Most perfect? No. Pretty damned great? Oh, yeah. “It’s top ten material.” I told her the story in its entirety, and she remained quiet, hanging on every syllable. “So, there isn’t much to clean up. Just some ash and melted men. About 6 total.”

  Her eyes went wide. “Only six? I thought the threat was neutralized? Destroyed.”

  “Well, yeah. It is.” I cleared my throat. There was a lot more to say. “The thing is, in the last place Artie and I were held, there were some lower-level rogues, and something triggered a self-destruct.” Did they need to know it was Fred? I thought not. “Most of the Rogues died in that blast.”

  Director Dixon’s mouth pressed into a tight line. “Rowena, do you believe that the threat posed by the Rogue faction is over?”

  I nodded. “I do. My…” I almost said my father. “My recollection of what Samuel said is very clear. He said that there are a few Rogues spread through the ages, but no one that actually matters and there isn’t an organized threat. “I smiled. “The bloodline is, for all intents and purposes, dead.”

  She breathed a sigh and her smile reappeared. Harold whirled her in a circle like a dance. Then he hugged her, and his face flushed as he let her go. “Well.” He cleared his throat. “This is certainly good news. The best news I’ve had in ages.” I glanced at the director, and she continued smiling, although there was a different glow in her cheeks that I wasn’t going to comment on. Not now anyway. Harold was talking. “Maybe now we can concentrate on the government contracts and keep things running smoothly.”

  Cynthia smiled at him, and he stuck his fingers in the collar of his shirt, just beneath his tie and gave a slight tug. “Awfully hot in here tonight, don’t you think? How about I get us all drinks?”

  He walked away and Artie spoke to Cynthia as Craig turned me to face him. “What do you say, we blow this joint and go back to your place?” But before either of us could move, Harold stood on top of a desk, as a waiter—I didn’t know TIME had waiters in their employ—handed us all glasses of champagne.

  “Today, the world is safer because Artie Dixon, Craig Ferguson and of course, Rowena Hembree have gone above and beyond their callings to rid the timeline of Rogue witches who seek to destroy everything this agency, the witches before you, since the Garden of Eden, and of course all of you have worked so hard to make safe.”

  I looked around. There were raised glasses and desks full of food, bottles of champagne like TIME had been waiting for this moment, prepared to celebrate in case it happened. I glanced at Artie. “I wasn’t aware that mission completions resulted in company parties.”

  “They don’t always. Sometimes we celebrate our holidays.” And by that he meant the holidays observed by witches—Yule, Imbolc, Spring Equinox, and Samhain, just to name a few.

  “Oh, Rowena, you should’ve been here for the last Yule Ball.” Craig smiled, waggled his eyebrows at me. It was a delightful display. And I was more enchanted by the minute.

  But Artie grumbled under his breath. Then louder, “Don’t remind me.”

  There was a story there, but someone flipped on some music—an old Britney—and I pulled Craig onto the dancefloor. This was my jam. Nobody loved Britney the way I did.

  And it was during her power ballad, when he pulled me so close, I could feel his heartbeat under my cheek, I decided I had to tell him. Not because I thought he would be pissed off that I hadn’t told him—which he would’ve—but because I wanted to start this off with honesty. And we’d done well up to this point. I wasn’t going to be the one who ruined it, the one who was responsible for making him feel the way my ex had made me feel.

  I lifted my head and gazed up at him. This could very well have been the last time I got to look at him this closely, to see the flecks of gold in his eyes from this angle, to see his smile aimed at me. I wanted a second to savor it.

  “I have to talk to you.” I probably could’ve said it a bit smoother, but since I hadn’t rehearsed it, or even planned it beyond the thought I had just before I spoke, that I hadn’t flubbed even that much was to my credit.

  “Okay. What’s up?” And still he swayed me in his arms like he trusted what I was about to say wasn’t going to destroy us. The us that we were anyway.

  What I had to say was so personal and so against the rules I couldn’t risk saying it out on the makeshift dance floor where all the people we worked with could overhear. Plus, I wanted to tell Artie, too. Although, I suspected he knew already.

  I pulled Craig toward where Artie was standing alone watching the party. As I passed, I whispered, “Hey, come here.”

  When we were in the hallway away from the music, Artie frowned. “Rowena, I don’t know what you’ve heard, but I am more of a one-on-one man.” I cocked a brow. “I don’t do threesomes.”

  He half-grinned.

  “Did you just make a joke, Arterial?” I needed this last moment of levity, this normalcy before I ruined it all. For all of us.

  Craig chuckled and slapped Artie on the shoulder. “No offense, pal, but I’m a one-woman man.”

  Artie cocked his head. “Your loss.”

  They both turned to me, and I stood for a couple of seconds smiling because I wanted to remember this moment, to etch it into my memory. It was perfect and later on, if this all came to an end, I was going to need it.

  I inhaled slowly, then blew it out, then looked from Craig to Artie and back again. “I don’t want to lie to either of you.” Artie closed his eyes and pursed his lips like he already knew what I was about to say, but Craig stared, cocked his head, his brow pinched.

  “What’s up, Ro?”

  “I’m going to have to ask you to keep this between us, because…” Because I was a big fat liar who was about to go against the promises I made when I took this job, when I agreed to adhere to the rules of time travel, when I gave my word. “Well, you’ll see.” I swallowed. “I don’t have a memory of having done it so I’m definitely going to be altering the course of the timeline. And I know it’s dangerous, I know that if I run into myself—younger or older—in the past, it can break time and space, or whatever.” Maybe I hadn’t quite paid attention that day in Theory of Time Travel.

  “Rowena, why would you do this?” Craig was the one I’d hoped would support the idea I haven’t gotten to yet.

  “I’m going back to the past to save my mother.”

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Craig was more accommodating than I probably had a right to ask or expect him to be, definitely more so than Artie whose disappointment—or that was what I thought it was—didn’t allow for more smiles or even full-on glances my way.

  Maybe I should’ve asked if he had a memory of seeing me back then, the adult me who was breaking rules but for the best cause. The consequences were worth the risk.

  I glanced at Artie who stood beside Craig behind the viewing glass as I checked the file one last time. My mother had died at six-fourteen PM. I would portal in six hours ahead. If I couldn’t get to my mother, make her believe, I could head Simon off before he got to her.

  While I was screwing with the mechanics of time, risking the balance that TIME worked so hard to maintain while they also eliminated threats to the future. It was a lot to keep straight in my head. But I’d watched a lot of Sci-fi, especially since I got this idea to go back and save her, and I was pretty sure I could do this. Hollywood, surprisingly, had so many of the facts right, and certainly they wouldn’t let me down. Bring on the space-time continuum, Marty McFly.

  I’d gone over the details so many times. Left my tracking bracelet and pendant with Artie so if anyone came looking for me, they would see I was still at the TIME agency. I’d asked Craig and Artie to remove the TIME trace I was creating so no one would know what I’d done. Last thing I needed was someone arriving a few seconds before or after me, trying to put the kibosh on my mission.

  You sure you want to do this, Ro?

  This is something I have to do. I don’t have a choice.

  Then I’m here, Ro. I have your back.

  I looked at him, smiled, gave a slight nod because this was the only thing I’d been sure of for years. Well, I glanced one more time at Craig. Maybe not the only thing, but it was one of the big one.

  * * *

  Let’s do this, Fred. If I managed to do it right, I would be back before anyone knew I ever left.

  I opened the portal and stepped through.

  This was Deja vu on an epic scale. We were on my mother’s street on the day I got my powers. The day I first melted a toaster. The sensation was heady. Almost overwhelming.

  I glanced at Fred. “Are you certain your fairy magic can turn a body into an exact carbon copy of another body so that it won’t be magically detected by any witch?” This was the plan. Our only plan and I needed to know if we were on a suicide mission or if things were going to work out.

  Fred, in true Fred fashion, popped a wing onto his hip and stared at me like I’d just suggested he grow a second head. He huffed and puffed and scoffed. “First of all, calling the Fae fairies or Fae magic fairy magic is offensive in ways I cannot even articulate. Congratulations, Rowena, you’ve rendered me speechless.”

  By the sheer number of words he used, he proved otherwise, but I didn’t interrupt.

  “Calling a Fae a fairy is like calling every mammal including humans a donkey, an Abyssinian, or a zebra.” He said zebra with a short A. His pretentiousness made me smile. “A fairy is a type of Fae.”

  “I’m sorry, Fred.” I really was. He was as put-out as I’d ever seen him.

  “It’s just hurtful, Ro.”

  “I know. I’m really sorry.” I cleared my throat. I never meant to hurt his feelings. First because I wasn’t that kind of witch and second because I had no idea he could pout so heavily. “Out of curiosity, Fred, what kind of Fae are you?”

  His lips made the smacking sound after he pursed them. “I’m...I’m… well if you have to know, technically I’m a type of fairy.” He shook his head. “But if you call me tinker or bell or any combination thereof just one time, I’m out.”

  I twisted my lips to hide my smile. “I would never.” I glanced at him almost afraid to ask now. “You’re sure about the body?”

  He nodded. “I’m magnificent, Rowena. Of course, I can do it.”

  This was my moment of truth, the second where everything I’d become since my mother died came into play. I blew out a breath and lifted my hand to knock on the door. Inside, there was movement, a bump, some footsteps, a knob that needed oiled. Then she was there. Standing in front of me.

  Her face was the emojis on my phone. Mouth open shock. Wide-eyed disbelief. A smile. Confusion. Then brow-pinched worry. Well, she recognized me and that was something.

  I held up a hand. “I know what this must look like. But we don’t have much time. You’re going to die today.”

  Lucy, my mother, cocked a brow and her lips parted. This was confusion and disbelief together. But if she’d known me, if she’d realize, I had a plan. It accounted for my mischievous smile. I couldn’t help it.

  She pulled me inside and Fred fluttered along beside me. As I followed her, I stared at the outfit. It was the exact outfit she’d been wearing when she appeared to me in the past and tapped her watch before she’d disappeared again.

  I laid out the story and ended with, “Tonight, Simon is going to come kill you.”

  “What?”

  “Yeah. Samuel Michaelson isn’t a very good person so…” I shrugged. “I had to kill him. Well, actually, I went to kill him, but the Winter Prince—a Fae”—I glanced at Fred for approval, and he nodded— “made a deal of some kind with Samuel and when Samuel didn’t deliver, the Winter Prince took back the years he’d given Samuel.” I didn’t call him “my father” with Lucy because, obviously, she knew.

  “I had no idea he was head of the Rogues.”

  I shrugged. Love was love. And whatever happened between them was her story. Her reason.

  Lucy glanced at me. “Things make a lot more sense, now.” This had to be weird for her. Awkward. “Okay. So, what’s the plan?”

  I was afraid it would take much more time to convince her, time we didn’t have. “I need you to portal.” I wrote down the exact time and place on a tiny sheet of paper and handed it to her. “Make sure I see you, tap your watch and then portal out.” It sounded ridiculous. “That is the minute I solidified the idea to save you in the first place.”

  It was her life I was trying to save, her bacon that needed pulling from the fryer and I wasn’t quite convinced she understood the consequences or that she took them seriously, but we were running out of time for me to make it clearer.

  She took a deep breath. “What can it hurt right? So, we blow up the timeline? What’s the worst that can happen?”

  The questions were their own answer, and we looked at each other. This had to work. Both our futures depended on it.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Lucy portaled out and then right back in. “Okay. Stage one, complete.”

  I chuckled. It was the phrasing. “Now we need to remove all the wards off of the house. Samuel said Simon was very clear that you were careless by not protecting the house.”

  Something was off. “I would never take the wards off.” but there we were, affecting her behavior in her time because I knew from the future things about the past. And I was using them. Even in my own head, the circular information made me spin.

  “Well, Simon said…” I smiled even though this was the most important part of the story. “We have to make sure everything is in perfect order, just like he said.”

  “Did he say it though because you’d already been here in the past, or did you come back to the past and remove the wards because he said it?” Lucy stopped erasing a spell to look at me. Her magic hovered in the air in front of her.

  I couldn’t think about it because I couldn’t figure it out no matter how many angles I used to consider the information.

  “I need to contact Artie and have him meet us at your apartment.” Every detail had to be precise, so I didn’t destroy the timeline. Fortunately, Lucy understood the importance. It was the perk of her being who she was.

  I called Artie’s number from Lucy’s landline. It was an old rotary phone and I flashed on those videos of the young kids who’d only ever used a cell phone and had no idea how to make a call on such a vintage piece of equipment.

  “Hello?”

  “Artie? It’s Rowena.”

  “Rowena? You sound different.”

  “Older, right? Sore throat. Can you meet me at Lucy’s house? It’s a TIME emergency.” I thought maybe I could use the mention to entice him into action, but he was Artie. No real enticement needed.

  And in a few minutes, he was standing at the door. He’d met the younger version of me. Hence how he recognized my voice was off a bit. And his non-reaction was almost a letdown. He was so true to his roll-with-it personality that he didn’t even blink when he got his first look at me. I laid out the entire story.

  “And this timeline’s version of me is going to be contacting you after she...I come back from meeting you in the past.”

  “Mm-hmm.” He chuckled. “That sounds about right.” He pulled a letter from his pocket. “You’re going to need this.” The acceptance letter signed by Harold Ferguson.

  I chuckled. “I wondered how that got on the door.” I folded the letter and put it into my pocket. More details.

  “What are we doing?” He waved a finger at the magic floating through the air. We would collect the removed wards and destroy them, but the first part of the process was lengthy. As I worked, I filled Artie in on the small and big details. Spare bodies, cloned DNA sequences, invisibility spells. It was a lot, and I might’ve sounded more on the crazy side than I wanted to be, but unless they knew it all, there were too many opportunities for something to go sideways. Sideways could get us all killed and disrupt any event on the timeline between this day and the one I’d come from as this version of myself.

  “Last one, Rowena.” Lucy pulled the ward into a cyclone and dispensed with the whole thing, sending it into another dimension.

  “Okay, now we need to go to Artie’s and wait until it’s time for the next part of the plan.” Timing was key. I couldn’t do anything too soon and I couldn’t be late by so much as a second. Precision was vital. I couldn’t stress it enough.

  “Tell me again what’s going to happen?” Artie was a man of few words, but he needed to feel comfortable that the plan was failsafe. And that was Artie in any era.

  “We’re going to wait at your place, then a little while before Simon is to arrive at this place, Fred and I will portal in. Fred has a body in his dimensional pocket, and we have some of Lucy’s DNA. So, Fred is going to clone that DNA and weave a spell with it that will make Simon think the body is Lucy. He’ll kill her.” Artie wasn’t the only one who knew the value of a good air-quote. “But it won’t be her. And then, Lucy doesn’t die.”

  I didn’t expect high praise, but a little enthusiasm would’ve been nice. I got two head nods and a wing flap. It didn’t matter. This was the plan, and we could make it work so long as we didn’t deviate. Deviation would be costly in the worst way.

  Though no one was doing cartwheels, they didn’t question the plan either or try to poke holes through it, so we portaled to Artie’s house. And as I walked into his living room, it occurred to me that I’d never been to his place. Never saw where he lived and spent his time.

  It was very minimalist, very clean lined. He had a few pictures, a couple of pieces of bric-a-brac, a few Stephen King novels mingled in with a copy of the bible and one of Moby Dick. There was no great window into his soul. Not on his bookshelves at least.

  He sat beside Lucy. It was funny. When I was talking or thinking about her, I could think of her as my mother. In the room with her, she was Lucy, a woman I’d known when I was young. That was something to unpack at my next appointment with the TIME therapist, if I ever went back. Or not because I would have to explain how I managed to be with her to not be able to call her my mother.

 

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