“You have no reason to trust me,” she said in an accent that made me think of bullfights and ornate cathedrals and plazas baking under the hot sun. “But I had to try. Brandon is in much danger. And though I have told him this as well, I think he is not willing to take it seriously. This is why I have come to you.”
I wanted to make a rude noise, but instead found myself asking, “What kind of danger?”
Gabriella sighed. Her perfume, honeysuckle and tuberose, clashed against the delicate pear-scented eau de toilette I’d dabbed behind my own ears. The sickly sweet mélange assaulted my senses as I stepped back.
Next to her, I felt knobby and wooden, a crudely made puppet conversing with a creature of mist and water.
Her deep green eyes seared into mine. “Blasi, he is watching me always, so I have only a moment. Before we came to this place, Celia told him I am not to be trusted. The woman does not care for me, and I do not blame her for this, as the feeling is . . .”
I could almost see the wheels inside her head turning as she searched for the right word in English.
“Mutual?”
She nodded. “I despise her.” She said it so simply and sincerely that I felt the smallest crack open in my defenses.
“Yeah. Join the club.”
The sleek bun at the nape of Gabriella’s neck didn’t allow even one strand to fall as she nodded. “Sí, sí. I would join this club. But as much as I wish to place the blame on that bruja, I do not believe she knows all of what he has planned.”
“Of what who has planned?”
“Blasi.” For a second, I thought she might spit on the floor. “You know this man?”
“Only by reputation.”
“He works for Brandon’s mother and grandmother. This you know, yes?”
I nodded.
“And that he has been ordered to bring back this . . . this thing of Tesla’s. This also is no surprise to you?”
Yeah, well, good luck with that. Besides Mac and Doug, he’ll have to get past Peters and his six guards.
When I refused to acknowledge the question, Gabriella waved it off, as if my answer was of no concern anyway. “You have men there, guarding the lab. This Blasi knows.”
I tried not to react, but something in my face must have alerted her.
“Sí,” she said. “What you do not know,” she added, “is that Blasi has more. Many, many more. More than eight men were deployed from the future. Blasi has hired many others from this time. And he has a spy in Tesla’s employ, an assistant of Tesla’s named Jacobo. For much money, this assistant tells Blasi everything Tesla has done. According to Jacobo, the professor tried to create the enhancement from Blasi’s design many times, only to fail. He sent three men through the machine he created, along with this new element. Two returned after three days, as is usual. The third man was never seen again. Only days ago did one of the enhancements—?taken into the past by a man named Emil Stefanovic—?succeed. Emil was gone for a total of six days, nineteen hours, and forty-three minutes. This prototype is the only one that works. And according to Jacobo, Tesla trusts no one with its location. Only he knows where it is hidden. Blasi,” she said. “He knows this. And he will use whatever means necessary to get it.”
Frigid tidal waves of dread began to swell inside me.
“I have to go,” I said, skirting around her.
“Espere! Por favor, tengo algo más!”
“What?” I snapped, eyes on the door. “What is it?”
“I need your help,” she said, green eyes locking with mine. “Blasi . . . Blasi va a matar a Brandon.”
I was nobody’s physical threat. My normal means of causing people injury generally involved me tripping and falling on them. Though once, I’d accidentally impaled Collum’s hand with a seventeenth-century dinner fork. But though I was shorter than the dancer by more than a head, I had blind, seething panic on my side. Before I knew it, I had her shoved up against the wall. Behind her lay wallpaper covered in watercolor renditions of Chinese characters. A likely priceless geisha figurine fell from a table and shattered.
I didn’t care.
“Did you just say,” I snarled, “that Blasi is going to kill Bran?”
Eyes glittering with tears, Gabriella nodded.
“Talk.”
She tried, but my forearm was still pressed against her throat. I swallowed. Made myself let go. Stepped back.
“I—?I’m sorry,” I said. “It’s just—”
“No. No. This is understandable. I am glad of your fear, because Brandon has none. I told him all this, but he is a man who believes nothing can ever truly harm him. You know this about him?”
“Unfortunately yes.”
“Blasi has spoken to Do?a Maria of taking Celia’s place as leader of the Timeslippers. He has convinced her that her granddaughter has become desequilibrada . . . loca. That she uses resources unwisely, concerned only with the rescue of Michael MacPherson. Maria is old and tired, yes, but she is not blind. She . . . She told Blasi that if he succeeds in this mission, she will honor his request. Brandon will try to block him, and Blasi will not let that happen. I may despise Celia Alvarez, but Blasi? He frightens me. I think, should this thing come to pass, none of us will be safe. Blasi must be stopped.”
“How do you know all this?” I asked, as my mind tried to decipher what this could mean for all of us.
She wouldn’t look at me as she shrugged in that way only European women can pull off. “He believes I am with him.”
“Why would he think that, Gabriella?”
Throwing back her shoulders, raising her chin high, she said, “I am doing what I must to protect mi familia. Would you not do the same in my place?”
She turned away before I could utter a word, but I saw it when her hand rose to swipe at her cheek. My mind began to fill in the gaps, and my stomach rolled over.
Because I was pretty sure I knew what she had to do to gain Blasi’s trust.
“Gabriella, I—”
She shook her head without turning. “No,” she said, her voice hoarse. “I have known Brandon for a very long time. He is like the brother to me.” She took in a shaky breath. “I think he should go back with you to your home, para siempre. It will never be safe for him to return to the Timeslippers now.”
For an instant I let the idea consume me.
Bran at Christopher Manor. The two of us, together every day. Mornings in the library, tucked up, debating literature and history and travel. Lazy horseback afternoons on the moors. Sunsets by the river. In the evening we could smile at each other across the dinner table.
And the nights . . .
We both startled as someone rattled the doorknob. The maid who’d helped me peeked around the door. “Pardon me, miss. Is everything all right?”
Gabriella’s voice lowered to a bare husk as she slipped away. “Brandon is in Blasi’s way, Hope, and he will stop at nothing. Help him. This is all I ask of you.”
I found Phoebe seated at the fortuneteller’s table. Her eyes looked bleary, but at my approach she stood.
“Sorry,” she said. “I’ve never been able to resist having my fortune told and . . .” She trailed off when she noticed my expression. “What is it? What’s the matter?”
I shot a look at the gray-haired gypsy, who was counting stacks of coins. I took Phoebe’s arm and led her away, quickly filling her in.