Leaving Lavender: A Time Travel Romance (Lavender, Texas Series Book 3) Page 10

  She stopped to stare at him in despair. “We should call the police.”

  “We can’t do that.”

  “Why not?”

  “Do you think the police would be on our side?”

  She didn’t know what to think about anything, not here. At home the constables were always on her side. One of the first things she’d been taught was if she was lost or frightened, she was to ask one of them for help.

  “The truth is that she has chosen to go off without us. She should be all right. I’m the one they’re after.”

  “They tried to blow us up last night! How can she possibly be all right?”

  “They want us alive, not dead,” he pointed out. “What made you think they wanted to blow us up?”

  “That’s what you said,” she protested indignantly, “when you first work up.”

  “I wasn’t thinking clearly. Obviously they could have killed me with one shot, instead they chose just to put me down. If you and Betsy hadn’t intervened, they would have taken me.”

  “But why would she leave me?”

  “Maybe she thought you wanted to stay with me.”

  She felt her face grow warm. “That’s just silly. We’ve got to find her and I know just where she’ll go.”

  “Of course,” he agreed, “back home to Lavender.”

  She shook her head. “No, not there. She’ll go to California looking for her father.”

  “Then that’s where we’ll go. We’ll make sure she’s safe.”

  The car felt big and empty with just the two of them. Zan insisted Eddie take the more comfortable back seat so she could stretch out and sleep, while he rested in the front one. He quickly reprogrammed the auto for their new itinerary and with the darkness of night falling around them, they once more entered the highway.

  Eddie lay wide-eyed in the darkness, so tired she couldn’t stay awake, but finding every time she dropped off, it was only to immediately awaken with a jerk. What would Mama say—for once she didn’t say ‘Cynthia’ even in her own mind—if she knew Betsy was off alone somewhere in this world that would seem strange even to her.

  She could only thank God that Einstein was with Betsy. She knew why her sister had left her behind. Betsy thought she was in love with Zan and would want to stay with him.

  It wasn’t true, of course.

  Oh, she found him attractive in spite of his strange ways, or maybe because of them.

  People at home had always thought she was weird. Maybe they were weird in the same way.

  Maybe she felt like he needed her.

  Or that she needed him.

  Well, in a way, she did love him. But she wasn’t in love with him.

  “Eddie, you awake?” his voice sounded from in front of her.

  She hesitated only a second. “I am now.”

  “Didn’t mean to wake you.”

  “You didn’t. I was just thinking about everything.”

  “I’m sorry to have dragged you and Betsy into this. It seemed so simple the way I had it figured out. I knew they’d be watching for me the minute I left the ranch if I was by myself, but with the two of you they would figure we were just going shopping or something like that. It would give us time to head for the badlands where I had the change of identities all worked out. Then we would go to Lavender and you two would be safe while I looked for the information I needed. And nobody could find me to get the final details of the plan in my mind.”

  “Could it really wreck the world, Zan?”

  “It could,” he admitted as though shamed. “If they could put it all together. That’s why I’ve got to disappear. It wasn’t a bad idea, Eddie.”

  For perhaps the first time in her adult life she giggled. “You just didn’t count on me and Betsy.”

  “Two most stubborn women in the world,” he admitted with what sounded like pride.

  He didn’t say anything else and she found her lashes beginning to close once more. She began to dream of home, of Lavender where the people were having a regular town meeting and a vote was to be taken on whether to allow Dr. Alexander Alston to remain as a citizen.

  “He’s a likable young man,” Papa argued, his face stern, but his eyes kind. “And he has many talents to add to our community.”

  “No!” Mama jumped to her feet. “You don’t know the world he comes from and I do. It’s a wicked place where people blow up their neighbors and ruin the earth itself. And he left my Betsy there.”

  Even in her dream this didn’t seem logical to Eddie. How could they have returned to Lavender without Betsy? She was the only one who knew the way in and out. Even as a little girl, she had brought her mother to the community.

  “If he has to go, I’ll go too,” she spoke up in her dream, addressing her friends and neighbors defiantly. “I will leave Lavender forever.”

  And then she jerked awake once again to find herself shivering with fear. And when Zan, seeming to feel her shaking, climbed over the back of his seat to lie down at her side, folding her in the warmth of his arms, she could not find it in her to protest.

  Chapter Fourteen

  When she’d dreamed of the ocean back in Lavender, she’d pictured gentle blue waves lapping up on golden sand, but what she saw as they drove along the jagged California coast was quite a different scene.

  She’d never been afraid of heights, yet this morning she felt as though the auto might at any moment fall off the edge of these high cliffs to drop into the dark green monster waves that dashed against the rocks. She shrank into Zan’s arms and felt them tighten around her.

  “It’s safe,” he told her. “People used to drive this highway themselves and sometimes there were accidents, but now with the autos, mistakes are rarely made.”

  Rarely! She laughed out loud. “I’d like it better if you said ‘never.’”

  Somehow the laughter took away the fear and she began to revel in the experience. She’d wanted this. Back in Lavender there were no seas and no deserts and she’d seen both. Now all she had to do was find Betsy. In the meantime she prayed for her sister and inside her head promised Mama and Papa that she would find her and take her back to them.

  She hadn’t known how they would find Betsy’s old home or her father but Zan said that wasn’t hard. He’d done a search and now the auto was headed along this crooked, picturesque highway toward the house, Betsy’s house, where strangely enough, Zan told her was also where Mike Burden lived with his family.

  Family? Betsy was going to get the surprise of her life. Eddie knew well enough that she’d never considered the possibility that her father would have other children, that she could find half-brothers or sisters.

  She had also never imagined a house like the one where Betsy had lived as a little girl. It was more like what she thought of as a palace, though one designed of stone and glass which stretched across the green lawns rather than climbing to the sky. A palace where a modern day princess would live.

  The grounds where tropical flowers bloomed in vivid reds, yellows and purples were surrounded by a transparent fence, designed, she supposed, so the residents had a view of the ocean that lay just beyond a cliff that ended only a short distance beyond the highway.

  A guard stood on either side of the gate and Eddie expected to be stopped, questioned, and most likely refused entrance. Instead the one on the right nodded politely and the gates opened so they could drive inside. They came to a stop under a covered canopy at the side of the house.

  “Guess Betsy beat us here,” Zan said. “We were expected.”

  “Or it’s a trap and they’re waiting here for you.”

  “Ever hear the story of the lady or the tiger?” he asked as they lingered in the auto.

  She shook her head, eyeing the house and expecting somebody to pop out at any minute.

  “There were two doors. Behind one was a man-eating tiger. Behind the other was a beautiful lady. The hero got to choose.”

  “Betsy or your brother,” she realized, drawing in a de
ep breath. “Well, we might as well open the door.”

  They’d barely gotten out of the auto when a side door opened and a man walked out. Geoff!

  “It’s my brother,” Zan whispered to Eddie. He felt her stiffen at his side. There was no point in getting back in the car to try to escape. An armed gate lay between them and outside.

  “Zan!” Geoff looped an arm around his shoulders. Since they’d never been a huggy family, the gesture felt stiff and awkward. “Hey, man, I’ve been so worried about you.”

  This hurt right down to his middle. The big brother he’d always trusted. Geoff who had looked after him since he was little.

  Doubts assailed him. Maybe he was wrong and Geoff hadn’t betrayed him. He so desperately wanted that to be true.

  He slipped free of his brother’s arm and lightly touched Eddie’s arm. “This is my brother, Geoff Alston,” he said.

  She nodded.

  “Edith Stephens, better known as Eddie.” Geoff smiled at her, but Eddie didn’t respond.

  “Why are you here, Geoff?” Zan asked.

  “I told you. We’ve been worried about you. Afraid you might be in danger. After all, you’ve a valuable guy.”

  “I’m an adult,” Zan said coldly. “If I want to take a trip with my girl, that’s my business.”

  “Got to admit you’ve got good taste.” Once again he smiled at Eddie, but her face stayed stony.

  “This is my sister’s house,” she said. “Why are you here?”

  The friendly pose oozed right off Geoff Alston’s face. “Your family is inside. I’ll take you to them.”

  Zan couldn’t tell what she was thinking. Her face was without expression, but she tucked her hand under his arm as they allowed themselves to be ushered in through a back hallway that led them past a large kitchen, then a formal dining room. In the distance they could hear the soft tinkle of music.

  Finally they stopped in the doorway of a huge room sparsely decorated in the current fashion with low, cushiony chairs and sofas, splashy paintings and photography.

  A young girl who looked to be eleven or twelve played a simple tune on a mandolin, apparently for her own amusement since no one else seemed to be paying attention.

  “Softly, softly

  Come dear one

  Come to me

  Softly, softly . . .”

  She broke off at the sight of them and, seeing fear in her young eyes, he knew she’d been singing for her own comfort. The tune was not a familiar one and he suspected she’d been making it up as she went along.

  He felt rather than heard Eddie’s sharp in-drawing of breath. Betsy was here, of course, standing in the back of the room next to her young cousin, Jerry Caldecott. His parents were seated on a sofa together, Lynne’s face quite pale though Moss looked flushed with anger.

  Across from them on an opposing sofa sat an unfamiliar man and woman. He hardly noticed the woman, but there was no mistaking the man’s cherubic face or fading gold hair. He had to be Betsy’s dad.

  Betsy gave a little cry at the sight of Eddie, but after a look at the two large men standing at one end of the room, she stayed in place.

  Neither man wore a uniform, unless a dark suit, cotton shirt and a blue tie was a uniform of sorts, but Zan knew their faces. They worked at Alston Adventures.

  “What a surprise,” Eddie finally spoke, “to see all of you here.” She went over to brush a kiss against Lynne’s cheek, smiling at Moss.

  “An unplanned surprise,” Moss responded drily.

  “They grabbed us and brought us here,” Jerry said indignantly. “Men from Zan’s company.”

  “My brother and I share ownership of Adventures,” Geoff corrected the boy. He sounded, Zan thought in surprise, almost insulted that Jerry would think the company only his brother’s.

  Funny, the things he was seeing and hearing since he’d met Eddie. The world had opened up and he wasn’t sure but that he would have preferred to continue to live in ignorance.

  Except, of course, that no grown man had a right to go on with his head stuck in the sand like that of a frightened ostrich. The rest of you, and all those you were leaving out to be harmed made too good a target.

  “Dammit all to hell,” the man he assumed to be the infamous Mike Burden, suddenly exploded. “What are all you people doing breaking into my home this way, scaring my wife and daughter and the servants . . .”

  “Sit down, Mr. Burden,” Geoff purred the words softly and though Burden had not risen, he settled further back on his sofa.

  “I thought this was Betsy’s house,” Eddie said.

  The dark haired woman seated beside Mike Burden was tall and thin with a chiseled, rather hard-looking face. She looked the last word in chic from her fitted gray pants to a white blouse that couldn’t have been worn more than once. Her hair was plastered in place and her makeup made her look like a mannequin. The look she gave Eddie would have shriveled a lesser woman. “This is our house, young woman. It belongs to my husband, my daughter and me and I’d like an explanation right now as to what all you people think you’re doing breaking in on us this way.”

  She turned to Burden. “Michael, summon the police at once.”

  “Ma’am,” one of the guards said politely. “We are the police.”

  She rose dramatically to her feet. “Michael, demand he show you his identification immediately.”

  Mike Burden, who seemed more afraid of his wife than of anybody else, got up too, looking in appeal at the guard who had said he was with the police.

  The man handed him a pocketful of identification. “Intelligence,” he told his wife with a shrug.

  “Faked,” she said with disdain.

  Geoff nodded and the woman’s phone buzzed. She answered it, listened, then, her face pale, disconnected. “We are advised to cooperate,” she told her husband. “Officially.”

  “I’m so sorry, officer,” Mike told Geoff Alston, “but you can understand that we’re a little confused about all this.”

  Before anybody else could speak, Eddie said again, “I thought this was my sister’s house.”

  Mike Burden’s smile was downright pitiful. “Actually it is, or rather it belonged to her mother, and Betsy is, of course, her heir.”

  “Her mother is still alive,” Eddie informed him. “Though she has authorized our use of the house.”

  “But Michael, you said this was our house,” his wife protested as though she was sure the strange young woman was making some sort of phony claim.

  “Uncle Moss?” Betsy stepped forward to look inquiringly at her uncle and aunt.

  Moss Caldecott lifted both hands in a gesture of resignation. “The house was left to the two of us, Cynthia and me, by our parents. We grew up here. When I married Lynne, I chose to live at the ranch in Oklahoma so this was your home and your mother’s.”

  “Then why is my father here?”

  “He agreed to stop his challenge to my insistence that you and Cynthia were still alive if I let him have the house. I couldn’t do that legally, not when it was no longer mine, but I could allow him to bring his family here and act as though it belonged to him.”

  Mike Burden was practically frothing with anger. “It was mine. She was mine, but she divorced me and ran away with my daughter. I deserved this house and everything that went with it.”

  “Michael, you’re saying this woman is actually your daughter?” his wife demanded.

  Zan had heard that Mike Burden possessed charm enough to bring bees out of their hive. If so, he had at least temporarily lost that ability. “Celia, it was all past, over when we met. I saw no necessity . . .”

  The girl who had been playing the mandolin approached Betsy . “You’re my sister?” she asked. “Truly?”

  “Half-sister,” her father snapped.

  “That’s enough,” Geoff interrupted in a rare display of temper. “My brother and I will leave the rest of you to work out your family matters while we have a serious talk.” He nodded to Zan to g
o ahead of him.

  Zan was tired of being ordered around, but it was more than an act of defiance when he took Eddie by the hand and asked her to go with him.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Geoff looked annoyed, but didn’t protest as Eddie accompanied Zan. He followed them to a small, book-lined room down the hall and closed the door once they were all inside.

  This room was different from the others. It looked old and masculine as though some gentleman’s study had been imported from England a century and a half ago.

  Geoff sank into an overstuffed chair covered in worn leather. “Are you sure your girlfriend should be here, Zan?”

  Grimly Zan led Eddie to a seat on the sofa that matched his brother’s chair, sat down beside her, and to his delight and surprise she cuddled close to him, observing his brother with open disapproval.

  He wondered what had happened to his brother, so admired and honored as a boy, looked up to as a man. Had it happened when he fell in love outside his home and left his Nancy and his children for another, lesser woman?

  Or had the new love occurred because he was a changed man, having sold out all his deepest beliefs.

  Who were those who had influenced, changed him, made him less than he used to be?

  The old love of little brother for the elder was still there. He wished no terrible fate on Geoff, but the admiration was wiped from his eyes. Perhaps this was part of finally growing up and becoming his own man.

  The old word said there was a time when a man left his father and mother’s to move and make a home with the woman of his heart. The look of his Eddie, her presence had opened his eyes to recognize the reality of the world that had all this time lain within his view.

  He’d liked being the scientist in his laboratory, lost in his own thoughts. It had, falsely, seemed a safe place.

  No more.

  Eddie stirred in her place against Zan’s side. Her loyalties were, at this instant, divided. Back in that big room with the others, her sister faced a painful scene alone. But even as her thoughts lingered with Betsy, she stayed because Zan wanted her here.