COLLATERAL DAMAGE
1904—St. Louis
Harte fought against the hold the two police officers had on his arms, but it wasn’t long before he was being shoved inside the back of a long, dark wagon with a handful of the other Antistasi. The door shut behind them, and the carriage rumbled on as Harte checked to make sure that the necklace was still tucked into the secret pocket sewn into his shirt.
During the fight, it had taken nearly all of his strength to keep himself from winning the mock battle he’d staged with Esta. The voice inside of him had rallied, urging him on—to take her down, to take everything she was. But that voice was quiet now.
It was a quiet he didn’t quite trust. Maybe the power was pulling away from the stone tucked in his pocket, just as it had pulled away from the Book. But it could just as easily be lying in wait, preparing itself for its next onslaught.
Someone lit a match as Harte was pulling off the mask, and the other people in the back of the carriage all looked at each other for a moment. Then someone laughed. “Damn, that was fun,” a man with a missing side tooth said as he wiped sweat from his brows and pulled off the gloves he’d been wearing.
Harte couldn’t quite agree, not yet, at least. He’d relax when they were free.
When the carriage stopped, he waited, his skin prickling with awareness, until the door opened to reveal a policeman standing there, his mouth twisted in disgust. “Looks like we got us a bunch of Antistasi snakes.” Then his expression broke into amusement, and he stepped back to let them out.
Harte released the breath he’d been holding, and he felt the power shift inside of him. It didn’t feel half as weak as he did.
He let the other guys go first. His nerves were still jangling from the adrenaline of what they’d just done, and he wasn’t in a hurry to get moving, but once he stepped out, he was relieved to be outside the close, stale air of the carriage and into the warmth of the night. Ruth was standing next to the spot where the carriage had stopped, waiting with some of the other Antistasi.
“You made the switch?” she asked when she saw Harte alight.
Harte nodded. “It’s done,” he said.
Though he still didn’t like it. If they couldn’t manage to get back to 1902 and to stop all of this from happening—if they were stuck going forward from here, now—who knew what the repercussions could be of an all-out attack on the president?
He pulled out the necklace to show Ruth. “Now your part of the deal. I’ll take Esta’s bracelet.”
“You’ll have to wait,” Ruth told him, reaching for the necklace.
He pulled it back. “Like hell—”
“Maggie hasn’t arrived yet,” Ruth said, cutting him off before he could get too worked up. “She should be here any minute.”
“Then we’ll talk about you getting the necklace once she arrives with the bracelet,” Harte said, tucking the necklace into his jacket. Once Esta arrived, Ruth wouldn’t get either of the artifacts.
They waited awhile as other people arrived, each breathing heavily and looking absolutely delighted with what they’d just done. Ten minutes passed and then twenty, and with each additional second, Harte grew more and more impatient. They should be here by now.
But before too long, the sounds of wagon wheels and hoofbeats quickly approaching signaled an arrival.
The power inside Harte lurched at the sight of the smaller carriage pulling up next to the brewery’s wagon and swelled with need when Esta clambered out of the back before the wagon was even completely still.
But Esta’s face wasn’t the picture of satisfaction he’d been expecting. “Do you have it?” she asked. When Harte nodded, her expression didn’t ease. “They have Julien,” she said grimly.
“What do you mean?” Harte asked, stepping toward her and wanting more than anything to wrap his arms around her and pull her to him. But when the voice inside of him rose at that idea, he stopped short.
The plan had been straightforward. Dangerous, but easy enough once the necklaces were switched. The Prophet would take the decoy necklace from Julien and place it on the neck of the debutante who had been chosen as that year’s Queen of Love and Beauty, and then the two of them—Esta and Julien—would leave.
“They took the Prophet’s float off to the side street as soon as the attack happened. They had us in this small holding cell under the wagon’s bed, and when we got to the Festival Hall, they let us out. But they took Julien right off—necklace and all. Jack was there waiting for him,” she told Harte.
Harte froze. “Jack Grew is here?”
She nodded. “I tried to follow them, but the Guards wouldn’t let me. Said it was for the artifact’s security or something.”
Harte didn’t like any of it. There was no reason for Jack to go with Julien, unless Jack somehow knew. “Was Julien okay?”
“I don’t think the Guards suspected anything,” Esta told him. “They seemed more worried about the necklace than about Julien being any kind of threat. I think as long as he stays calm and keeps with the plan, we can go back and get him after they make the necklace switch.”
He didn’t like it, but things could have been worse. They could retrieve Julien, and maybe in the process, they could get the Book from Jack as well.
Soon they heard more hoofbeats approaching.
“Maggie has the cuff,” Harte murmured to Esta as Maggie came into view. She nodded to him, letting him know she understood.
“Tell me you didn’t do it,” Maggie said to Ruth even before she slipped down from the horse. Then she ran to her sister and grabbed Ruth by the arms. “Tell me it isn’t done. That it didn’t work, or—”
“Everything went as planned,” Ruth told her, frowning.
But Maggie was shaking her head like she didn’t believe it.
“It’s fine,” Ruth told her, gentling her voice in a way Harte had never heard it. “Everyone’s safe, and the necklace was switched. All is well.”
“No,” Maggie said. “No. We have to stop it.”
“There’s nothing to stop,” Ruth told her.
“But the serum—it doesn’t work.”
Ruth frowned. “Of course it works. We saw with our own eyes—”
“They’re dying,” Maggie said, her voice nearly hysterical. “I thought it was just that Arnie’s burns were too much for him this morning, but then this evening it was Greta. She’s gone already, and the rest are following, dying by their own magic. There’s nothing I could do for them. Even Isobel couldn’t do a thing to heal them. It’s killing them.”
Ruth’s jaw tightened, and her eyes went hard. “That’s unfortunate.”
“It’s not unfortunate. It’s a catastrophe. They’re all dying, and it’s our fault. If that necklace detonates, we’ll be responsible for the deaths of everyone at the ball. All those people—”
“So they’ll die,” Ruth said, pulling away. “How many of ours have they killed with their laws and their Guard and their hate?”
“We can’t—I can’t just let this happen,” Maggie said, horrified. “This isn’t what I intended. This isn’t—”
“There’s nothing we can do now,” Ruth said. “It’s already done.”
“We can stop it,” Maggie told her. “We can disrupt the ball—we can do something to get them out of the building before it’s too late.”
“I won’t risk any of mine for the Society.”
“It’s not just the Society in there, Ruth. It’s their wives and daughters, too,” Maggie persisted, not noticing how close to her Esta had gotten.
“Who live off the benefits of the evil their husbands and fathers commit.”
Maggie took an actual step back from Ruth and nearly ran into Esta. From the look of horror on Maggie’s face, Harte suspected that she’d never quite seen this side of her older sister before. “Ruth,” she pleaded.
They had the necklace, and from the look Esta was giving Harte, he knew she’d just lifted the cuff from Maggie. They could go now, before they got caught up in the fallout that was sure to come.
Except that he couldn’t. “We can’t leave Julien in there,” Harte told Esta. Her horrified expression told him that she agreed.
“We can’t leave any of them in there,” she said, her voice shaking.
“How do you plan to get into the ball?” Ruth asked. “There will be Jefferson Guards at every entrance. Even if you could get past them, you would have to contend with more inside and the president’s security on top of it.”
“We’ll figure something out,” Harte said. But short of charging the doors and hoping for the best, Ruth was right. Trying to save the people in the ball was a suicide mission. With all the dignitaries that were attending, they’d never be able to get past the security, and if they did, they’d never get back out again. It was the whole the reason they’d taken the necklace from the parade.
“I can help with that,” North said softly.
“I won’t allow it,” Ruth said. “It’s a fool’s errand. And you’re not going anywhere until I get that necklace,” she told Harte.
“You’ll have to take it from me,” Harte said.
“North,” Ruth commanded. “Take care of this.”
“With all due respect, ma’am, I’d rather not.” North stepped between them.
“What are you waiting for?” Ruth asked the others.
But the men and women who’d dressed themselves as serpents to disrupt the parade didn’t make a move to attack. Most of them studied the ground at their feet, their jaws tense and their shoulders hunched against the weight of what they had just helped to do.
“Then I’m done with the lot of you,” Ruth said as she reached for her sister’s hand. “Come, Maggie. Let’s go before we’re seen.”
“I’m going with them,” Maggie told her. She ignored her sister’s protests and stepped forward to slip her hand into North’s. The cowboy’s eyes shone with satisfaction.
Ruth’s face had turned a blotchy red, and her expression was a mixture of anger and shock. “Maggie, you’ll come now as you’re told.” Even Harte could feel Ruth’s impatience simmering in the air as thick and real as magic itself.
But Maggie looked over her shoulder at her sister and shook her head. “I haven’t been a child for a long time, Ruth. I’ve caused this, and I’m going to do something to stop it.”