Spelled, page 32
“How so?”
“He wove in a part about true love. The spell was used to not only save Vaughn’s life, but to unite her with her true love.”
“How do you know that?” I asked.
Margaret Becquerel smiled.
“There’s been a lot of speculation and study over the years.”
“By who?” I felt like I was missing something.
“We aren’t the only one who have been pulled back in time by the spell.”
“How many others?”
Mrs. Becquerel waved a hand.
“I don’t even know,” she said. “No one has kept up with it.”
“How does anyone keep it straight? To keep from marrying someone they’re related to.”
Mrs. Becquerel’s eyes brightened.
“That’s what I wanted to know. So I have a theory.”
“Okay.” I glanced over my shoulder. I didn’t like George not being here.
“I think that every time someone goes back in time, a new time line starts.”
“That’s an interesting way to think about it.”
“It’s the only way it can work,” she said. “I’ve given it a lot of thought.”
From the looks of the journals lined up behind her, I didn’t doubt that one bit.
Maybe she’d had too much time to think about it.
But that was what psychiatrists did, wasn’t it? They tried to figure things out. Make sense of them. No just happily going through life for them. Everything had to be analyzed.
It made sense though. If time travel was indeed possible, which it obviously was, there had to be different time lines.
Finally, after what seemed to have been forever, but was only a few minutes, George came back into the room. He was slightly out of breath.
Instead of standing behind me this time, he handed his mother the bottle of wine and pulled a chair over to sit next to me.
“Can this wait?” he asked. “I’d like to show Juliette something while there’s still daylight.”
Mrs. Becquerel looked a bit disappointed, but waved a hand.
“Go on,” she said. “I’ll see you downstairs for dinner.”
I held out a hand for Juliette.
“Oh,” Mrs. Becquerel said. “Juliette. You’ll find something suitable to wear in the guest room. George. Would you see that she wears a dress to dinner?”
George led me from the room.
“What’s wrong?” I asked as we walked through her room into the hallway.
“Nothing,” he said. “I just thought you needed to get away for a bit. My mother can be a bit intense.”
“It’s okay,” I said.
He wouldn’t understand. But somehow I did.
Margaret Becquerel was merely protecting what was hers.
CHAPTER 39
GEORGE
I led Juliette toward the indigo fields. I hadn’t planned it out. It just seemed like the natural thing to do.
The plants were coming into their full bloom.
The deep purple blooms hid a wealth of inky blue dye in plain sight.
“This is where it all starts,” I said as we walked along the edge of the field.
“Indigo plants,” she said, reaching out to lightly touch one of the flowers.
“Careful,” I said. “the dye takes a while to wear off.”
“This is your passion?” she asked.
Was it?
It was just what my family did.
“It’s who I am,” I said. “I learned it from my father who learned it from his.”
She didn’t say anything as we walked.
“What’s your passion?” I asked.
“Numbers,” she said.
“Numbers?”
“Yes.” She looked into my eyes. “Numbers don’t lie. And I take comfort from that.”
“Then the club… in New Orleans?”
She shook her head. “It’s not my passion. It’s my father’s passion and maybe my sister’s. But I just work in the back. On the books.”
“It’s what you want to do then,” I said.
She shrugged and stopped. Looked around her at the waves of blue blooms.
“I don’t think I have a passion,” she said. “At least not that I’ve found.”
I took her hands in mine and snagged her gaze.
“Then maybe you’d like to stay here,” I said. “In your past. Maybe your passion is here.”
“Maybe,” she said, with a little smile.
I kissed the backs of her fingers.
“Maybe you can find your passion, too,” she said.
I smiled into her eyes. “I think maybe I already have.”
“Indigo plants?” she asked with an impish smile.
“They’re not so bad,” I said. “But I seem to have developed an interest in the future. Or at least products of the future.”
“You’re sort of a product of the future,” she said.
“In a way, yes,” I said. “And I didn’t even know it.”
“You don’t look very modern,” she said.
“No?” I asked, stepping back. “I thought I looked quite modern.”
She took my straw hat from my head. “This isn’t helping,” she said as she set it on her own head.
“It looks good on you,” I said.
“That’s because it’s the kind of hat that girls of the future wear.”
“Are you sure men don’t wear dresses in the future? Because everything seems so turned around.”
“Actually,” she said. “People do pretty much whatever they want to do.”
“Is that so?” I asked with a little grin. “I think this future sounds like my kind of place.”
“No,” she said, turning away. “I don’t think you’d like it.”
“Why do you say that?”
She turned back around to face me and searched my eyes.
“Because you’re a gentleman,” she said, putting one hand on her hat as she gazed up at me.
Gentleman or no gentleman, I wanted to kiss her right now.
So I leaned forward and pressed a kiss against her forehead before I pulled her against me into a hug.
CHAPTER 40
JULIETTE
I stood in the guest room, staring inside the open doors of the armoire. The large cabinet served as a closet.
Mrs. Becquerel had been right. There was definitely something in here for everyone, though it had the look of a lost and found. Everything from dresses to scarves to old shoes that smelled like they’d seen better days.
My job was to pick out something appropriate to wear to dinner.
But without any guidance, I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to pick out to wear.
Just how formal were these family dinners?
After scrolling through the dresses, I decided to go with something that I considered in between. Not too formal and not casual.
Apparently my jeans and sweater were at the extreme of being too casual.
So I peeled out of them and tugged a long blue dress off a hanger.
The skirt had a slight fullness to it, but didn’t seem to require the hoops like Mrs. Becquerel wore.
I stepped into the dress and pulled it up over my waist.
It was a little loose in around the middle, but that didn’t bother me.
It had a ton of little buttons, but fortunately, they were in the front of the dress.
So I took the time to button each one of them, all the way up to the neckline.
Then I turned and looked at myself in the full-length mirror.
I barely recognized myself.
Very formal.
I put my own shoes back on. I saw nothing wrong with my booties. They were in much better shape than any of the old shoes in the armoire.
Besides, they fit. And they didn’t smell.
I went to the dresser and plopped down on the bench in front of it.
My fingers trembled as I picked up a brush and began to run it through my hair.
I was nervous.
Nervous to be going to a family dinner with the man I was crushing on.
I’d thought he was going to kiss me earlier and he probably would if I hadn’t made such a big deal out of calling him a gentleman.
But he was. And I couldn’t see him in the future. He wasn’t like any of the other men I’d ever known.
Maybe a little bit like my father. My father was a gentleman.
He held down the fort while my mother had her career.
That man had given up so much for my mother. He’d practically raised their two daughters by himself.
Hopefully he didn’t see it as the sacrifice it was.
I hoped it was a responsibility that he took some job from.
I could see George being like that. Taking care of his responsibilities even though it might limit him on what he could do with his life.
I was nervous about seeing George again. I hoped he liked the way I looked in this dress and that I’d picked out the right one.
But I was also nervous about seeing his mother again and meeting his father. I wanted his parents to like me.
For the obvious reason. Meeting the parents was a big deal, especially in my world. But maybe even more importantly, if his parents didn’t approve of me, I would either have to try to find a way back to the future or learn to live in this time alone.
That was something I wasn’t ready to explore.
I toyed with my hair for a few minutes. Wishing I knew how to pull it up in an up do. My sister would know how to do that, but I’d always had my head stuck in a book instead of paying attention to such things.
Finally, giving up, I let it fall around my shoulders and stood up.
With nothing left to do, I opened the door to the hallway.
George stood across from my door, waiting for me.
“You waited for me?” I asked.
He held out an arm for me to tuck my hand into.
“Like you said, I’m a gentleman.”
“Right,” I said. Walking alongside him down the hall toward the stairs.
“You’re shaking,” he said before we started downstairs. “Nervous?”
“A little,” I admitted.
There’s no need to be,” he said, taking both my elbows in his hands. “A gentleman always protects his lady.”
“I’m your lady?” I asked, my voice a bit breathless.
“Do you want to be?” he asked, running a hand through my hair.
My heart was racing and I already knew the answer.
“Yes,” I said.
He leaned forward as though to kiss me.
The grandfather clock began to chime the hour.
George straightened.
“We’re going to be late for dinner,” he said.
“Of course.”
And I held his arm while we went down the stairs.
It took all my concentration to navigate the dress on the stairs.
But suddenly, I was ready for dinner to be over so George and I could be alone again.
I was his lady and he was my man.
CHAPTER 41
GEORGE
After dinner, I led Juliette outside to sit on the veranda.
We sat side by side on the big wooden swing at the far end of the veranda.
My parents had been surprisingly well behaved. I think it had something to do with the letter they’d gotten from my younger sister.
She lived in Birmingham with her husband. We hadn’t seen her in nearly a year and she’d just had a baby.
According to the letter, she was on her way here and would arrive within the next few days.
Sierra was my parents’ baby girl. Always had been and always would be. Didn’t matter that I was the one who’d stayed behind to take care of them and the family business.
I didn’t blame them.
Sierra was a charming, beautiful young lady and we all missed her dearly.
I was excited for Juliette to meet her.
The timing was excellent in fact.
My sister would be here and she would meet the woman I was falling in love with.
She would probably stay a couple of weeks, three at the most.
It would be ideal if Juliette and I could have a wedding while my sister was here. It wouldn’t have to be big. It could be a small, family only affair.
“What are you thinking about” Juliette asked.
“Nothing really,” I said. “Just enjoying the fresh evening air.”
“It’s so dark out here,” she said.
“You don’t like the dark?” I asked, shifting my thoughts from marrying Juliette.
“I’m used to street lights and car lights and even night lights. We do everything we can to push away the darkness.”
“Nothing wrong with a little darkness,” I asked, putting my arm around her.
“Not when you’re here,” she said, leaning her head against my shoulder. “Are you excited to see your sister?”
“Of course,” I said. “It’s been strange not having her here.”
“Is this one of her dresses?” she asked, running a hand along the skirt.
“I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe. Probably.”
She looked at me sideways.
“What? She had a lot of dresses. I don’t remember them all.”
“Are you and your sister close?” she asked wistfully.
“We were,” I said. “We studied together and rode horses together. But then she got married.” I shrugged. “What about you and your sister?”
“We’re close. But we’re very different. That doesn’t matter, though, does it?”
“No,” I said. “That sibling bond is one of the strongest. Right after a person’s… mate.”
“Mate?” she said with a little laugh.
“Yeah,” I said, wrapping an arm around her. “You know what a mate is, right?
“Someone you don’t think you can live without,” she said. “And even if you could, you don’t want to.”
“Close enough,” I said.
And I wondered how it was that I’d found my mate despite being separated by centuries.
CHAPTER 42
JULIETTE
George took my hand and led me to the swing at the end of the porch.
He held the swing as I sat, then sat down beside me. The art of being a gentleman was one of the good things that had been lost with the passage of time.
Lightning bugs twinkled in the yard reminding me of those summer days before my family had moved into town. Our mother had already been commuting, but when our father had started spending all his time at the club, it didn’t make sense for their girls to be left in the suburbs.
I missed those days. Things had seemed so much simpler. And time seemed to move at a slower pace.
I never would have predicted that I’d be here, in another century.
My heart was full of contentment at this moment.
George used his feet to gently move the swing.
When he held out a hand, I put mine in his and he linked our fingers.
How could something so unexpected and… unusual feel so right?
My sister knowing where I was made it so much easier to slip into this time. It was almost like I’d gone on a trip to another country.
But this trip had a one-way ticket.
If George’s mother was any indication, there would be no returning to my time in the future even if I wanted to.
And if had to make that decision right now, I would choose to stay right here. Right now.
“Tell me something about the future,” he said. “About you in the future.”
“Okay,” I said. The me of the future was fading into the background.
Like the distant memory of my childhood. The slower pace of right now—in the past—was addictive.
“Everything seems to be moving so quickly,” I said. “Everyone is in a hurry and it’s all about how fast things can get done.”
“Like the steamboats. The captains keep pushing them to go faster and faster.”
“Exactly,” I said. “Except that it’s not just boats. It’s everything. How fast can we get from one place to the next? How fast can we build things? There’s fast food. Fast cars. Fast airplanes that fly around the world.”
Even in the shadows, I could see him looking at me.
“That sounds awful,” he said.
I laughed. “It kind of is. If we were in the future right now, we’d probably be sitting in front of a television instead of sitting out here having a conversation.”
“A television?”
I shoved my hair back with my free hand. How did I even begin to explain that?
“It’s something people watch. Sort of like reading a book, except that it’s watching instead of reading.”
“That sounds complicated.”
“I don’t even know how to explain it.”
“So you’d rather be doing that? Watching that… television?”
“No,” I said. “I’m enjoying just sitting here. Talking to you.”
“Me too,” he said. “But…”
“But what?”
He lifted our linked hands and kissed the back of my hand.
“But there’s something else I’d really like to be doing right now.”
My heart rate shot into overdrive.
“What’s that?”
“I’d like to do this.”
He lightly placed a finger beneath my chin as he lowered his face to mine.
When he pressed his lips against mine, I knew in my heart that my life would never be the same again.
CHAPTER 43
GEORGE
Juliette’s kiss was as sweet as honey.
As soon as my lips touched hers, I was done.
I’d already been falling in love with her. But this kiss sealed the deal.
She was the woman I’d always dreamed of. The woman I wanted to spend my life with.
If the way she was leaning toward me was any indication, she felt the same way.
I placed my hands on either side of her face and placed little kisses on her cheeks, then kissed her on the mouth again.
