West of Paradise (24 page)

Chapter Thirty
One Year Later

K
atherine was still on the Cape when she received the message, having made the place her home. She’d grown accustomed to the sound of the sea, the smell of salt, and sand at her doorstep, and it felt more like home than any place else.

She hadn’t had much company since she’d been here. Dee had come down once and they’d met in Hyannis for lunch. And her grandfather had come. Begging.

She’d agreed to meet him at the Squire in Chatham. “I want the truth,” she’d said after they’d got their drinks.

“I know you must hate me Katie, but I swear on my honor I never intended anything to happen. I only meant to delay. It was a flat tire, for God’s sake.”

“For what?” she’d asked, finding it hard to believe anything could be worth what they’d lost. His daughter. Her mother and father. He knew it, too, shook his head as he tried to answer, knowing his words weren’t enough by a long shot.

“It was the merger, between McLeod and Tecto.”

Katherine remembered. She knew the history of the company. That merger had been the ushering in of a new era for McLeod Industries. They were everywhere now and without Tecto . . .

“It was an accident,” her grandfather said. “I will go to my grave with the guilt of it.”

They’d left it at that.

For a second she thought it might be him, because of the subject line: please reply.

But it was Louis Cade. Wanting her to come back. She actually laughed out loud when she read it.
As if I would step foot back on that island
, she thought, deleting the message and returning to the book she’d been reading.

She got a second message the next day and three more on each subsequent day, despite putting him on her blocked list. He found a way around whatever security protocols she wrote, and she wasn’t expert enough to stop him.

What do you want?
she wrote back.

Package has been sent,
came the reply.

The following day she received a message with an attachment: a round trip ticket to LAX. The message said only to come at once and that it was important.

Damn him! Damn that Louis Cade.

But of course she went. She’d made her decision as soon as she wrote the first response.

❧

Three days later she was back on Cristobel Island, in the company of Louis Cade.

“Are you going to tell me why I’m here, Louis?” she asked crossly as the came into the library.

“Yes, I am,” Louis said.

She looked at him. “Well?”

“You should probably sit down. This may come as a shock.”

❧

Jack was living in a condo on Sanibel Island when he got the letter. It was the same damn printing that had drawn him in to start with.

He debated whether to burn it or read it, not sure if he wanted to open that can of worms or leave it closed and squirming in the dark. He turned it in his hands while he watched the sunset from the dining room balcony. It made him feel peaceful to watch the orange twilight fade into the dark, hear the waves rolling up along the sand, smell the tangy salty fragrance of the sea, but not the sea he had known.

No, this was a warm sea, a sea meant to cleanse and wear slowly away at those things you didn’t want anymore. And he had thought he was almost there, at the place where he was mostly content once again with his life.

Until he got the letter. It was brief and to the point:

Dear Jack,

Please come at once. There has been a development.

Louis Cade

There was a ticket clipped to the paper.

❧

The following morning found him on a plane heading west sitting in between two guys in suits who never shut up the whole time. He was almost happy to see Miss Adjani waiting for him, looking much the same as he had left her: stunning.

“I hope this is going to be interesting,” he said. “Because I was actually beginning to enjoy myself again.”

Miss Adjani gave him an apologetic smile. “I’m sorry, Jack. Louis wouldn’t have asked if it wasn’t important.”

They took a shuttle over to the private runway where Louis Cade’s plane was waiting. It was déjà vu until they landed late that day. It was raining hard and the wind gusted around the island, warm but strong. It took them a good twenty minutes to make shore through the chop.

The drive to the compound was torturously slow. As soon as Miss Adjani put the brake on they both jumped out and grabbed what they had, making a run for the front entrance.

Inside, lights gleamed everywhere, from tall nooks in the walls, hanging from the ceilings, and sitting on tables, creating bright spots that led from the entry to the dining hall then down to the lower hall. Directly across from them recessed lights lit the way down the short corridor, an invitation to the gallery and library.

“Where is he?” Jack asked, not wasting time.

“He’s in the library, Jack, but it was a long flight; maybe you’d like to freshen up? Put on some dry clothes?”

“No, I’d just as soon know what’s so important I had to come.”

Miss Adjani shrugged. “As you wish.”

She took him to the library, and it was almost exactly as he remembered it but for the addition of a few paintings he thought were new and the woman he thought he’d never see again.

Her eyes were just as blue as he remembered.

❧

Katherine dug her fingernails into the palm of her hand.

It was Jack. It was really Jack. He wasn’t wearing a frock coat or a hat but she recognized him just the same in his sopping wet jeans and oxford and corduroy jacket. He looked like a drowned professor from a liberal arts university.

Tears sprang to her eyes and her heart thumped in her chest, but she blinked quickly and forced a smile. How had he managed to blend in so well? She would never have guessed he hadn’t been born to the time period and to see him here, now . . . alive.

Before she could think what to say Louis spoke from her side.

“My apologies, Jack. I know you don’t like surprises, but as it turns out the development I spoke of involves both of you. I hope you can work things out between you. Oh, and to be clear, until about a half hour ago, Katherine was under the assumption you were still living in 1881.”

Louis exited the library without another word, taking Miss Adjani with him.

Jack stared at her, shaking his head in disbelief. The bemused expression that said she’d done something unexpected again crossed his face.

“I . . . I can’t believe I’m seeing you,” she said at last. “I can’t believe you’ve been here all this time and I didn’t know. When did they tell you?”

Jack swallowed. “I knew pretty much right after you left,” he admitted.

“But how did you know?”

“It was the twenty questions thing. I didn’t notice it right off because it was as familiar to me as it was to you. It wasn’t until you were gone that I realized it was a later invention, from our time.”

“And then?”

“I came back, but they wouldn’t tell me anything about you.”

Katherine nodded, remembering the privacy clause she had signed.

“It took me a while to find out where you were, but I couldn’t get in to see you. They said you were incommunicado.”

Katherine winced, remembering how she’d retreated those first few months. “I’m sorry, I . . . I got tired of the press,” Katherine said.

Neither of them said anything for a while, not sure which words were right, or wrong. And then they both spoke at the same time and laughed, slightly embarrassed, and Jack played the gentleman and insisted she go first.

She felt her face flush. “I wanted to say I’m sorry,” she said, “for leaving.”

“It’s all right. I understand.”

She shook her head. “I . . . I’m not sure you do. You don’t know how many times I wished I’d never come back, how many times I thought about Harlan’s place. I even went there, can you believe it?”

“Really?”

Katherine blinked again and smiled. “It isn’t the same,” she said.

“No, it wouldn’t be,” Jack agreed.

Katherine took a deep breath, feeling it hitch in her throat. “Can I ask you something?”

“Anything,” he said.

“When you first got here, did Louis ask you what you wanted?”

Jack nodded, looking straight at Katherine. “He asked me, if I could have my heart’s desire . . .”

“W-would your answer be the same?”

“No,” Jack murmured, taking a step toward her.

Katherine met his gaze, not flinching though in all truth was she was afraid of the answer.

Jack closed the distance between them. “It’s you, Katherine,” he whispered. “It was always you, from the first moment I saw you.”

He was kissing her before she could say anything else, wrapping her in his arms and holding her tight and it was exactly like her dreams, except better, because it was real. She kissed him back.

“I missed you. I missed you every day.” He wiped the tears from her eyes.

“Oh, Jack,” she said, her voice catching. “You have no idea. I thought you were gone . . . forever . . .”

“I’m sorry, I wanted to barge into your private compound so many times . . .”

“Oh my God, I wish you had.”

He kissed her again and they had almost a full two minutes of bliss, wrapped in each other’s arms, before an apologetic cough interrupted them. They broke apart slowly, though not completely, neither wanting to let go entirely.

“Sorry,” Louis said from the doorway, meaning it this time.

“What now?” Jack asked, holding tight to Katherine’s hand.

“Well, if you recall, I said there had been a development.”

Jack glanced at Katherine, pulling her a little closer. “I thought this is was what you meant.”

“I wish it were.”

“Why don’t we sit and be comfortable,” Miss Adjani said, gesturing toward a grouping if chairs near the stone hearth at the end of the room.

Jack and Katherine reluctantly followed her to the end of the room, taking seats next to one another, fingers entwined, while Louis and Miss Adjani sat across from them. Within moments one of the employees appeared as if on cue with a tray and a carafe of coffee.

“Let’s hear it,” Jack said as soon as he had his coffee in hand.

“Yes, tell us why you’ve asked us here,” Katherine echoed.

Miss Adjani cleared her throat. “I will. We will. But first, I think we should explain that this place was not meant to be what it is now. Louis originally intended it to be a simple retreat from the madness, a place where there was nothing to remind of the world beyond, a place where a person could forget about whatever it was they might want to forget and just be, here, now. But then of course he discovered the way to go back.”

“I never intended to share it with anyone,” Louis said. “It went in the face of everything I imagined the island to be; not to mention, I thought it would be dangerous. But then I discovered people
had
gone back, and it was actually necessary they do so. That’s how you were chosen. I knew you both needed to go back to do what you did.”

“But what if we hadn’t?” Katherine asked.

“I already knew you had. It was simply my job to facilitate getting you there.”

“But why didn’t you just tell us?”

“Well, I did.”

Katherine and Jack both gave Louis a look that said otherwise.

He gave a sigh. “I told you as much as I dared, as much as I thought I should. If I had said you had to go back in time and kill your own great-great whatever grandmother, would you have done it?”

Katherine didn’t answer and Louis nodded, not without sympathy.

“Okay, then why are we here now?” Jack asked.

“Ah, yes, well, as I said, there’s been a development.”

“What
kind
of development?” Jack asked, not liking the sound of it.

“You need to go back again.”

“Are you kidding me?”

“I’m afraid not. And believe me, I don’t like this any more than you do. This is highly unusual. I’ve never encountered anyone who was supposed to go back more than once.”

“And why on earth would I agree to go back?”

“You can’t ask this of him,” Katherine interrupted, appealing to Miss Adjani. “Not after we’ve found each other again.”

“Oh, we’re not asking him to leave you,” Miss Adjani said. “In fact, we’re asking you to go together. That’s the development; you’re both supposed to go back together.”

Katherine stared at Louis in shock, and then Miss Adjani, before shaking her head adamantly. “Do you have any idea what I went through? What Jack went through? He was almost killed—twice!”

“I know,” Louis said gravely. “And believe me, I considered not contacting either of you—except that I knew there was no other way. You have to go. You and Jack both.”

“And if we don’t?” Jack asked.

Louis stared back at both of them. “If you don’t, then Duncan MacCabe will not return to Scotland and father anyone.”

Jack swallowed. “Duncan MacCabe? But that’s . . . that’s my . . .”

“Exactly. That’s why you have to go.”

“This is crazy,” Katherine said.

“I know. It seems that way. But if it’s any consolation, you will be somewhere warm and beautiful,” Miss Adjani said.

“Oh? And where might that be?” Katherine asked, a hint of sarcasm in her tone.

“Greece,” Miss Adjani said.

Katherine’s face softened. Greece. That
did
sound nicer than the Old West. And she’d be with Jack.

“Wait,” Jack said, “When?”

“1821.”

“Wait a minute, that’s right at the start of the Greek War of Independence.”

“I know.”

“But that’s going to be dangerous!”

“It’s all right Jack,” Katherine said. “I’ve already been kidnapped, shot at, and almost hanged. Anyway, I can’t let you not get born after I’ve just found you again, can I?”

“But this is . . . would be . . .”

“I know, dangerous, which is why you need me.” She gave him her best smile and he tried to return a doubtful look, but then he started to laugh. She laughed, too, and pressed herself closer to him, kissing his still damp cheek.

“It will be just like Harlan’s place,” she said. “Paradise.”