Cynda inhaled deeply, which she instantly deemed a mistake. After a prolonged coughing fit, she shook her head at her own stupidity.
Never were that smart, were you Lassiter? The grin came instantly. She had a name, and it had stuck. Though her mind still resembled a moth-eaten sweater, some things were clearer than they’d been before the Nothing Time. She sensed other people’s emotions more strongly than before. Danger registered more clearly, almost like a scent in the air. There had been benefits to misplacing her memories. Minimal time lag, for one.
Cynda shifted her Gladstone to the left hand to keep her right free. The pistol was in that pocket, though she didn’t expect to use it. Rovers weren’t gun sorts of people, though they’d been trained in how to fire some of the older varieties. Most preferred a Neural-blocker. A lot less messy, but frowned upon by TPB.
Her first inkling that she’d lost some of her Victorian savvy was when she went to cross a street and forgot to look in all directions. A hansom rounded the corner at a brisk clip and she had to lurch back onto the kerb to keep from being flattened. Then she felt a tug on her skirt, followed by the rapid patter of retreating feet. One of the toolers had just nailed her. She dug into the pocket and found a few coins missing. Fortunately, the bulk of her money was in the Gladstone. Her interface, buried in the secret pocket, remained safe.
“Money in boots, except for a few coins,” Mr. Spider advised from her shoulder. “That’s what you used to do.”
“That I had forgotten,” she grumbled. She’d given a lot of thought and preparation to this journey, but the “taken for granted” parts of her job weren’t mentioned in the run reports. Those would give her the most trouble. All the street savvy she’d relied on in the past was either missing or forgotten, making the danger seem much more tangible than before. She would just have to trust her instincts. She knew who her friends were here. She knew some of her enemies. In the middle was a lot of gray.
Gray could get me dead.
Since she couldn’t very well open the case and move the cash about on the street, she tightened her grip on the Gladstone and set off again, leery of what other traps lay in store.
It took a few hotels until she found one that had a room. When the clerk mentioned her accent, as he called it, she claimed to be from New York. That always did the trick.
He consulted his register. “I have only one room available. It has a sitting room with a separate bedchamber. It comes with attendance.”
Which meant you had a domestic fuss over you. That sounded good. A maid could bring you hot water for baths. “So why is it so busy?” she asked, signing the register.
“Between Guy Fawkes Day, the opening of Parliament, and the Lord Mayor’s Show, rooms are at a premium,” the clerk replied.
As he turned to retrieve the room key, his words hit home. “Guy Fawkes Day?”
The clerk turned around. “Oh, of course, you’re an American. You may not be aware of our celebrations. It is in honor of Guy Fawkes, who attempted to blow up Parliament as an act of rebellion. It is also called Bonfire Night.”
“Remember, remember, the fifth of November,” she murmured, her mind awhirl.
The clerk beamed. “I see you’ve heard the rhyme.”
As he selected the key and finished the paperwork, Cynda spied a newspaper lying on the counter. Pulling it toward her, she checked the date.
Sunday, November 4 1888
That wasn’t right. She was supposed to have arrived in London on the thirteenth of October, the night Nicci Hallcox met her Maker.
Off-time. It’d only happened to her once before, when she’d come to Victorian London in August to find a missing tourist. She would have blamed this episode on chron operator error, but she knew Morrisey wasn’t capable of making such a basic mistake.
Keeping her apprehensions to herself, she allowed the porter to carry her Gladstone to the room. Once she’d tipped him and shooed the dutiful maid out the door, she retreated to the bedroom and reset the interface for the night Keats’ life had slid off the rails.
OK, let’s try this again.
The overpowering smell of the river made Cynda’s stomach lurch. Why was she here at the edge of the Thames? She was supposed to be a short hike from the Charing Cross Hotel. She glanced down at the interface. The dial was blank. She gave the stem a twist. Still blank. A sharp shake did nothing to rectify the problem.
Her pulse began to race. What the hell is this?
Just then, she heard the creak of carriage wheels and the snort of a horse. Cautiously, she stepped back into the shadows.
The driver was heavily cloaked against the night air and kept looking around, uneasy. The carriage door swung open and a figure climbed out.
“This will do,” he said. “It’s a short haul to the river, and he doesn’t weigh much.”
He?
The voice registered. Dalton Mimes, the crazy author in the asylum, the man who’d killed Chris Stone. But what was he doing here? Cynda shrank farther back into a nook near a storage shed, worried he might spot her.
Meanwhile, another man exited the carriage. He was tall and wore a dark coat, his back to her.
Turn around.
With effort, Dalton Mimes and his companion pulled something out of the vehicle. It took her a moment to realize it was a body. As they adjusted the weight between them, she caught sight of the face. Bile rose, scorching her throat.
Chris. She was off-time again. This was the twenty-third of September, the night her lover had been murdered and his body thrown into the Thames. For some reason, she’d been brought here to witness this moment.
As they hefted his lifeless corpse, her eyes filmed with tears. She blinked to clear them.
“Let’s get it done,” the man ordered. He didn’t move like a Victorian. That puzzled her—if he were from ’058, her interface should be registering his ESR Chip. Unless he took it out. She didn’t have one, after all.
Mimes complied, and with much tugging and complaining, Chris’ body was carried to the pier and tossed into the Thames like a sack of unwanted puppies.
At the sound of the splash, Cynda’s hand dove into her pocket for the firearm, the ants inside her screaming for lethal revenge.
“It won’t bring him back,” she heard from her shoulder.
“I don’t care,” she hissed.
“It may make things worse,” Mr. Spider said.
“How could it be any worse?”
“Trust me, it can,” he nearly shouted.
The voice of her conscience had never steered her wrong. She took three deep breaths, trying to calm herself. There was no way to change the timeline now. Chris was gone. Forever.
He deserved so much better than this.
She forced herself to remove her hand from the pocket, clenching it into a quivering fist.
The cloaked man turned and she finally saw his face in the muted light. Cynda studied him intently, channeling her anger into action. He was tall, with a rigid stance. That seemed an important clue. Frantically, she rummaged in her mental filing cabinets for a name.
“That night in Wapping?” Mr. Spider suggested.
The memory surfaced. She heard the sound of a gunshot echoing off the brick warehouses and Harter Defoe collapsing, blood pouring from his chest.
Copeland. She’d called him Ramrod because of his stiff posture. He was one of the two TPB minions who’d come to collect her when she’d been hauled back to 2057 for trial. The man who’d threatened to shoot her and wounded Defoe instead. Somehow, this jerk was tied to Mimes. But why would TPB want Morrisey’s nephew dead?
“Taking the trash out,” Copeland joked, gesturing toward where Chris’ body had just splashed into the Thames. “Piece of cake.”
“You son-of-a-bitch,” she spat.
“Did you hear something?” Mimes asked, craning his head around.
Cynda froze. She didn’t sense the presence behind her until right before the hand covered her mouth, pulling her further back.
“Quiet. Don’t move.”
Fear coursed through her as her hand closed on the pistol again. She would have pulled it out if Mimes hadn’t moved closer, staring directly into her hiding place. He seemed to be looking right at her. She waited for the shout of discovery. Instead, he blinked a couple of times, then shook his head and backed off.
“Time to go,” Copeland called. The men loaded into the carriage and with a clatter of hooves the conveyance rolled away.
“They’re gone,” her companion said, releasing her. As she turned, a figure appeared out of the air. It was Defoe. Or at least someone who looked like him. With the shape-shifters, you never knew.
“How do I know you’re really you?” she asked, still edgy.
“Who else would it be? I’m the one who always saves your skin.”
Her eyes lit on the flower in his lapel. “Tell me about the rose.”
He smiled. “You said the one I was wearing didn’t have the right scent. That was when I knew you still had a working brain. Satisfied?”
She nodded. As she watched, he shifted into a distinguished gentleman, a lion’s head cane in hand. He had a white bloom around him, like he was edged in a silvery cloud. She’d seen that once before at the crazy place. The man who’d claimed to be her brother had one of those.
She decided to test a theory. “Change back to the real you.”
He looked confused. “What?”
“Just do it.”
After a quick look around, he shifted to the form she knew as Harter Defoe. The white outline vanished.
“Okay, now change back.”
He easily reverted to the Victorian gent again. As she’d expected, the white edging returned.
“I’ll be damned.”
“What are you going on about?” Defoe asked.
“Nothing,” she said. “Why didn’t Mimes see me?”
“I went invisible and took you with me.”
“Neat trick.”
“It can be useful. So, what brings you here?”
“I didn’t intend to be here. Right now, my interface seems to have a mind of its own. I was supposed to go back to the night Keats was framed. I ended up on the fourth of November instead. When I tried it a second time, I was here, in September.”
“Playing their games again,” he muttered. “I landed in New York City. Couldn’t get to London no matter how I tried. Then some messenger boy handed me a ticket for a steamship, so I’ve spent the last week floating across the pond in First Class, regretting the wasted time.”
“So why are you here?” she quizzed.
“Testing a theory.” Defoe looked around again, suddenly uncomfortable. “We need to compare notes—something we were going to do the last time, but were interrupted.” He straightened his jacket. “Oh, and one other detail—if anyone asks, I’m Malachi Livingston.”
“Livingston,” she murmured. Why does that sound familiar?
“Dr. Montrose has probably mentioned me. I’m on The Conclave.”
“You’re one of them?”
He shrugged. “I got bored. Retirement is fine, but I have to keep my hand in. Let’s find a dining room with a quiet corner. I need to rest.”
Is this what she had to look forward to? Being bored to tears and having to content herself with meddling in the time stream?
“Pity they don’t have sushi here,” she lamented.
He shot her a look. “You actually like that stuff?”
“I do now. And Tai Chi. Chess, even. I’m getting pretty good at it.”
Defoe knit his brows. “I take it Theo oversaw your care?”
“Sure did. He helped me put my mind back together. It took a lot of effort to keep the shrinks out of the way.”
“Did he mention the Duckling Effect?”
“The what?”
“Oh, Theo,” he said, shaking his head.
“Look, I’m tired, so speak English.”
“You still have the attitude, I see.” He offered his arm and they strolled along the docks. “Just don’t shoot the messenger, all right?” She nodded.
“Klein told me that after NMR treatment, the patient often adopts traits of the person most involved in their therapy. It’s sort of like a baby duck patterning after its mother. Your sudden love of sushi is a good example.”
Morrisey hadn’t told her any of that. Part of her was sincerely irritated. Then she shrugged it off. “Beats not knowing who the hell you are.”
A chuckle. “You have me there.”
“Anyway, there are worse people to pattern myself after.”
Defoe’s eyebrow quirked upward. “True, but I wonder if the world is ready for a Morrisey-Lassiter hybrid.”
“Then they shouldn’t have screwed with my brain in the first place.”
She paused and turned toward the water, thinking of Chris as he made his solitary journey downriver. She couldn’t remember their last time together. It was squirreled away in her memories, just out of reach.
“You’ll remember it eventually,” her delusion assured.
“He was a great kid,” Defoe said softly.
She could only nod, clenching her teeth to hold back a new round of tears.
At least now she knew the truth: Mimes had been involved in Chris’ death, but he’d had help from TPB’s minion.
Someone who isn’t crazy. Someone who could pay the price for murder.