Through The Leaded Glass (34 page)

Kate let her go with a weak smile. She was
back. September fourteenth. Exactly when she’d left.

Which meant she wouldn’t miss her
appointment.

But she’d miss a hell of a lot
more.

Alex.

Had he gotten away from Frederick? What
happened after she’d left?

There had to be a way to find out.

She looked around. This place was loaded with
reproductions and all things medieval. Dare she hope for a
bookstore or library?

Kate ran down Guildsman’s Way, looking at the
shops. Costumes, leather goods, potpourri and herbs, jewelry, a
hatter’s shop…

No bookstore.

Just then trumpets sounded. The
joust.

Alicia! She should be there by now. Maybe she
was waiting for Kate to get back from her medieval excursion and
they could compare notes.

More importantly, Alicia could tell her how to
go back.

Kate stopped in the midst of the crowd and
ignored the toddler trampling on her dress.

Go back?

Yes.

Yes, damn it. She was going back. He didn’t
get to make decisions for her just because he loved her. She was in
charge of her life. If Jay taught her anything, it was that. Alex
could take his misplaced chivalry, however well-meaning, and just,
well…

She took a deep breath. He could take his
misplaced chivalry and modify it to include her because she was
going back to live in his world. With him. With all its risks and
dangers because he was what she was missing in her life. He and
William and that misplaced, but well-meaning, chivalry.

She smiled. She was going to talk to Alicia,
find out how to do it, then get her daughter and together, they’d
go back to Alex.

She joined the crowd headed toward the lists.
Alex had loved her enough to put her life, her desire for her
daughter, ahead of his own wishes. That wasn’t the action of a
self-centered, lord-of-the-manor, king-of-all-I-survey type like
Jay. Oh, she’d known it when she’d been with him, but when push had
come to shove, when it’d been time to put up or shut up, Alex had
stayed true to his word.

And she was going to be true to
hers.

She’d said she loved him. She wasn’t going to
give up on it now. She wouldn’t let a little thing like five
hundred years keep them apart.

The trumpets sounded again as they entered the
arena. People sat on low-rise stands on one side across from a
large stage mimicking a Tudor town where the “Queen” and her
“court” gathered to watch the knights. Colorful banners hung from
lamp posts, red, green, orange, yellow, blue…

Shelton blue.

Kate left the stands and wandered to the far
side of the field where people sat on the grass or hung on the
rails surrounding the lists. A service gate for the cast stood just
around the bend.

She looked at her outfit. If it was authentic
enough for real medieval people, why not now? She could bluff her
way with the best of them.

Taking a fortifying breath and trying to look
as if she belonged, Kate slipped through the service
gate.

She nodded to one of the “squires,” biting
back a brittle laugh when he “m’ lady”-ed her, and hurried on to
the blue banner.

She didn’t see anyone. Including
Alicia.

She couldn’t have misjudged this. Alicia
had
to be here.

She bent down behind the stairs leading to the
stage. What had Alicia said? “I’ll touch base with you under the
royal blue banner.”

She’d tricked her once with the
medieval
lingo, maybe this was another clue. “Touch base”
could mean talking to her or contacting her some way.

Kate looked around. The back of the stage was
the rough side of the painted boards the public saw, a skirt of
sorts held together by posts driven into the ground. She looked up.
Directly above her was the blue banner.

She ran her hand along the inside of the post,
stopping at each joint of the skirt board. At the fourth one, she
found it. A lipstick case had been pushed into the
joint.

She worked it out and opened it.

Kate,

I’m sorry I couldn’t explain everything to
you before I went and that we never got a chance to meet up “back
then,” but I had some things of my own to take care of. I still do,
which is why I’m not with you now. I know you’re probably really
mad at me, but you have to admit it was fun. I mean, who else ever
got to experience what we have? Well, maybe others, but Master
Griff won’t tell me, so I’ll have to go with “not many.” Anyway, I
returned, but only to tell you I still have things to do here. I
just wanted to let you know that I’m okay and
please don’t
hate me too much. I thought it might work out for you this time,
but since you’re weren’t there when I last was, I guess it
didn’t.

Love, Alicia

“
My lady?” A knight at her shoulder
startled Kate. “The joust is about to begin. Will you take your
seat please?”

“
Um, yes, I mean, no, I mean…” She
took a deep breath and folded Alicia’s note. “I’m not supposed to
be here. I have to go.”

She ran past the startled knight, a few other
late arrivers to the “court,” and back through the service
gate.

Alicia wouldn’t be able to help her now. She
had to find her own way back.

She ran back down Guildsman’s Way, almost
trampling a boy and his dragon. She dodged him, then a pair of
teenagers who had removed the wrappings of their newly purchased
swords—the management would be evicting them shortly for that—and
ran toward the pirate ship.

Master Griff could help her.

She ran across the gangplank and into the
crowded interior where hurricane lamps buzzed with some
questionable wiring. The pirate tipped his hat as she
entered.

“
Master Griff, where is
he?”

“
Who?” the pirate asked.

“
Master Griff, the salesman. He
sells shields here? Which side?”

The pirate removed his hat and scratched his
head. “I’m sorry, my lady, but there’s no Master Griff
here.”

“
Of course there is! You introduced
me to him last wee—I mean, about an hour ago.”

“
Afraid not, ma’am. There’s never
been anyone here by the name of Master Griff. But if it’s shields
you want, head left.”

Kate thanked him and maneuvered her way as far
left as she could. Customers toting num chucks and war clubs kept
getting in her way. On the one side of the ship dozens of swords,
maces, battle-axes and other nasty implements of torture hung in a
large display case. On the other—

No wooden boxes filled with shields. Just a
glass countertop filled with knives. What shields there were hung
on the wall behind the extremely large and burly pirate currently
showing a double-edged dagger to a middle-aged man.

The shields were all factory-produced,
perfectly gleaming, brightly adorned pieces of faire regalia. Not a
dented, dingy one in the lot.

Kate worked her way to the other side of the
ship. Maybe he’d moved over here, though she knew before she got
there she wouldn’t find him. It was as if he’d vanished as
completely as she had when she’d touched the window.

Fighting back the tears, Kate ran out of the
shop. Now what? The window was broken, Master Griff and the shield
nowhere to be found. That left only the dulled, dented
ring.

Her one hope.

She ran down the street again, looking for the
table where she’d first found it. There, beneath the orange and
gray banner…

Farley’s Family Jewels.

There was coincidence and there was
coincidence. And she didn’t believe in either.

The faire’s most famous pair of conquistadors
ran into her as she stopped suddenly in front of the
store.

“
Pardón, señorita,” Don Juan said
with all the gallantry of an era five hundred years ago. “Mi amigo
y yo, we would like to offer you the finest seat in the house for
our show. It is the least we could do after plowing into you like
Don Quixote tilting at his windmills.”

Kate waved her hand, not taking her eyes off
the store. There was a man inside, he wore orange and
brown…

“
Perhaps, la señorita would prefer
Miguel sing an ode to her beauty?” the other man asked.

“
Look, I’m sorry,” Kate said, not
even glancing at the Spaniards, “but I have to go see a guy about a
ring.” She took a deep breath, squared her shoulders and entered
the store.

The man’s welcoming smile disappeared when
Kate strode up to the glass counter. “May I be of service, my
lady?” he said somewhat hesitantly.

“
Are you Farley?” From the looks of
him, unless Simon himself had traveled through time, she’d bet this
guy was a direct descendant.

The man nodded.

Kate brandished the ring on her finger. “Where
did you get this?”

The man looked from her face to the ring. He
frowned and reached for her hand. “I’ve never seen this before. I
wouldn’t carry something so… pedestrian. Though—”he got out his
loop and studied the emerald and whistled. “That is one quality
stone. Where’d you get it and would you be interested in selling
it?”

Kate let his words wash over her. This was all
so not right. “You’ve never seen it before?”

Farley ran his thumb over the stone as if
measuring it. “Trust me. If I had, I’d have remembered it. It needs
some work, but you’ve got an heirloom piece there.”

No kidding.

“
Are you interested in
selling?”

Kate shook her head. Get rid of her last link
to Alex? No way.

“
Well, perhaps you’d be interested
in acquiring something to complement it?” The man unlocked the
display case between them and pulled out a velvet-lined
box.

Calista’s necklace.

Kate sucked in her breath. Could
that
be her way back?

“
Where did you get this?” she
asked.

“
It’s been handed down in my family
for generations,” he answered. Sensing a sale, Farley Junior
removed the necklace and held it up. “Would you like to try it
on?”

Kate backed away, afraid to touch it. She
wanted to get her daughter first. “No. But can you hold it for me?”
She whipped her credit card out of her pocket, glad for the one
thing Frederick had done right by giving her her clothes
back.

“
Certainly. I’ll hold it for you
until the faire is over today.”

“
No, I mean, could you keep it for
me? Not let anyone else buy it? I’ll pay for it now and come back
in, say, a month or two?”

She was used to receiving that look he gave
her by now. “Sure, lady. It’s your money. I’ll put it in the vault
and give you a receipt.”

Kate signed the credit slip, careful not to
even brush by the box.

It couldn’t be a coincidence that she’d found
him and the necklace. It just couldn’t be.

She’d come back when she had her daughter, get
the necklace, then travel back in time to be with Alex.

It was just too coincidental not to
work.

Chapter
Thirty-Three

Three Months Later

Coincidences sucked.

The necklace didn’t have one ounce of
time-travel ability.

Kate ran the stones through her fingers again,
touching each one to the recently cleaned emerald ring, looking for
some way, some Rubik’s Cube sequence to send her and Emma back to
fourteen eighty-seven.

Nothing worked.

Kate looked down at the sleeping baby in her
arms. It’d been three months since she’d seen Alex. Three months
since that trip to the faire, and her life since had changed as
drastically as it’d had when she’d time-traveled. She was now the
proud, adoring mother of one beautiful baby girl. She’d taken leave
from her job while she acquainted herself with all the nuances of
caring for a baby, enjoying each moment spent with her little
bundle of joy.

But always in the back of her mind was the
image of sharing this special time with Alex and
William.

They should be together.

God knows, she’d tried. She’d packed a bag
full of baby items and medicinal supplies, a few creature comforts
like chocolate and paperbacks, eschewed the packages of disposable
diapers and jarred baby food, because, really, how much could she
hope to carry with her, made sure Emma’s vaccinations were up to
date, then called a messenger service to deliver Calista’s
necklace.

But now, here she sat on her sofa, bay window
at her back, sleeping six-month-old in her arms, two bags of
supplies hanging from her shoulders, the RenFaire costume billowing
around her, and the necklace didn’t do squat.

She’d been so sure. She’d just
known
the necklace would send her back. Why else would she have found
it?