Borrowed Time (The Witches of Mingus Mountain #2)

12. A Timely Meeting

12

A TIMELY MEETING

“Interesting,” Jeremiah commented as he turned the amulet over in his hands. The cabochon garnet set into the bronze mounting glowed like old blood against the flames leaping in the hearth, just a few feet behind where he stood.

I wanted to snap, That’s all you have to say?, but I managed to remain silent. Yes, I knew I was feeling frustrated, but getting all up in Jeremiah’s business wasn’t going to hasten things along. Not that I knew him well, but I could tell he was a man who went at his own pace and no one else’s.

It probably didn’t help that I was already restless after the way Seth and I had to cut our kiss short on Saturday night, or how we had to spend all day Sunday looking as though we were enjoying ourselves as we explored Flagstaff when every cell in my body seemed to be crying out for him that much more. The novelty was wearing off by now, and I just wanted to go back to a place where, if not precisely my home, at least the people around me seemed to be just fine with the two of us getting together.

Well, now that he knew he wasn’t his cousin Abigail’s consort…and they had no idea I was half Wilcox.

A bridge we’d have to cross at some point, I supposed, but I figured I’d worry about that later…if we even ended up back in 1926 at all. From the way Seth had spoken on Saturday night, it halfway felt to me as if he might be perfectly okay with jumping right past the Roaring ’20s and ending up in a place with central air conditioning and driverless cars and all the other creature comforts of the twenty-first century.

True, I hadn’t told him about social media and the way some people seemed to be glued to their phones twenty-four/seven; according to my mother, things were better now than they used to be, but we still had a ways to go. All the same, I had a feeling if Seth and I sat down and weighed the pros and cons, he’d probably decide that my future had more to offer us than his past.

Except for the part where he’d have to leave everyone he knew behind.

Did he really care about me enough to do that?

I didn’t know. This was the first time I’d ever been with anyone who made me feel this way…and I thought Seth was in a similar boat…but still, raging hormones weren’t always the best measure of a relationship’s longevity. Even if I left all that behind — even if I managed to ignore the way the slightest brush of his fingers against mine was enough to get my blood raging all over again — I couldn’t ignore the way we worked well together, were easy with one another in a way I’d never been with a man.

That would be a hell of a lot to give up if Seth decided he just couldn’t live anywhere except the time and place he knew.

Or if I decided the same thing and we had to part ways.

Apparently, Seth was feeling the same kind of impatience I was, because he said, “I guess Devynn and I were hoping for a little more than ‘interesting.’”

Rather than take offense, Jeremiah only smiled. Although he’d been a little surprised to see the two of us show up this morning rather than just me as promised, he hadn’t let that small change in plans rattle him. No, he’d only ushered us into his study and said that he’d given Mrs. Barton the morning off, and so he needed to go to the kitchen to fetch another teacup for Seth.

At least it was good to know we’d have the house to ourselves, if only for a few hours. Jacob was safely in school, of course, and it didn’t sound as if the housekeeper would be back before lunch, so we had a good chunk of time to get some business taken care of.

“I’ve seen oblique references to these sorts of artifacts in some of the books I’ve collected over the years,” Jeremiah said. “It seems there was a brief period during the Renaissance when some witches and warlocks experimented with expanding their powers by creating these external foci for their abilities. However, it also seems as though they had far too high a risk of falling into the wrong hands, and so they were destroyed.”

“But not all,” I commented, and he gazed down at the bronze amulet for a moment before he inclined his head ever so slightly in agreement.

“It would seem that way,” he said. “I haven’t made a study of such things, but I believe the symbols etched into the bronze are sigils of power, ways of concentrating magical energy. Whoever the witch or warlock was who created this thing, they would have somehow placed some of their very essence, their magical talent, inside the amulet. That is what your ‘Lorenzo the Magnificent’ was drawing on when he used the artifact to create a performance that truly was magical.”

Even though I’d known it had to be done, I was still feeling guilty about stripping the man of his one true claim to fame. The show Seth and I had caught on Saturday night was the last one of the troupe’s run — it sounded as though they were headed to San Francisco after this — so I had no way of knowing what Lawrence Pratt had decided to do next. Stick it out but modify his part of the show so he was only doing the minor sleight-of-hand tricks he could manage on his own without a magical boost? Announce an early retirement and get on the first train that would take him back to Minnesota?

I hoped it was the latter. Yes, it would be hard for him to go home to a much more mundane life than the one he’d experienced on the road, but as Seth and I had both told him, witches and warlocks needed to be with their people. He wasn’t so old that he couldn’t still find someone and settle down. Magical talent was a capricious thing and didn’t always seem to be tied to genetics, so it was entirely possible that his children wouldn’t suffer from the same handicap he did.

“Devynn and I were wondering,” Seth said. “Do you think we could use the amulet in the same way, except to boost the power and accuracy of her time-traveling gift? It might be the one thing that could get us where we need to go.”

Jeremiah didn’t answer at once, and instead laid the amulet down on his desk. Except for the leather-encased blotter that rested there, it was noticeably bare, just like it had been the last time I was in this room. I didn’t know whether he tidied up before he had visitors, or whether the desk was mainly for show.

And I sure as hell wasn’t going to ask.

“That’s one possibility,” he said. “You say that Lawrence Pratt told you he used the amulet to create his illusions?”

“More or less,” I replied. “He didn’t go into a lot of detail, but it sounded as if all the amulet needed was the intention to do a certain thing. From what he said, he didn’t have much magic of his own, only the small stuff like unlocking doors and lighting candles, that kind of thing.”

Dark eyes thoughtful, Jeremiah said, “He probably has more abilities than he thinks, or the amulet would have had nothing to tap into.”

Seth and I exchanged a glance. “But if he actually had some real magic,” Seth said, “why wouldn’t it have manifested when he was younger?”

Although Jeremiah didn’t exactly smile, I got the feeling he was somewhat amused by our youthful ignorance. “Magic, as many people have observed over the years, is not an exact science. Nor is it an ‘if this, then that’ sort of proposition. It could be that there were circumstances within his family that led him to block his own powers — something I don’t think is that unreasonable, considering how eager he was to leave his clan and travel the world — or it could simply be that every single witch and warlock hides far more potentiality than they could ever imagine.”

Except it seemed that Jeremiah had imagined such things…and found the key to unlock them. That was why his magical experiments had led him and the rest of the family to be driven from their homes in Connecticut, and why he was so much more powerful than any other warlock I’d ever encountered.

And even though the current generation of Wilcoxes didn’t like to discuss their late primus too much, not when the man had been dead and buried for more than twenty-five years, it had probably been much the same situation with Damon Wilcox, Connor’s older brother. He’d investigated his magic with the same keen mind that had allowed him to get a Ph.D. in physics, and I’d always wondered if he’d used some of his knowledge of how the universe works to get his powers to expand far beyond those you’d expect of even a primus.

His understanding of the human heart, on the other hand, had had quite a few gaping holes in it.

“At any rate,” Jeremiah went on, “you did what you had to. I would have done the same, as it would have been far too dangerous to leave the amulet in Lawrence Pratt’s hands when it was clear he had no real concern about exposing the rest of us.” He paused there, and for a moment, his gaze met mine, reassuring, as though he knew I needed the external confirmation that Seth and I had done the right thing. When Jeremiah spoke again, though, his tone was brisk. “I propose an experiment. Not with your talent, Devynn, as there are too many variables right now for me to be comfortable with, but with yours, Seth.”

For a second or two, he could only stare at the Wilcox primus, clearly nonplussed. “But we all know how my powers work.”

“We do,” Jeremiah said calmly. “Which is why your gift is a good one to experiment with. You told me when you first arrived here that your power of teleportation only works to move yourself around in space, and not anyone else. I propose that you take the amulet, set the intention to send the two of you to your room at the Hotel San Francisco…and see what happens.”

“What if nothing happens?” I asked, which in a way might be the best outcome. Although I knew Seth’s power functioned in an entirely different way, I still couldn’t help having visions of some sort of terrible transporter accident like I’d seen in one of those old Star Trek movies that my brother Patrick was fixated on for a while. Materializing inside a wall wasn’t my idea of a fun time.

“Then we’ll try something else,” Jeremiah said, not looking too daunted by the prospect. “But I think this is a simple enough experiment that it shouldn’t cause too much of a problem.”

Hopefully.

Something about Seth’s jaw hardened, and I knew he was set on trying this as well. Even though he must have realized deep down that it wasn’t his fault, I knew he hated that his gift hadn’t allowed him to take me immediately to his cousin Helen’s house after I was shot. If he’d been able to do that, then possibly none of this mess about being caught in 1884 would have even happened.

But, as my cousin Jeremy had once cheerfully said, wish in one hand and spit in the other, and see what happens.

Well, unless you were Autumn Garnett, another of my Wilcox relatives, who actually had a magical talent for making wishes come true. It, too, hadn’t done her much good, except at least she’d finally been able to wrangle it to a good outcome.

“It’s fine,” Seth said, and came over so he could take me firmly by both hands. “I’ll need you to hang on tight, though — I don’t know what exactly happens when I’m between places.”

Maybe he folded space somehow, or dematerialized himself. I didn’t know how his talent functioned, and I doubted he did, either, not when you really got down into the weeds on how it all worked.

“I have a better idea,” I told him, and unclasped my hands from his and instead placed his arms around my waist. It felt a little awkward with Jeremiah standing there a few feet away and watching the whole procedure, but I thought that position seemed a lot more secure than just holding hands.

Seth’s mouth quirked. “Yes, that is better.” He paused there and looked over my shoulder, his gaze meeting Jeremiah’s. “You can give me the amulet now. Better put it in my pocket.”

Also looking somewhat amused, the primus came over and dropped the amulet into the pocket Seth had indicated. “Godspeed.”

I honestly didn’t know whether God — or the Goddess the McAllisters prayed to — had anything to do with it, but I still thought it wasn’t a bad idea to have a higher power watching over the two of us.

“All right,” Seth said. “Here we go.”

And just like that, Jeremiah’s study vanished. For the merest fraction of a second — far less than the blink of an eye — everything went dark, and I thought I could see strange flashes of light around the periphery of my vision.

Before I could even begin to guess what those flashes were…stars wheeling past, vestiges of the sunlight in Jeremiah’s office…my own imagination…the world became bright again, and we were standing in the middle of the hotel room where Seth had been staying.

Well, okay, it wasn’t bright, bright, because the curtains were still shut and the space was only lit by the small peeps of sun that were able to make it past the drapes, but at least it wasn’t that utter void any longer.

Moving slowly, he let go of my waist and looked around. “It worked.”

“It sure did,” I said, knowing my voice sounded giddy with relief. “Score one for the amulet, I guess. Did you do anything different?”

“Not really,” he said. “Whenever I travel like this, I think of where I need to go, and my talent sends me there. In this case, I saw both of us standing in this hotel room, just as we are now, and then we…traveled.”

Very cool. It was good to know that the amulet had worked just as Lawrence Pratt claimed it did — by amplifying a person’s intention and strengthening their magic so whatever feat was required would actually happen.

Another question was knocking around in my mind, one that had surfaced before but had been pushed aside by all the other complications we’d been dealing with.

“Can you only go to places you’ve been?” I asked. While his teleportation gift was a very useful one, if it was limited in such a way, then it still wasn’t a carte blanche to travel wherever he wanted.

“No,” he said. “That is, I have to have something to connect with, even if it’s a person’s description of a place. But when I was around sixteen, I read somewhere about all the saguaro cacti down in the southern part of Arizona and wanted to see them. So…I sent myself there. Not for very long, because it was awfully hot, and even though I was out in the middle of the desert, I didn’t want to risk possibly bumping into one of the de la Pazes and have them ask me what the hell I was doing there.”

While I agreed that could be something of a problem, I still said, “But aren’t the McAllisters friendly with the de la Paz clan?”

“We are,” he replied. “Still, it’s one thing to be friendly and something else entirely to appear in their territory without permission.”

He had a point there. Even now, with all three Arizona clans friendly with one another — and friendly with the Castillos in New Mexico, since Angela’s daughter Miranda had become their prima a few years earlier — it was still polite to let the other clan know if you were going to be doing anything more than popping in for a quick day of shopping or whatever.

“Got it,” I said. “I guess what we need to do now is see if you can repeat the trick — we don’t want to be gone too long, or Jeremiah will start to get worried.”

“True enough,” Seth agreed. He placed his arms around my waist again, only this time he bent down to press a soft kiss against my lips. “I really wanted to do that back at Jeremiah’s house, but I didn’t think it would be a very good idea, not with him standing there and watching.”

No, probably not. But although I could feel my heart beat a little faster from the sensation of his mouth pressing on mine, I knew we probably shouldn’t linger here.

“Someday, we’ll be able to kiss all we want,” I promised him. “Now, though, we should probably get going.”

Seth nodded. “Hold on.”

And again came that flash of darkness, and immediately afterward, we were standing in Jeremiah’s office, in the same spot we’d occupied before we left.

“Excellent,” he said. “It seems you didn’t have any trouble at all.”

“None that I could tell,” Seth replied, then pulled the amulet out of his pocket and handed it over to the primus. “As you said, it seemed to amplify my magic enough that it was no problem to have Devynn ride along, so to speak.”

Jeremiah held the amulet for a moment, as if weighing it in his palm, and then set it down on his desk. “It is clearly very powerful — and useful. And now that I know it was able to amplify your gift, I think it’s time we focused on Devynn’s talent. Being able to travel in space together is important, but without her gift of time travel, you still won’t be able to escape this place.”

Something I’d already worried about on more than one occasion. If we were stuck here permanently, I supposed Seth could go to the McAllisters and give them a carefully edited version of what had happened to him, but would his clan even accept me? And if the situation was reversed, would he ever be able to make a home for himself here among the Wilcoxes?

If Samuel wasn’t part of the equation, I might have been a little more hopeful about that particular outcome. But I knew he hated the McAllisters on principle…and I had a feeling he wouldn’t be too pleasantly disposed toward me, not once he discovered I was Robert Rowe’s daughter.

Some people never gave up their grudges.

All the same, I didn’t know how I felt about fiddling around with my gift, even with Jeremiah guiding the process. So many things could go wrong.

When I didn’t speak right away, Jeremiah continued. “And that is why we’ll need you to leave us now, Seth. This is the sort of work that must be carried out without any distractions.”

At once, his brows pulled together. “I won’t get in the way — ”

“It’s not a question of being in the way,” Jeremiah cut in smoothly. “It’s a question of mental distraction. You have utter control of your gift, but Devynn is not quite so lucky in hers. I don’t want anything to disturb her focus.”

As much as I might have wanted to argue with that statement, I knew he was right. I loved Seth, but if he stayed there while I was trying to work, I didn’t know whether I’d be able to concentrate the way I needed to.

Something in my expression must have communicated those thoughts, because although his jaw set, he didn’t argue further, only said, “All right. I suppose I can understand that. Should I go back to the hotel my way, or should I walk to make it seem more normal?”

“You may translocate,” Jeremiah replied at once. “It’s easier for you, and because I have a spell in place to prevent people from noting your comings and goings from the house, it isn’t as if anyone would have noticed yours and Devynn’s arrival in the first place.”

Well, that made things easier. At least, until it was time for me to go back to the hotel, which I assumed I’d have to manage on my own. It wasn’t as though I could pull out my phone and text Seth to head on over here to collect me.

Besides, I was a big girl. I should be able to handle the walk over to the Hotel San Francisco, since it was less than a quarter-mile away from Jeremiah’s house.

“All right,” Seth said. His gaze moved to me, and he added, “I suppose I’ll just wait for you.”

“It won’t be too long,” I replied. “We can go for lunch afterward.”

Maybe I was overstepping by promising we’d be able to get together for our noon meal, but after all, Jeremiah had already told us that Mrs. Barton would be back a little after twelve. It wasn’t as though I could stay the whole day here.

And because the primus didn’t protest, I had to believe he understood this first session of ours wouldn’t be a prolonged one.

Seth gave my hand a quick squeeze, then vanished.

Although Jeremiah’s expression still seemed neutral enough, I could tell he was glad we were alone so we could get down to work. He inclined his head toward the chair that faced his desk, saying, “You should sit down. We aren’t going to make any immediate attempts at time travel.”

“We’re not?” I asked, feeling a little foolish.

After all, wasn’t that the whole reason why I was here?

“Not right away,” he responded. “First, I need to get a better idea of what happened when you first tried to use your gift — what went wrong, and how, and whether the problems you experienced were always the same, or whether they changed somewhat depending on what you were attempting to do.”

In other words, attacking the issue in a scientific way, even though magic had absolutely nothing to do with science. However, I could see how trying to be logical about the problem might be the best way to approach it, since being emotional about my situation hadn’t done anyone any good.

“Sure,” I said, then lowered myself into the chair. After spending a few days in 1884, I was getting better at managing my voluminous skirts and not utterly crushing my bustle every time I sat down, but still, I longed for the lightweight, simple dresses of the 1920s.

Or the stretch jeans of my own time. Anything except a ten-pound dress and a corset, no matter how good my figure might look in those garments.

“Tell me about how your gift awakened,” Jeremiah said, and I launched into the same story I’d told Seth, where I’d somehow managed to send myself hours ahead in time and then had to wait for the rest of the world to catch up.

“Is there anyone else in either the McAllister or the Wilcox clans of your time who has a similar gift?” Jeremiah asked.

“Only my mother,” I replied at once, since that was the first thing my parents had tried to find out, desperate to see if there was anyone around who might be able to coach me through using my unpredictable and sometimes frightening gift. They’d even asked around with the de la Pazes and the Castillos, but no one in any of the local witch clans seemed to have my same time-bending talent. “But hers isn’t like mine at all.”

By that point, the primus had sat down behind the desk. Now he steepled his long fingers under his chin, giving a remarkably good Sherlock Holmes impression — or at least, it would have been if he’d been wearing one of those silly hats or holding the curved ivory pipe the famous detective always seemed to carry.

“I know it didn’t start that way with your mother,” he said. “She was able to give herself an extra five minutes whenever she needed it, correct?”

I nodded. “And when she did so, it was sort of as if she created a little bubble of time for herself and everything else caught up eventually. But my gift doesn’t seem to work that way. Or rather, I was working with much larger spans of time, even when I first started out. To everyone else, it just looked as if I’d disappeared.”

“Until they, too, caught up with you,” Jeremiah observed. “What happened when you moved into the past?”

“I didn’t,” I said.

Maybe the slightest flicker in his black eyes. “You always sent yourself into the future, never into the past?”

“Yes,” I replied. “Which makes me wonder exactly what’s going on now — first that I went back into 1926, and then here to 1884. It doesn’t make much sense.”

He was silent for a moment, fingers still touching his chin, as though that somehow helped him think. “Did you consciously avoid traveling to the past, or is that something which seemed to happen naturally?”

“A little of both, I suppose,” I said. Since I’d analyzed the problem enough over the years, I hoped I might be able to provide at least a little helpful information. “That is, when my gift first appeared and I was doing it more or less inadvertently, I always went forward. And then when it became clear that I couldn’t control the amount of time I traveled, I locked it all down as best I could. Maybe it was just a subconscious belief that I could cause a lot more trouble by traveling into the past than I could into the future.”

“Even though your mother did that very thing in order to save your father.”

Jeremiah’s tone was completely even as he spoke those words, so I couldn’t glean much from them. Even though he’d known he could never be with her, for a variety of reasons, did it still sting that my mother had chosen Robert Rowe over him?

Another question I’d never ask, that was for sure.

“Even though she did that,” I said, then went on, “Or maybe because she did. She went back in time to fix a very specific problem, but she still wouldn’t have succeeded if it hadn’t been for your help. My father would have died and become a ghost, and I and my brother and sister would never have been born. It just seemed as if there was a lot more space for something awful to happen if I went into the past. At least when I traveled into the future, I might have scared my family, but I couldn’t change anything that had already happened.”

“That makes some sense, I suppose,” Jeremiah said. “It still doesn’t explain why you moved into the past both times you were injured — first, when you got that knock on your head when you tripped and fell in that mine shaft, and then when you came here after being shot. There must be something else involved beyond merely losing any conscious ability to control your talent.”

Again, what he’d just said sounded sensible enough to me, but I had no idea why I would have gone into the past rather than jump ahead, the way my gift usually did when left to its own devices.

I shrugged, since I didn’t know how else to respond to his comment.

Some men might have been annoyed by such a noncommittal response, but Jeremiah only looked thoughtful.

“When was the last time you consciously used your talent?”

“About eight years ago, when I was fourteen,” I replied promptly, since that day was engraved on my memory for all time. Or rather, the day the past had caught up with the present, and my mother had sobbed and held me tight, as though she never intended to let me out of her sight again. Traveling into the future was an odd experience, since for me, I felt as if nothing much had happened, that I hadn’t shifted from my present reality at all. It wasn’t until I heard from my family that I’d been missing for hours…or, on that one notable occasion, for two weeks…that I realized I’d gone anywhere at all.

By this point, Jeremiah was leaning forward in his chair slightly, hands resting on the blotter on the desk in front of him. “And what did you do to keep yourself from using it after that time?”

“Sheer willpower, I guess,” I said. “I sort of stopped myself from thinking about the future very much and did what I could to stay focused on the present.” I stopped there and gave him a rueful smile. “I suppose a lot of self-help experts would say that’s a good thing, that it’s always better to be in the moment as much as possible rather than getting lost in the regrets of the past or wasting a bunch of time thinking of eventualities that might never happen.”

If that had been Seth sitting in front of me rather than Jeremiah Wilcox, my comment might have elicited a question as to who exactly “self-help” experts were. However, the primus didn’t ask any questions and instead remained silent for a moment, clearly thinking over what I’d just said.

Then he sat up a little straighter. “I would like you to travel five minutes into the future.”

I blinked at him. “You make it sound so easy.”

“I think it is…if you’ll let it be.”

About all I could do was lift an eyebrow. His generation might have been born a hundred years before self-help was even a thing, but what he’d just told me sounded a hell of a lot like what some kind of personal growth guru might say.

Before I could utter a protest, though, Jeremiah continued. “That is, I think you’ve built such a wall around your talent that you’re utterly out of touch with it. Because of that, you no longer have any idea how it even works. So, let’s go back to the basics. Five minutes. That was your mother’s original talent, and I believe it’s the basis of yours as well, even if your gift is of vastly greater scope.”

I wanted to argue that my mother’s talent had a hell of a lot of scope, too, considering she’d used it to time travel to Flagstaff more than a hundred and thirty years in the past. On the other hand, though, she’d come here for one very specific purpose, one she trained for like someone training for a marathon.

Just because you were really good at running twenty-six miles didn’t mean you’d be able to effectively jump hurdles.

“What happens if I go three days into the future?” I asked, unable to keep the plaintive note out of my voice.

“Then I suppose we will all catch up with you eventually,” Jeremiah replied. He didn’t look particularly perturbed.

Well, of course he wouldn’t. Now he knew a little more about how my talent worked, and that meant even if I vanished in front of his eyes and didn’t come back in five minutes, he knew the world would meet my time-traveling self at some point.

Unless I went a hundred years into the future, that is.

I wanted to tell myself that wasn’t possible, that I’d never jumped that many years. Except I had, only going in the opposite direction.

“You’ll let Seth know what’s going on if I travel farther than five minutes, won’t you?”

“Of course,” Jeremiah responded. Then he smiled. “Or rather, if it turns out to be longer than you would have normally spent here, then I’ll send word at that point.”

I supposed it would have to do. While I didn’t much like the idea of using my gift this way, I also knew we’d never get anywhere if I kept allowing my fear to prevent me from accomplishing something useful.”

“All right,” I said, even as my gaze moved to the clock on the bookcase behind him.

Ten forty-two.

“See you at ten forty-seven.”

A single blink. That was all that ever happened when I traveled in time…at least, on the occasions when I hadn’t been unconscious. The rest of the room remained the same, right down to the crackling of the fireplace and the man sitting behind the desk.

Or rather, the man who stood near the bookcase, one of the leatherbound volumes in one hand.

“Welcome back,” Jeremiah said.

I looked over at the clock again. This time, it said the hour was five minutes after eleven.

“Missed it by a little bit, it looks like,” I remarked.

“Only twenty minutes,” he told me. “Considering how far into the future you went on earlier occasions, I don’t think that’s too far off the mark.”

Maybe not, except we had a finite amount of time to work with each other until the housekeeper came back, and every time I was wrong by even a little bit, I shaved off some minutes we couldn’t really afford to lose.

“I’ll admit I’ve screwed up a lot more than that,” I said. “But what does that really prove?”

He didn’t look too worried. “I think it proves that you have more control over your gift than you think you do…certainly more than your fourteen-year-old self did, even if you’ve kept your talent closed down for nearly a decade. But now, another experiment.”

During all of this, the amulet had been lying on the desktop. Now Jeremiah reached for it and handed it to me.

“Now I want you to hold the amulet and try again. Five minutes, which would make it 11:11 when you come back.”

An angel number, as some of my more woo-woo Wilcox cousins would have pointed out. Funny how even among witches and warlocks with real magical powers, there were those who also studied astrology and Tarot and collected crystals.

Then again, at least crystals were pretty.

The amulet felt solid in my hand, heavier than it looked. Probably because it was solid brass; a similar piece made of gold might have been hollow to save on materials costs.

But would it be enough to get my unruly talent to behave?

“Eleven-eleven,” I repeated, clutching the amulet in one palm.

Once again, there was the same odd eye-blink sensation that happened whenever I traveled in time. Jeremiah hadn’t moved, as far as I could tell.

And the clock said the time was 11:12.

“Excellent,” Jeremiah said. “Off by a minute, but I think that margin of error is acceptable.”

Had I really managed to get it that close? Not the exact time I’d been aiming for, although, as the primus had just pointed out, a minute wasn’t too much to get worked up over.

“You think it was the amulet?” I asked.

His gaze moved to the lozenge-shaped hunk of bronze in my hand with its glowing red garnet eye. “I believe it was you and the amulet working together. You used your magic in the way you knew how, and the amulet allowed that magic to be focused properly. This is…encouraging.”

“Do you think Seth and I will be able to travel to the future now?” I asked eagerly, but at once, Jeremiah lifted a quelling hand.

“I don’t think you should go that far. Not until we’ve performed a few more experiments to see if your control stays consistent when you’re working with larger segments of time.”

That didn’t sound very good to me. “What, do you want me to travel days or even weeks, and just leave the rest of you to catch up?”

A glint showed in Jeremiah’s black eyes, one I thought was probably of amusement and not just a reflection from the fire. “I don’t think I’d ask that much of you. But perhaps a good portion of a day, possibly six or even eight hours. This is something you would need to discuss with Seth, of course.”

Yes, because I certainly wouldn’t abandon my companion for such a huge chunk of time without making sure he was on board with the idea. What would he even do with himself while I was gone? Hang out with Jeremiah? Go visit some of the saloons down the street from our hotel and get wasted?

I somehow had a hard time imagining Seth doing anything so reckless. Yes, it seemed he was all right with drinking a little now that he was in a time when such a thing wasn’t against the law, but he’d still been very moderate about his consumption. It wasn’t as if he’d gone out and bought himself a bottle of whiskey so he could tipple in private while I was sleeping.

“Sure,” I said, then paused. Technically, we still had some time to work, since Mrs. Barton wouldn’t be back for another forty minutes or so.

On the other hand, I didn’t know whether I felt up to much more time travel today. I’d been lucky so far…and I didn’t think I wanted to press that luck.

The same sort of thoughts must have entered Jeremiah’s mind as well, because he said, “I think we’ve done enough for today. You’ve made excellent progress. Now you need to talk to Seth and decide what you want to do next. Send me a note when you’ve come to an agreement.”

“And you’ll arrange some other errand to keep Mrs. Barton busy for a few hours?” I asked with a grin.

The corners of his mouth lifted ever so slightly. “Yes, I am sure I’ll be able to come up with something.”

“What about this?” I asked, holding out the hand that still held the amulet.

He reached over and took it from me. “It’s probably best if I keep it here. Hotel rooms are not always the most secure places in the world.”

No, I supposed they weren’t. Someone more suspicious might have thought Jeremiah wanted the amulet so he could claim it as his own, but I knew that wasn’t his intention here. His powers were already vast, and he had his little empire here in Flagstaff firmly under control. He really didn’t need the thing.

Especially because I knew, even as powerful as the amulet was, it couldn’t grant him the one thing he truly wanted…to have the Wilcox curse broken.

“I’ll contact you soon,” I promised.

“I’m sure you will.”

A pause to collect my shawl and hat from the coat tree in the foyer, and then I was saying goodbye before heading down the front steps. As always, the street around me was peculiarly empty, and I knew Jeremiah’s spell was holding, ensuring that I’d be able to come and go from his house without anyone — including his family — knowing that I’d been a visitor there.

However, that little bubble of luck collapsed the second I began to walk up the front steps to the Hotel San Francisco.

Coming down them was Samuel Wilcox.

Somehow, I curbed the impulse to bolt, since I knew doing so would only call more attention to myself.

Instead, I put on a smile that I prayed didn’t look utterly false, and tilted my hat-bedecked head toward him. “Good morning, Mr. Wilcox.”

“Good morning, Miss Prewitt,” he said, then paused so he was blocking my way.

A thrill of fear went down my back, but I told myself I had nothing to worry about. We were standing near a busy street, with people coming and going from the hotel as well. No way in the world would even a scoundrel like Samuel Wilcox attempt something in front of so many witnesses.

On the other hand, that didn’t mean he couldn’t still get his jollies by giving me a hard time.

He smiled then, an expression that might as well have been worn by a shark. In fact, something about those cold black eyes reminded me exactly of the eyes I’d seen when my little brother was greedily consuming as much of Shark Week as he possibly could.

“And what has you out and about on this fine morning and all by your lonesome, Miss Prewitt?”

I wouldn’t let my own smile budge even a fraction of an inch, not when I knew doing so would let him see that he’d gotten to me. “Oh,” I said airily, as though I didn’t have a care in the world, “I’ve just been to Brannen’s to get a new packet of hairpins. I’m always seeming to run through them and never have enough on hand.”

Those black eyes narrowed slightly, then tracked to the reticule I held. I’d purposely chosen an item for my excuse that would have fit easily in my bag and would also explain why I wasn’t carrying an obvious parcel.

Samuel’s smile grew even more unpleasant, although I wouldn’t have thought such a thing was possible.

“I’m surprised your brother allows you to go out and about on your own,” he said. “Flagstaff is a rough town and not the sort of place where an unaccompanied woman should be without an escort.”

Although I’d gotten that same impression, I certainly wasn’t going to let Samuel Wilcox think he’d scored a point.

Instead, I widened my eyes and replied, “Really? It seems like a much more civilized place than I’d expected. Certainly, I haven’t encountered anyone who was anything but friendly.”

“Impressions, Miss Prewitt, can be deceiving,” he returned, black eyes glittering. “I would take care, if I were you.”

After delivering that parting shot, he continued down the stairs and then turned right on the street, telling me he was probably heading home.

I, on the other hand, remained on the steps of the Hotel San Francisco for a few seconds more, watching him until his tall, black-clad figure disappeared amongst the throngs of people and wagons and buggies that choked the street.

Something in me wouldn’t allow myself to view those final words of Samuel’s as anything other than a threat.