"Where's he going?" Jenna asked. What if they brought the station authorities in? If that happened, Ianira and Marcus and those beautiful little girls would die. Nobody could protect them, not as long as they remained on this station.
Marcus didn't even glance up. He was stroking his wife's hair back from her bruised forehead, holding her cold hand. Their little girls whimpered and clung to his leg, too young to know or comprehend what was happening around them, but old enough to know terror. "He goes to bring medicine. Food, water, blankets. We will hide her in the Sanctuary."
Jenna didn't know exactly what or where Ianira's Sanctuary might be, although she suspected it was hidden deep under the station. But she knew enough to blurt out, "You can't! It won't be safe there. These bastards will hunt through every inch of this station, looking for her. For you, too, and the children."
Frightened brown eyes lifted, met hers. "What can we do, then? We have friends here, powerful friends. Kit Carson and Bull Morgan—"
Armstrong cut him off. "Not even Kit Carson can stop the Ansar Majlis," Noah bit out, bitterness darkening the detective's voice, leaving it harsh and raw. "You have to get completely off this station. The faster, the better. We sure as hell are," Noah nodded toward Jenna. "The only place that's gonna be safe is someplace down time. There's a whole lot of history to hide in, through this station's gates. We hide long enough, stay alive long enough, I can slip back through the station in disguise—and I'm damned good at disguises—and get the proof of what we know to the up-time authorities. If we're going to stop the bastards responsible for this," Noah jerked a glance toward Ianira, curled up on her side, fragile as rare porcelain, "the only way is to destroy them, make sure they're jailed for life or executed. And we can't do that if we're dead."
"Who is it?" Marcus grated out. "I will kill them, whoever they are!"
Jenna believed him. Profoundly. Imagination failed her, trying to comprehend what this ordinary-seeming young man in blue jeans and a checkered shirt had already lived through. Noah told Marcus what they were up against. All of it. In thorough and revolting detail. The suspicion that flared in Marcus' eyes when he looked at Jenna wounded her.
"I'm not my father!" she snapped, fists aching at her sides. "If that son-of-a-bitch were in front of me right now, I'd blow his head off. He always was a lousy, rotten, stinking bastard of a father. I just never knew how much. ‘Til now."
The suspicion in the other man's brown eyes melted away while something else coalesced in its place. It took a moment to recognize it. When he did, it shook Jenna badly. Pity. This ex-slave, this man whose family was targeted for slaughter, pitied her. Jenna turned roughly aside, shoved her pistol through her belt and her hands into her pockets, and clenched her teeth over a flood of nausea and anger and fright that left her shaking. A moment later, Noah settled a hand on her shoulder.
"You never killed a man before." It wasn't a question, didn't have to be a question, because it was perfectly obvious. Jenna shook her head anyway. "No." Noah sighed, tightened fingers against her shoulder for a moment. "They say it's never easy, kid. I hadn't either, you know, until that hit in New York." Jenna glanced up, found deep pain in Noah's enigmatic eyes. "But I always knew I might have to, doing the job I chose. It's worse for you, probably. When a kid comes to the Temple young as you are, she's hurting inside already. You got more reason than most. And Cassie told me you cried when you accidentally ran over a mongrel dog on the road out to the ranch."
She clenched her teeth tighter and tried to hold back tears she did not want the detective to witness. Noah didn't say anything else. Just dropped the hand from Jenna's shoulder and turned away, moving briskly around the confined space Jenna had chosen to defend, making up a better bed for Ianira. That it was necessary only upset Jenna more, because she hadn't done a good enough job of it, herself. The Latin-speaking teenager returned a few silent minutes later, bringing a first aid kit, a heavy satchel that wafted the scent of food when he lifted the flap, blankets piled over one shoulder, and a couple of stuffed toys, which he gave to Ianira's daughters. The children grabbed hold of the shaggy, obviously home-made bears, and hugged them with all their little-girl strength. Jenna's eyes stung, watching it. No child only three years old should ever look at the world through eyes that looked like that. And Artemisia's sister was even younger, barely a year old. Barely walking, yet.
"We can't stay here long," Noah was saying, voice low. "They'll be searching for her. We'll have to smuggle her up into the hotel room Jenna's reserved. We can hide there until the Britannia Gate opens." The detective checked a wristwatch. "We won't need to hide long. But we've got to outfit for the gate between now and then. And find a way to smuggle Ianira through."
"Us," Marcus said sharply. "We all go through."
But Noah was shaking a head that ought to've gone grey by now, if the detective's private life was anything like what they'd already lived through. "No. They're going to send a death squad after us, Marcus. They'll send somebody through every gate that opens during the next week, trying to get her. I won't risk all of you anywhere in one group. Just in case the worst happens and the bastards who follow her through the gate do catch up."
"Not the Britannia," Marcus insisted stubbornly. "They cannot get through the Britannia. It is Ripper Season. There have been no tickets for today's gate for over a year. I could get through working as a porter hauling baggage, because I am a station resident, but no one else."
"Don't underestimate these people, Marcus. If necessary, they'll kill one of the baggage handlers, take his place, and get through that way, using their victim's ID and timecard."
Marcus' already pale cheeks ran dead white. "Yes," he whispered. "It would be easy. Too easy."
"So." Noah's voice, so difficult to pin down as either a man's light voice or a woman's deep one, was cold and precise. "We put Ianira in a steamer trunk. Same thing for the girls. You," the detective nodded at Marcus, "go through one of the other gates with your children. And we'll disguise you as a baggage handler, since they're almost invisible. The problem is, which gate?"
The teenager spoke up at once. "The Wild West Gate opens tomorrow."
Jenna and Noah exchanged glances. It was perfect. Too perfect. The Ansar Majlis would track Marcus and the girls straight through that gate, figuring it would be the one gate Jenna was likeliest to choose. The tour gate into Denver of 1885 was the only gate besides the sold-out Britannia where the natives spoke English. And Carl had been such a nut about that period of American history, the killers tracking them would doubtless figure Jenna had cut and run through the gate she and Carl would've known the most about, the only one she could get tickets for, not knowing, thank the Lady, that Jenna had secretly bought tickets through the Britannia in another name more than a year ago.
Noah, however, was frowning in concentration, studying Marcus closely. "It could work. Put you and the girls down Denver's Wild West Gate, with me as guard, send Jenna and Ianira through to London."
"But—" Jenna opened her mouth to protest, terrified at the prospect of Noah abandoning her.
A dark glance from steel-cold grey eyes shut her up. "There are two of us. And two groups of them." The detective nodded at Marcus and Ianira, who still lay unmoving except to breathe. Fright tightened down another notch, leaving Jenna to wonder if she'd ever be hungry again, her gut hurt so much. Noah said more gently, "We have to split up, kid. If we send Marcus and the girls through without a guard... hell, kid, we might as well shoot them through the head ourselves. No, we know they're going to follow whoever goes through the Wild West Gate. So I'll go with them, pose as somebody they're likely to think is you, use a name they'll think is something you'd come up with, something you'd think is clever—"