Timestorm (38 page)

“Whoa,” Holly said, laughing. “That’s some wishful thinking, huh?”

I left the drawer open and turned back over, pulling Holly on top of me, kissing her and running my hands all over her body until she was the one reaching into the drawer and making the next move.

Her hand shook as she dropped the red-foiled package between us. I caught her wrist and pulled her hand toward my mouth, kissing her palm. “Are you sure?”

“Yes,” she said. “I trust you.”

There wasn’t a trace of doubt in her eyes to cause me to hesitate, so I didn’t.

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

DAY 4: 2009. 12:01
A.M.

“Maybe your dad put the condoms in the drawer,” Holly suggested.

“Maybe.” I rested my chin against her chest, looking over every inch of her skin from the shoulders up, memorizing the scars and the marks that made her Holly. I was trying my best not to let the sadness consume me, to remember that I’d made the right choice. She combed her fingers through my hair and I pressed my forehead into her chest, closing my eyes briefly, inhaling the moment. I almost wished this was the bottom of the ocean and I could just die right here like this.

I lifted my head when Holly’s fingers slowed down and eventually her hands lay heavy on my head. Her eyes were fluttering shut. I leaned in and kissed her, lingering with my mouth against hers long enough to get her eyes to open all the way again.

“You’re falling asleep on me,” I said, smiling.

“I’m sorry.” Her lids started to drift closed again, but she gave me a lazy smile in return. “I’m just happy … and that makes me tired.”

“But you haven’t told me yet,” I said. “Is this going to make a hot diary entry?”

She laughed but her eyes stayed closed. “I think maybe it’s just too perfect to put into words. We’ll see.”

I got up and put on the jeans I had worn earlier and went to the kitchen, my heart heavy and beating hard as I got a glass of water and dumped in the clear powdered solution that I knew would ensure Holly’s inability to keep me, Courtney, and Marshall from leaving in a few hours’ time.

Luckily, her eyes opened when I returned to the room and she gratefully took the glass from my hands and chugged half of it. That would be more than enough. It was almost too easy.

I pulled her into my arms, her cheek falling against my chest, her heart thudding slow and steady against my skin. I waited until the heaviness of her body against mine increased and I was sure the drugs had kicked in. It wasn’t until then that I finally allowed a few tears to fall and my emotions to completely consume me.

I lay awake until a quarter to four, then slid out from under Holly, covered her with a blanket, and folded her clothes neatly, setting them on the bed beside her. Courtney’s gentle knock on the door sent my heart racing again, but I hadn’t changed my mind. I leaned in to give Holly a quick kiss on the forehead and then left the room, shutting the door behind me.

DAY 4: 2009. 6:40
A.M.

“I can’t believe we’re taking a commercial flight,” Courtney whispered into my ear as we took our seats in row thirty-five, seats E and D. “And coach? Seriously?”

Chief Marshall leaned over from his seat at the end of the middle section. “It was the only way they wouldn’t catch up to us. Once we get to Norway, we’ll have to lie low for about eighteen hours before we get on the boat.”

The word “boat” sent my heart into a full-out sprint. Courtney squeezed her eyes shut beside me and drew in a slow breath.

We had both been provided with passports identifying us as Landon and Marie Robertson. I’m not sure what Marshall’s name was but the fact that we hadn’t even traveled under our own names would mean it would take a while for Dad and anyone else to catch us.

It wasn’t fear that consumed me and forced me to reach into my bag for the heavy sedatives, it was the thought of Holly and Dad waking up to find us missing. To know that we weren’t coming back. Ever. Adam would explain it all eventually. It killed me to think about what they would feel in that moment. No way in hell could I sit on a plane for seven hours absorbed in those thoughts.

I held the bottle out to Courtney, offering her a pill. She shook her head and patted a book in her lap. “I’ve got some things to do.”

My head started falling toward my sister’s shoulder over the next few minutes and I was out like a light long before takeoff.

*   *   *

The small cabin Marshall had rented near the coast had the most amazing views. I couldn’t even fathom how this much beauty could exist in moments as dark as this one. Since I’d passed out on the flight over, only waking when Courtney shook me for a full five minutes after the plane had emptied, I was a bundle of nerves now, watching Courtney sleep in the bedroom we were occupying with two twin beds and creaky wooden floors. I’d already forced myself to eat a sandwich and take a shower and there was nothing left to do but sit in the dark and think about what would happen the next morning.

I nearly fell right off the bed when Courtney’s pink cell phone buzzed loudly from somewhere in the bag lying at the foot of her bed. She stirred and then woke up, her eyes first meeting mine, wide with panic.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered as if the caller on the other line might hear us talking. “I had to bring it in case I wanted to call at the last minute.”

I squeezed my eyes shut. “Just turn it off, please.”

She fumbled around in her bag and finally powered off the cell phone. That seemed to instantly increase the distance between us and everyone else we loved. I needed that distance if I was going to make it through this. “It was Mason.”

My eyes opened again and I tried my best to look sympathetic. “I’m sorry. It must have been hard leaving him.”

She nodded, her eyes glistening with tears. “But it’s not like you and Holly. I’m fourteen, Jackson. I like him a lot but I don’t think I’m capable of that kind of love yet, you know?”

“Yeah, I do.” If she was even twenty percent like me at age fourteen, then I totally understood why she wasn’t there yet.

“Honestly, I’ve only really loved two people in my life—you and Dad.” Her voice trembled more with every word. “And there’s part of me that feels like I’ve always known it would just be you two and that I wouldn’t get older. Not like you.”

I didn’t know if that was true or not but it hurt so much to hear either way. It wasn’t fair that I got more years to live than Courtney. We were twins. It should have been equal.

Courtney must have seen my face because she quickly added, “I didn’t mean it like that, I really didn’t. I’m so happy you had the time to become
you
and be in love with Holly. It’s like you got to be a man. At least for a little while.”

I smiled and then stood up, walking across the room and sitting beside her, giving her shoulders a squeeze. “I missed you so much. All those years, it was like I couldn’t be a whole person again. Maybe it’s best that we’re doing this together so one of us doesn’t end up alone without the other.”

She leaned her head against my chest, tears dripping off her nose and onto my hand. “Do you ever think about what’s on the other side? What if it’s just the same thing all over again?”

“Like reincarnation?”

“Maybe.” She sighed heavily. “If it
is
like that, then I want you to promise me something, just in case I’m not there or another version of me doesn’t know what I know.”

“Okay, what should I promise you?” I wiped the tears from her face with the sleeve of my sweater. “Should I get married to Holly Flynn and have six kids?”

She glanced up at me, her eyes wide and amused. “How did you know I’d say that?”

I laughed. “Because you told me that before, when I visited you in the hospital.”

“So maybe we have nothing to worry about then,” she said, laughing with me. “Sounds like all the versions of me think alike.”

Marshall opened the door then, interrupting our conversation. “Jackson, can I see you in the other room please?”

I shrugged when Courtney gave me a questioning look and then headed across the hall into Marshall’s room. He had a white plastic bag in his hands and a roll of packing tape.

“Raise your shirt,” he ordered. I did as I was told and then turned around, my back to him when he gestured for me to do so. “This bag contains two capsules with a potassium cyanide solution in the event that you arrive at our destination with your heart still beating and your thoughts intact.”

“Is that going to happen?” I asked warily.

“It’s highly unlikely but to not send you prepared would be barbaric,” Marshall said. “Your sister’s survival is impossible but there are two capsules just in case a miracle happens. Do not swallow these whole, crush them between your molars. Brain death will occur within minutes of consuming the poison and then your heart will stop beating shortly after.”

I held still while he firmly taped the bag to my back. It would be hell to rip off if I did need the suicide pills. When he was finished, I turned around to face the man I had once considered a murderer. And even knowing the truth, I still couldn’t see a good person. Not exactly. “Are you scared?”

“Fear is not something I allow myself to feel,” Marshall said.

“What do you feel, then?” I asked. “You must feel something or else you wouldn’t be able to do this. You wouldn’t care.”

He shuffled over to the dresser and fiddled with a stack of papers. “That’s where you’re wrong, son. I’m just another Thomas given a direction and a purpose that I feel is the only right way. And I plan to do everything in my power to ensure the outcome is the one I wanted. The difference between him and me is that I was shown a different path early on. The same path that you happen to be on yourself.” He looked up at me then, taking in the stunned expression I hadn’t tried to hide. “Don’t mistake my choices for nobility. I’m playing a chess match, just like Thomas, only we have different strategies, different endgames, and different teachers. My teacher, Frank, believed in free will above all things. Thomas’s teacher believed in peace above all things. Do you see where our lines cross?

“And Agent Meyer? He believes in love first. The goal of a good leader is to find what drives his soldiers and feed that need. I let him have you and your sister, and Eileen, too, before she was killed. He exceeded every expectation I ever had for him. If it weren’t for Eileen, you, and Courtney, he would have been good … above average … but not the great agent that he is today. We wouldn’t have made the progress we’ve made toward this goal of stopping Dr. Ludwig and Thomas.”

I couldn’t even begin to wrap my head around the complexity of his thoughts and the tremendous difference between him and me and how we viewed the world and people. And just the simple reminder of Dad and how much he loved me and Courtney caused a lump to form in my throat. I cleared it away quickly before asking, “What if I can’t? What if I get there and I just can’t make myself … you know … take the plunge?”

Marshall opened a dresser drawer and removed a gun and held it out for me to take. “You might need this. And to answer your question, I have no doubt you’ll follow the plan precisely just like you jumped off that rooftop without hesitation to save Holly.”

I tucked the gun into the back of my pants and nodded. He was probably right, but there was no way to know for sure until the time came.

Courtney was asleep again, her cheeks bright red with a brewing fever. She had to be in so much pain right now. It killed me to think about it. Instead, I lay on my bed for a couple hours, sitting on my thoughts and good-byes. I hadn’t really gotten a chance to talk to Adam after the big moment in the park and making our plans. He was the only one I really needed to say good-bye to since he knew what would happen to me and Courtney and I hadn’t said a thing to him. Without hesitation, I found myself reaching for Courtney’s phone. I turned it on, searched for Adam’s number, and then quickly sent him a text.

Thanks for always being my constant. Take care—Jackson

Then I turned the phone off and stuffed it away before he had a chance to reply.

Bucket list officially complete.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

DAY 5: 2009. 6:10
A.M.

Chief Marshall drove the large boat like he’d been doing it all his life. Courtney and I sat in silence as the chilly morning air hit our faces along with the splashes of cool ocean water.

“Why do we need such a big boat?” Courtney asked. “This is made for, like, thirty people.”

I stared straight ahead, my stomach in knots, my arms and legs numb with fear. I could have really used a bottle of whiskey or even a couple beers. “Maybe a smaller boat would get sucked down the hole.”

Suddenly, just when I thought the blue water could go on forever in the same state, the swirl of a whirlpool came into view. It looked exactly like I’d imagined and even in my scared-shitless state, I couldn’t help running over to the edge to get a closer look.

Marshall stopped the boat a little ways away from the phenomenal maelstrom. Even with this distance separating us, the force of the swirling waters rocked the boat back and forth. Courtney was at my side now, her trembling hand resting on top of mine, both of us staring out across the water.

“We’ll have to swim out a bit first,” Marshall said, coming up behind us.

I closed my eyes, trying to hear my thoughts over the loud hammering of my heart. When I opened my eyes again, there was so much adrenaline running through my veins, it was like I could see more clearly, details were so precise. My fingers buzzed with electricity. I could dodge five bullets at once if I needed to.

But no, I’ll be drowning myself instead.

“I guess we’re not getting scuba equipment,” I whispered to Courtney, loud enough for Marshall to hear.

Courtney glanced warily over her shoulder at Marshall, her face filled with panic. “Can we have a minute? I just need a minute.”

“Of course.” He walked away, heading toward the opposite side of the boat.

“What are you going to think about?” Courtney whispered. “What’s the last thought that will sit in your head forever?”