“And you’re saying the evidence couldn’t have been faked?” I ask the question of Tate, not Campbell. His scrutiny makes me uncomfortable, and I don’t really like looking at him. “Saul couldn’t have faked it?”
“Saul . . .” Tate shrugs. “Yeah, maybe.”
“You knew Katherine, didn’t you? Do you think she was capable of something like that?”
Tate tilts his head to the side like he’s considering it. “Your mother was more than a little unstable when it came to Saul. You should have heard her at the New Year’s Eve party. This World War II historian, Adrienne. She started coming on to Saul when Katherine was out of the room. When Katherine came in and caught them together, it took me and two other guys to get her away from there. I thought she was going to rip Adrienne’s throat out.”
One bit of that story doesn’t line up with the version I heard from Adrienne. I think Tate has flipped around exactly which party was coming on to the other. I don’t press that issue, deciding to stick with the main point.
“Jealousy is one thing. I was asking about mass murder. Stranding her pregnant self in the past? If she was so crazy about Saul and just wanted to get him to herself, wouldn’t she have planned this for a jump where they’d actually be traveling together?”
He considers that and then nods. “Maybe.”
Campbell tosses back the rest of the drink. “What the hell does it matter? Like I said, the evidence was conclusive. The investigators needed a culprit, and Saul gave them one ready-made. But he also gave the anti-alteration cause a boost, and I seriously doubt that would’ve been part of his plan. No more genetic fixes, no more CHRONOS, nature as nature intended.”
He spits, thankfully into his glass, but it’s still gross. “All that happy horseshit the weak use to bind the strong. The poor use to bind the rich.”
Tate is staring at him. “So . . . you knew from the beginning that it was Saul? Even before this Cyrist stuff began popping up? All along?”
“What if I did?” Campbell’s diction, which was slurred and indistinct only a few minutes earlier, is increasingly crisp, making me wonder what’s in the glass. Or maybe what was in that “jolt” Tate gave him.
“You let her believe all of the evidence against Katherine, knowing it was false? Knowing that you were—no, since you pulled me into it as well—knowing that we were sending a sixteen-year-old girl into the hands of a man responsible for killing most of the people at CHRONOS? Instead of back to her own time?”
“Yes. Because she could be put to use there.”
“But at what cost?” Tate asks.
“Oh, give me a break. You’d have sent her back either way if you thought she could give you your precious job back. All that whining about how you don’t belong here, about how you were made for a time long past.”
That hits a nerve, because Tate stands up and takes a threatening step toward the old man. “No. I wouldn’t have. I ought to snap your neck for lying to me, for lying to both of us.”
“Wait—” I reach out and grab Tate’s arm, even though I definitely understand the sentiment and even though I’d stand zero chance of stopping him if he was determined. “We’re here to talk, remember?”
Tate stands there for a good five seconds, like he’s trying to decide, but he finally huffs and sits down again.
I look at Campbell. “Saul said you had a bet. Then why send me back to help him?”
Campbell pushes himself up from the sofa and goes to a small lit alcove in the wall. He shoves the glass into the light. There’s a brief flash as the light grows brighter, and his glass vanishes. “Another.”
A new glass appears, so this must be some sort of replicator system. Thankfully this glass isn’t spit-lined like the other one, but is instead filled with more of the emerald-colored liquid.
“Would you like anything?”
Tate just snarls in his direction, which Campbell interprets as a no. I’d prefer to do the same, but my time in the pod with Alisa left me feeling dehydrated.
Campbell issues the request, and a clear glass of water appears in the dispenser. He places it on the low table in front of me and settles back into the opposite sofa before answering my question.
“Our wager was about Saul’s methods. I didn’t think—and still don’t think—that using some bullshit religion was the best way to achieve our goals. If he’d used the keys a bit more . . . judiciously . . . he could have fixed the problems and left the basic society, the basic history, intact. Instead, he screws up everything and leaves a bunch of moralistic fools in charge who are even worse than what we had before. Just to prove he was right.”
His tone is disdainful, but I think there’s an underlying hint of admiration. It’s a disconcerting mix.
Tate is still glowering at him, so I guess I’m taking the lead in the questioning. “What if you could help us change that? Show Saul he’s not as smart as he thinks?”
Campbell rolls his eyes. “And how do you propose to do that?”
“Go back and stop him from ever getting the keys. Make the changes you’re talking about, but do it your way. A . . . surgical strike. No more Cyrists.”
“Says the woman whose face decorates their temples. Their money, too. Why should I believe you’d want to change that?”
I take a long sip of the water to give myself a few seconds to think. Any arguments I’d use as Kate would undoubtedly be useless in convincing Campbell. And since I’m supposed to be Prudence, I need to think about why she would be here. I’m pretty sure Tate would be part of it. I remember the look on her face in Woodhull’s office when she was talking about him feeling useless without CHRONOS, and she’d be even more upset to see him as he is now. But I doubt the “twoo wuv” defense would resonate with Campbell, either.
So I go with a partial truth. It’s my partial truth, but I’m beginning to suspect it’s Pru’s as well.
“Because I don’t want Saul to win. And I don’t mean your silly little wager. I want him to lose everything. Everything.” I enunciate each syllable and hold his gaze as I speak.
He watches me silently for a few moments. I don’t look away, don’t blink, just arch one eyebrow at him and stare back.
“And why do you think I can help you?”
Truthfully, I’m no longer sure that he can help. I’m thinking Kiernan’s plan of finding Pseudo-Saul might be the better one. But maybe Campbell knows something.
“You’ve been here in the building since the time shift. Tate said they took your key. Do you know what they did with it?”
“They said they were using it to extend the field so that I could travel freely throughout the facility. Just another way of saying I’m a prisoner.”
“Hmph,” Tate says. “Some prison. You’ve seen what it’s like outside. People fighting in the line and degrading themselves to get in for a day. And they won’t earn enough to buy the food that Cyrus there eats each evening. You wouldn’t go outside if they let you.”
“Do you know where they took that key?” I ask.
“Why? Are you planning to carry it back to Saul and put me out of my misery?”
“No.” While I’m not entirely convinced that the world would be a poorer place if Campbell went poof, mentioning that to him seems unlikely to help my case. “I don’t have any quarrel with you, Campbell. I’ll leave the key until things are . . . fixed. But here’s the problem. I need to stop myself from giving the other keys to Saul. We got them from the CHRONOS archives, but it isn’t around anymore. If our theory is correct, those keys have to be somewhere, like they were in the archives, prior to September 20th. Tate says no one knows the history of CHRONOS better than you do, so we thought you might have some ideas.”
That’s not exactly what Tate said, but based on the bits and pieces various people have told me about Campbell, it’s clear he was obsessed with CHRONOS. And he seems like the type who might be swayed by a bit of flattery.
Campbell’s expression suggests that was a misread on my part,
however. He’s quiet for a minute, watching me over the edge of his glass long enough to make me uncomfortable.
“You’re lying about leaving the key,” he says. “I doubt you can fix this. Either way, you won’t risk leaving a key behind to protect me. But you’re telling the truth about wanting to bring Saul down, so I’d be willing to gamble. Not existing is better than living as a ghost.” He tosses back the last of the green stuff and leans forward, setting the glass on the coffee table between us. “Of course, whether I trust you is irrelevant, since I don’t know what they did with the key.”
Tate kicks the leg of the coffee table. It splinters, and the glass crashes to the floor. I expect it to break. Instead, it bounces, then rolls a few inches until it bumps into the dog’s bed. Cyrus gives it one lazy lick and then ignores it.
The outburst surprises me. I’m not sure if I widen my eyes too much or blink too hard, but my left contact lens pops out. I glance around near me as best I can without drawing attention. I don’t see it.
Campbell just laughs at Tate. “Ooh, big bad Viking temper. Sit down and let me finish. I don’t know what they did with the key Saul gave me, but I do know Saul Rand. He’s twisted, perverse, and single-minded. He’s only loved one person, only trusted one person in his whole life, and that person is Saul Rand. Look at the effort he put into letting me know he won. The lives he was willing to expend to get that point across. If he set all of this up from his perch in the twenty-first century, then I can promise you he made sure one of his Cyrist lackeys found those keys.”
“Yeah,” I say, trying to keep my voice calm as I look about for my lens. “But which one?”
“Like I said. He trusts one person, and that’s Saul Rand. He couldn’t have the real deal in this timeline, so I think he’d settle for the pale imitation that lives here in the future. I’ve had two conversations with the man. He’s boring, insipid, and has been thoroughly pampered his entire life. Would you like me to arrange a meeting?”
Tate gives Campbell an odd look. “She needs to get the keys before September 20th . . . that’s in the past. What good would a meeting in the present do?”
Campbell sighs. “Don’t be dim, Poulsen. Meeting Pseudo-Saul in the here and now—a meeting that she’ll remember but he won’t—gives her an advantage.”
“Maybe. But the system has already tagged her as a Rand. It picked up on the DNA. And he’ll recognize her.”
“I would certainly hope so,” Campbell says. “That’s her biggest advantage if she plays it right. That outfit needs to go, however, if you want to play Cyrist Madonna. Use my printer to manufacture one of those white flowing monstrosities you wear in their propaganda.”
Campbell tilts his head to the right, and I see a glimmer of something I don’t like at all, something slightly malicious, in his eyes. “You remember how to use the printer, don’t you, Prudence?”
“It’s been . . . a while.” I push up from the sofa slowly, taking one last chance to scan the area around me for the contact lens. No luck. “I’m sure it will come back to me.”
“I’ll show you where it is, then.” He follows me to the door and says in a lower voice, “You might want to grab another lens before Poulsen there takes a closer look at you. And while you’re fabricating a new outfit, go ahead and fabricate a new story about who you are and why you’re here. Because you’re not Prudence Rand.”
RESIDENCE INN
BURTONSVILLE, MARYLAND
September 12, 5:15 p.m.
Charlayne startles when I arrive back at the hotel room. And that causes me to startle because she whips up the rifle she’s cleaning and braces it against her shoulder. It looks a thousand times more dangerous than the pistol I’ve used, and it also looks emphatically wrong in her hands. It took me three weeks to convince Charlayne to take up karate back in my original timeline. She freaked when we were biking one day because she accidentally squished a lizard. And here she is acting like she’s fresh out of boot camp.
Maybe she is, sort of. She said they’d been preparing for this for a long time. I just didn’t know the preparations included advanced weapons training.
It’s not loaded if she’s cleaning it, I remind myself, trying to force my heartbeat back into normal range.
She lowers the gun, letting out her breath in a big whoosh. “Could you give us a warning or something?”
“No early warning system on the keys. You’re going to have to get used to it.”
“Maybe you could settle on a specific time?” Trey suggests, looking up from his phone. “That way, we’d know when you’re coming in.”
Although, now that I look closer, it’s my phone he’s holding. That’s kind of odd.
“Okay,” I say to Charlayne. “Next arrival at exactly five thirty. Does that work?”
“Sure.” Charlayne gives me an apologetic smile. “And sorry about the gun. I’m just nervous. About all of this.”
She has every reason to be jumpy. I glance from Charlayne to Trey, and a wave of guilt hits me. Both of them are here because of me. Yes, they’d still be in danger from the Culling if I’d never met them, never crossed their paths in any timeline. But they wouldn’t be on the front lines. They’d be off living a normal life, blissfully ignorant of all this insanity. I can’t help but feel that would be better. Kinder.
“So, something went wrong?” Trey asks.
“Sort of. Charlayne, could you get Tilson and the others in here before I start?”
Charlayne gives me a quick nod and hops up to fetch them.
Trey eyes my costume, and an amused grin spreads across his face. “Is that what women wear in 2308? Not complaining, but . . .”
“Maybe it’s what they wore when Pru visited, but women’s fashion has taken a rather conservative turn.” I glance over at the guns on the bed. “What’s with Charlayne and the heavy artillery?”
“Ben says she’s actually a good shot, especially at long range. And even though I hate to say it, those guns could come in handy soon. We’ve . . . got a lead on your mom and Katherine.”
My eyes widen. “Oh my God. Where? How?”
“Well, it’s just your mom, really, but we’re hoping Simon has them in the same place. Remember when I set up that geo-location app for you and your mom when we were in London?”
“Now that you mention it. I’d kind of forgotten before that.”
“So had I. But then your phone buzzed—it was your dad. I answered. Hope that’s okay?” I nod, and he says, “I didn’t tell him where we were for . . . security reasons . . . but I told him you’re okay and you’d call him soon. He seemed really nervous. Anyway, your phone’s the same type as your mom’s, and holding it jogged my memory of setting the geo app. This blip on the map has been moving pretty fast since I first checked, and I lose the signal every now and then. I’m thinking she’s on a plane.”
Trey hands me the phone, and I see the blip he’s talking about, currently over the ocean, approaching DC.
“Maybe she had the phone in her pocket and they didn’t check,” he says. “We’re just waiting for them to stop moving.”
“And then?”
“Assuming you get the keys, then we take the fight to Simon. Did you know you lost a contact?”
The door opens and Charlayne and Ben enter. Tilson is behind them, followed by Max.
Attached to Max is Eve.
I stare at her, open-mouthed, unsure whether this is a trap or just stupidity on Max’s part.
He catches my expression and says, “What? I couldn’t leave her in the trunk indefinitely.”
Okay, not a trap. Just stupidity. Complete and total stupidity.
“And she has information. We’ve been having a productive little chat. Turns out her dad wasn’t always New Cyrist. In fact, he used to be—”
“Regional Templar? I already knew that. You may not remember the previous timeline, but I do. Eve here sicced the temple hounds on me, and I have the scars to prove it.”
I expect Eve to gloat, but
she’s barely listening. She has Max’s arm in a death grip, and her self-assured smirk is gone. In fact, she looks nervous. Extremely nervous.
Tilson says, “I still think you should have taken her back to your place, Max. She could be wearing a tracker. And what if she manages to get away?”
“I checked thoroughly,” Max says defensively. “There’s nothing on her body that could lead anyone to us. And she won’t be running away. Will you, Evie?”
Eve doesn’t answer at first. Then Max starts prying her fingers away from his arm one by one until he’s holding her wrists in one hand, with the other pressed against her chest. He repeats, “Will you, Evie?”
“No! I won’t! Please.” She tries to move closer to him, her expression escalating from nervousness to sheer terror. “I won’t go anywhere! I promise, Max! Don’t let go . . .”
Her voice is almost a whimper at the end. This Eve is nothing like the one I knew. The Eve I met at the Cyrist temple, at her little barbecue, and even at Briar Hill, struck me as manipulative, bitchy, and quite possibly evil. But possessive and clingy? Definitely not.
And then I get it.
“You have her key, don’t you?”
“Actually, Tilson has it.”
“Does she exist without it?” Trey asks, glancing from Tilson to Max a little nervously.
“Don’t know. Don’t care.” The look Max gives Eve is angry and contemptuous, but there’s also a good deal of hurt in the mix. I think the bit about not caring is a bluff. To my surprise, Eve gives him an almost identical look, making me wonder whether the role she’s playing became a little too real at some point, at least where Max is concerned.
“Saul’s people like to alter several things at once,” Max says, “probably because these shifts hit them in the gut the same way they do us. I doubt they’d wipe out Evie on purpose, but there’s always a chance. Eve clearly thinks so, don’t you, sweetie? I’ve never had a very clear answer as to what happened to her mother.”