“So Ray Liotta’s playing in this game?”

  He laughed. “No, but the real Shoeless Joe is.”

  “Oh, right.” I giggled. “This time travel thing is so confusing. I mean, logically, I know we’re sitting here, nearly a hundred years in the past, but I keep forgetting. Everything looks so crisp and real.”

  Maddox squeezed my hand. “Believe me, I understand.”

  “Hello, brother.”

  I whipped my head around at the sound of Laith’s voice. Part of me itched to slap the grin from his lips. The other part yearned to kiss them. I hated that my body responded to him at all.

  “Laith.” Maddox gritted his teeth, and I could tell it was taking everything in him not to attack his brother.

  “Oh, come on. Don’t tell me you aren’t enjoying the game.” Laith kept his eyes trained on the field. “Kerr just struck out the third batter. I imagine Rothstein’s seething right about now.”

  “You know that’s just a rumor.” Maddox looked around before answering in a whisper. “No one knows for sure if Arnold Rothstein had anything to do with the fix.”

  “You know what they say: where there’s smoke, there’s fire.” He grinned down at me. “It’s a shame we won’t be here to see the end of the game, but I’m afraid I have other plans.”

  “Where’s my brother?” I asked. “Where’s Josh?”

  “Josh is perfectly fine. In fact, I’d say he’s quite enjoying himself. Come on, I’ll take you to him.” Laith held out his hand and waited.

  “She’s not going with you!” Maddox snapped, tightening his grip on my hand almost to the point of pain.

  I glanced around us and tensed to my toes. We were beginning to draw a crowd. The last thing I wanted was to get arrested in a time when women didn’t even have the right to vote.

  “Maddox, please.” I rested my hand on his arm. “I need to see my brother.”

  “Fine.” He clenched his jaw and nodded. “But we’re sticking together.”

  Laith rolled his eyes, looking too sure of himself for my comfort. “Whatever. Come on.”

  We followed Laith through the stands until we reached the vacant seats at the very top. Josh stood a few feet away, leaning over the railing, watching the game through an ancient pair of binoculars. “Can we go back to the good seats, now? I can hardly see anything from here.” My brother turned to us with a sour frown. He looked frustrated but fine. At least Laith seemed to have taken good care of him.

  “Josh!”

  I moved toward him, but Laith stepped between us. “Not so fast. Josh wants to stay and watch the game.”

  “I don’t care what Josh wants!” I hissed, working against my own emotions to keep my voice low. “My mother is going to freak out when she realizes he’s gone. He needs to come home with me. Now.”

  Laith smiled. “You see, that’s where you’re missing the point. There’s absolutely no reason Josh can’t stay to watch the whole game and still get home before your mother realizes he’s missing. It’s called ‘time travel.’” He actually made the quotation marks in the air.

  “I’m guessing you didn’t drag us all the way here just so Josh could watch a ninety-five-year-old baseball game.” Maddox squeezed my hand until I felt the bones compress.

  “Well, no. Not exactly. I’d like Ava to come with me while you stay here with Josh. You can make sure he gets home safe and sound, and we can take a little time to get to know each other.” The smile Laith directed at me made my mouth go dry.

  Maddox pushed me behind him. “Absolutely not.”

  “Fine,” Laith snapped. “I’ll just take Josh, and we’ll leave.”

  “Wait!” I stepped around Maddox. “I’ll go.”

  “Ava, no!” Maddox looked horrified, but I had to make sure my brother got home safely. “You can’t go with him.”

  “Maddox, I have to. I can’t do that to my mother. She’d never recover.”

  Maddox scoffed. “He’s not going to keep Josh.”

  “Oh, I dunno. He’s a great kid. I’ll bet we’d have loads of fun jumping around time. I can take him back in say, twenty years. I mean, he’ll still be eleven, but at least he’d be home, right?”

  Now I really wanted to slap the smirk from his face.

  “You wouldn’t do that!” Angry tears sprang into my eyes, but I blinked them back.

  “I wouldn’t want to, but trust me. I would.” Laith turned toward Maddox, and his eyes flashed. “I refuse to end up on the short end of things this time.”

  The pain of his threat felt like a dagger plunged between my ribs. “What are you talking about?”

  “Ask your boyfriend.” Laith’s features hardened as he glared at Maddox then softened again as he turned back to me and held out his hand. “Well? Are you coming?”

  “Can I at least say goodbye first?” I wiped the first tear as it fell.

  “Fine.” Laith exhaled sharply. “Be quick. This era bores me.”

  Laith walked over to Josh, ruffling his hair as the two of them shared a joke.

  How dare he laugh while he tears out my heart?

  “I can’t simply let you go, Ava.” Maddox’s face blurred from behind my tears as he cupped my cheek and leaned in. His mouth came down on mine in a desperate kiss. He held still with our lips pressed together for several beats then released me. “My heart is breaking, and you haven’t even left me yet.”

  I licked the salt from my lips. I wasn’t sure if the tears were his, mine, or maybe a combination of the two. “I know. I feel it, too.”

  He choked back a sob. “I’ll find you. I promise, if it takes another three hundred and fifty years. If it takes a hundred thousand years. I’ll never stop looking.”

  “I love you, Maddox.” I pulled him in for one last kiss before tearing my lips away. “I’m ready.” Even as the words came out, I knew I was lying. I would never be ready to leave him.

  Maddox put on a brave face as he walked over to Josh. I couldn’t hear what they said, but Josh shrugged and went back to watching the game.

  “Just waiting for you.” Laith took a step toward me, and I held my hands up.

  “Can I—”

  “No. You’ve said your goodbyes. Now it’s time to go.” He almost sounded sad, as if he knew I was leaving against my will.

  “You won’t let me give my brother one hug? I don’t know when I’ll see him again.”

  His jaw clenched, but he managed a stiff smile. “Josh. Can you come say goodbye to your sister, please?” Laith stepped to the side. “Quickly.”

  “Hey, Ava. You look weird all dressed up.” Josh met me halfway between the brothers, and I wrapped my arms around him in a crushing hug. “Geez, what the heck? I was trying to watch the game, you know.”

  I laughed through my tears, resting my head on his small shoulder. “I know. I just wanted to say goodbye.”

  “Okay, well… goodbye.”

  He turned to walk away, but I grabbed his hand. “Josh, wait. Tell Mom I—”

  “Don’t let go!” Maddox shouted as he dove toward us. His hand wrapped around my neck, and he jerked me toward him at the same time as scooping Josh up with his other arm.

  Laith shouted out a string of obscenities, rushing toward us just before an energy ripple propelled him backward, and the abyss sucked us in yet again.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  A gust of icy wind swirled around us as we spiraled through the dark tunnel. Even my hair got caught up in the cyclone, ripping free of the pins and slapping me in the face as it whipped through the air. The sound reminded me of the waves breaking against the rocks at the lighthouse, and I shuddered.

  My hand had gone numb from my death grip on Josh, but I was terrified of what would happen if I let go. I had no idea if Maddox had a grasp on him or if my connection was the only thing holding him to us. Maddox said there had to be skin contact to make the jump, but he never said what would happen if we lost contact during one. After everything we’d been through that day, I couldn’t allow my inability to hold on to ruin it all.

  The churning made me seasick, and I swallowed back the urge to empty my stomach. The mere thought of puking in a pitch-black vortex made the queasiness so much worse. I wondered if Alice felt this way tumbling down the rabbit hole. Then I remembered Alice was a character in a book. The sickness in my stomach was real. The wind rushing in my ears was real. I was real.

  Everything went as quiet as death, and we landed in a cold, dark place with a jolt. For a moment, none of us moved. Then Maddox tightened his hold on me as if he couldn’t believe we were safe. He kissed me—my forehead, my eyelids, my cheeks—as if the thought of not touching me caused him pain.

  I wrapped my arms around his neck, meeting him in the middle with my lips. His mouth closed over mine, and we were kissing. I couldn’t get enough of him, and if his enthusiasm was any indication, he felt the same way.

  “Really? Can you two get a room?” Josh’s snarky tone burst our blissful little bubble. Then he let out a squeal of delight. He’d clearly enjoyed the trip. “That time jump thing rocks! Can we do it again?”

  Maddox ignored Josh’s question, untangling my body from his as he examined me with his hands. “Are you okay?” His voice still carried the anguish from our almost parting, and the need to comfort him overwhelmed me.

  “I’m fine.” A little white lie. I couldn’t have gotten any farther away from fine if I tried, but Maddox didn’t need to know that.

  Laith had almost succeeded in kidnapping me. He had taken my brother. And if not for Maddox’s quick thinking, I might never have seen either of them, or my mother, again.

  Mom.

  “Wait.” I turned in his arms to survey my unfamiliar surroundings. There wasn’t much light, but as far as I could tell, we were in some sort of tomb or dungeon. I could barely make out the dirt floor, and wispy spider webs stretched across the low, wood-beam ceiling. The stone walls looked sturdy but damp, and the stale air smelled like mildew and decay. “Where are we?”

  “Oh, cool!” Something caught my brother’s attention, and he scurried off like a rat on a sinking ship.

  “Josh, wait!” I had no idea what condition the space was in or how safe it was to go wandering around. “Stay where I can see you. We don’t even know where we are. Or when we are.” I mumbled the last part, not really intending it to be out loud, but Maddox had said time travel wasn’t an exact science, so we could literally be anywhere.

  “We’re back.” He pulled me into another hug. “It should only be a few minutes past the time we left, actually.” Logically, I understood him, but I couldn’t seem to wrap my head around it. We’d been gone for hours. How could only a few minutes have passed? And what difference did it make how long it took if we were trapped below ground?

  “But where?”

  “It’s the basement,” Josh shouted from the shadows. “I came down here the day we moved in, but Mom told me to steer clear until she had someone check it out. Do you think there might be bats hiding down here? That would be so cool! Or maybe there’s a body buried under the floor.”

  “God, I hope not.” I looked up at Maddox, and he shook his head, biting back a grin. “So how do we get out of here?”

  “Stairs, duh.” Josh answered as if it were obvious, and I guess it was, but I didn’t see any stairs from where I stood. As if he’d read my mind, he wandered back into the open and grabbed me by the hand. “This way, spaz.”

  “Gee, thanks, jerk.” I gripped his clammy hand as he towed me to an even darker corner of the basement.

  “These are the stairs, but I’m not going first. Who knows what’s up there,” said the kid hoping to find bats or a dead body.

  “Way to be brave.” I gave him two thumbs up, but I doubted anyone saw in the dark.

  “I’ll go.” Maddox took the lead up the creaking steps but had to use force and his shoulder to open the swollen old door at the top. When it finally gave way, the three of us burst into the kitchen like a set of dominoes.

  One look at Maddox sprawled out on the floor under me and I broke out in a fit of giggles.

  “What on earth were you three doing down there?” Mom appeared in the doorway with her hands on her hips and her bitch brow firmly in place. “Josh, didn’t I already tell you the basement was too dangerous?”

  “Sorry, Mom.” Josh scrambled to his feet, a hundred-watt smile lighting up his face. “But we just got back from time traveling to 1919 to watch Shoeless Joe Jackson play baseball!”

  “Shoeless Joe, huh? Have you been watching Field of Dreams again?” Mom tried to hide the grin, but she didn’t do a very good job of it. Ever since Dad died, Josh had worn out our copy of the movie, watching it at least once every weekend.

  “No! And I can prove we went to the game.” Josh fished through his pocket and pulled out what looked like a yellow business card. He held it over his head with pride. “See?”

  Mom took the card from his fingers and flipped it over to read it. Her eyes snapped up to mine. “Where did he get this?”

  “What is it?” My stomach rolled as I imagined the possibilities.

  She held it out for me. “It’s a ticket for game three of the 1919 World Series.”

  I swallowed, and my saliva went down the wrong pipe, making me choke and cough, thankfully saving me from having to answer.

  Maddox had my back, literally, whacking me until I could breathe again. “We, uh, went on a little scavenger hunt and found a trunk of stuff from the early nineteen hundreds in Ava’s closet. It must have been in there.”

  I sucked in an uncomfortable breath. “Yeah, that’s where I found this dress. And Maddox’s suit. We were just playing with Josh until you got home.” It was amazing how well I lied once I got going.

  It didn’t escape me that Maddox could be considered an expert in the art of deception.

  “Did not!” Josh stomped his foot and pouted like a toddler. “We went to the baseball game. But I only got to watch the first half of the first inning before Maddox grabbed me and made me come back.”

  Mom flashed an apologetic smile at me then steered Josh toward the stairs. “Okay, that’s enough adventure for one day, kiddo. Time for bed.”

  “Where’s my ticket? I want my ticket back.”

  “Here!” I waved it in front of me, and he darted across the kitchen and snatched it out of my hand before heading upstairs with Mom close on his heels.

  “Quick thinking.” I rested my head on Maddox’s chest, melting into him as he wrapped his arms around me.

  He rested his chin on the top of my head. “Occupational hazard.”

  “I’ll bet.” I pulled back to look into his eyes. “What the hell was your brother thinking, bringing a kid on a time jump? Did he think Josh could keep something like that a secret?”

  “I don’t imagine he cared. It’s not as if anyone would believe Josh. He didn’t see anything that couldn’t be researched on the Internet, and even the ticket stub is something you can get from collectors here and there. Luckily, you happened to have a stash of things from that era.”

  “And if I hadn’t?” I tucked myself under his chin again, listening to the rhythmic beat of his heart.

  “I would have said I found it in the basement. Relax.” He kissed the top of my head. “People are always willing to discount the unbelievable. You’ll see.”

  “If you say so.” I had to wonder how often he’d had to distract people from the truth. How many times had I let things slide because they seemed impossible?

  He chuckled. “I do.”

  “But what do we do now? What’s stopping Laith from coming back and grabbing Josh again?” The question sat like a stone at the bottom of my stomach.

  “Laith didn’t grab me. I went with him because I wanted to.”

  I spun around in Maddox’s arms to find my brother standing at the edge of the kitchen in his pajamas, a sour scowl pasted on his face. “Josh, Laith isn’t like Maddox—”

  “You’re right.” He stepped forward, his dimpled chin pointing at Maddox like an accusation. “Laith isn’t like Maddox. I like Laith. He’s a nice guy. He likes baseball… like Dad. And he’s like Shoeless Joe. Everyone thinks he did something bad, but he didn’t. He got blamed for what someone else did. Laith should be your boyfriend, Ava. You’re stupid if you think Maddox is the good brother.”

  With that, Josh turned around and ran out the way he came, leaving me in total and complete shock—and Maddox restless and tense.

  Maddox tried to convince me to let him sleep on my floor that night. His reasons hinged on watching over me in case Laith showed up to grab me in a fit of frustration, but I suspected it had more to do with my little brother’s smear campaign. For whatever reason, Josh’s dislike of Maddox had gotten under his skin.

  My brother had it in his head that Laith had his reasons for doing what he did. And maybe Josh was right. Maybe Laith believed he was doing the right thing, but believing something didn’t make it true.

  Unfortunately, that went for Maddox, too. I believed in him wholeheartedly, but after our trip to 1919, I wondered if there weren’t layers of the story I’d missed, nuances he’d left out along the way. The problem was I didn’t want to think of either of them as all bad. Maddox owned my heart, but my soul belonged equally to both of them. And as I lay there, studying the cracks in my ceiling, I realized how much I wanted Laith to be as good as Josh believed him to be.

  Unfortunately, history told a different tale.

  I couldn’t sleep. Instead, I tossed and turned, desperate to shut off my brain, but the events of the day continued to replay through my mind like an old newsreel. Only the colors were all wrong.