Page 52 of Borrowed Time

Not that he had much say in the matter, and yet he hoped he and Devynn would be gone before then.

“I think I have to try,” she said. “Honestly, after that first successful experiment, I was ready to head over here, scoop you up, and beam us back to the twentieth century.”

“Or the twenty-first century,” he replied, and her shoulders gave an odd little hitch, as if she wasn’t quite sure how she was supposed to respond to his comment.

“Whichever,” she allowed. “But Jeremiah convinced me that wouldn’t be very safe…or smart. On the other hand, that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t be doing whatever I can to safely expand my range so I know we’ll end up where we need to be.”

Baby steps, as his mother might have said. True, sending yourself forward in time for the greater part of a day was probably a little more than a baby step, but it was also nowhere near the same as trying to travel decades…or even a century.

“All right,” he said. “I can see why you should try that next. What’s the plan?”

“Jeremiah told me we could send him a note when we’ve decided what we want to do.” Devynn paused there and sent him a brilliant smile. “First, though, I want to get something to eat. Experimenting with time travel can work up a real appetite.”

They had a quiet meal at the hotel restaurant, one uninterrupted by any Wilcoxes…or by anyone else, for that matter. Devynn obviously hadn’t been joking about her appetite, because she consumed much more food than anyone in that wasp-waisted corset should have been able to manage, although by the time she was finished with her plate of ham and scalloped potatoes and green beans, she decided against dessert.

“Maybe with dinner,” she said, a twinkle in her blue eyes, and Seth could only smile. She was clearly cheered by hersuccess that morning, and she had every reason to be. They had much farther to go, of course, but he thought that maybe…just maybe…they were beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

To that end, they went up to his room after lunch and composed a quick note to Jeremiah, one that told theprimusthey were ready to go on to the next step and that he should let them know what a convenient time might be. The wording was vague enough that Seth was confident no one would be able to glean any real information from it, even if they had the temerity to open the envelope and peek at its contents.

Of course, they would still do their best to avoid that situation, which meant hiring the boy who loitered around the hotel lobby in the hope of being able to shine some shoes for the princely sum of five cents, their payment of a whole nickel accompanied by a stern warning that Mr. Wilcox would certainly know if the envelope had been tampered with.

At those words, the boy — who looked like he was probably eleven or twelve, with messy blond hair and quick hazel eyes — blanched a little, although he said stoutly, “I won’t touch it, sir. Mr. Wilcox will have this letter in a flash!”

And he hurried off, envelope clutched in one hand, his speed showing that he was more than happy to be paid such a huge sum for what was, after all, an easy enough task to perform — especially since Seth guessed the boy would hand off the note to Mrs. Barton rather than confront the fearsome Mr. Wilcox in person.

“Now we wait,” he told Devynn after they went back upstairs.

She nodded…but also looked almost impatient.

“I’m tired of waiting,” she said. “I want to be done with all this and back where — well, wherever we’re supposed to end up. I suppose it was interesting for the first few days, getting to see what my hometown looked like all these years ago, gettingto meet Jeremiah Wilcox in person after everything my mother told me about him, but we don’t have a life here. We’re just sort of in limbo.”

Because they were alone, Seth allowed himself to reach over and take her hand in his, although he forbore from kissing her because the draperies were still open.

“It’s hard,” he agreed. “But we’re working toward fixing this. Right now, the important thing is to not let ourselves get discouraged.”

Her fingers tightened on his. “I know,” she replied, then gave him a lopsided smile. “I suppose I’m just tired of wearing this corset.”

Understandable. “You’re doing amazingly well,” he said. “And who knows? Maybe all you’ll need to do is one or two more trips in time, and after that, Jeremiah will think you’re ready to go back where we came from.”

“Here’s hoping,” she replied, then paused. “What do you think we should do with the amulet once we’re back?”

“Put it in a safe and forget about it,” he said at once, and knew he wasn’t joking. While it might help them get back to his time — or to hers, since they still hadn’t made any kind of real determination about that — once they were safely there, the thing needed to be locked up and forgotten about. The artifact was far too powerful…and too much of a temptation…to be left lying around where someone might try to use it.

For a moment, it looked as though Devyn wanted to argue with him, since her lips parted and it seemed as if she had something to say. But then she released another breath. “You’re probably right. I’d like to think no one in my clan would misuse it, but I can’t say that for sure. I’ve got hundreds of relatives I barely know, so it’s really hard for me to say what they would do if they found out something like that amulet existed.”

The McAllister clan of his era was much smaller than that, of course, but Seth was equally uncertain.

Actually, as much as he hated to admit such a thing to himself, he doubted very much that his brother could be trusted with a relic like the amulet. He’d already shown how he would go to great — and illegal — lengths to achieve his ends. Maybe he no longer had to worry about impressing his lost love now that he was engaged to theprima-in-waiting, but Seth still knew Charles would come up with some way to use the amulet to improve his life, whether that was gaining greater personal wealth or merely enhancing his powers so they might be more on a par with his soon-to-be wife.

Either way, it was a scenario Seth had no wish to see play out in his clan.

“Then we’ll make sure to lock it up no matter where we go,” he said.

Devynn leaned her head against his shoulder, obviously not caring whether anyone could look inside the window to see what they were up to. And really, he supposed that was the sort of thing a younger sister might do with a brother she trusted and looked up to. He couldn’t know for sure, not when Charles was his only sibling. When he was a small boy, he’d asked his parents for a little sister, and they’d only smiled and said their family was perfect as it was.

Now that he was older, he knew they were only doing what everyone in his clan did — keeping their families on the small side so they wouldn’t completely overrun tiny Jerome. True, there were plenty of McAllisters in the neighboring towns and much more far-flung places like Prescott and Payson and Wickenburg, and yet those who had the good fortune to have remained rooted in the little mining town generally did whatever they could to stay there.

But it was good to have Devynn this close to him, to be able to smell the sweet perfume of her hair and merely enjoy how alive she was, how real…how precious.

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