Her skin began to warm against mine, and her breathing grew labored. I finished with the memories I didn’t understand, one in particular, and held on, afraid to open my eyes.
The machine monitoring her heartbeat sped up, and an alarm went off on another machine.
“Dad?” I stood, stepped back, and looked at him instead of her, but I didn’t let go of her hands.
Anger. Fear. Despair. Pain.
The rush of emotions sucker-punched me. I might have gone down if they hadn’t been followed by love. Gratitude. Joy. Relief.
Her blue eyes, the mirror image of mine, opened. She was smiling.
“Mama?” I used the name I’d called her as a child, and my voice broke. I buried my face in her neck, feeling her pulse, strong and sure. “Are you… are you okay?”
“I knew you could do it.” Her voice was weak, and then she was crying.
I touched her face, held her hands. Felt the overwhelming love Dad had for both of us rush over me like healing water.
“I could hear. I knew how you tried to save me. How you blamed yourself, and I knew when your father came back. I just kept holding on.”
Then she caught a glimpse of Dad behind me.
“Liam?”
He rushed past me, wrapped her in his arms, and kissed her.
Every lightbulb and electrical appliance in the room blew at once.
I turned to sneak out, to give them time to reconnect, but my mother called out to me.
“Kaleb?”
I turned around.
“Where’s Lily?”
My mouth dropped open. “What?”
“She’s such a lovely girl.” Mom smiled again, as if she had a secret.
I guess she did.
Chapter 55
Lily and I escaped to the front porch.
“Are you okay?” Lily asked, putting her hand on my shoulder. I covered it with my own.
“I don’t know. Mom and Dad. It’s amazing.” I stared across the dewy grass and breathed in the smell of a new morning. But it wasn’t a fresh start. “Emerson and Michael…”
“There’s hope.” I heard it in her voice, felt it in her soul.
“Lily? What aren’t you telling me?”
“I know where the Infinityglass is.”
“What? How?”
“I lied to Teague. Once I figured out the Infinityglass was a person, I looked for it on the map. It’s in Louisiana, near New Orleans. We can save them, Kaleb.” Her smile was full of promise. “We just have to find the Infinityglass, and we can make everything okay.”
I touched the bruise on her cheek, ran my thumb under the cut on her mouth.
“I hope you aren’t going to let a fat lip stop you,” she said.
I barely touched my lips to hers, but rather than seek her emotions, I paid attention to my own.
All I felt was love.
Until other emotions pushed between us.
More relief. More gratitude. So much more love.
Michael. And Emerson.
I turned to see him, along with Emerson, perfectly healthy, standing right in front of us. I stared at them in wonder, and then I jumped off the porch steps, grabbing Mike to make sure he was real, reaching out for Em’s hand.
They didn’t disappear.
“How?” I asked, once everyone had hugged and been hugged at least fifteen times. “We were sure you were gone, forever.”
“So were we,” Em said. “Once we got inside, I realized that the Phone Company didn’t look like the Phone Company anymore. No one was inside, and there weren’t tables or chairs or… anything. I turned around to run back out, but the smoke was so thick…”
She’d been terrified. Being trapped, compounded with her fear of fire-I could feel the tightness in her throat, the shaking of her arms and legs.
“But I could see her,” Michael said, reaching for Em’s hand. “I knew we had one chance.”
“We couldn’t travel,” Em said, her voice stronger now, “because we didn’t have exotic matter. But we had our duronium rings, so we could get inside the veil.”
“The rip changed while we watched,” Michael said. “The Phone Company went back to normal.”
“But we couldn’t get out of the veil.” Em shuddered. “We were trapped.”
“If you were trapped, how the hell are you standing here right now?” I demanded. That’s when I felt him.
Poe stood two feet away from us, just outside a veil.
“Edgar,” Em said, with pink cheeks. “Jack and Cat used him as a tool. Just like Ava, just like me.”
“I’m still not following,” I said. At all.
There was extreme fierceness in Em’s voice. If Poe was going to have a champion, the girl he’d tried to kill was his best chance. “He’s not a traveler to the past or the future, but he can move through space. Kind of like… teleporting.”
“Explain.” I stared at Poe, trying to get any other emotion besides sadness from him. It was all I could find.
“I use duronium to get inside veils.” His voice was thin, and it seemed as if he could barely stand. “I use exotic matter to get from place to place. Jack used me to do the same.”
“You were using Cat’s exotic matter,” I realized. “Did Cat help Em and Michael get out of the rip?”
“No.”
“How did you get them out?” I asked.
“I have my own source of exotic matter.”
I let the possibilities of that statement sink in.
“If we’re done with the happy reunion, I’m not just here for kicks and giggles.” I noticed a red spot on the front of Poe’s shirt growing wider by the second. He swayed to one side, blinking furiously. “I came to warn you. Landers. Chronos. Together… mistake. Huge mistake.”
And then he collapsed.
Acknowledgments
Thank you to:
Awesome Agent Holly “The Death Kitten” Root. You never cease to amaze me. They say choosing an agent is like choosing a spouse. I totally leveled up.
Fab Film Agent Brandy Rivers. Your advocacy for Hourglass has been tireless. Southern girls are the best. Thank you.
Everyone at Waxman Literary, for handling all the details.
Excellent Editor Regina Griffin, and the whole team at Egmont. I can’t even begin to list all you’ve done for Hourglass and Timepiece!
Lissy Laricchia, cover photographer, whose mind I’d like to crawl inside for an extended vacation, and cover designer Alison Chamberlain.
My foreign publishers, along with every sales rep, bookseller, bookstore, reader, and bookpusher alive. Where would I be without you?
Twentieth Century Fox, for being able to see the potential in Hourglass as a feature film. If it happens or not, the possibility is the real gift.
My writer friends. Beth Revis, for the Firefly reference; Victoria Schwab, for the thin blue line; MG Buehrlen, for kite string and shin kicking elves; Jodi Meadows, for an always open chat box and the kindest approach; CJ Redwine, for ledge wrangling and peach tea runs; and Rachel Hawkins, for the endless laughter and the “hurts me in my feminism” line. Half up, half down, Hawkins.
Cuban ladies who came to my rescue! Christina Diaz Gonzalez, and Chantel Acevedo (who made phone calls to Marta and Aris to make sure I got Lily right!). Empanadas for everyone! (But one of y’all are going to have to teach me how to make them.)
Jen Lamoureux, for being a precious friend and a tireless worker on the Murphy’s Law fan site.
Katie Bartow and Sophie Riggsby, for being seriously spectacular. (Can’t wait for you to find yourselves between the pages.)
Clint Redwine, for taking three rolls of film in Sedona. (You made it in, too!)
Writer/readers who helped more than they know: Bill Cameron, Valerie Kemp, Tessa Gratton, Natalie Parker, Jeri Smith-Ready, and all authors repped by Freddy the Moose (who makes an appearance-because he never stole my cranberry juice).