Chapter 67 Mallory Plantation—Rick
Mallory Plantation—Rick
When the fog thinned, Rick found himself staring straight into Alistair’s face.
For a few confused seconds, none of it computed. How the hell…? His mind fired blanks. Then, a rush of panic hit him. Where was he?
Instinct took over. He reached for his gun, but his hand met only air.
Right—he’d used it earlier as a club. The Glock in his leg holster?
Gone. Or maybe he just couldn’t feel it through the lightning bolts of pain shooting up his side.
Even thinking about moving sent hot irons searing through muscle and bone.
The scream that rose in his throat stayed locked there.
If they’d landed in the middle of the Illuminati’s stronghold, they were finished. No backup, no weapons, no way to warn the families. Nobody would ever know what happened to them.
He tried to angle his arm toward the brooch. Maybe he could manage a lateral shift out—but not until he was sure where Clay and Tavis had ended up.
Groaning, Rick forced himself upright. The motion ripped through him in waves of fire. He blinked through the haze, expecting stone walls or chains, some medieval hell of an interrogation chamber.
Instead, the air smelled of hay. Rick touched the floor and felt dry straw beneath his palms. A barn. Convenient. The hay would make cleanup easier—absorb the worst of it.
“What the hell happened to ye?”
The voice was accented, Scottish—familiar enough to stir his confusion into disbelief.
He squinted up, not trusting his eyes. “Great. Now I’m hallucinating.”
“Can ye stand?”
Definitely hallucinating. “Sure. Absolutely. I’ll just trek the Cumberland Trail while I’m at it.” Every word came out between ragged breaths. “If you see Clay and Tavis, tell them I went hiking.” He tried to look around but couldn’t even turn his head.
“I’m right behind you, asshole,” came Tavis’s groan. “Thanks for the ride home.”
“I’ll get the tip,” Clay added, voice tight with pain. “But five percent is all you’re getting—and that’s me being generous. Plus, a one-star review.”
Rick let out a broken laugh that ended in a cough. “I got you here, didn’t I? Stop complaining.”
The voice spoke again, drier now, faintly amused. “The lads look like hell, but at least they kept their sense of humor.”
Rick froze. Slowly, painfully, he lifted his eyes. The man standing over him wasn’t Alistair after all—but Elliott, framed in the soft gold light filtering through the open barn door.
“Where are we?” Rick croaked.
Elliott crouched beside him, his face just visible through the settling fog. “Ye’re in the new barn—the same one ye left from, only a minute ago.”
Rick blinked, trying to steady the spinning room. “Then why’s Alistair here?”
“He came back with Remy, Skye, and Archibald,” Elliott said matter-of-factly. “Don’t ye remember?”
Rick tried shaking his head, but fire shot through his ribs. “Not possible. Alistair’s dead. That’s why we went back—to save him.”
“Ye went back,” Braham’s voice rumbled from behind them, “to give Eliot Ness evidence of Maurice Bowes’s tax evasion scheme.”
“Bullshit,” Tavis growled.
“If we’d met with Eliot Ness, I’d at least have a story to write,” Clay added.
Rick exhaled a shaky laugh that turned into a wince. “I’m way too busted up to argue. Just… help me up.”
Braham slipped an arm around his waist, and Rick’s scream tore straight through the barn. “Fuck! Ribs!”
Braham grimaced and shifted to the other side.
The engine of Penny’s golf cart whined as she sped across the dirt floor. She slammed it to a stop near them and jumped out. “My God, Rick—what happened to you?”
“I didn’t ask for it,” he rasped, breath sawing in his chest.
“And you didn’t walk away either.” Her voice cracked as if she were trying—and failing—to keep calm. “Let’s get you into the cart. I’ll drive you over to Charlotte so she can put Humpty Dumpty back together again.”
She was trying for humor, but the quiver in her tone made Rick’s chest ache more than his ribs.
Across the floor, Marcelle and Aislinn came running.
“What happened?” Aislinn gasped.
“We had a slight disagreement,” Tavis said, grimacing.
“And you were part of it, Clay?” Marcelle asked, already scanning him for injuries.
Clay tried to laugh. “I sketched the other guys—with horns on their heads.”
Marcelle bent down and kissed his bruised forehead. “I bet you did. What can I do?”
“Get carts and haul these guys to the clean room,” Braham ordered. “Charlotte called in reinforcements when she heard the lot of ye were going back looking for trouble. Emily and Isabella are with her.”
Penny glanced toward the pile of duffels and bodies. “Are you and David handling that mess?”
“Eek!” Marcelle shrieked, jumping back. “The one with the smashed face—he moved!”
Elliott kneeled and checked each man’s pulse, two fingers against the carotid. “They can all move. The lads brought back four problems.”
“They’re in worse condition than we are,” Rick muttered. “We can still scream. They can’t.”
Another golf cart screeched into the barn, driven by Mark, Tavis’s brother. He leaped out, breathless. “I got the SOS! What the hell’s going on? Shit, man, where’ve you been?”
“I’ll explain later,” Tavis grunted. “Help me up.”
Elliott went to Clay’s side. “Come on, lad, let’s get ye moving. Archibald would be here too if Charlotte hadn’t sentenced him to house arrest.”
“I’ll take the other side,” Marcelle said, stepping gingerly over a motionless thug.
With Braham’s arm locked around his back, Rick staggered toward the cart, boots scraping, breath coming in harsh bursts.
Every step sent a fresh spike of pain through him, white and blinding.
He braced a hand against the cart, fingers digging into the leather seat as he fought to stay upright.
“Fuck,” he ground out, head dropping for a second before he forced it up again. “Why’d you let me go on that trip?”
Penny shot him a look. “Are you asking me? You volunteered. I couldn’t talk you out of it. Said you wanted to use the evidence to put Bowes away for life. Remember?”
“No, I don’t.” Rick sank onto the seat, gripping the roll bar. Braham lifted his legs for him.
“Hold on,” Braham said. “Penny’s a maniac behind the wheel. I don’t want to pick ye up off the road.”
“I’m not a terrible driver,” Penny protested.
“We’ll argue that later.” Rick jerked his chin toward the pile of motionless men. “Maurice Bowes is one of those bastards. If this trip was about delivering evidence to the FBI, why’d I bring him home?”
Penny hit the brakes so hard that Rick pitched forward. “Damn it, Penny!”
“You brought Bowes back? Why in God’s name?”
“I couldn’t kill him, and I couldn’t leave him there. I was afraid he’d hurt Alistair—or Skye.”
“How could he hurt them?” she countered. “They’re here—and now so is he.”
“The other three,” Alistair said, stepping closer, “are Bowes’s top lieutenants. Ye’ve cut the head off the snake.”
“They were trying to kill us.” Rick’s voice cracked under the pain. “Where’s Skye?”
“With Remy in Houston,” Penny said, taking another sharp corner. “Exactly where she was when you left a minute ago.” She reached to steady him as the cart bounced.
Rick shouted, “Fuck, Penny! Don’t grab me like that!”
“That’s enough, Rick O’Grady!” she snapped. “Do you hear Tavis or Clay talking that way?”
“Tavis’s Navy,” he said through gritted teeth. “I’m Marine. We were trained to swear better.”
That earned half a smirk. “Smarty-pants. What about Clay?”
“He’s from the Upper East Side.”
“And that means what?”
“He has manners,” Rick said.
She shook her head, chuckling despite herself, and hit the remote to the garage door.
The panels lifted smoothly as she steered into the basement.
Once inside, she keyed in the security code and eased the cart down the ramp into the clean room, where Isabella, Emily, and Charlotte already waited beside three prepared gurneys.
The lights spilled over the battered trio—blood-streaked, dust-covered, barely standing—as Penny braked to a stop.
Charlotte’s gloved hands went to her hips. “Well,” she said, voice calm but eyes wide, “I see you found trouble.”
Rick forced a grin. “Trouble found us.”
“How bad?” Charlotte asked, stepping up to the cart and snapping on sterile gloves.
“Tavis might have a busted arm, a deep cut on his side, and a collection of minor bruises,” Rick said, his voice hoarse. “Clay’s got a deep gash in his thigh, one eye closing fast, maybe a concussion, and possibly a sprained wrist.”
Charlotte turned to him. “And you?”
“Ribs. Cuts. Maybe a broken finger.” He glanced at his swollen left hand. “But Clay’s the worst. He’s lost a lot of blood.”
Charlotte flicked on her penlight, inspecting his pupils. “What about your head?”
“I took some hits.”
“How many is some?”
She didn’t wait for an answer. With a practiced motion, she ripped Rick’s shirt open, yanked free the Velcro straps of his vest, and peeled it away. Her fingertips probed his ribs.
Rick yelped, grabbing her wrist. “There. Right there.”
Charlotte nodded briskly. “Localized pain, swelling, bruising—likely a couple of broken ribs.” She looked at Emily and Isabella.
“All three need full-body MRIs and IVs with Ringer’s.
The lines are MRI-compatible. They’ve all had their tetanus shots.
Start broad-spectrum antibiotics—the same protocol we use after time-travel.
” She turned back to Rick. “Pain level?”
“One or two,” he said. “We used autoinjectors before we jumped.”
Penny folded her arms. “If you’re doped up, what’s with all the moaning?”
“I’m”—he groaned—“looking for the sympathy vote.”
Charlotte arched an eyebrow. “Monitor vitals and consciousness. No more morphine yet. He’s probably in more pain than he admits.”
Rick stuck his tongue out. “You’ve always been stingy.”
“I’ll take Rick,” Isabella said, tugging on a fresh pair of gloves.
Rick squinted. “Great. The baby doc.”
She smiled sweetly. “I brought prizes.” From a pocket, she produced a handful of suckers. “Pick your flavor—lemon, lime, grape, blueberry, orange, or cherry.”
Rick snatched the grape. “Feed me those, and I’ll let you stitch me up.”
Isabella grinned over his shoulder at Penny. “I’ll allow the attitude for now, but if it keeps up, I’m stitching without Novocain.”
Penny leaned close, eyes soft but commanding. “We know you’re hurting. But if you’re not nice to Isabella, you’ll go to the end of the line. Straighten up.” She reached into Rick’s trouser pocket, found his rosary, and closed his fingers around it.
The cool beads grounded him instantly. He squeezed them tight, letting the metal crucifix steady his breathing. The pain was real, but it wasn’t just pain anymore—it was confusion, too, the fog of everything that had happened and everything he didn’t understand yet.
“Penny, will you help me with his pants?” Isabella asked, handing her another pair of gloves.
Between grunts and shallow breaths, he let them ease off his boots and slide down his trousers. There was a lot of hissing, but this time—miraculously—no cursing.
“He can keep his briefs,” Isabella said. “I’ve seen enough junk for one lifetime.” She cut away the rest of his ruined shirt and unfastened the back of his body armor. “I’ll start his IV. You wipe him down with antiseptic wipes.”
“You’re making that face again,” Rick said weakly, watching Penny’s expression. “Do I look that bad?”
She gave him a sad smile, one that didn’t quite reach her eyes. “Worse than after New Orleans. I didn’t see you after Afghanistan, but it can’t have been much worse than this.”
He turned his face away, swallowing hard, his jaw working as if the words had found something raw.
Penny reached up, brushing the damp hair off his forehead with careful fingers. “Close your eyes.”
He did, lashes lowering as his breath hitched once before settling.
“Let the morphine do its work,” she whispered, leaning close. “We’ll take care of you now.”
The words wrapped around him, steady and sure. The searing edges of pain and confusion softened, then slowly began to recede, leaving only the distant hum of relief.