He falls to his knees in front of me. I can smell him, like the deep forest in the rain.
“I don’t know what’s going to happen tonight,” I say. “But if we make it out of here alive … then I want you to come home with me.”
He makes a noise in the back of his throat and tries to turn his head away. I grab both sides of his face and look into his eyes. “You can get away from this life for good.”
When he speaks, his voice is as jagged as broken glass. “They’ll find me, Lydia. You and your family would be in danger.”
“You’ve been in the past for almost a week now and no one has come looking for you. How do you explain that?”
“I don’t know. I’ve been waiting for them to come. It’s one of the reasons I’ve been trying to get you out of this time period.”
“But no one has come, Wes. That’s my point.”
“It doesn’t work like that.” He reaches up to take my hands. He gently pulls them away from his face and holds them clasped between us. “They might not even know I’m missing, because to them I never went anywhere. If I travel back to the exact same time I left, then it’s like this never happened.”
I raise my eyebrows. “Wouldn’t that be fate? I thought you didn’t believe in it.”
He gives me a half smile. “Not fate. It will be my choice to go back; I just haven’t done it yet.” His smile fades. “But the point is that it’s impossible to hide from the Montauk Project. It’s an organization that has informants all over the world, across all of time. I can’t expose you like that. I won’t.”
“I just want you to have a chance at a normal life.” I close my eyes, take a breath, and take a chance. “And I want to be with you.”
His hands tighten on mine. I open my eyes slowly. He’s staring at me, his mouth slightly open.
“I’ve never felt this way about anyone before. I didn’t know I could feel this way. I think … I’m falling in love with you, Wes.”
His eyes are liquid black. He pulls me against him. My arms wrap around his neck and then his lips are on mine and he’s shifting me even closer, one hand hard on my hip, the other curled into my back.
He tears his lips from mine and kisses my cheeks, my chin, my eyelids. I bury my face into his neck. “I can’t lose you,” I whisper against his skin. “You have to come back with me.”
“The guards are coming,” he says hoarsely, pulling away. I’m sitting on his lap, not quite sure how I got there. He lifts me to my feet as the door swings open, hitting the opposite wall with a bang.
The guards grab us roughly by the arms and yank us into the hallway, two men escorting us each. We’re pushed down a long corridor and through a doorway. It’s difficult to see where we’re going; the overhead fluorescent lights are dimmer than they were before, as though a dark film has come down over the entire Facility.
Wes and his guards are somewhere behind me. I know he could easily overpower them and I wonder why he doesn’t. Then I realize he’s probably trying to protect me from getting hurt in the struggle that would follow.
The guard holding my arm turns a corner and stops so fast that I run into him. He opens a door on the right and shoves me inside. I stumble forward and catch myself on a low desk. I hear a shuffle and turn to see Wes pushed in behind me.
I straighten from the desk. Wes is already beside me, and he wraps an arm low around my waist. I glance around as I lean into him. We’re in a small, dark place and I recognize it immediately: the two-way-mirror room looking down onto the time machine. Wes and I are alone in here—the two doors on either end have guards stationed outside of them.
I’m trying to figure out why they brought us here when I see lights flicker through the tinted window in front of us. Guards in black uniforms and scientists in white coats filter into the time machine room. There’s a flurry of activity as the monitors are turned on and the guards position themselves strategically. We can’t hear what’s happening in the opposite room, but we can see everything.
Dr. Faust enters. His white lab coat flaps open as he rushes to one of the desks. A wide, rounded screen is mounted to the back of it, and a large keyboard sits in front. Faust hits a button and the lights dim. The glass top of Tesla’s Machine starts to flash and spark. The dull metal body vibrates and hums.
General Lewis enters the room, followed by two guards. They’re dragging Dean between them. He looks barely coherent. He’s been beaten badly, and I wonder in horror if he’s the man we heard screaming in the cell. I jerk forward, and Wes follows, keeping his arm curled around me.
“They’re sending him back in time,” I whisper.
Wes doesn’t respond. He doesn’t have to. It’s obvious what’s going to happen, and we can’t do anything to stop it.
Dean lifts his head with visible effort and turns to face the two-way mirror. I freeze. He seems to know that we’re behind the glass, though I have no idea how. He bobs his head up and down, and tries to smile. Red blood drips from the corner his mouth, falling to the white floor. He’s mouthing a word at us, but I can’t see what it is. I lean forward.
“Peter,” Wes whispers into my ear. “He’s saying Peter.”
I press my hand over my mouth. Tears start to fall down my cheeks.
Dr. Faust says something to the guards holding Dean, then points to the
