“Oh.” She waited, expecting him to share it, but he continued walking without saying anything else. “You’re not going to tell me?” she asked, not because she cared, but because he seemed to have been leading up to that. And, all right, maybe she was a tad curious.

  Mace shook his head. “Not here. In private, I would.”

  Hm, Andie wasn’t about to ask him to drag her off behind a tree for a private moment, so she let him drop it. Besides, his next comment flustered her, and she forgot the others.

  “Your parents should have let you play sports. You’re very athletic and a talented fighter. You must be very dedicated to your practice.”

  “I—thank you. Yes.”

  Andie rarely had a reason to throw punches outside of the dojang, so she wasn’t used to people outside of the sport complimenting her. Especially men outside of the sport. Oh, her last boyfriend had wished her luck when she had gone to tournaments, and he had come to watch once, but he’d let his real feelings come out afterward, pointing out that women weren’t as strong and fast as men, and that in the real world, if she had to spar against a man, she would get her clock cleaned. Apparently, it had never occurred to him that she sparred with men all the time at practices. She’d never claimed that she could beat every man or even most of those who shared her rank, but she had been irked enough at his comment to proclaim that she could beat him. The beers had helped the argument along, and they had ended up in a dark parking lot, flinging punches at each other. She’d felt triumphant when she had thrown him over her shoulder and pinned him in thirty seconds. He, however, had broken up with her the next day. She had been haunted by advice her mother had given her when she was thirteen years old and doing fancier tricks than any of the boys at the skate park. Men, she had said, wanted someone they could take care of, someone who clearly needed their help, not someone who unmanned them by outperforming them at their own passions.

  The statement had seemed so ridiculously antiquated at the time, not something she would have expected from her scientist mother, and Andie had dismissed it. But every time she had broken up with a man, those words had come to mind, the suggestion that if she had been someone different, someone more willing to bend and hide her true self, things probably would have been different. Easier. But didn’t she have the right to find someone with whom she could be herself?

  By the time the sky darkened with the promise of dusk, most of the men were carrying a woman. Andie was surprised the group hadn’t thought to bring horses or mules to carry their captives. Even with her experience with longer treks, her calves were aching, and she kept stumbling, something made more irritating by the fact that she couldn’t stretch a hand out to grab a tree or boulder for support. Mace glanced at her a few times, as if wondering if she might need to be carried too. There was no way her pride was going to accept being slung over some man’s shoulder. She stared at the trail ahead and plodded onward, distracting her mind with thoughts of escape. There had been no chance to speak unobserved during the trek, but perhaps tonight, all the women would be placed together, and she might learn about the others and see if they had any ideas.

  Up ahead, the trees thinned, and Andie let herself hope that they were coming to a clearing where the men would want to set up camp. Her stomach grumbled, reminding her that she had not eaten since the night before. But she refused to ask her kidnappers for anything. Besides, she had not seen them eat either. Maybe food wasn’t that plentiful here. Birds chittered, and all afternoon, Andie had seen small animals shooting across the trail ahead of them, but nobody had said anything about taking a gun and doing some hunting. Not that Andie wanted to eat squirrel stew. She kept fantasizing about Canadian bacon and pineapple pizza and a big, foamy latte from the coffee shop.

  Their trail came out onto a wide road that stretched east to west, the faded asphalt broken into shards, much of it missing, leaving dirt and potholes. In places, brush encroached, with tree branches stretching toward the middle of the road. The spot seemed familiar to Andie, and she stopped to look around, noting the mountains visible over the trees.

  “Keep walking,” someone said, giving her a shove from behind. Her guard sounded as weary as she felt.

  Andie took a few more steps, eyeing the contours of the slopes rising on the south side of the road. She halted again and stared, stunned realization smacking her in the face.

  “This is Snoqualmie Pass,” she blurted.

  There should have been ski lifts stretching up the steep slopes she was looking at; even in the summer, they would be visible, with the bald lines of the runs showing where the trees had been cleared. But there was nothing except forest, and there was no sign of the lodges off to the side of the highway. Yes, the highway. This broken stretch of road she was standing on should have been filled with cars zipping toward and away from Seattle, but she didn’t hear the rumble of a single engine as she stood there, gaping back and forth. Nothing but the grumbles from the men and the whine of a nearby mosquito visited her ear.

  Chapter 4

  Theron sat on a boulder, the abandoned cabin where the group was camped just visible in the growing gloom behind him. A few other dilapidated outbuildings dotted the clearing, some so choked with weeds that one couldn’t have gained access through the doors without a machete—or a flamethrower. The cabin must have been used often by travelers, though, because it was in decent repair.

  He squinted at his work, a sketch in his leather journal, the details growing harder to make out as the daylight faded. It was just as well. Then nobody would see him working on it. He had been reluctant to go far from the women, especially given some of the speculative grumbles that had come from the men about having their blankets warmed tonight. But he couldn’t be seen drawing maps and taking notes about landmarks; his fellow kidnappers would wonder why he was so eager to keep track of the way back to that time machine.

  Part of him was tempted to take off as soon as everyone went to bed. If he alternated between running and marching, he might be able to make it back to that cave to destroy the machine and then return by dawn. That was half of his mission, making sure that the thieves no longer had access to the past. That would put an end to all of this kidnapping and stealing. But the women—the ones in his group, the ones in the other group, and any others the army could find once the market was discovered—needed to be sent back to their own time. When General Morimoto had given Theron this mission, he had spoken of a second time machine—or rather the original time machine—that was locked within a secret base deep within Mount Olympus, a unit that had been guarded by the military for generations. The general planned to use it to return stolen people to their time period, but Theron was reluctant to rely upon something he had never seen. What if he destroyed the one that he knew worked and they later found out the one in Mount Olympus hadn’t worked for ages? The general had spoken of a previous group that had gone back in time to hunt for the thieves, trusted soldiers who had failed to return. Morimoto believed they had decided they preferred living in the past to returning to the present, but what if the fault had been in the machine? What if those soldiers had never made it to the past? Theron would hate for his brash actions to condemn these women to stay in his world.

  Even Andie?

  The question came from the back of his mind, making him pause in his sketching to think about her. No, he would not mind if she stayed in his time, if she wanted to, but he highly doubted that. Even when he got her away from the kidnappers and the threat of slavery, she might not be that impressed with his world and the simple lives people led these days. Theron hadn’t seen any populated areas during his visit to her time period—the kidnappers deliberately chose isolated people and belongings so that the police and military of the past would not be able to find them—but he had heard about the great megalopolises and all that they offered. During his brief time there, he had spotted satellites orbiting in the night sky, moving in a way that stars did not, and had seen a passenger airplane flying overhead. Amazing.

  He had wanted so much to ask Andie more about her experiences as a pilot. Some planes existed in his world, with the military having a few of them, but they were mostly propeller-driven one-or two-man craft. Simple machines for a simple time. The term fighter jet certainly stirred his imagination. But Theron hadn’t wanted to inundate Andie with questions, lest he scare her, make her think he was interrogating her. For some reason, she had relented and told him about herself, and he treasured that. He had wished he could share more about himself, but he hadn’t dared say even his name where someone might overhear.

  A few more days of this ruse, and he should have the location of the market. He already had the location of that time machine, so long as the other team didn’t move it when they were finished using it. Theron worried that might happen—if it stayed in one place and was easy to find, someone’s team should have done so long ago. Morimoto and the other higher-ranking officers didn’t want a time machine out there in the hands of civilians, especially civilians who were using it for theft.

  Not all of the higher-ranking officers...

  Theron grimaced, still shocked that General Duckworth had strolled into that cave—and that the kidnappers had acted as if it was a perfectly normal thing. He was relieved that his subterfuge had been believed. After he had tried to help the women escape, he had been certain he would be discovered. He certainly hadn’t thought he would get away with taking them through the time field without repercussions. Of course, there might still be repercussions. Bedene kept glaring back at him, and Theron had a feeling that, sooner or later, he would figure out his identity. Even if he didn’t, the man didn’t trust him. If Theron disappeared tonight, Bedene would notice it and demand to know where he had been when he returned. And what would he say? He had gone out for a stroll? No, if he left tonight, he wouldn’t be able to come back. Not openly, anyway. He supposed he could track the men at a distance, following them until they reached the market. As long as the group stayed in the trees, Theron might be able to do that without being discovered, but what if they reached the inland sea and took a boat? Theron would risk losing them forever.

  Grumbling, he put his notebook away and pushed himself off the boulder. Full night had fallen, and he couldn’t see to continue writing. He would check on the women and let that determine his course of action for the night. If the men were too weary to harass them, perhaps Theron would take the risk of going back. Destroying the time machine was one of his priorities; the general had made that clear.

  He walked past the man slumped against the log wall next to the door, his chin drooping to his chest. He must have been assigned to stand guard, but he appeared too tired for the task. Nobody looked Theron’s way when he stepped into the dim cabin. Someone had lit one of the lanterns taken from the campsites, but it didn’t brighten much of the open structure, a single giant room with a loft up above. The furnishings were sparse, and most of the gear had been dumped on one side, a few blankets stretched out to claim sleeping areas. Andie, Min-ji, and the third woman that Russell’s team had collected sat over there, with Andie gesturing as much as her bound hands would allow, whispering to the other two. Concocting some scheme to escape? If Theron were in charge, he could be keeping a closer eye on her.

  But Bedene was sitting on a stump by the hearth on the opposite side of the room, with a few of the other men, most of who were watching the two teenage girls. Their hands were free, and they had been pressed into duty with skillets and fire tending. The smell of sizzling meat filled the cabin, and Theron’s nose wanted him to walk over and check on the possibility of a meal, but he noticed two of the men sitting on a large split-log table, watching the women, both those at the hearth and those on the blankets. One of them was the one that Andie had bitten the night before, Blackie. Theron sensed that he might want some revenge.

  Far too many eyes were following the women’s movements, and Theron realized that he could not leave, not even to fulfill his mission. Someone had to stay here and keep this night from sliding into atrocity. He would see these women safely back to Fort Kitsap, and then he could take a squad of men out to deal with the time machine and the kidnappers.

  And you think you can do that? Against twelve men?

  He had to. And he had to do it in a way that wouldn’t arouse suspicion about who he was.

  “No problem,” he muttered, and snorted at himself. What had the general been thinking, sending him out here alone?

  He caught Bedene watching him, that suspicious squint to his eyes again. Theron smiled and gave the man a cheerful wave, if only to throw him off. Bedene glared back.

  The two men sitting at the table nodded to each other, mumbled some words of agreement, and pushed themselves to their feet. Even before they started walking toward Andie’s group, Theron knew they intended to go in that direction.

  He took a few steps forward, deliberately stepping in their path. “What’s for supper?” he asked. Maybe a simple thing such as food might distract them from carnal intent. “You starved after walking all day? I am.”

  “Already had a sandwich.” One of the men waved toward a smashed tin of travel bread and some dried meat that had come out of someone’s pack. “Looking to relax now.” He gave Theron a friendly smile, though there was wariness in his eyes too. Rami, that was the man’s name, Theron recalled. “Why don’t you join us, big man? You like the tattooed girl, right? We’ll take the younger ones.”

  Blackie thumped him in the arm. “I want Tattoo.”

  “Nobody’s taking Tattoo,” Theron said.

  This time, Rami thumped Blackie in the arm. “I told you he’d want that one. He was talking to her all day, trying to be charming, like we’re back in civilization and he’s gotta dress up and court her.”

  Theron looked down at his bare chest. Dressing up hadn’t quite been involved.

  Blackie snickered. “Yeah, like you don’t just take what you want out here. You’re not going to make it long, new blood.” The man’s snicker faded, and his eyes closed to slits. “You’ll push someone’s hackles up the wrong way, and you’ll get a dagger between your shoulder blades.”

  “That’s more my concern than yours, isn’t it?” Theron would have tried to get along with the men if he had respected any of them even a single iota, but he was waiting for the day when he could bury these boys six feet under. If he was wise, he would wait until he had a platoon of soldiers with him, but he had a feeling they were going to force him to be unwise.

  “My concern might become yours real soon,” Blackie said, “because I want Tattoo.”

  Not surprisingly, Andie and her friends had noticed this conversation and were looking toward the men. Blackie wasn’t speaking quietly. Everyone in the cabin probably knew his intentions.

  “Why don’t you keep your paws to yourself for a couple of days, and then go buy willing women with the coin you’ll get from the sale?” Theron suggested, doubting his idea would take root in the infertile brain matter this one carried around.

  “Maybe I like them better when they’re not willing.” Blackie smiled like a wolf, looking past Theron’s arm toward the trio of women.

  “That make you feel more like a man?”

  “It makes me feel good.” Blackie grabbed his crotch, having all the shame of a rabid badger. “When they’re fighting you, and you come all over them. Bet you’d like it, too, new blood, if you got that stick out of your ass and relaxed some. There doesn’t need to be trouble between us. Just step aside.”

  Two men by the hearth stood up, their stumps rocking audibly in the cabin. Theron heard it because the area had gone quiet, save for the snapping of the logs in the fire. If he had been across the water, or anywhere in civilization, the men getting up to pick a side would have stood behind him. These idiots joined Blackie and Rami.

  “Been a long day,” Rami said, lifting his chin now that he had men at his back. “And it’s been a long time since we had girls. You’ll have to fight all of us, if you think you get to keep them to yourself.”

  “How about nobody keeps them?” Theron pulled out his knife.

  The men tensed, but all he did was spin the blade on his fingers.

  “You expect us to believe that, Mace?” Blackie asked. “You want that one for yourself. That’s all this is about. Look, you can have her first, then I’ll take her. That’s a fair deal. But you don’t get to be selfish, not when there are only five of them and...” He glanced at his little group, mumbled, “four,” then counted out loud, trying to tally up the rest of the room, but he got distracted somewhere about ten. Maybe it was the way Theron was flipping his knife.

  “New blood,” Bedene said, still on his stool. “Go gather some firewood. It gets cold up here at night. We’ll need some more.”

  Theron snorted. “Sure, I’ll jump right to it.”

  Blackie grinned. “Yeah, go gather some wood. And take your time, will you?”

  Theron ignored him, his eyes locked with Bedene’s.

  The leader’s jaw clenched, and his hand dropped to his rifle. “That wasn’t a request.”

  “Why don’t you come over here and do something about it then?” Theron had no idea if all of them would jump him or not, but he thought that if he knocked Bedene on his ass, the others might back down.

  But Blackie was the first one to move. He must have thought Theron was distracted, because he yanked out a dagger and jumped at him.

  Theron stepped into the attack, knocking away the arm holding the weapon as he drove his own blade into the man’s chest. Bones cracked as his knife crunched through them and pierced his attacker’s heart. Theron yanked the blade free and grabbed Blackie’s blade at the same time. He jumped back, expecting that more of them would come at him. He wasn’t disappointed. All three men rushed him. He threw a wild lateral slash toward their faces, making them think twice for a second, and used the feint to leap to the side so he only had to face one. While he was in the air, he threw Blackie’s blade so that it would land near the women. If this went to hell, and every man in the cabin attacked him, he would need allies. Maybe Andie would be able to cut herself free and do something.