That was one of those moments that had forever altered my way of thinking, my way of seeing the world, and I knew it wasn't only due to the deaths, but rather the stark realization that I had no control over any of it.
This was another of those times.
I leaned back against the tree, my mind caught in an endless spin as it tried to make sense of my situation. A part of me still wanted to believe that it was all a show, the figments of a mad man’s imagination. He was tricking me. It had to be that. It couldn’t be anything else.
But it wasn’t like I could actually prove him wrong. My ankle made it almost impossible to get up on my own, and at the moment, I wasn’t even sure if it would help. If Gracen was as deranged as I knew he must be to expect me to believe his story, he would be on me before I managed to get more than a few steps. And based on what I'd seen, there wasn't anyone around who'd hear me if I yelled for help.
I looked over at him as he lay on the ground in the protection of the brush, his hat cocked over his eyes as he snored. He'd fallen asleep for about an hour before but had already woken twice at the slightest sounds. Between my ankle and not knowing the terrain, I had little hope of being quiet enough to escape without him knowing it.
I rested my head against the tree behind me, weighing my options. I knew my training would be next to useless with my ankle, unless he was stupid enough to come too close. It was the cane that worried me. It was a weapon that could be an issue if he was willing to use it. At that moment, I wished I'd revealed to him that I was a woman. Men had a habit of underestimating women, so if I tried to do something, he would probably try and grab me instead of using the cane. That would put me at an advantage.
I watched him turn over, and when the next couple gunshots fired without waking him, I knew this was my most likely opportunity. I rolled over slowly, the twigs under me snapping as I moved. I kept my eyes locked on his back, seeing if the sounds would wake him. I remembered how my father could sleep through a marching band, just to wake up at the sound of my brother’s cough from across the hall.
I prayed Gracen wasn’t similarly tuned to breaking twigs.
When he still didn’t move, I risked pushing myself up, placing most of my weight on my good leg as I used the tree for support. The pain in my bad ankle had subsided, but I decided against trying to see how much I could use it. With any luck, I could get far enough without testing it too much, and, by morning, I'd be far from here, and the swelling would have gone down.
I started to move in short hops, looking back once or twice to see if he'd woken up, but his back was still to me, and it didn’t seem like that was going to change. Feeling bolder, I quickened my pace, quickly pushing through the trees until I found myself on an open plain.
That was when I realized that Gracen wasn’t crazy after all.
There was no highway. There were no flashing lights from distant ambulances or the honking of cars. There were no towering buildings in the distance or the familiar Boston lights shining back at me. As far as I could see, the city I knew didn't exist.
I could see Boston, but it was nothing like the Boston I knew.
Gunshots blasted again, and I finally realized what was weird about them. They weren't the gunfire I'd become accustomed to in the army. Those weren't modern guns. Even if there was some sort of rational reason for why I kept hearing shooting from Boston, I could think of no reason as to why they'd be using old-fashioned guns.
I didn't know how or why it had happened. I had no explanation for any of it, but it didn't matter.
I was in the past. In 1775 Colonial America, to be specific.
I tried to remember what I'd read in my brother’s book and realized that walking towards Boston would either get me killed or worse. The battle would be across the river, but still too close for comfort. Even if the British soldiers assumed that I was a man, I doubted they'd be inclined to be compassionate to someone sneaking around the night before a battle.
Even though I now knew that Gracen was telling the truth about where – when – I was, he was still a stranger, and I didn't know where his loyalties lay.
I did, however, know that I'd feel more comfortable with colonists than I would with the Brits. I didn't know where the army was, but I figured I would have better luck finding a “rebel” colonist out there somewhere than trying to sneak past the British army in Boston. My ankle was slowing me down, but I didn’t stop moving. I needed to get as far away from here as possible, especially since I knew exactly what was going to happen tomorrow.
I found a road, keeping to the tree-line as I followed it, ready to hide if anything seemed out of the ordinary. My training was starting to kick in, my senses more alert, the darkness around me slowly becoming more comforting. I tried to make as little noise as possible, stopping as often as I needed to rest in the hopes that I wouldn’t collapse from fatigue. The truth was, I didn’t know half the extent of my injuries, and I had a feeling that my ankle was the least of my worries. The knot on my head throbbed in time with my pulse, which wasn't exactly comforting.
I heard the sounds of footsteps ahead, and I quickly pushed deeper into the woods. I crouched down, making sure to keep my weight off my bad ankle, and watched the road. I listened closely, and soon, the sounds of men came closer. A few minutes later, they appeared, their coats brown, their muskets held against their shoulders as they patrolled down the road.
Brown coats, not red ones.
Colonials.
This was my chance to get with people I'd be able to trust. I pushed myself to my feet, but just before I could make my presence known, something hard hit the back of my head.
My knees buckled as the world around me started to go dark, and the last thing I knew before I passed out was that a pair of arms kept me from going to the ground.
I came to with a deep, excruciating pain in the back of my head that made everything else I was feeling in my body seem like mild aches.
My vision swam in and out of focus, and when I was finally able to blink the world back into proper view, Gracen was sitting a few feet away from me looking like he'd just been to hell and back. His hat was missing, his curls in wild disarray. His overcoat was draped over his shoulders like a cape, and he was holding his cane in both hands.
I tried to move, and it was only when I couldn’t that I realized my hands had been tied together behind my back. The ropes dug into my skin, and I had a feeling that even if I were able to break free, the numbness would render them useless for a while.
I glared at him, but he merely raised an eyebrow in response.
“Untie my hands,” I demanded.
His grip on his cane tightened even as his frown deepened. “Do you have any idea what you could have done?”
“I have a pretty good idea, actually,” I hissed. “I'm not as stupid as you seem to think I am.”
“You almost got us both killed,” he hissed back. “You’re a sympathizer, aren’t you? Or is it more than that? Are you a spy? A soldier?”
“None of the above,” I said. And it was true. Technically. The army I was a soldier in didn't actually exist yet. “I just needed to get away from Boston.”
“Why?” Gracen asked. Then, before I could decide whether or not to answer, he spoke again, “On second thought, don’t answer that. I can’t risk being seen with you. My family can’t be tied to sympathizers.”
I struggled against the ropes, stopping only as they dug deeper into my skin. There was no way around it. If I wanted to leave, I’d have to talk my way out of this.
“Listen, I’m grateful for what you’ve done,” I started, “but I can’t be here. I need to get home. There’s no reason for me to be here.”
He shook his head. “I can’t let you go now. It’s too dangerous, and since I’m the only one of us who seems to understand how much, you’re staying put until dawn.”
I regarded him carefully, weighing my options and quickly realized that I didn’t actually have any. “What then?” I asked.
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“Then you will be free to go,” he said. “You shall go your way, and I shall go mine.”
I wanted to tell him that dawn would be a little bit too late, that the gunfire we were still hearing wouldn't stop but would become louder, closer. That by the time the sun came up tomorrow, things would get much more complicated.
But I kept my mouth shut, unwilling to risk giving away who I really was and the time I was actually from. Besides, I doubted he’d believe me. I didn’t believe it myself, and I was living it.
“So we wait?” I asked.
He nodded and sat back, his eyes fixed on me as he tried to find a comfortable position. I tried to do the same, but my hands made that an impossibility. Between that and the insanity of the last few hours, I doubted I’d get any sleep. From the way Gracen was looking at me, it was a fair bet he wouldn’t be sleeping either.
It was going to be a long night.
Chapter Seven
My father was a large man, the kind who made you think twice before you decided to do anything stupid. His size had kept him out of trouble for most of his life, and the scowl he usually kept plastered on his face had pretty much the same effect. A military man to the core, a patriot at heart, he exemplified everything the US Army stood for.
And he scared the shit out of pretty much everyone who saw him.
But I knew the real him. I knew the heart of gold he concealed, the warm hugs he gave, the smiles that came when he was proud. There were times when I felt like he had ruined my future forever, that no other man could ever match up to him.
Maybe that was why I put up with so much of Bruce's shit, because on some level, I felt like my expectations were too high.
I also knew that if my father found out some of the shit Bruce pulled, my fiancé would've come face-to-face with the scariest my father could be.
Which was what happened one night I came home crying after Bruce and I had been in a terrible fight.
I'd just returned from my first tour and had a week of leave. I'd gone home but had spent my first night on a date with Bruce...where he'd proceeded to drink too much and make snide comments about how women looked in uniform. When I called him on it, he'd gone into a fifteen-minute tirade about how things hadn't been easy for him while I was gone. How hard it'd been to go that long without seeing me. Without sex.
That was the last straw. I'd stormed out and taken a cab home. Dad hadn't said a word. Hadn't asked me what was wrong. He'd just held me until I stopped crying.
I hadn't heard him leave later that night, but the next day, Bruce had come to apologize. The moment I saw his expression when my dad came down the stairs behind me, I'd known why Bruce had come.
I wondered what my father would've thought of Gracen. Somehow, I didn't get the impression that he would be as easily intimidated as Bruce. Dad would've liked that.
I, however, wasn't so sure I liked it. Or him, for that matter.
As the night dragged on, sleep didn't get any closer. I tossed and turned, my hands hurting more and more as the ropes rubbed my skin raw. While I was used to not being in the most comfortable places to sleep, this was definitely on the top of my discomfort list.
Finally, I gave up and looked over to where Gracen sat. His eyes were closed, his cane still in his grasp.
I had to admit he was a handsome man, despite his crude ways of dealing with situations. His high cheekbones and chiseled jaw made him easy on the eyes, and his curls just added to the charm. The fact that he wasn't wearing a wig, like a lot of people during this time period, told me that he was as pretentious as his accent made him sound.
If I'd met him in another place and time, I would have probably given him more than just a second glance. He was the kind of man who commanded attention, of that much I was sure.
My mind wandered back to Bruce, and I wondered what he was doing now or if my parents had called him when I didn't arrive home. Then again, even if they had, there was no guarantee he would've answered. I doubted he’d be calling me again anytime soon to try to get me to come early. He might've sounded annoyed at first, but I didn't doubt he'd find a way to get over it. Over the years, he'd lost the part of him that had always put me first – if he'd ever really had it to begin with.
I wondered what would have happened if I'd done as he asked and gotten straight on a plane to Vegas. My parents would've been upset, my father probably even more than my mother. I knew he'd been looking forward to my return and had wanted to discuss my possible re-enlistment before I made a final decision. I was surprised when he supported my decision to eventually open my own pediatric practice, even suggesting that he could lease a small space downtown to help me set up. When I first mentioned that this might be the time to make that change, I thought he'd give me hell for wanting out, but he hadn’t.
He was probably going out of his mind by now and trying not to show it. My mother would definitely be worried sick. I could only imagine how Ennis was handling it. I wished there was some way for me to let them know that I was okay.
If being tied up in the company of an eighteenth-century Loyalist a day before one of the precursor battles of the American Revolution was any indication of me being okay.
I closed my eyes and tried to fall asleep, but my mind was still racing from worry, from all of the new information. How the hell was this even possible? How had I gotten here?
I retraced everything that I could remember. The accident, the man trying to unbuckle me from the car, everything, but I still couldn’t find any logical explanation for the time warp I’d found myself in. I vaguely remembered my time in the darkness, the feeling of being hurled back and forth, the arms that had grabbed and pulled me. My mind tried hard to piece things together. It still didn’t make any sense, and I was slowly starting to realize that there might not ever be an answer.
I might just have to accept that I was in 1775...and might never get back to my own time.
I wasn't sure if I could, but I was too tired to do anything about it now, even if the ropes around my wrists had left me with any viable options. I coughed and shook my head, trying to work out the knots in my neck and fight the pair of throbbing spots on the back of my skull. One from the accident, the other from Gracen.
“If you plan to stay awake all night, do you mind keeping it down,” he spoke up without opening his eyes.
I looked at him and grinned. If I had to be miserable, at least I knew he wasn't doing much better. “I doubt my coughing is what’s keeping you awake,” I said.
He opened his eyes and glared at me. “It wouldn’t, if you’d bloody lie down and go to sleep.”
I used my best sarcastic voice. “I'm sorry if the prisoner is causing you problems.”
“You’re not a prisoner.”
I turned slightly to my side to show him the ropes, an eyebrow raised as I dared him to contradict the obvious.
“Well, at least not for long,” he amended. “Believe me, I want to get rid of you as much as you wish to be rid of me, but I cannot have you going off to the rebels.”
“Why do you even care?” I asked. “If I truly were a sympathizer, wouldn’t the best option be to send me over to the colonists?”
His eyes widened as he leaned forward, all pretense of sleep gone. “Are you bloody mad, man?” He sounded shocked. “Let you tell them that Gracen Lightwood pulled you from the fields where the army would have certainly found you, most likely held you as a spy? Do you know what that would do to my family?”
I rolled my eyes. “There's no need to get overdramatic.”
He scowled at me. “You know nothing of my family, Mr. Daviot. My father, Roston Lightwood, supports the English position here in the colonies more than he’s supported me. His wealth depends on the British, and he would rather his family die before ever having any of us associated with the rebels.”
“That’s a shame,” I muttered, knowing well what would happen to the Loyalists in the years to come.
“A shame?” Gracen asked in exasperation
. “Bloody ungrateful, if you ask me.”
“So you share your father’s opinions?” I found myself honestly curious, not only making conversation.
“I have taken no side,” he said. “This isn't my fight.”
“You live here, don't you?”
“I was born in London.”
Nice deflection. “That wasn’t my question.”
He looked down and used the tip of his cane to draw patterns in the dirt. “My father loves the Crown. He spent most of his life in service of the king. All he ever had was his work, and he was rewarded for it. It’s why he brought us to the colonies. Shortly after I was born, he was given a tract of land just outside Boston for his services. Had he stayed in England, his inheritance would have been a pittance.”
I was beginning to understand. “You feel the need to be just as grateful as your father.”
He thought about it for a moment. “I suppose that is some of it. But I am a British citizen by birth, no matter where I make my home.”
In a flash of memory, I remembered something I'd seen in some movie. How the people who were born and raised in England didn't consider the colonists to be British citizens...until it came to their blind obedience.
“You know that not everyone in the colonies enjoys the same liberties as British citizens, right?” I asked. “That the rebels, as you call them, just want to be treated equally.”
He gave me a hard look. “The world is rarely so simple; something you colonists don't seem to understand.”
I wanted to disagree. I did understand it. I had seen war. I had seen death. I'd seen what it meant to fight for what you believed in against people whose beliefs were just as strong. There was rarely any right side, rarely a winning side, and things were never clear cut or easy. No matter how righteous the cause, innocents were always in the line of fire.