time to worry about it. His attention was fully on the guy he’d attacked. The man might be a leader here, but it wasn’t an empty title. Damn, the man could fight.

He kicked, punched, and grappled to the point he was afraid he was outmatched. Then the other man went down and Ward was on him in an instant. He had his arm around his neck in a chokehold he didn’t dare release. Gritting his teeth, he dug deep and clenched tighter, mentally counting, and just when he didn’t think he could hold on anymore, the man went limp.

Thank God. Ward bowed his head. He pulled his gun free from his lower back and turned to look around.

Jesus.

Sari had her damn shoe off again and was whaling away on one of the henchmen. The second henchman was sprawled out cold on his back. He clambered to his feet and raced over to Sari. One hard clip of his fist against the henchman’s temple and he was down, too.

Sari leaned back, gasping for air.

“About time.”

He grinned. “Why? You were doing just fine.”

She laughed.

You had to appreciate a woman who could smile at a time like this.

She stood up and ran to her father, who was trying to catch his breath off to the side. “Dad, we need to go. Now.”

“Yes.” He straightened and slapped Mark over the shoulder. “Come on, Mark.”

Ward took one look around. “Do we need anything from here?”

He walked over to Tron, bending to search his pockets, and pulled out a timepiece. He held it up. “This is the third.”

“Good.” Sara held out the other two. “Let’s go. We’re out of time.”

They needed no urging. The four raced down the hallway.

“Is there something special we have to do?”

Sari frowned. “I don’t know.” She glanced over at her father. “Dad, is there?”

“Yes.” Greg held out his hand for one of the watches she held. She handed both over, watching as he fiddled with dials, even opening the first one to make an adjustment on the inside. Then he repeated his actions with the second one.

There were so many questions whirling around in her head, she didn’t know what to say. First things first, they needed to go home and fast.

As if hearing her unspoken urgings, he said, “I’m trying. I’m trying.”

Sari held back the panic threatening to overwhelm her. She wanted to be gone. Their window of opportunity was now, but only if they could take it. She bit her lip and focused on her breathing.

Then he held out his hand for Tron’s watch.

Ward gave it to him and her father fiddled with it. Just as she was about to say something to him, Ward placed a restraining hand on Sari’s shoulder. “Easy,” he whispered. “Give him time.”

She closed her eyes and nodded. “Sorry,” she whispered.

He squeezed gently, reassuringly.

Sari couldn’t stop glancing over her shoulder. The men could arrive at any time. She closed her eyes and found prayers slipping through her mind.
Please let them make it. Please let them go home safely. Please.

Another long few minutes and her father said, “Done.”

She opened her eyes to find him grinning at her.

“Let’s go home.”

S
ari laughed.

She stood in the middle of her kitchen spinning and dancing and laughing like a wild woman. She was home. Safe and sound. Ward stood, grinning wildly, at the entrance. Both her father and Mark were sitting, exhaustion, euphoria, and a sense of disbelief still on their faces. Her father rubbed both hands down over his face. She didn’t know if he was rubbing away tears or fatigue. For at least the fifth time, she ran over and hugged her father. Then she danced toward Ward and caught him up in a close hug.

“It’s so good to know that’s all over.”

Ward interrupted. “That’s the question I was going to ask. Is it over? Can we know that for sure?”

Sari glanced at him in surprise. “Yes, of course. We’re all home. The watches are all here. Jed and Jordan can’t cross over anymore.”

“But I thought there was mention of a fifth watch?”

At the silence in the room, she spun around to stare at her father. “Dad?”

He threw up his hands. “I think it’s over. I can’t be sure there aren’t more watches.”

The silence was deafening. Both Mark and Greg stared at each other.

Sari hated this. The silence. The odd looks between the men. The unknown. That’s what really bugged her. There was something she didn’t understand. And it was important.

“Damn it. What aren’t you telling her?”

Ward walked over to stand beside her. He wrapped an arm around her. She leaned into his strength. Craving it. Wanting so much more. He faced the two seated men. “Are you saying that we are still in danger?”

“I don’t know.” Greg tried to smile. “I
think
we’re safe.”

“Except for the fifth watch.” Ward pursed his lips. “Something was bugging me. Jed and Jordan have been here for a month this time. Where do they stay? How do they live?”

He glanced over at Mark’s blank look, then at Greg, and nodded. “Greg, one of them lives on this side, correct?”

Sari glanced from Ward to her father and back. Slowly, his words filtered through her brain. “It has to be. It’s the only way they’d be able to come back and forth and not stand out. Someone coached them. Gave them a place to stay. A way to live. To understand our way of life.” She sat down heavily. “Oh my God. Father, do you know who this person is?”

Her father ruffled his hair. “Tron’s brother.”

“What brother?”

Once again Greg and Mark looked at each other. They turned as one to face Sari and Ward. “Tron’s brother has lived here for decades. Since Mark went over.”

“Jesus.”

Sari didn’t have anything to say. She didn’t know why she hadn’t considered such a thing. After all, she’d wondered why they hadn’t taken technology from this world over to that world. It only made sense that one of them wanted to travel and possibly stay here. She just couldn’t get her mind wrapped around the problem of whether that was a good thing or a bad thing. The issue appeared to be if he could come and go at will.

“Oh shit.” Ward stared at Sari’s father. “Does this man have the capability to cross dimensions at will?”

“No, not at will. It’s all dependent on timing. But he goes home several times a year.”

She tilted her head. “Via the house?”

Her father nodded. As she’d never been here and the house had been empty for the last fifteen years, that made a sick kind of sense. No one had been here, so it had been easy to travel. In fact, with the shop out in the front of the house, no one would have heard intruders coming and going quietly over the years. And that was yet another reason for her mother to move a long ways away.

As family loyalty and trust went, it made sense. She doubted Tron trusted many. “Is he the only one that you know of?”

Both older men nodded.

“Why?” Sari asked. “Why would he want that? What’s in it for him?”

“He gets to live here.” Greg gave her a crooked smile. “Away from Tron – a hard man for anyone to take.”

“What’s to stop this man from closing the door forever and locking his brother on the other side?” She was struggling with the idea that one man controlled the gate between two worlds. Surely both societies could have used the knowledge. Not just the one man.

“We need to have a talk with him, see if he’s interested in closing the door forever. If not, we need to find a way to send him home without a watch.”

“That won’t work. He’d have to have a watch to travel home, and that will leave a watch on their side, keeping the door to our house open as well.”

“Oh God.” Sari poured tea. The mindless activity occupied her hands while her mind raced.

“Then he can go home, hand over the watch and stay, or die and stay here anyway.”

Sari glanced over at Ward. The cop personae stood in front of her like she hadn’t seen before. He wasn’t going to tolerate anything but this door between the two worlds being closed permanently.

She had to admit it was the only solution she could live with herself. Her family had been traumatized for centuries. Enough was enough.

Ward said, “Let me get this straight. Tron kept one of his family over here all the time just to keep tabs on Sari’s family?”

“No, not just for that.” Greg shook his head. “Also to keep Tron in the loop about our technology and weapons, government, etcetera. He didn’t want his people knowing about this world as he figured he’d lose control. But they’ve learned from us.”

“Bizarre,” Sari murmured. And way too much to take in all at once. The implications were horrific.

“So this brother is the only person we need to worry about?” At the older men’s nods, Ward asked, “Does he have a family?”

“No. He didn’t want one.”

Sari couldn’t help but stare. “So he has no family but he lives like a spy here, going home once a year with new ideas, concepts, and inventions that he can take over to his brother?”

Mark nodded.

“Who is he?” Ward asked, “The brother? And where does he live?”

Mark frowned, his gaze locked onto the top of the tabletop.

Greg cleared his throat. “Um…you know him too.”

He opened his mouth to speak when a voice behind her spoke first. She spun around.

“It’s me.”

“Brodin Wilson?” She sat back in shock, her mind still adjusting to his surprise appearance. But as she thought back over the years, the one man who’d been here on the spot, the one man who hadn’t doubted the crazy story both Sari and her mother had told…it had to be him.

Ward was on his feet in a flash, his small handgun out and ready.

“That won’t be necessary.” Brodin stood in front of him, a small pistol directed at Ward.

Sari gasped. Ward closed his eyes. “God damn it,” he said savagely.

“Now move over closer to Sari. Carefully.”

Ward started to move.

“Slowly,” Brodin ordered. “I don’t have a problem shooting you, but I’d just as soon not deal with the mess afterward.”

Ward snorted. “No problem. Just drag the bodies to your world. What do you care if your brother gets to deal with the mess? He’s good at cleaning up. Isn’t he?”

“He is at that,” Brodin grimaced. “What my brother puts up with from his sons is nothing short of a miracle considering his attitude toward everyone else. Still, he’s my brother. And it’s my home.”

“A home you’re planning on returning to, I presume.”

“Never.” Brodin smiled sadly. “It’s not like here. My brother rules like a dictator. He gives no one any freedom. I might not be a slave, but I was a prisoner to his whims no less.” He glanced over at both Mark and Greg and smiled forlornly.

Greg stood shakily and walked over to Brodin. “You don’t need a gun here. Not in my home.”

“What about him?” Brodin said, waving the gun at Ward, who still held his own gun at the ready. “I don’t know him. Therefore, I don’t trust him.”

“And yet you’re happy to force men from here to be slaves for your brother?” Sari asked in outrage. “How could you?”

“I had no choice, any more than your father did. He went over to save you.” He took a shuddering breath. “I helped him once I understood that Lisbeth was pregnant, making you or the unborn child Tron’s next slave.”