Page 43 of Never Leave Me
“Ready?” Jasper was examining a clear test tube and the minuscule amount of clear liquid at the bottom.
If only she could have said good-bye to Harrison. The image of him in the seat across from her in the jet when they’d landed flashed into her mind. She’d felt his gaze upon her as she walked off the plane. It had seared her with each step she’d taken. She’dbeen tempted to turn around, walk back to him, and tell him that she did care, but that she was scared.
An ache worked its way up her chest into her throat. What if she never had the chance to see or talk to him again? Dr. Lionel might never wake her up from the coma, might use her to deliver the holy water until her body could no longer survive a comatose state and died. Even though she’d been prepared to die and leave Harrison only a few days ago before she was healed, somehow this parting seemed harder.
Jasper stared across the deserted castle grounds as though imagining what it must have once looked like. “If this works and you really cross over to the past, don’t forget about all the lives you’ll be saving. Not just my dad’s but many others.”
“I hope you’re right.” Especially for Josie and the rest of the children in the Serenity House.
Jasper lifted the test tube toward her lips.
“You want me to drink it here?” She took a step back. “Right outside the front doors of the castle?”
“I’d have you drink the holy water inside the castle, but we don’t want the family to accuse you of breaking in.” He gave her a once-over as if making sure her costume was in order. “After thinking through all the scenarios, we decided that here outside the door is the best place.”
A thousand questions rolled through Ellen’s head as they had all afternoon as she’d prepared to cross time. She wished she’d paid more attention to Marian’s descriptions of what life had been like in the past. But she hadn’t believed time crossing was possible and had dismissed Marian’s talk as crazy and coma-induced.
Jasper swished the liquid again. “According to everything I’ve gleaned, you should show up in 1382 on this exact day and this exact time, the evening of May 18. Since Marian crossed into Mayof 1381, she’ll have lived in the past for almost a year. But your dad will have yet to show up, since he didn’t cross until May 21, 1382.”
“In other words, I’m arriving about three days before him?”
“Yes. Make sure to utilize his expertise in getting the holy water.”
She didn’t understand how it was possible she could meet up with a dead dad and sister in the past. It seemed too ludicrous to consider. But here she was. About to venture into the unknown.
“Arthur’s speculations about time crossing indicated that people have movement through the quantum energy field to the time period they last picture in their mind. That means you’ll need to silently tell yourself 1382.”
“1382,” she whispered, trying not to think about the fact that she was about to fall into a coma and that she’d somehow, someway find herself in a completely different time and place. Or would she?
Jasper raised the glass container to her lips again. Even though her stomach tied itself in knots, this time she didn’t resist. As he tipped the flask into her mouth, she let the liquid drain onto her tongue. It was cool and tasteless. She swallowed the scant drops but felt nothing different, nothing out of the ordinary.I want to go to 1382, she told herself the way Jasper had instructed. 1382. 1382.
For a few seconds she stared back at Jasper, who was watching her face intently. The holy water—if it really was that—wasn’t working on her.
Then everything went black.
Ellen opened her eyes to complete silence. For a moment, she felt as though she were floating in the air, suspended above the world.
At the slam of a door, her body awoke to her surroundings, tothe sagging mattress underneath her, the overpowering sourness of body odor, and thick tapestries shadowing the bed.
“I do not care if she is asleep!” an angry male voice boomed nearby. “I shall question her now!”
Ellen bolted up in a tangle of sheet only to realize she was attired in a sheer chemise with thin shoulder straps and nothing underneath. Her heartbeat sped with a rush of wild thumping, and she dragged the foul-smelling sheet around her. Just in time.
The bed curtains jerked open, and daylight poured over her.
Was she in the past? And if so, apparently she’d been asleep for hours—all night and well into the next morning.
Her mind couldn’t work fast enough to make sense of the details—the antique furniture and simple sparse decorations, the plainly clad and cowering people in the room, and the imposing figure looming above her.
He grabbed her arm and dragged her from the bed. It was all she could do to keep hold of the sheet as her bare feet touched the floor, which appeared to be covered in long pieces of straw or dried grass.
She straightened and found herself standing in front of a tall man with thick arms and legs. He wasn’t overweight, but neither was he slender. His face was wide and his chin covered with a short beard that narrowed into two points. His dark brows angled above equally dark eyes. Although his hair wasn’t yet touched with gray, the lines in his forehead and next to his eyes showed him to be a man of some age and experience—in his forties, if she had to guess. His long black tunic had a decorative trim around the collar and cuffs and was fitted at his broad waist by a leather belt fastened shut with a silver brooch containing an intricate cross pattern.
“Who are you?” His gaze roved over her. Even though she’d attempted to hide herself behind the sheet, it was a scant covering,and the lust simmering in his eyes told her he was able to see much more than he should.
Something in the biting grip of his fingers on her arm warned her she had to respond right away with a satisfactory answer, or she would be in trouble.
“I’m Ellen Creighton.” She scrambled to remember the story she’d plotted with Jasper. “My sister is Marian—Durham.”
