“Is she a runner?”
“She’s Ensley’s best friend. What do you think?”
“Since she’s willing to drop everything and come to Cambridge, I like her already.” JC lifted his glass. “I need another drink. You want a refill?”
George lifted his empty highball glass. “Yeah, give me two fingers.”
JC refilled their glasses, then dropped into the recliner and pulled up the leg rest. Damn, he was tied. He’d been on the go for weeks and only arrived home a couple of days ago. It was time for some R&R.
“I know you’ve got a heavy schedule,” George said, “so if you have to leave tomorrow, I’ll understand. I’m going to hang around here for the weekend, and Dad can come up Monday. Somebody should be here in case she comes back…or…”
“There is no…or,” JC said. “And I’m not leaving you alone with this situation.”
“I won’t be alone. Barb will be here.”
God, he was tired if it took him that long to read between the lines. “So, you’re saying…what? That you want me out of the way?” JC almost gave George a fist bump, but he corralled his emotions. He didn’t want George to know he was anxious to get out of Cambridge and start putting his rescue plan into motion.
“We can handle the weekend, especially if Dad hires an investigator. If we don’t have any luck, I might call you to come back.”
“Sure. I’ve got to meet a client out of town for a few days, but when I get back, I’ll do whatever I can.”
“If she’s still missing next week…” George’s voice trailed off.
“We’ll find her,” JC said. “Don’t give up hope.”
Again, he wanted to tell George the truth, but he couldn’t. For the past few years, since the family discovered an evil force was also searching for the brooches, silence and secretiveness were even more imperative. And that was the real reason he was keeping the appearance of this brooch to himself.
6
The Badlands (1885)—Ensley
When Ensley came out of the fog-induced sleep, she was lying on a vast grassy plain. She rolled over onto her back. The sun was inching above the horizon, filling the sky with a rosy glow, while the dew lay in droplets on the damp blades of grass. If she stayed there much longer, her clothes would get wet, and while it wasn’t cold, it wasn’t a warm spring day, either.
The vivid green grass brightened the sterile-looking buttes in the distance. She took a deep breath, inhaling the fresh, sweet air scented with the fragrance of silvery purple sagebrush. Either she was dreaming, or she’d taken a magic carpet ride home—back to North Dakota.
She climbed to her feet and looked around, spotting her hat about six feet away. The last thing she remembered was running down the stairs fanning the fog with her hat. And here it was, and here she was. She swiped it up and set it on her head just so.
The Killdeer Mountains were in the distance. The magic carpet had dumped her off only a few miles from the family ranch…
…that she sold just days ago.
From where she was now—probably four or five miles from the ranch near Killdeer on the Spring Creek—it would take ninety minutes to walk across the plains to get there. The new owners wouldn’t be there yet, but the caretakers would be, and they’d give her a lift to town.
She checked the time on her Apple watch, but she had no cellular service. That was weird. She always had service out here.
After about thirty minutes walking across the uneven terrain, her hip ached, and her calf muscles cramped. It was time for a water break and a few stretches.
Water? If she wanted a drink, it would have to come from the creek.
Yuck! She’d have to be desperate to risk drinking polluted water. And she wasn’t that desperate yet.
She stretched her calves and kept going, following the creek—which probably wasn’t a good idea since the rushing water reminded her of how thirsty she was.
When she didn’t intersect with the roads she expected to find, she second-guessed her location. She grew up here, rode horses and ATVs, camped out, and hunted. The land was as familiar as the back of her hand.
She ignored her concerns and kept walking. Then, when she reached the cluster of round-top buttes on the north side of her family’s ranch, she stopped, and you could have picked her jaw up off the ground.
“What the hell?” There were grasslands and timber and brush-filled coulees, but no utility poles, no roads, no cars, no neighbors. Fear took hold and shook her senseless. “Where’s the homeplace?”
She plopped down near the bank of Spring Creek in a belt of cottonwood trees to figure out what happened to her. The peaceful sounds of rushing water didn’t help. Neither did the breeze blowing through the trees or the songs of the Western meadowlarks.
Could I be lost? Nope. That’s impossible. Well, smarty-pants, there’s no other explanation. She could ride through the plains wearing a blindfold, remove it, and know exactly where she was at any time of the year.
This was home or had been until she sold the ranch.
She thought back to the brooch, and the chant engraved on the stone. Did all that swirling propel her into a vortex that carried her to another time? If she hadn’t edited a ten-book time travel romance series, the notion would never have occurred to her.
Time travel was possible in fiction, but not real life—not her life.
So where should she go now? The nearest town was Killdeer, but if the ranch wasn’t here, the town wouldn’t be either.
She picked up a stick and drew three equidistant Xs in the dirt. The middle X was the ranch. The X on the left was Grassy Butte. The X on the right was Killdeer. From the first X to the third X was about thirty miles. She could follow Spring
