“Parker, cover up,” Rose says with a sigh.
He turns to catch me staring. “Living up to your name there, stalker.”
Warmth flushes my cheeks, and my eyes shoot to Rose’s chest, to the concealed tattoo I glimpsed last night. “You have it too, don’t you?”
Rose and Parker eye each other, and Rose shakes her head.
“Please, tell me. I’ve seen it before.” I glance between them. “What does it mean?”
“We call it the Mark of the Time Traveler,” Parker says. “Every member of our group at Neurovida had it.”
“Okay, Parker, you’ve said enough,” Rose says through clenched teeth.
My heart stops. The Mark of the Time Traveler. And my mother had a copy in her journal. “Who designed it?” I ask.
Rose and Parker exchange another glance, and there’s a small crease between Parker’s brows when he turns to face me. “You did,” he says. “You—”
“Parker,” Rose yells.
He tightens his lips and reaches for his soup, sulking at Rose when his hand passes through the mug.
“Can I see it?” I ask Rose. I’d ask Parker, but only aquarter of the clock is visible above his waistline, suggesting the rest sits indecently low.
Rose hesitates for a moment, then lets out a loud breath as she scowls at Parker. “I guess you’ve seen it now.” She leans back, lifting the front of her shirt to reveal the same tattoo in the center of her chest, extending underneath her black bra. “Hurt like a bitch.”
I’m ambivalent about tattoos, but there’s something beautiful about Rose’s. The subtle rise and fall of the clock with each breath, as if it’s in motion. I study the intricate design, its curving lines and swirling clock with its six unique hands. Vines with beautiful flowers and sharp, deadly thorns climb upward, over a backdrop of the sun setting over the ocean. Far more detailed than the sketch I found in my mother’s journal.
Parker steps beside me. “What is it?”
“Are yousuretime travel isn’t genetic?” I ask.
Parker nods. “We studied theory of time travel with McGregor at Neurovida every day for years. If it was genetic, we’d know. Why?”
A heaviness seeps into my limbs. “I found a sketch of your tattoo on a scrap piece of paper in my mother’s journal.”
“Okay?” he states.
“Why would she have it unless she was a time traveler, or she knew something about Neurovida?”
“Maybe in the future,youdraw the clock and put it in your mother’s journal yourself.”
“I didn’t draw it.” Neither did my mother. Whoever drew the clock used a heavy hand and thick, hurried strokes to craft the circumference of the clock. Nothing like my mother’s precise, delicate penmanship.
“I think you need to entertain the possibility that you’ve got this around the wrong way,” Parker says. “Maybe you designed our tattoo based off the picture from your mother’s journal because it had sentimental value?”
“Maybe.” Another question to ask my mom when Parker takes me to see her.
“Plus, you designed the tattoo specifically for us,” Parker adds.
“Parker,” Rose warns.
“That’s why there’s little symbols—”
Rose throws the journal down. “Jesus Christ, Parker,” she cries. “Stop breaking your oath.”
Parker leans backward. “I’m not.”
“Yes. You are. And you’re being fucking careless about it. The Alphas would be ashamed of you.”
