Chapter 41 #4
“It must have been terrifying to be tied to Capone’s safe and traveling through the vortex,” Kenzie said.
“It all happened so fast, I didn’t have time to think about it. I mean, it was shocking to travel from Capone’s vault to my house, but so much happened afterward that it didn’t really sink in until I got here.”
“Remy dumped ye in the middle of a circus, and ye’re doing very well,” Elliott said.
“The last couple of hours have been a whirlwind.”
“I’m sorry ye didn’t have any preparation. That’s only happened once to a lad. Noah was twelve when Rick brought him here in an emergency, much like yer situation.”
“Does Noah live here now?”
“His parents do, but Noah’s attending the University of Colorado.”
She gasped. “College? That’s wonderful. I’m glad he adjusted so well. I hope I can, too.”
“Ye will, lass. That’s a promise,” Elliott said.
Skye studied a picture of her mother again, swiping at fresh tears. “How will we know for sure about my parents and the Robertsons?”
“We’ll do a DNA test using your blood and your Aunt Edith’s hair,” Remy said. “The test will establish a biological relationship, if there is one. And we’ll know for sure.”
“How long will that take?”
“I’ll go to Houston from New Orleans and get her hairbrushes,” Kenzie said. “The lab can extract DNA from her hair and compare it to your sample. It will take the lab anywhere from twenty-four hours to a few weeks, depending on the type of test and the lab. Charlotte can tell you more about it.”
“I don’t understand any of that.” Skye slowly got her tears under control again. “I’ll talk to Charlotte about it, but I have a question about the brooches. You have two. The Robertsons had one. Erik has one. Violet has one. And so does Archibald. How many are there?”
“Twenty-five,” Elliott said. “With yers, we now have sixteen in our possession.”
“How did Marcelle and Bastien get the Robertsons’ brooch?” Skye asked.
“We believe Sheena and Alistair threw it across the room trying to get free of the fog,” Kenzie said. “Edith must have found it and kept it until her estate sold it recently. The woman who bought it sold it to—”
“Me!” Marcelle blurted out.
“What? The Robertsons’ brooch found its way to Marcelle, and you found your way to me.” Skye shook her head. “That’s too many coincidences.”
“There are no coincidences,” Elliott said.
“Sure, there are.”
“If fate or mystery or God… or even brooches… can cause coincidences, then the cause is known, and again there are none.”
Skye nailed Elliott with an intense look. “I need a few hours of sleep before I can diagram that sentence to understand it fully.”
“When you do, show it to me,” Remy said. “I heard Elliott and Kenzie discussing that several years ago, and I didn’t understand it then. Even Penny Malone said it was complicated for her tired, stressed, and alcohol-infused brain to follow.”
“Whoever Penny is, I want to meet her.”
“Penny bought the topaz brooch at an estate sale in New Orleans and disappeared. We went back to rescue her and fought in the Battle of New Orleans. While we were there, we found the Fontenots, who threw the topaz, traveled back in time, and got stranded in the past for several years,” Remy said.
“That’s where Papa is staying,” Kaitlyn said. “Rhona and Philippe are wonderful people. They told me their story and how much Remy means to them. She was very sick, and Remy took care of her.”
Skye drank the glass of water first and then poured a whisky, swirling it for a few seconds before knocking it back. “Tell me this. Can I use the brooch to travel back to rescue my parents, assuming the Robertsons are my parents?”
“You could,” Clay said. “But what year do we travel to? The year before you were born?”
“Then what would happen to me?”
“Nothing. You’re already here.”
“If they have a daughter in the 1970s, will that mean there are two of me?”
“It gets complicated,” Kenzie said. “Our cousin Patrick was born in the late 1800s. After his parents died, he lived on the streets of New York City until he met Jack Mallory in 1909 and came home with him. Patrick is twenty-three now. He went back to 1896 with the team to find Aislinn. That’s when he had the boxing match at McSorley’s.
His birth father came to watch him, not knowing Patrick was his son, while Baby Patrick was at home with his mother. ”
“There were two of them in the same place?” Skye asked.
“And it worked out okay,” Kenzie added.
“That means we can find my parents, take them to Inverness, and they can get back to living their lives, and never know about me.”
“Yes, but can you do that?” Remy asked. “Can you meet them and not tell them who you are?”
“It’ll be hard, but I want them to have their lives back. If they hadn’t thrown the brooch, they could’ve returned.” She quieted while she poured another shot, but didn’t drink any of it. “I won’t belong anywhere.”
“You were born and raised in Chicago in the early 1900s. But you were born out of place and time. If your parents hadn’t time-traveled, you would’ve been born in Scotland in the 1970s.
The MacKlenna Clan is your family now,” Remy said, his voice a low, steady promise.
Then he added in a whisper that was barely a breath against her ear, “And I’m your family… your home.”
Skye smiled, the corners of her eyes crinkling with genuine joy. “And I’m yours,” she replied, her voice filled with a quiet certainty.
“We have to do our due diligence,” Kenzie said. “There’s a lot we don’t know, like why they changed their names.”
“That seems like an impossible task,” Skye said.
“Meredith has a top-notch genealogy team that can find needles in haystacks. They’ll find them, but it might take a few weeks.”
“In the meantime, we’re going to get ye settled into yer new life,” Elliott said.
“The planes are leaving for New Orleans at ten o’clock. Be on the front porch by nine thirty to catch a ride,” Braham said. “If ye miss the vans, ye’ll have to drive yerself, and the plane’s not waiting for stragglers.”
“Planes? Airplanes?” Skye asked. “When I told Marcelle that my name was Skye Marshall, she thought I meant I was a sky marshal. Will there be one on the plane?”
“If there were, he or she would haul our asses to jail for carrying firearms,” Remy said. “Come on. Let’s go check on Archibald.”
“He’s sleeping.” Braham flashed his phone, showing Archibald in bed. “Since his suite is next to yers, try not to keep him awake all night.”
“Send me that app so I can monitor his recovery.”
“Ye have it, which means ye haven’t checked yer mobile for two hours.”
Remy flipped him off. “I visited him less than an hour ago. He didn’t have a fever, and he was resting comfortably. So doan give me any shit.”
“Not to put any pressure on you, Skye, but we were hoping the woman in Remy’s life would improve his foul language. It’s not working,” Kenzie said.
“We’ve had a stressful few days, so I’ve overlooked it,” Skye said. “But it’ll improve. He can’t go to medical school sounding like a gutter rat.”
“Medical school?” Kenzie’s eyes narrowed, a glint of surprise and perhaps accusation in their depths as she focused her gaze on David. “Did you know?”
“Remy told Elliott,” David said, as if that explained everything.
She wagged her finger at him, her voice tight with playful accusation. “You’re supposed to tell me stuff like this.”
“It wasn’t my secret, Kenz.”
Before this escalated, Remy’s resolve to keep this information private crumbled, and he reluctantly confessed. “I have to take the MCAT first. It’s far from a done deal.”
“That’s Charlotte, Sarah, Isabella, and now Remy. How many doctors does a family need?” Kenzie asked.
“More than three,” Elliott grumbled. “Now get out of here and go do whatever.”
“Elliott, there’s a cool story I forgot to mention,” Clay said.
“When Sean MacKlenna was a young man, he went to New York City in 1901 to see Amy and read her newspaper articles. And get this. He was her and JL’s steward, Chester, when they sailed on the S.S.
New York. He knew he couldn’t interfere with what happened on the ship. ”
“Don’t tell Amy and JL about Sean, aka Chester. He could’ve warned them to stay away from Stephen Thomson,” Kenzie said.
“Isn’t the number one brooch rule not to interfere?” Clay asked.
“Sean wasn’t a traveler, so how could the rule apply?” Kenzie asked.
“He learned about it from a traveler. What’s the difference?” Clay asked. “Breaking rules could have unintended consequences. Maybe he would have gone to the cargo hold to rescue Thomson’s captives, and Thomson killed Sean instead. What would that have done to the MacKlenna line?” Clay asked.
“Ended it,” Elliott growled.
“That would have made him the last MacKlenna,” Kenzie said.
“Hell, I don’t have the answers, Clay. Travelers have to do the best they can without coloring too far outside the lines,” Elliott said.
Kenzie closed her computer and walked toward the door. “That advice and a dime will get you a cup of coffee. I’m done here.”
Remy stood and reached for Skye’s hand, his fingers gently brushing hers. “So are we,” he said softly. “We’ll see you in the morning.”