Time's Enemy: A Romantic Time Travel Adventure (Saturn Society Book 1) (40 page)

She whisked the coverlet off the sofa, had barely pulled it around herself when Dr. Caruthers entered.

His footsteps rang hollowly on the hardwood floor. “Ah, Charlotte, it’s impolite not to answer the door when—”

“I was taking a bath!” She said the first thing that came to mind.

Caruthers stopped. She clutched the coverlet tighter as his dark beady eyes traveled down her body. Even though the blanket covered her, she felt raw, exposed, like a hunk of meat. She tensed, trying to stop herself from shaking under his scrutiny. “A bath?” he said.

“Y- yes, sir.”

“In your stockings?”

Hellfire! How had she forgotten?

He glanced at the closed bedroom door.
Jump, Tony!
Caruthers’ oily gaze returned to her, slid up and down her. “I think not. It appears you’ve been providing our Enemy with more than refuge.” His lips drew into a sneer. “Be prepared to accept the punishment meant for him if he escapes—”

“No! It’s—”

He strode past her, toward the bedroom door. Why didn’t Tony jump?
Please, Tony! Hurry!

“It’s not like that at all!” She had to stall him. Trembling, she loosened her fist, and the blanket slid to the floor.

Tony crouched beside the bedroom door. Damn thing didn’t even lock—but the footsteps had stopped.
Get rid of him!
he silently urged.

The walls blurred into thick, round concrete pillars—
Shit!
He couldn’t warp now, not without a scrap of clothing!
Make him leave!
If she could just get the man to leave, he’d run to the kitchen, swipe his clothes and his glasses, and be gone.

His ears pricked at the man’s words. “...interrupted something.” The smooth, masculine voice held a threatening tone.

“It’s not what it looks like, I knew you’d be watching the house, waiting for me to bring him—”

A roar rose in Tony’s ears. She what?

He strained to hear her response. “...had to make him trust me—”

A lecherous laugh. “And that includes giving him all you’ve got?”

“You know what Theodore says. Whatever. It. Takes.” She emphasized the words. Another Society law?

“Whatever it—” Laughter. “Ah, Charlotte, I never realized your dedication extended to using your body. Good work, my dear.” Tony bolted upright. Had everything been a set up? The air rushed out of him. He clutched at the wall. Had he been utterly blind?

“...whatever it takes,” she repeated.

“Where is he?”

“In the bedroom,” she said loudly. “If he hasn’t jumped already.”

Footsteps rang on the wooden floor. Coming for him.

His stomach grew raw, layers peeled away as if he was suffocating from the inside out. He had to warp. Now, the hell with his clothes and glasses. He reached for the bedspread, but before he could grasp it—

The vertigo struck, fast and hard.

Tony uncurled his body, the concrete cold and wet under his bare ass. A semi rattled across the I-75 bridge overhead. Before him, Robert Drive shined darkly in the streetlights. A light fizz on the pavement... Rain.

He stood, then sagged against a concrete pillar. He needed to get to his car fast—
Charlotte... All lies. Everything—
before recovery kicked in.
She used me.
He had to get home before he passed out—
betrayed me
—and he wound up in the hospital. At least he hadn’t told her he loved her. He couldn’t go to the hospital, didn’t have time for that, not when he had Bethany’s death to prevent—

Forget Charlotte! Run for the car, be glad it’s raining.
He’d have a better chance of getting to the parking garage unseen, the chill breeze notwithstanding.

Ignoring the cold, he streaked across Robert Drive, skulked along the outside wall of a junkyard, darted from building to building until he reached Seventh Street. A bum slouching in a doorway shouted a guttural catcall as Tony ran by.

When he reached the parking garage, he crouched at the wall for a moment and hugged himself, trying to shake off his shivers. The cold was dissipating from his skin, the drizzle barely noticeable. But it wasn’t because the weather had warmed or the wind and rain stopped. He was getting numb. Fading into recovery. He sidled along the wall, toward the attendant’s booth—

Brakes squeaked behind him. He barely registered the sound of the car coming to a stop on the wet pavement before headlights burned his shadow into the parking garage wall, and flashes of blue slashed the night.
Fuck.
“Hey buddy,” a man called. “Little chilly to be walking around in your birthday suit, isn’t it?” Car doors opened, and footsteps approached. Tony didn’t even have the energy to turn around and face the officers.

T
HE BATHWATER HAD GROWN COLD
, but Charlotte remained, curled up with her knees drawn into her chest. She’d drawn the water scalding hot, as hot as she could bear, but it did nothing to cleanse the shame that stained her to the core. Boiling water wouldn’t be hot enough to wash away the image forever burned into her brain of Caruthers’ leering grin and his evil laugh as he unzipped his pants, then pinned her to the floor while he—

No! No-no-no-no, it didn’t happen.

But it did.

Her gaze flicked to Theodore’s Saturn Society knife lying on the edge of the tub. She’d found it on the living room floor where Tony must have dropped it when she undressed him.

Too bad she hadn’t seen it until after Caruthers walked out the door. When she stopped crying enough to see, she’d grabbed it and crept to the bathroom.

Like walking, the water had hurt at first, but as it cooled, it leeched away much of her physical pain.

But nothing would ever heal her spirit after being taken and used by a man she despised. She’d never lose the sense of worthlessness and dirtiness, or forget the stab of Caruthers’ laugh when he informed her it would do no good to tell anyone. No one would believe a woman who wore low-cut dresses to her restaurant job, who’d taken in a man who wasn’t her husband, boarder or no. A woman who’d lost her only source of income and was surely desperate. In dropping that blanket, he said she’d asked for it, never mind she’d screamed no a hundred times. How could the neighbors not have heard?

She ran through a mental list of people who might offer some consolation, give her a shoulder to cry on. She certainly couldn’t tell Mabel. She’d say it was Charlotte’s fault, even if Charlotte didn’t mention the blanket. Dewey might believe her, but she couldn’t tell him. It was too shameful.

Theodore wouldn’t blame his fellow Watchkeeper, the one who helped him dispatch and punish time criminals—one of whom Charlotte had allowed to escape.

Only Tony would believe her. He’d hit Irving for merely making lewd suggestions. Tony had told her later that in his time, what Irving had done was called sexual harassment, and it was against the law. If she told him about Caruthers, she had no doubt Tony would go to Cleveland, hunt him down and kill him—

But Tony was never coming back.

Her tears returned, and she bowed her head, resting her arms on her knees. Thank heavens Tony had the sense to stay away. The Society was too big a risk. There was nothing for him in this time except life on the run and likely capture... then life as a doddering idiot.

Better a life of misery and loneliness than that.

Her eyes lit on the knife again. Blinking away her tears, she picked it up and ran her finger over the engraved PIPPIN 1905, then drew the blade’s edge across her finger, staring in fascination as a bead of blood formed, reflecting in the pallid bathroom light. She was a fallen woman, the one man who believed in her never to return.

She yanked the blade away and squeezed the handle. Tony had vowed never to come back because he didn’t want her to die.

He said she had many things yet to do.

She’d chanced Caruthers’ lust so Tony could escape.

If she had to make the choice again, she’d do the same.

She put the knife down. Tony wanted her to live. Even if he couldn’t be with her. Perhaps some day, in a more enlightened time, she’d find a way to make Ben Caruthers pay.

After she got out of the bathtub, she threw on a dress and trudged downstairs. She returned with the solar radiator, pushed open the back door, and stumbled down the walk to the garage.

Slowly, she lowered her project to the concrete slab beside the garbage can. The impact jarred a pipe loose with a clank. It didn’t matter. She stood, brushing the metallic dust from her hands. Next time Dewey stopped by with his car, he could take it to the dump. Useless junk. A chapter of her life that was now closed.

She plodded back up the walk. When she moved into the Society House, there would be no time for foolishness like the solar furnace. She’d have to help Theodore entertain guests and keep the House tidy. Do the cooking. With Charlotte there, he wouldn’t need to use Society funds to pay a housekeeper.

Her landlord had been generous, letting her stay as long as he had. But with her owing June’s rent on top of May’s, eviction loomed near. She had nothing—thanks to Caruthers, not even her self respect. She should be thankful she had somewhere to go. She would simply have to find someplace else to be whenever Caruthers came around.

She slipped inside and wandered into the kitchen. A cup of tea might soothe her nerves and allow her to sleep. Sleep and forget, if only for a few hours. But the sight of Tony’s clothes mingled with her dress on the floor brought a fresh flood of tears. She sank into a chair at the table where, such a short time ago Tony had given her more pleasure than she’d ever known. Love she’d never thought existed outside of the movies.

By the time her tears dried, she’d forgotten why she came into the kitchen. Unless it was to collect the clothing?

She rose, retrieved her dress, and draped it over a chair. Then she picked up Tony’s shirt. Her insides convulsed, trying to expel another sob, but no tears were left. She slowly, lovingly folded the shirt and lay it on the table beside his glasses. She’d keep his things, in the unlikely event of his return.

She almost dropped his trousers, they were so heavy. His wallet. Unable to contain her curiosity, she pulled it out. The pants slid to the floor, forgotten.

The wallet flipped open to reveal the card Tony had shown her that long-ago day in the attic. Ohio Driver License. With his beautiful picture and rainbow-reflecting state seal. Her throat threatened to close again, but she swallowed and flipped though the booklet of flexible, clear pages.

A strange card marked VISA, with a breathtaking, silvery-rainbow bird that practically soared off the card. Mercy! What technology could create it? Next were photographs, in vivid, life-like color. The older couple had to be his parents. Then the sister he’d mentioned, with a man and two boys.

Next was a teenage girl. Her eyes looked just like Tony’s. His daughter. Charlotte rubbed the photo, as if she could feel the girl’s soft cheek.

Her heart twisted at the thought of the terrible end this beautiful young woman had—or would—meet. What Caruthers had done to her was nothing. She, at least, was alive and whole. The physical pain he’d inflicted on her would fade.

Tony was right. If it were her child, she’d do anything, even risk the Treatment, to spare her the tortuous death this girl had suffered.