Beyond This Time: A Time-Travel Suspense Novel (29 page)

“Then why put yourself in the middle of all this now?”

Mitch shrugged. “Hey, bad voodoo or not, when you need me I’ll always be there for you.”

“Thank you.”

“‘Tis nothing m’lady.” He took her hand. “I talked to Alvin yesterday, and I guess there are a few things he forgot to tell you. He was worried.”

“Then I’m right, his heart attack
was
triggered by my stupid trek into the past.” She took a deep breath. “What did he forget?”

“I don’t know. His machines started beeping before we got a chance to talk about it, and the doctor kicked me out of the CCU.”

Her grip tightened on his hand. “We have to go home, Mitch. Go home today.”

“Can’t go today.”

“Then when?”

“Let me check.” He pulled his hand free and took the tattered Arson/Fatality computer printout from his back pocket. He studied the names and times. “Looks like we aren’t going anywhere until Friday.”

“This is so wrong,” Kat said. “Pop’s in the hospital and I’m thirty-seven years and three days away from him.”

“You have zero control over this issue, Kathleen. We came through at a certain time and we have to leave at a certain time.”

“He needs me, Mitch.”

“Your Pop’s a tough old bird. He knows the score; he’ll still be around on Friday.”

“That’s April 5. Mitch. The same day Lettie Ruth…” Kat’s voice dropped off, her thoughts unspoken.

A gust of wind rattled the paper in his hand. “We still have time to make some changes in the past. It’s not too late for Lettie Ruth.”

“Right now I’m more concerned with Pop’s future. Besides, the past has already changed.”

“What do you mean?”

“You and me, Mitch.” She waved in the direction of the clinic. “We weren’t part of their lives before. But what happened to me has drawn this group together.”

“They weren’t total strangers before you came along. Their relationships were already established.”

“Those were different relationships. Now they have new ones.”

“I don’t know. Things seem pretty much SOP around here. Everyone seems to have followed through with the whatever they were doing, or planned to do, before you and I showed up.” He said the words, recited the litany but in his heart he knew better.

Kat shook her head. “Wrong, partner. I can name three changes since our arrival.”

“Like what?”

“Like how Lettie and Dreama
didn’t
go to the Ladies Prayer Breakfast yesterday. You really think my aunt would have missed hearing her brother preach the first time if not for me?”

Mitch grunted and picked at a mosquito bite on his arm.

She held up two fingers. “I’ve heard Pop tell the story of how he and Lettie Ruth took part in the Birmingham lunch counter sit-in
on this date
and got arrested a hundred times. But they didn’t go today and he’s been here all afternoon. Mitch, he’s suppose to be in jail.”

“That’s a big change.”

“Glad I got your attention,” Kat said. “And the third thing, because they were out looking for me, Lettie Ruth and Taxi ended up in the wrong part of town this morning and got jumped.”

Mitch’s freckles popped out on his too red face in response to her last statement.

“Rein it in, boy,” she cautioned. “We’ve had our share of troubles with that bunch, don’t stir it up.”

“Damn it!” he roared, jumping out of the chair. His long legs got tangled in the arm rest and as he shook them free the chair flipped over. “I’ve had enough of this racist shit. What in the hell is the matter with the people in this town?”

“That’s just the way things are. It’s 1963, Mitch.”

“1963 sucks big time.”

“No argument on that point.” Kat drew up her knees and pulled the yellow dress skirt over them then patted the end of the chair. “Sit down here and listen to me.”

“Don’t feel like sitting,” he grumbled.

“Sit, stand. I don’t care what you do … as long as you pay attention. This is not our time, Mitch. We don’t belong here and our dumb mistakes will bring a world of hurt down on these people.”

“Where are you going with this?”

“We have to let the past remain the past,” she said sadly.

“That past include Lettie Ruth?”

She nodded. “Remember your speech about making a ripple in the pond? Well, our ripple is turning into a tsunami. If we change what originally happened, we could end up getting more people hurt.”

“I don’t see anything like that happening,” he argued. “Missing a church service and one sit-in doesn’t fall in the disaster category. Nobody has gotten hurt.”

“All right, then what about the car full of rednecks that chased you and Taxi? Would that have happened if you’d been asleep in your apartment early yesterday, instead of getting into brawls down at Bubba’s Julep Junction?”

“I handled the situation. Taxi won’t have any more trouble out of them.”

“Oh yeah? I’ll bet next month’s pay those boys will be looking for his green De Soto for a long time to come.”

“Come on, Kat. They don’t have any reason to go after him again.”

“They don’t need a reason. Taxi is a
Negro
. Not a black man. Not an African-American. But a Negro. And that same Negro got caught ridin’ around in a car with a white man. That dog don’t bark down here.”

“They could’ve chased him any time. Doesn’t mean it’s my fault.” Mitch felt like a fool, but he couldn’t let her keep thinking along these lines. She’d been through enough without adding the rest of the world’s troubles to her load.

“If I’m willing to take my share of the blame, you should do the same,” she lectured. “Yesterday morning Lettie Ruth was supposed to be in church, not on a road with Taxi. And she and Pop were supposed to sitting at a lunch counter in Birmingham this afternoon. Hear me on this, none of these things happened before.”

“Who’s to say we’re the catalysts?” he argued.

“Stop it, right now,” she ordered. “You know we’re at the heart of these changes. We have to leave the past alone. Otherwise, we’ll create a bigger mess. Now, what time can we leave on Friday?”

“On Friday,” he ran his finger down the names. “we can leave at— Shit.”

“We have to go.” Kat grabbed his wrist. “Please, Mitch. I don’t think I can stay here much longer.”

He shook free of her grasp and held up his hand. “Lettie Ruth’s name is on the list now and she dies on Sunday instead of Friday April 5. That’s two days later. And other names have been added since we started this conversation.”

She buried her face in her hands. “I told you we were the carriers of death.”

=TWENTY-ONE=

“
Listen to me, Kat
.” Mitch pulled her hands away from her face. “You cannot fall apart now. I know you’ve been through hell, but if you don’t get a grip, the hell is going to start all over again.” He watched her struggle with her demon emotions. After a few minutes the lines smoothed as her facial structure was reshaped into a mask of strength.

“All right,” she said, smoothing the wrinkles out of her dress. She met his eyes. “Explain yourself.” The hysteria was gone, her voice calm and determined.

Impressed by his partner’s incredible willpower, he felt immediate relief. Could she keep it together once she learned the latest twist in their nightmare? “A few minutes ago we had a green light to head home at 12:45 A.M. on Friday.” He handed her the printout. “Take a look at this.”

She read down the Arson/Fatality names. “Sweet Jesus,” she whispered. “No one died on the April 5
^th
? How can it change?”

“I guess we’re having a much more interesting discussion than I thought.”

Kat stared at him. “But
how
?”

“Voodoo.” He ran his fingers through his ginger hair. “Hell, I don’t have the answer. All I know is Jane Doe’s name is gone and Lettie Ruth has been added. Along with three brand-new victims.”

She shook her head. “Not three, Mitch. Count again. There are four new names on that damnable list.”

“Four? There were only three names when I handed it to you.” He walked over to her chair and knelt in the grass. “Show me,” he said, pointing at the paper with a shaky finger.

“These last four, not counting Lettie Ruth,” Kat said, touching each name as she read them aloud. “
Maximilian Devore. Lamar Gordon. Kathleen Templeton. Louis Smith.
”

“This is a very weird piece of paper,” Mitch said, taking the list out of her hand. He got up and began to pace in front of her chair. “It all goes down on the 7th now. Let’s run it through and see what turns up.”

“You mean a connection to us?”

He ignored her question and said, “Besides Lettie Ruth, we have Maximilian Devore.”

“Which is Taxi,” she said. “And we know him.”

“What about Lamar Gordon?”

“Lamar is the Webster Avenue preacher’s son. I met him on Monday.” Kat choked back a sob. “Mitch, he’ll be thirteen on Friday … but because of our chance meeting, he’s gonna die on Sunday.”

“Hold on a minute. You saw him once and only for a few minutes.” He shook his head. “There’s no way to connect that brief encounter to his name on the list.”

“If I’m right, and we’re the eye of this storm, the more we interact, the greater the danger.”

He stopped pacing and trapped her honey-colored eyes with his blue ones. “You just negated your own argument. You’re not interacting with the kid,” he said slowly.

“Yes, I am. Yesterday, Lamar and his cousin, Virgil, took me to the Gordon’s house to change clothes, then on over to the church. He’s a kid, Mitch. A kid with a great story to share with his buddies. Lamar will be talkin’ and then all of Maceyville will be gossiping about the black woman raped by three white boys.” Kat took a deep breath. “When April 7 rolls around, those three animals will be poundin’ on his door to make sure he keeps his mouth shut.”

“Then why isn’t Virgil on the list? You know him too, so if your theory is on target, his name should be right beside Lamar’s.”

Kat played with her dress hem. “Wait another five minutes then check again.”

“That’s not funny, Kat.”

“Knowing what’s going to happen is a heavy burden. The power of life over death.” She looked up, her eyes sparkling with tears. “Mitch, how did you get here?”

“The door opened at 6:12 Monday night.”

“I left that same morning and I know there
wasn’t
a 6:12.”

“Stop right there,” Mitch said. “I know what you’re thinking … and it’s wrong.”

“Let me see the name.”

He stepped away, hands behind his back. “The way your mind is working you’ll find a vague connection whether one exists or not.”

“There was not a 6:12 when I left,” she repeated. “I want to know who’s in that time slot now.”

Mitch glanced at the list. “It’s no one you know. Let it go, Kat.”