A hard mass forms in my stomach. I snap the journal shut and slide it back into place. I’ve gotten through the past ten years without these journals. I didn’t need them when she left me, and I don’t need them now. I shove the box back into the hidden compartment and stand.
Heavy footsteps thump by the front door.
I’m halfway along the hallway when my feet jerk to a halt. The image of my mother’s aged journals flashes through my mind, a bitter taste filling my mouth.
Leave them, like she left you.
I should be grabbing clothing or toiletries—things I need for the next twenty-four hours—but I race back into my mother’s room and fall to my knees. Water seeps into the fabric of my dress. I seize the metal box and hurry back along the corridor, grabbing my phone and satchel from the dining-room table and scampering away from my family home with the dated ramblings of a dead woman.
6Rose
“Quickly, come in,” McGregor says, skittering into the old brick building Parker and I have spent the past ten minutes waiting outside. McGregor beelines down a labyrinth of door-lined corridors and disappears inside his office. Parker and I follow him, Parker pausing at the threshold and gesturing for me to enter before him.
I roll my eyes and step into the stuffy room. My throat tightens. Bookshelves line the walls, crammed with aged textbooks and journal articles that leave barely enough space for the dark, mahogany desk and the two chairs before it.
McGregor sits behind his desk, staring at me as if I’m a disobedient student. Holding back my own scowl, I cross my arms over my chest and lean against one of the bookshelves.
“May we sit?” Parker asks, as if he’s about to schmooze McGregor over a lavish lunch.
The slight incline of McGregor’s head is stiff. I pick up a mound of papers resting on one of the sad fabric chairs and plant my ass down. I keep my face blank but, hidden by McGregor’s desk, my left foot twitches like I’m an addict in withdrawal. Parker reclines in the seat beside me.
McGregor clasps his hands on top of his desk and leans forward, his beady eyes darting between Parker’s face andmine. “I want you to tell me absolutelyeverythingyou know about time travel,” he says in a sharp tone.
“You taught us everything we know,” Parker says. “Anchors and shields and theories—yourtheories really. All of the research was conducted by you.”
McGregor’s stern expression gives nothing away. “When do we meet? What year?”
“In—”
“Parker,” I say. I’m not hand-feeding McGregor from a silver spoon until I know he’ll make it worth our while. “All you need to know is that we’ll meet in the future at a time-traveling institution.”
“Run by whom?” McGregor asks.
“We were never told,” I say, shaking my head. “We weren’t the first time travelers to live there. But we were the first group to be formally recruited.”
“Why?” McGregor asks Parker.
“To stop—”
“Next question,” I snap, and McGregor’s lips pull down at the corners.
“I want to hear it from the beginning,” McGregor says, eyes flicking to Parker. “From him.”
I grit my teeth as Parker launches into conversation with McGregor before I can stop him, beginning with Neurovida, the time travel training institution where we first met McGregor’s future self. As they speak, Parker weaves in personal recollections of the time he and McGregor shared at Neurovida, cementing the close relationship I never knew they had. I keep waiting for McGregor to chuck us out, or for Parker to say the wrong thing but…
He won’t.Because Parker is… Parker. And I may havebad luck, but if life’s a hand of cards, he was dealt a royal fucking flush.Dick.
“I was hoping you’d take a look at our blood, see if anything stands out,” Parker says.
“I’m willing to study your blood under a microscope, but I won’t promise anything else,” McGregor says, adjusting his glasses.
Parker releases a breath. “Thank you. You told me the key to time travel is in our white blood cells.” His eyes dart to mine.Don’t do it, Parker.“I want you to look at mine because… I’ve lost my ability to travel,” he says, and I huff.
“How?” McGregor asks.
“A drug. Injected into my neck.” His fingers brush the puncture site as if he can still feel the sting of the needle. “You created it, in the future. And I’m hoping if a drug can be given to take someone’s powers away—”
“One can be created to restore it,” McGregor says, his blue eyes twinkling.
