Time Masters Book One; The Call (An Urban Fantasy, Time Travel Romance) (31 page)

“Hmm. Tomorrow afternoon?”

“That would probably work. I think
tha
…”

“Oh my
gaawsh
!” Kitty blurted as she looked past Tomy, her eyes riveted on whatever had gotten her sudden undivided attention. What ever it was, Tomy immediately felt sorry for it.

“What is wrong?” Shona asked concerned.

“Oh! OH! I’ve never seen anything like
that
befor
e!” Kitty kept closing
her mouth only to have it fl
op open again as she gawked.

“Oh, what now?” Tomy, annoyed, turned to see what idiotic thing had caught Kitty’s attention this time.
Probably a man.
It was usually always a man.

He
was a man, all right! Tomy turned back around to look at the
table-top
, trying as best she could to keep her composure for Shona’s sake. After all, Tomy had to set the good example. Lord knew Kitty hadn’t.

The
best laid
plans often go awry. “Lordy!”

“What? What is it?” Shona asked, trying to see what would make ev
en
Tomy
hold her breath. She fi
nally stood to see over Tomy’s head, but saw only an endless row of bookshelves. She
sat down and looked from one fl
ushed face to the other, eyebrows raised in disbelief. “I see nothing. So will one of you kindly explain why neither of you seems to be able to breathe?”

 
Tomy actually hit the surface of the table, the color of her face brightening even more as she caught her
breath
. Kitty just sat, craning her neck, still searching. “Wow…”

“Wow what?” Shona’s tone was becoming increasingly sharp.

“A man,” Kitty sighed.

“Oh, is that all?” Shona said, disappointed, having hoped for something of more interest.

“Is that all?” Kitty repeated, shocked. “You have got to be kidding!”

Tomy swallowed hard, still trying to regain her composure. “It was a man.”

“Tomy?” Shona asked simply as if intrigued.

Tomy glanced over her shoulder, and then quickly turned her attention back to Shona. “I know this goes against most everything I’ve told you, but I do have eyes, and now and then something is bound to catch them. And girl, let me tell you, they were just caught good!”

Shona g
lanced from one fl
ushed face to the other and shrugged. “Hmmm, I seem to have missed him. Pity.” She began to look over the math equations Tomy had given her.

Kitty nudged Shona in the ribs. “You wont’ miss him this time!” Her voice rose steadily up an octave, her last word coming out a high chirp. “He’s over there!” She began to bounce in her chair with excitement.

Tomy held onto one of her book
s with both hands, obviously fi
ghting the urge to g
rab another look at the magnifi
cent man she had glimpsed earlier.

“You two are acting ridiculous,”
Sho
na
commented dryly, her fact fi
nder voice now in place.

“
Willyoulookathimwillyoulookathim
!” Kitty’s head bobbed up and down as she spoke, her voice still sounding like air escaping from a balloon.

“No,
I will not. I have better things to do.” Shona returned to her math.

Tomy, unable to stand it any longer, slowly tur
ned herself around in her chair,
to sneak a peek without being obvious. “Oh,
Lorrrrdy
!” She closed her eyes, swallowed hard and let out the breath she was holding. “Shona, girl, you’d better look now before he disappears.”

Shona kept her face buried in the sheet of equations, occasionally marking an answer down. “Whatever for?”

“Because I’m telling you, honey, it’s not often you lay eyes on a man with looks good enough to make
my
mouth water!”

Shona looked up from her work and gave Tomy a bemused smile.

“Oh my gawsh, he’s looking right at us!” Kitty squeaked in time to the rhythm of her bouncing.

“I do not believe you two!” Shona exclaimed. “If you are going to act like this, I am leaving.” She moved to gather up her things.

“He’s coming this way, he’s coming this way!” Kitty breathed as her feet did a little tap-dance under her chair. She quickly covered her mouth to cut off her own excited squeals.

As if she
didn’t have the whole third fl
oor’s attention already, Shona thought as she stood up from the table.

“
Omigawsh
!
Omigawsh
! Don’t stand up!” Kitty was beside herself.

At least someone was; Shona certainly didn’t want to be anymore. “I am going to
fi
nd myself another table. I am getting nowhere sitting with the two of you,” she scolded as she slammed her work between the pages of a book and turned to leave.

He stood not twenty feet away leaning casually against one end of a bookshelf, two huge arms crossed over a massive chest, wearing a pair of grey sweats. He was huge, well over six feet and powerfully built, with strength evident not only in his physique, but his presence. He was looking right at her, his head cocked to one side, his tied back hair p
ouring over one broad shoulder like a dark waterfall.

Shona took in the sight all at once, a general picture
to be quickly catalogued and fi
led away. But something about him refused to let her just
toss
him into the back of her mind like Kitty’s prattle. No, not something about him, but the man himself, the look he was giving her. A
look which
plainly told her to stay.

It frightened her, and she was sure it showed on her face.

His eyes brightened at her, making he
r notice their color for the fi
rst time. They were an unusually bright green; very similar in color to her own, she realized. Th
ey softened as he off
ered her a light smile and her own eyes widened in return.

Shona dropped back into her chair, slamming her book onto the table as she did, making
Kitty yelp in surprise. She fi
xed her eyes nervously on her now-folded hands.

Tomy sat, studying her, a familiar smirk on her face. “See, honey. I told you so,” she whispered across the table.

“Shona, he’s looking right at you!” Kitty breathed.

“What!” Tomy exclaimed
,
her gloating now pushed aside. “Don’t you dare look back at him, girl!
”

“Why shouldn’t she look at him? There’s nothing stopping him from
staring at her!” Kitty argued.

“Don’t listen to this bubblehead! You just keep your eyes down and ignore him!” Tomy glared at Kitty.

“Well, it’s fi
ne for you to look at him and for me to look at him but not for Shona?”

“That was before he decided to check
us
out!” Tomy put a hand on the table near Shona. “It’s okay to look as long as they
ain’t
looking back.”

“Well,” Kitty started, disappointment heavy in her voice. “I don’t think you’re going to have to worry about it anymore. He’s gone.”

Shona breathed a sigh of relief as Tomy spun in her chair and saw empty space where trouble had stood. She also breathed easier. No confrontations with men today, not if she could help it! Especially after what happened at Stan’s the night before. Actually, Tomy and Kitty weren’t sure exactly what had happened last night. They only knew they’d never seen Shona act the way she did, and it caused Tomy more than a little concern. Tomy didn’t feel like protecting Shona, there’d been enough of that last night. It was what Tomy usually had to do if a man began to look at her, even before the girl’s counter dancing antics. Oh sure, Shona had som
ething about her that could defi
nitely attract them, and Tomy knew it wasn’t just looks. Yes, she was pretty, but her features seemed to teeter bet
ween beautiful and odd, almost E
lvin. At any rate, Tomy had had to verbally beat back more than one curious male while in Shona’s company.

Shona, unfortunately, didn’t quite know what to do when approached and would usually freeze like a rabbit caught in the headlights of an oncoming semi. Thankfully last night, she simply ignored the men, instead being too caught up in the music.

Highly educated, yes. Musically talen
ted beyond measure, a most definite yes.
Refi
ned and ladylike?
With the exception of the previous night, double yes. Keen to the ways of the opposite sex?

Very musically talented.

* * *

After two hours of Shona’s bowed head, Kitty’s chirping and Tomy’
s “Lordy,
Lordys
,” the women fi
nally got ready to leave the sanctuary of the library and head directly home. Well, perhaps not directly
;
Kitty was driving.

Dallan leaned against a pillar in the main lobby area of the library and watched them descend the wide sta
ircase that led to the upper fl
oors. He stayed back toward the shadows so as not to be seen as they chatted amongst themselves and walked past him toward the double glass doors leading outside.

The one called Tomy seemed to be the leader of the trio and dominated most of the conversations upstairs. The ‘chirper’ certainly did her share
of the talking, if one dared to consider what came out of the lass’s mouth talking. The one John referred to as the Maiden sat with her head bowed the whole time, barely uttering a word, instead engrossed in whatever the Tomy lass had given her before Dallan had moved in for a closer look.

He left the concealment of the shadows and carefully made his way through the maze of shelves, tables and humming, buzzing, paper-spitting contraptions. He pondered the events of the past few days, not to mention the past few hours, wondering which one to throw in the bloody heathen’s face once he got his hands on him! Kwaku had gotten him into this bizarre predicament; he was going to see to it that the heathen got him out as well.

Dallan seethed as he went, recollecting all that had happened to him, all tha
t been done to him, since he fi
rst found out about the… Muiraran. Drugged by Kwaku in Genis Lee, only to wake up to a nightmare world of metal carriages able to move about on their own and women running around in naught but their shifts. Clubbed over the head with a cane by Mother MacNab, who had to be at least ninety but with the swing of a blacksmith. Lugged about a small apartment and doted over by Angus MacNab, his newest keeper. O
n top of it all was the horrifi
c amount of sound constantly beating a path to his brain. He’d forgotten what it was like to be in a city, but a noisier, more frightening place he had never known. There was nothing familiar, nothing he could latch onto to strengthen his slipping sanity.

The only things holding him together were the presence of John Eaton and the burning desire driving him to do things he thought he never would, such as hunt down and capture a wee lass as the heathen insisted. But even Dallan had his limits.

* * *

“Well, what do you think?” John asked the Scot as he came surreptitiously down the aisle where the small company had been patiently waiting, in more ways than one. John waited for hope, any sort of hope that would mean the successful end of the assignment.

Lany waited for Dallan to get a clue
as to what was expected of him
.

Angus waited for it all to be over so he and his mother
could
live out th
e rest of their days as Zara
promised
as reward for helping
keep wat
ch over the Maiden
.

Kwaku Awahnee waited for lunch.

Dallan cast John a
‘huh?’
sort of look in response, sending his hopes
plummeting.

“Talk to me, Dallan,” John prompted as he placed himself directly in front of the big Scot who now leaned against a shelf, arms crossed over his chest, a troubled look on his face.

Dallan picke
d up the concerned note and off
ered him his attention at last. “I canna do this, John.”

John sighed. “Dallan, I’m sorry. I know how you feel about this. But it’s the only way.”

Dallan’s body tensed.

“Dallan, please,
e
verything is riding on this.
Everything.
If you don’t convince the Maiden of who she is, then…”

“Then what?” Dallan interjected. “What will ye do if I were to walk away from all o’ it right now? Why should I be the one to do this? Why not Master Lany here?” Dallan tossed his head in Lany’s direction, causing him to hold his hands up as if blocking the statement. “Or wee Angus?” he snapped.