Chapter Thirty-Four
Nolan
We land in the middle of her living room, soaked to the bone.
I grip her pink coat and try to tear it from her shoulders, but it’s too heavy and her arms are trapped. Her body is limp and uncooperative underneath mine, her eyes closed, her lips tinged the faintest shade of blue.
“Fuck.” I yank at her jacket again, her head lolling to the side. “Fuck. Harriet. Please.” Magic bursts out of me and the jacket disappears, the thin blue oxford she has on underneath clinging to her chest.
She’s too still.
She’s too cold.
“Harriet,” I snap, shaking her once. I pinch her mouth open and lean down, pushing air into her lungs. But I don’t know if it’ll work. I’m a—I’m a ghost. I don’t breathe. I lean back and settle my hands over the middle of her chest, pressing with a firm rhythm.
She doesn’t stir.
“Harriet,” I say again. How long was she under water? One minute? Two? Time is fleeting, especially in a memory. I never should have let go of her.
Christ, I’ll never forget the sight of her tumbling over the edge, terror blowing her eyes wide, her hands reaching for me. I scrambled to follow, but she disappeared too quickly. I couldn’t see her beneath the surface. I couldn’t see anything.
“Harriet,” I whisper again, begging now, my hands still pressing over her chest. I count to thirty, lift my hands, and wait to see her lungs fill.
They don’t.
I press my mouth to hers again.
“Harriet, please. Please, love.” I cup her chin with a trembling hand. I stop trying to breathe air into her lungs and soften my mouth against hers in a kiss. I’m desperate. She’s so fucking cold. “Come on, now. Wake up. Wake up for me.”
Is this the consequence Isabella warned me of? Is this the price I need to pay?
If so, the cost is too steep.
I stare down at her pale face. “Harriet.” My voice cracks. “Come back to me.”
I trace her cheek with my thumb. Water drips from the ends of my hair to the floor. I’m aware of the silence, the quiet pressing down on me as it wraps us in a cocoon on Harriet’s floor. It squeezes at my lungs and at the back of my neck, my breaths overly loud in the absence of Harriet’s.
“Please,” I whisper.
Harriet lurches beneath me with a sputtering gasp, choking on water.
I quickly turn her on her side as she empties it from her body against the hardwood, coughing and sputtering, my hand firm against her back as I help her through it.
Relief is a razor blade slicing me open. I’m so grateful it hurts.
“It’s all right,” I soothe as she curls onto her side, her knees tucked to her chest. Her body trembles violently, her wet hair a tangled clump against her neck. “We’re back. I got you.”
I found her beneath the water. I got her back and I didn’t let go.
She’s safe now and she’s—she’s going to be fine.
Her gaze is bleary, her teeth chattering.
“Co-co-cold,” she stammers. I spit out an ugly word.
Of course she’s cold. I chuff my hands over her shoulders and let my magic flow through me, shivery and bright.
My control is tremulous at best and it explodes out of me in a frantic wave, rattling the ornaments on the tree as it covers Harriet like a blanket.
She whimpers as she’s wrapped in gold. My hands grip her tighter.
“You’re all right,” I repeat. I can’t stop shaking. “We’re back.”
We never should have returned to the past. Not when I know the key to moving me forward is hidden on the top shelf of her supply closet.
These trips are nothing but a distraction, and now a threat to her safety.
I should have grabbed her hand and pulled her back to this time as soon as we landed on that boat. I knew where we were.
It was selfish, not to tell her.
My magic pulls back, caressing her gently as it returns to me. Pink cheeks. Messy hair. Tired eyes. She’s exhausted but alive, lying curled in a half-moon on her living room floor.
She glances at her chest with a surprised sound. “You ch-chose the nutcracker ones.”
She plucks at the top of her matching flannel pajamas, smiling faintly at the dancing nutcrackers. I can’t say it was a deliberate choice. I chose whatever would get her the warmest the fastest. She shivers and I frown, waving my hand again. A sweatshirt appears on top of the nutcrackers.
It’s far too big. She’s dwarfed in the soft material, the sleeves extending over her hands. She tucks her fingers in the cuffs, curling herself into a ball. “Is this y-yours?”
“Yes,” I reply immediately, my heart still hammering in my chest.
I can’t stop touching her. I trace my palms over her arms, her shoulders, the line of her neck. I press my hands against her warm skin and finally release a breath when I feel her pulse fluttering, steady and sure.
Another shiver twists its way over her shoulders and my magic explodes out, adding mittens on her hands and a hat over her hair. I blink and she’s wearing snow pants, cinched tight around her waist.
An amused smile quirks the corner of her lips.
“While all of this is very helpful, I think it would be best if you dried yourself off.” Her eyes soften, her hand raising to brush some of my wet hair away from my face. “Your hands are cold. You must be freezing, Nolan.”
I pull away from her. I’ve been dripping on her warm, dry clothes.
Touching her with my frigid hands.
“’M sorry.” I reach for my magic again. My wet clothes disappear in favor of jeans and a gray T-shirt. “I don’t—you were—and then—” I clench my jaw, my molars snapping together. “I’m so sorry,” I finally grit out.
“Oh, Nolan,” Harriet whispers. She extends her arms, shifting closer on the floor. “Come here. Don’t apologize. I’m okay.”
But she almost wasn’t, and it’s because I couldn’t keep her safe. Because I’m too cowardly to tell her the truth. Because I can’t stay away.
I haul her into my lap and bury my face in her hair, exhaling a heavy breath. She clings to me just as fiercely.
“No more trips,” I say into her neck. “No more, Harriet. We’re not going back.”
She combs her fingers through my hair. “But we haven’t—”
“No more,” I say again, my voice hard. I press my hand to the middle of her back, trying to tuck her closer. “I won’t take you. I won’t do it, Harriet.”
“Okay,” she agrees. She scratches her nails against my scalp. “That’s okay. We’ll stay here.”
I nod, my nose against her neck. I should have told her about the compass. We never should have gone to the past. “I won’t—we’re not going back again.”
“Okay,” she says once more, reassuring me. “We won’t go, Nolan.
It’s okay. I’m all right.”
“Okay.” I squeeze my eyes shut, wrapping my arms around her. I can’t stop seeing her beneath the water, her golden hair drifting around her. Her amber eyes bright, even through the dark. Her pink coat and her hand, reaching for mine.
My brow furrows and I twitch my head to the side, remembering.
Not when I yanked her from the ocean, but before.
Cold water. A splitting pain across my forehead. Pressure against my chest and burning across my nose.
Everything blurry and dark, and then light.
Her hand. Reaching for mine.
I thought she was an angel.
My eyes snap open.
“I saw you,” I murmur.
Harriet rearranges herself in my lap until her arms are draped over my shoulders, her cheek resting against my shoulder. “Hmm?”
“Beneath the water,” I say, my voice shaking. “I saw you.”
“Oh. Yeah, you did. I didn’t see you, but I could feel your magic.” She presses a kiss to the tip of my ear. “Thank you for coming to get me.”
I shake my head. “No, Harriet. I saw you. I remember you. I—I remember when I was drowning,” I stutter, not knowing how it’s possible, but feeling the truth of it in my bones. I remember. “I saw you beneath the water. You reached for me. You tried to grab my hand.”
A line appears across her forehead. Her eyes search mine. “You mean you saw me when you pulled me out,” she says slowly. “Right?” I shake my head. “No. It’s my memory. From before. It’s hazy, but I remember you. You, Harriet. I remember your coat.” Church bells.
Robin’s-egg blue. Sea glass green. Pale, pale pink. Pink. The pink of her coat. “Harriet. It was you. I was dying and I saw you.”
“How?” she breathes.
I shake my head. “I don’t know.”
I remember that itch that first night we met. When she was sitting on her couch with her hair pulled into a messy ponytail. I looked at her and something felt familiar. A wisp of a memory, floating at the edge of my consciousness.
She’s always been there. This entire time, Harriet has been there. “What does it mean?” she whispers.
“I don’t know,” I whisper back.
I press my forehead to hers and breathe in her peppermint sugar smell. I feel the softness of her hair. I close my eyes and try to connect the dots.
“Maybe I was always supposed to find you,” I rasp.
Maybe, my heart adds, you were always supposed to be mine.
Harriet takes the news—and her recovery from almost drowning off the coast of 1902 Ireland—in stride.
She makes pancakes with her puffball hat still pulled low over her ears, her mittens discarded on the kitchen counter as she wields the spatula.
The realization that I somehow saw her present self in my dying moments more than a hundred years ago has validated her every theory regarding my presence in her life.
“I knew it,” she says for the fiftieth time since we entered her kitchen, her eyes bright with enthusiasm. A wet clump of batter goes flying off the end of her spatula. “I knew I was supposed to help you move on. And now, look! We have proof!”
I think of the compass sitting on the top shelf of her storage closet and shift uncomfortably. “It’s not exactly proof,” I counter, still trying to stall. Still trying to drag out our time together.
Apparently, I haven’t fucking learned my lesson.
She sets both hands on her hips, glaring at me from the stove. She looks adorable in her oversize sweatshirt and flannel pajamas. Wild hair and rosy cheeks.
“I thought you’d be happy about this,” she says. “It’s a guarantee that you’re going to move on.”
“It’s no such thing,” I say wearily. “We have no idea what it means.
Not really.”
Half of me is still hoping it’s a string of coincidences, meaningless in their frequency. Two ships passing in the night, nothing more and nothing less.
Harriet turns off the stovetop. “It means something, Nolan. You know it does.”
That’s what I’m afraid of. How can I move on if it means I must leave this behind? Afternoon pancakes and a cluttered kitchen with mismatched tea mugs. Harriet and her pajama sets.
The irony is breathtaking. Harriet is the key to my salvation, when salvation means I’ll be somewhere without her.
I pick at the edge of my pancake. The chair across from me screeches against the floor. Harriet’s hand reaches for mine. “Hey. Talk to me. What’s going on?”
Our fingers knit together. I don’t know how to articulate the guilt and the trepidation and the hesitation, so I say, “I’m having trouble figuring out how to say goodbye to you.”
She makes a small sound under her breath, her hand tensing and then relaxing in mine.
“We knew this was going to happen,” she whispers.
“Aye. I know.”
I didn’t realize how hard I’d fall. I had no idea how important she’d become in such a short amount of time.
I think of her beneath the water. The look on her face. Her hand, reaching for mine.
I didn’t realize I’d already been missing her for more than a hundred years. Now I’m going to miss her for an afterlife more.
“I don’t want to leave you alone,” I say, my throat tight.
“I won’t be alone. I have Sasha. And Oliver.” She tries for a small smile, mouth trembling. “You don’t have to worry about me. I’m going to be okay.”
I know she will be. She’s resilient, and intelligent, and so damned lovely it makes my chest ache.
She’s a force to be reckoned with and I’ve seen her steadily rebuild her confidence over the past few weeks.
She has a solid belief in herself now—that she can stand her ground and be okay.
That she’s worth the effort it takes to demand more for herself.
I know she’s going to be fine without me. She’ll be better than fine.
She’ll shine so fucking bright. Just like she’s been shining.
I know it.
It’s me I’m worried about.