Clandestine (5 page)

“I appreciate your cooperation in this matter. I have also been making inquiries into all newcomers. This new paid companion of your aunt’s, Miss Ashton, is it? From whence does she hail?”

Kit held her breath.
Oh no
.

“Yorkshire, I am told. She had been staying with the vicar but had glowing references from Lord Curtis.”

Kit grimaced. False references she wrote with her own hand.

See, this is why you should never, ever tell a falsehood
, Virtuous Angel whispered.

The answer seemed to mollify Linwood, however, as the drumming fingers stopped.

A knock sounded at the door.

“Come,” Arthur called. The door swung open.

“I say, most sorry to interrupt.” Jedediah Knight’s nasal words skittered down Kit’s spine. Like squeaky chalk on slate, that voice. “My mother sent Miss Ashton to fetch her embroidery, but Miss Ashton has not yet returned. Have you seen the chit?”

Kit could almost see Jedediah’s long nose twitching as he spoke, flushed and clashing with the striped orange and pink waistcoat he wore.

Both Linwood and Arthur disavowed knowing her whereabouts.

Jedediah grunted. “Hopefully she has not taken to sneaking whiskey in her chambers. Mother’s last companion spent every day half-sprung.”

The
nerve
of the man! Kit clenched her teeth. Though if anyone could drive someone to the bottle, it would be Jedediah Knight. Kit could hardly blame the woman.

Truth be told, if her situation became any more intolerable, whiskey could start to look like a viable solution.

Which merely underscored the point more fully. The sooner she found her brother, the better.

Daniel could try to shut her out of his life, but Kit was made of stronger stuff. She just needed to find him before he did something colossally stupid.

And even if he did, she would not abandon him. Ever.

Chapter 3

Duir Cottage

Herefordshire, England

February 18, 2014

T
hirteen yellow roses sat gracefully in the windowsill as Marc pulled up to Duir Cottage—their cheerful blooms mocking the seriousness of his current situation.

Granted, the roses looked right at home with the honey-colored stone and thatched roof of the cottage. Ivy covered the fence surrounding the house, and an enormous old oak tree arched protectively over the entire building. The sunny yellow roses were just golden gilding on all the oozing English charm.

Marc had arrived at Duir Cottage six days ago. Both Emme and James were currently in Seattle and had reacted to the blackmail threat much as Marc expected.

James, laughing: “What a devilish mess. Adds a dash of excitement to everything, doesn’t it?”

Emme, puzzled: “Are you sure this isn’t one of your friends’ ideas of a practical joke? Like they just made a super lucky guess?”

Marc had no real answer for either of them.

Unfortunately, Emme and James had an off-the-grid trek through Mongolia planned, starting the next week. And in Emme’s own words, “No blackmail traveling disaster is going to derail this trip. Period.”

So . . . yeah. Emme and James would come straight back to Duir Cottage in March. In the meantime, Marc intended to uncover information about the blackmail and stall for time to sort out a solution.

His efforts, so far, had been disappointing. The blackmail letter had been slipped into the post box and that was it. No more letters had arrived. No one suspicious had been seen lurking around the property. Google found no digital chatter anywhere about the portal.

Just nothing. Not a single lead. All Marc could do was hope the blackmailer contacted them again.

He
hated
waiting. Simply sitting around, everything on hold.

Not cool.

So after a couple restless days, he took the bait and purchased thirteen (obnoxiously chipper) yellow roses and placed them in the mullioned front window, just as the letter had directed. His attempt to flush out the blackmailer. The flowers waved an affectionate ‘hello’ every time he pulled up to the cottage, looking absurdly pleased with themselves.

Why would a blackmailer choose
yellow
roses? It seemed so . . . friendly. Neighborly, even.

He had pointed this out to Emme’s best friend, Jasmine, when she called to check up on things.

“They’re worse than a puppy. So sunshiny. It’s like they want me to pet them or something,” he had said.

Jasmine chuckled. “I would pay good money to see you pet roses—”

“Jas . . .” Marc warned.

“—but I hate to be the bearer of bad news. Yellow roses don’t always represent friendship. In many societies, they mean the exact opposite: treachery and death.” Trust Jasmine to set him straight. “Besides, there are thirteen of them. That’s never a good number of anything.”

“Nice. So you’re telling me that my cheery roses secretly want to stab me in the back with their thorny claws?”

“You have to admit, it would make for a great movie. You could call it
Thorns of Menace
.”

Silence.

“You think you’re hilarious, don’t you?” Marc made his voice suitably grumpy.

“Absolutely.” Her laugh sounded tinny through the international phone connection. “Just imagine. You could dress up yellow roses in little dread-locked wigs and make them tiny chainsaws out of grass—”

Marc had practically hung up on her.

Stupid, stupid flowers.

But even with the roses displayed as directed, there had been no more notes from the would-be blackmailer. Just complete radio silence.

One more thing for his overflowing Inbox of Frustration.

La Pochette’s scathing review of
Croc-nami
had gone viral. Insanely viral. Marc had begun avoiding the internet altogether, as the memes, parodies and links were non-stop. Some enterprising person had even created an animated gif that moved between Marc saying, “Later, alligator,’ hefting that chainsaw above his head, and the big-eyed anime crocodiles pleading,
Beware the Croc-nami.

Emme found it hilarious. Apparently, anyone with an internet connection found it hilarious.

It wasn’t as if Marc couldn’t laugh at himself. Really, he could. And often.

The problem was his future as an actor in the industry.

Would he ever be able to live it down? Or was he now doomed to forever be the
Croc-nami
guy?

Though
if
knowledge of the time portal were leaked to the press, Marc could claim that it was a promotional stunt for a new movie. A time travel romp with Marc portraying a Navy SEAL turned swashbuckling pirate. It would be more believable than actually
having
a time portal in one’s cellar.

Ninja Pirate 4
, anyone?

He could only imagine the heyday that FauxPause would have with
that
juicy bit of news.

Driving past the front of Duir Cottage with its jaunty flowers, Marc parked the car in the old stables and collected his groceries from the backseat, pondering the blackmail problem.

Even if the world found out about the portal, it wasn’t as if the portal were a revolving door, allowing any passerby to stroll through. It wouldn’t work for just anyone.

No. The portal had a mind of its own. An agenda.

Jasmine, resident mystic and knower-of-all-things-weird-and-arcane, explained it best.

Past and future formed an eternal
now
. So to the portal, time was not a river, but a vast ocean where the lives of every person who had ever lived existed simultaneously as concentric rings rippling on its surface. As if each life were a stone dropped into the water by some unseen hand. And where the expanding ring of one person became tangled with that of another, the portal provided a link, a pathway that could be traversed.

But only those who had a connection with someone in the past could travel the portal. Therefore, as a method of transportation, the portal was decidedly unreliable. It usually just sat in the cellar, a slab of carved rock pulsing with unseen power. Marc had spent the last two years jokingly touching it, rubbing it like a lamp, tempting fate to release a genie.

Nothing ever happened.

Not that he expected anything would. How could he—a football-loving, martial-arts-doing, twenty-first century actor—have anything in common with a nineteenth century person? The very idea was laughable.

Shrugging, Marc walked through the overgrown back garden to the kitchen door, balancing his groceries while he dug a key from his jacket pocket. He had the key in the lock and the door open before he noticed that the room was not as he left it.

Nothing had been disturbed per se. The modern kitchen with its marble countertops and stainless steel appliances sat gleaming to his left. The huge, rough-hewn dining table still rested directly in front of him. And the enormous fireplace with its wingback chairs and overstuffed sofa beckoned cozily to his right. Everything in its place.

However, the unexpected addition of a beaver top hat and old-fashioned greatcoat draped over one of the dining table chairs caught his attention. Stark and ridiculously anachronistic.

Beyond the table, he had a clear view of the central hallway. The door down to the cellar—and the time portal—stood open. A large antique-looking wooden trunk sat in front of it.

Every one of Marc’s senses instantly ratcheted to high alert.

Silently, he set his keys, phone and bag of groceries on the wooden kitchen floor. Stepping fully inside, he quietly closed the door. He scanned the room, noticing no one, hearing nothing.

Had he interrupted someone just arriving in 2014?

The entire set-up smacked of planning. One didn’t accidentally
fall
through the portal with a trunk that size. No, someone had prepared to do this. And was that someone still in the cellar, bringing up more items?

Most importantly, was
this
the person behind the blackmail attempt? It was too much of a coincidence to not be related. If so, what was this person’s link to him and the twenty-first century?

Stealthily, Marc edged around the table, cursing his squeaky leather shoes, praying he was being quiet enough. He touched the greatcoat as he crept by—both it and the top hat identical to those James would wear.

He paused at the edge of the hallway, listening again. Nothing. No one.

Should he say something? Try to lure the person out?

As usual, he felt no fear, just the heart-pounding rush of adrenaline. He had spent over twenty-five of his thirty-two years studying martial arts and street-fighting. His bare hands had always been protection enough.

Cautiously, Marc peered around the door frame, through the trapdoor in the floor and down into the cellar. The wooden stairs descended steeply to packed earth, empty. But he couldn’t see into the back of the dark cellar where the portal hummed. Was someone down there?

Cloth suddenly clamped around his mouth, a strong hand pressing into his face. Hard.

Marc breathed in a sickly sweet smell, making him instantly woozy. But years of martial arts training sprang into action, despite his suddenly spinning head. He shot back an elbow, delivering a sharp blow to his attacker’s ribs, getting a low grunt as a response.

Male
, his mind absently noted. His attacker was definitely a man.

Marc hooked the unknown man’s leg with his own, while simultaneously grabbing the arm which held the cloth over his mouth and twisting it outward painfully, breaking the man’s hold. Allowing Marc to snatch a breath of much-needed fresh air. Even so, the room spun crazily.

Marc sensed blackness creeping in at the edges, enhancing his light-headedness, making his movements less precise than usual. Relying on muscle memory, Marc used the twisting momentum of his body to throw his attacker to the ground.

But the man was not entirely unfamiliar with street fighting, and Marc was sluggish. So instead of tumbling down the stairs alone, the attacker had time to grab Marc, sending them both spinning toward the ground. Marc found himself face-to-face with a brass button embossed with a vine-covered crest. And then they were both rolling, rolling down the wooden stairs.

Marc instinctively braced for impact, but it never came.

Instead, he just continued on . . . falling, falling, falling . . . the button flashing before his gaze, searing into memory.

Until blackness took him.