Departure(86)

She steps closer and scrutinizes my face, especially my forehead, where the gashes were after the Titans invaded the camp, the wound she cared for in the abandoned stone farmhouse. She reaches up, touches that place, where my hairline meets my forehead, just as she did in the Podway, in the only moment we had alone in all the time we spent in 2147. I wrap my fingers firmly around her wrist and let my thumb slide into her palm, just as before.

“What do you want to do now?” I ask.

“I want to finish what we started on the way to London.”





50





We lie in the bed where I found the notebooks, where I read them, a few days ago—or a hundred and thirty-three years from now, depending on how you choose to see it. Either way, this is the exact place where I saw what my life had become. I was horrified then, and I’m terrified now. Terrified and excited.

Then, when I found the journals, Nick walked in, sat on the end of this very bed, beside me, and told me that the journal wasn’t my future, that it didn’t have to be. That I could make a different choice.

It seemed like an empty promise at the time, kind words said to ease my pain and quiet my mind.

But it came true. Here I am. Back in my time. With the knowledge of everything that happened.

The terrible future I almost repeated will never be.

And Nick Stone is here in this bed with me. With all his memories. And none of his clothes.

Perfect.





When the sunlight through the wide window in my bedroom becomes too bright to ignore, Nick sits up and pulls his boxers on, then his trousers.

I panic a little.

How clean is the shower?

Not as clean as I would like it to be.

And breakfast. I bet a starving vagabond wouldn’t eat what’s left in my fridge.

He pulls his shirt on and glances back at me. “Gonna get some breakfast. What would you like?”

I want to go with him, but I’m a fright. I didn’t get a great deal of sleep last night. And I could use every precious second he’s gone to address the previously mentioned domestic concerns. I request a muffin and coffee and suggest a reliable spot around the corner, and then he’s gone.

I turn over in bed and put my face in my hands. Why am I so bloody scared?

It’s not about the memories anymore, or the decision that has haunted me. It comes down to this: I like Nick Stone very much, and I’ve no idea what he thinks. In fact, I don’t know him at all.

That’s not true. Not one bit. I know him very well indeed. I feel like I know every inch of his soul, what kind of person he is. I knew it the first few moments I met him, when he came to the defense of Jillian before the plane crashed, when he stopped the stampede in the nose section and saved a lady who would have been trampled, and those cold, electric moments on the bank of the lake when he rallied the hesitant survivors to swim out to the plane. When he saved my life, at great risk to his own.

That’s the man I’m in love with.

But I have no idea how he feels about me. That’s what’s terrifying. I don’t know what this means to him: one sleepless night together.

It’s not something I’ve ever done without knowing someone for a long time. It’s a big deal to me, and I wonder if it is to him. Maybe it’s something he does often. Maybe it doesn’t mean anything to him at all.

The door pops open, and I spring up. God. I haven’t done a thing to the flat. It’s still a mess, and I’ve lain here naked in bed like a lazy tart the entire time he was gone.

He holds a brown bag up, and I motion to the kitchen area. I pull a tank top and some pajama pants on and stroll out, trying to look only ten percent as crazy as the thoughts in my head.

“Breakfast is over. Apparently it’s eleven thirty.”

He spreads out some sandwiches on the table, four in fact—he wasn’t sure what I would want. We sit, nibbling them, talking about matters infinitely less important than the real question at hand.

We work up to more serious matters. The memories, for one. Nick figures dumping them at once in our minds must have presented a problem. Maybe the human psyche has limitations in how it deals with conflicting memories or maybe the neurons in the brain needed time to integrate the new memories. He thinks the pieces were triggered by the four of us—Yul, Sabrina, him, and me. I was the last piece for him. I smiled when he said that, and he paused and smiled too.

He’s not sure if Sabrina and Yul have recovered all their memories yet, but he has contact with both of them.

“But there’s another call I need to make first.” He punches at his cell phone. “What time is it in New York? Almost seven. Close enough.”

He drifts over to the window, stands by the chair that holds the poster board with “Flight 305” written across the top, and dials a number. He waits as it rings, staring out the window at the people milling about on the street, heading off to lunch.

“Oliver, it’s Nick Stone. I hope I didn’t wake you.”

A short pause.

“No, everything’s all right. I’ve been thinking—about Grayson. I think we should include him in the Titan Foundation. I think if we give him the opportunity, the chance to make a change, to be involved at the ground level in how the Shaw fortune is spent . . . I believe he might jump at it.”

Nick waits again, his eyes still, then darting back and forth. I like that—it’s almost like I can see the wheels inside his brain turning.