A scream rose in my throat –
No – oh God, no –
I have to go! Let me go!
He needs me!
Screaming full-scale now, the force exerted on my body so intense I flopped like a hooked fish.
Let me go!
Someone rushed near, crying out my name.
And then, in a flicker of light, she disappeared.
Chapter Twenty-Five
The Iowa Plains - June, 1882
I REGAINED CONSCIOUSNESS FLAT ON MY BACK, STARING UP at a sky so bright I flung a shielding forearm over my eyes. Sense returned more slowly, in fits and starts; it took seconds for my mind to catch up with my body as I struggled to recall my last memory, the one just prior to this brilliant blue sky edged with a tall fringe of grass stalks.
Shore Leave.
Ruthie and Derrick.
They were trying to get back to the nineteenth century –
Oh God –
I sat up too fast, only to be blasted by a rush of dizziness; I hung my head until the blotchy colors receded from my vision, rolling next to all fours on the scratchy, uneven ground. I tried to grasp handfuls of grass to gain my footing but fell instead, as wobbly as a toddler.
This is not the time to freak out, Camille.
Think.
The last I knew I’d been standing in Shore Leave, thinking for all I was worth of Malcolm Carter, concentrating on his existence in June, 1882, picturing his face and his horse, and the prairie…and me at his side.
Oh, my God –
“Ruthie…” I cleared my throat, heart flapping, panic mounting like a storm surge, and tried again. “Ruthann! Derrick!”
“Over here,” came a faint reply and my shoulders sank with relief.
“Can you speak up? I don’t know which direction you’re in!” My voice echoed over what seemed an endless expanse of prairie. Flickertail Lake was not in sight; we were nowhere near Shore Leave, I knew that much. I inhaled for three counts and exhaled for six.
“You’re on my left,” Derrick called. “I think, anyway.”
“Are you all right? Do you see Ruthie?” Successful at my second attempt to stand, I hurried toward the sound of his voice, parting waist-high grass with both hands, keeping an eye out for snakes or other creatures. My back felt bruised, but that was the least of my worries. “Where in the hell are we?!”
“Iowa,” said someone only a few yards behind me. I hadn’t heard anyone approach and spun around so quickly I fell again, this time flat on my ass.
A man riding a horse sat watching me, a beautiful chestnut-brown horse, holding the reins in one hand while the other rested on the saddle horn. He wore a cowboy hat and dirty jeans and at the sight of me, his expression changed swiftly to one of abject disbelief – I felt the same thing happening to my face. My heart delivered a hard, hammering punch to my breastbone before taking abrupt wing, disappearing in the cloudless blue sky. Both hands flew to my lips as I stared, open-mouthed.
He dismounted with such effortless grace he was on the ground before I knew he’d moved. He would have crossed the meager distance between us with two strides except that I was already there to meet him.
“Malcolm,” I gasped, threading my arms about his neck, unable to restrain this elemental instinct. He was damp with sweat, exhaling in a rush against my loose hair and returning my exuberant embrace as I imbibed the physical reality of him, the immediacy of Malcolm Carter at long last close enough to touch. His hat fell off and I laughed with the pure delight of a child, running my fingers through his dark curls, over his eyebrows and cheekbones and lips. He was tall, bending forward in order to receive my touches upon his skin. His muscles curved like lean bands of steel; he might have been carved from warm hardwood. But his hands were gentle, fingers twining deep into my tangled curls, cradling my face.
Amazement radiated between us as we traced paths over one another, but no unease; our touching was the most natural thing in the world. Of course it was – his soul was the other half of mine. He was Mathias in another version of himself, my husband, my lover, the very essence of my true love.
“You’re here!” My smile was wider than the horizon, all agony, all fear, momentarily annihilated. “You’re actually here.”
“I know you.” He spoke the words slowly, bracketing my ribs with both hands. “You aren’t Cora, but I know you…”
By contrast, words flew from my lips. “Of course you do. I’m Camille, Ruthann’s sister! She told you all about me. And I’ve known about you for years. Do you know how long I’ve wanted to do this?” Before he could respond – or I could think twice – I drew his head closer and kissed his mouth, a soft, quick, elated stamp of possession, giddy with the bliss of finding him, of actually setting eyes and hands upon him, when for so long I’d had nothing but a cold, flat, black and white photograph. His lips were so very familiar; he smelled just like Mathias.
He grinned as I drew away, wide and warm. A grin to rival the sun, one I would have known anywhere. Betraying no lack of composure over the fact that I’d just kissed him, he murmured, “Holy God,” speaking the words as though praying, crushing me closer, resting his cheek to my hair while I buried my face against his chest, trembling and overcome; an intermingling of pain and joy unlike anything I’d ever known. We may have continued holding each other until time ran out if the sounds of Derrick’s clumsy approach
