I glanced at the clock. “My mom’s gonna be home soon.”

  “Laith knows you’re frantic. He can feel your emotions just as easily as I can. He’ll use that to his advantage. He’s going to wait until the most intense moment to get a message to us.”

  “So he didn’t jump into the future with him?”

  “He wouldn’t take him into the future. It could potentially create a paradox down the road. He’d take him into the past. Somewhere safe. He’s not going to want to lose his only bargaining chip. But he won’t care if he makes everyone insane with worry while he’s at it. Will your mom check on Josh when she comes in?”

  “She still checks on me most nights.” I smiled at the memory of her standing in the doorway, thinking she’d been stealthy. “But she just sticks her head—” I jumped to my feet and clasped his hand in mine. “Come on, I have an idea.”

  I towed Maddox up the stairs and into Josh’s room. “Go grab a pair of jeans and a shirt out of his drawer. Turn them inside out and ball them up on the floor. Oh, and don’t forget two mismatched socks.”

  Maddox stopped and made a face. “Mismatched socks?”

  “Josh never wears matching socks. Trust me. We’re about to pull the oldest trick in the book.” I peeled back Josh’s blankets and lined up his pillows so it would look like a body under the covers. I grabbed his old teddy bear from under the bed and arranged it to resemble the back of Josh’s dark head resting on a pillow. With the lights off, Mom would be fooled into thinking Josh was asleep. Or so I hoped.

  Maddox did as I asked then stood back to scratch his head. “And you think this’ll work?”

  “Oh, absolutely.” I shot a grin over my shoulder as I put the final touches on our plan. “I can’t even count the number of times my brother’s managed to pull this off without getting caught. I think he likes getting away with the deception more than anything else. He never goes farther than the backyard. Mom let him watch Ferris Bueller’s Day Off one too many times, if you ask me.”

  Once we had Josh’s room set up, we shut off the light and headed to the attic.

  “He should have contacted us by now.” Maddox checked his phone for the umpteenth time then looked around my room as if searching for something. “You said you saw a face in the mirror earlier. Did you see anything else that may have been Laith trying to get a message to you?”

  “Just my name on the window.”

  “Didn’t you say he wrote on your bathroom mirror once?”

  “Yeah.” I shrugged. “While I was in the tub.”

  Maddox’s face flashed with anger. He quickly tamped it down.

  “Stop imagining him seeing me naked.” I slapped his arm. “It’s bad enough I have to think about it. I need you to focus.”

  He pressed his lips into a tight line and nodded. “Yeah, okay. Sorry.”

  “Hey, what if we filled my tub with hot water and let the bathroom steam up? If he’s trying to send me a message, maybe he’s waiting for a place to put it.”

  Maddox reached out and grabbed me, pulling me in for a quick kiss. “You’re brilliant. You know that?”

  I couldn’t hold back the smile.

  “Lead the way.” He followed me into the bathroom and quickly opened the hot water taps on the sink and tub until the water came out full blast. “Come on, come on…” He paced in the small space, waiting for the cloud of steam to fill the bathroom and fog the mirror.

  “Look!” I pointed at the swirled script forming on the glass.

  Comiskey Park October 3, 1919

  See you after the first pitch.

  Chapter Twenty

  “October third, 1919? ‘See you after the first pitch?’ Is he referring to a baseball game? Does that mean anything to you?” I stared at the words on the mirror, trying to make sense of the message.

  “Yeah. Apparently, my brother has a twisted sense of humor.” Maddox chuckled but didn’t elaborate.

  “Comiskey Park? Why does that sound familiar?”

  He caught my eyes in the mirror. “Because that’s where the Chicago White Sox used to play.”

  I pulled my attention from Maddox’s reflection and turned to face him. “Why is he sending us to a baseball field?”

  He shrugged but made a point of looking everywhere but at me. “I’m guessing he wanted to catch the game.”

  “There’s something you’re not telling me.” I watched him carefully as he walked out of my bathroom.

  I followed him into my room, catching up to him beside my unmade bed.

  He completely ignored my comment but turned to face me. “You’re going to want to change your clothes.”

  “What?” I peeked down at my Tattoo You T-shirt and favorite jeans. “But we’re going to a baseball game.”

  “We’re going to a baseball game in 1919. You can’t go like this.” Maddox brought his lips to my ear as he trailed a finger over the exposed skin at my collarbone, sending a delicious shiver down my spine. “Not that I’m complaining about how you’re dressed because you look fantastic. But you’d create quite the scandal in pre-1920s Chicago.”

  I shook my head to clear it. “Oh. Right. Of course. I wasn’t thinking.” If he didn’t stop touching me, I doubted I’d ever think straight again.

  He kissed the sweet spot behind my ear then flopped down on my bed, staring up at the cracks in my ceiling as if trying to solve an equation. “Does your mom have anything you can borrow?” He picked up my pillow and brought it to his face.

  “Anything from that era? I doubt it.” I bit back a smirk. “Did you really just smell my pillow?”

  He shrugged then smiled and shoved the pillow behind his head. “Well, we can’t just show up in regular clothes. We’d never get through the gate looking like a couple of vagrants.”

  I wasn’t sure how I felt about that statement, but I let it go. “So you’re saying Laith has a stash of clothes from the early twentieth century?”

  “I’m certain he does. I know I do.”

  My eyes popped wide as his words sank in. “You have clothes from the twenties?”

  “And the thirties, forties, and fifties, actually. You can get away with a lot of the same stuff for the sixties and seventies, and I avoid the eighties like the plague.”

  I nodded. It made sense.

  “Do you have any long skirts or—”

  “Oh my God, I can’t believe I forgot!” I shot a glance at the narrow storage closet on the other side of my room. “When we first moved in, I discovered these trunks filled with old clothes. I think they must have been my grandmother’s, maybe even my great-grandmother’s. I’d planned on selling them on Etsy or taking them to a vintage shop, but I got distracted.” My cheeks heated up as I thought of exactly who had distracted me.

  He gave me a knowing grin. “Well, what are we waiting for? Let’s see what’s inside.”

  Maddox helped me drag the first trunk out of the closet, and I carefully removed the floral silk dress I’d seen that first day.

  I stood in front of the full-length mirror and held it up to me. The long-sleeved dress looked to be about ankle length with a pattern of pale pink and white flowers repeating over a delicate cream background. As far as I could tell, it was absolutely perfect. “Do you think it’ll fit?”

  Maddox’s eyes seemed to glaze over as he watched my reflection. “I guess there’s only one way to know for sure. Why don’t you try it on?”

  I nodded and disappeared into the bathroom, hanging the dress on the back of the door. I yanked my T-shirt over my head and shimmied out of my jeans. “Laith, you’d better not be watching me,” I whispered into the mirror before slipping the dress over my head.

  My grandmother must have been about my size because the dress not only fit, it fit as if it had been made for me. The high-waisted skirt and the thick lapels of the wrapped bodice accentuated every barely-there curve of my body.

  I grabbed a few clips from my sink and swept my hair back, twisting and rolling it into a haphazard up-do before pinning it in place. I took a deep breath and stepped out of the bathroom.

  Maddox was stretched out across my bed, but when he saw me, his mouth fell open, and he jumped up and crossed the room as if he’d time-jumped to me. “Ava, you…” He took my face in his hands and without breaking eye contact, he slowly closed the distance between us until his lips barely brushed mine. “You take my breath away.”

  Just when I thought he’d take a step back, his eyes flashed with need. He slid one hand behind my back as the other fought against the pins to snake into my hair, tilting my head slightly so he could really kiss me. Without asking for the permission I would have willingly given, his mouth claimed mine, setting off a chain reaction of fireworks through my body.

  The entire house could have fallen down around us, and I wouldn’t have noticed. Every bit of my attention focused on Maddox. Our lips moved together as if they’d known each other in a past life. And in a way, I guessed they had.

  My arms went up to wrap around his neck, and he responded by pulling me flush against him. I couldn’t tell which heartbeat was his and which was mine. His hand skated around to rest on the slippery fabric at my hip, and my pulse spiked. He swallowed my moans, capturing my bottom lip between his then releasing it with a pop before going in for more. Every touch, every sound drove me past the point of rational thought.

  We were both breathless when he finally pulled away, putting a little distance between us. “I-I almost forgot…” He didn’t finish the sentence, but we both knew what he meant. Josh. Laith still had my little brother.

  “Let’s go.” I slipped my feet into a pair of pink ballet flats and grabbed Mom’s tan London Fog overcoat on the way downstairs. We hurried out of the house before my mother got home and made things even more complicated. Instead of taking Maddox’s bike, we walked the less than half a block to his house.

  All that time wasted searching for him when he’d lived just four houses away—if I’d only known.

  “I’ll only be a few minutes.” He gave me a quick kiss before disappearing down a dark hallway.

  I waited in the empty living room while Maddox changed into something more appropriate. His house was stark in comparison to mine. He’d said the place had been abandoned for years, and it showed. The old vine-patterned wallpaper had peeled away from the corners, and dark stains made random patterns on the ceiling like a giant Rorschach test. But it had good bones. It could be a nice house if he fixed it up.

  I sat in the only chair, a stiff high-backed thing that must have been designed for looks, because it was most definitely not made for comfort.

  “Ready?”

  His voice startled me, and I nearly capsized myself out of the chair. “Uh huh.”

  Maddox laughed. “Are you sure?” He looked different in a suit, with his messy hair tamed into a neat style. Older. But very handsome.

  I kept my eyes down so he wouldn’t notice how much he affected me. “Shut up. You scared me. This place is sort of creepy.”

  “Yeah, sorry. I’ve never had much need to fix it up. My room is nice, if you…”

  My head snapped up, and even in the dim light from the old chandelier, I noticed his face flush to his hair.

  Maddox rubbed the back of his neck. “Uh, never mind.”

  I crossed the room to stand in front of him and gazed up into his hazel eyes. “I’m ready.”

  He cleared his throat, but his voice still came out a little husky. “Ready?”

  “Yeah.” I reached up to straighten his tie. “To, you know, time travel with you.”

  “Oh, right.” He shook his head. “I don’t know what I was thinking.” He took me in his arms so we were chest to chest and placed his palm against the bare skin at the back of my neck, making me shudder. “We need to have skin-on-skin contact for you to… so I can bring you with me.”

  I didn’t even want to ask how he knew that, but I nodded and slid my hand into the back of his hair, where I could feel his pulse thrumming against my fingertips. “Is this good?”

  He dropped his forehead to mine and let out a half-groan, half-whine. “Yeah. It’s, uh… it’s good.” Then he took a deep breath. “I’m sorry.”

  “What for?”

  “This is going to be disorienting.”

  I felt the room swirl around me, pulling me in all different directions until a deep, dark hole sucked us in.

  Just like in my dream, I spiraled down a dark tunnel with an icy wind whipping around me, threatening to rip me to shreds. Only this time, Maddox held on to me as we dropped into the abyss. And instead of grasping at the air, my hands held tight to him like a lifeline. With my face buried in his chest, I couldn’t see. I could barely breathe. And just like the dream, it took so long to reach the bottom, I feared we’d fall forever.

  I bit back the scream building in my throat as we landed with a thud. Maddox was right. We didn’t end up crouched down or naked in a dark alley. But we weren’t at the ball field, either. Instead, we clung to one another in the middle of nowhere, a glowing ripple of energy dissipating around us.

  “Where are we?” I gaped at the trees and rolling hills. We were a few yards from a small pond with a wooden bridge. “Is this even Chicago?”

  Maddox did a quick scan of the area and laughed. “Well, this is ironic.”

  I untangled my fingers from his hair and stepped out of his arms. “What is?”

  “We’re in Washington Park.”

  “Did something go wrong? Weren’t we trying to hit Comiskey Park?”

  Maddox laughed again. “Totally different kind of park. But to answer your question, jumping isn’t an exact science. We can get close, but to my knowledge, neither of us has yet to jump on a giant X marking the spot.”

  “Oh. Then what about Washington Park is ironic?”

  “Well, we’re not too far from the spot where the Fountain of Time sculpture will be erected about a year from now.”

  “That’s interesting, I guess.” I failed to understand the significance of the sculpture.

  “You don’t know it?”

  “No.”

  He frowned and took a tentative step toward me. “Come here. You’re all… windblown.” Maddox spun me around then took his time tucking my hair back into the pins. With meticulous precision, he wound each lock around his finger before securing it into place. The sweet gesture took me off guard. “You’ve never heard of the Fountain of Time?”

  I started to shake my head, but his hands in my hair prevented me from moving. And his warm breath against my neck banished all thoughts of sculptures, parks, and baseball games into the fringe of my consciousness.

  He secured the last pin and turned me around, a slight smile curving his full lips. “Henry Austin Dobson’s poem ‘The Paradox of Time’ inspired it. A personal favorite of mine, actually.”

  I caught the sweet scent of fresh-cut grass as I stared up at him and cleared my throat. The urge to kiss him overwhelmed me. “I don’t know it.”

  “‘Time goes, you say? Ah, no! Alas, Time stays, we go.’” Maddox kept his voice low, seductive, locking his eyes on me as he recited the poem. “‘Or else, were this not so. What need to chain the hours, For youth were always ours? Time goes, you say?–ah no!’ Fitting, wouldn’t you say?”

  “Hmm.” I gulped, and something intense crackled between us, making my stomach flutter.

  “We’d better hurry.” Maddox dropped his eyes to the gold watch on his wrist. “We don’t want to miss the first pitch.”

  I nodded and took his outstretched hand. “What time does the game start?”

  “Two-twenty, and it’s already almost one.”

  “Is it far to the field?”

  “Far enough by foot.”

  We arrived at Comiskey Park with ten minutes to spare. Maddox picked up the tickets waiting for us at the gate, and we made our way to our seats.

  The stadium was way smaller than the modern venues I’d been to with Josh and my father, and crowds of people settling into the teal seats looked as if they’d be more comfortable in an office building than a ball field, or maybe the set of a movie. Men in fancy three-piece suits escorted women in long, narrow skirts and wide-brimmed hats. I didn’t see a single kid in baseball attire. No one ran up and down the stairs shouting with team spirit. The stadium was as serene as a church. Maddox was right; I would have stuck out like a sore thumb in my jeans and concert tee.

  “What do we do now?” I leaned over to whisper, and he met me in the middle.

  “We wait.” He reached out, taking my hand and lacing my fingers with his. “Cincinnati’s up to bat first. Dickie Kerr’s about to throw the first pitch and get the first three batters out in a row.”

  “Have you been here before?”

  He laughed. “I can’t be in two places at once, remember? Though I have seen newsreels and read articles about it. This series is pretty infamous, historically speaking.”

  “What happened that made it so infamous?” I leaned into him until our shoulders pressed together.

  “Are you kidding me?”

  I gave him a look.

  “Have you ever seen Field of Dreams?”

  The mere mention of my dad’s all-time favorite movie brought tears to my eyes, and I blinked them back. “Uh, yeah, I’ve seen it several times.”

  He put his lips closer to my ear. “Ray Liotta’s character, the ghost of Shoeless Joe Jackson, got sent to the cornfield because he’d been banned from baseball for life after this World Series.”