Page 141 of The Girl Out of Time
She separated from him, taking his hands and bringing them up to their chests. Her eyes glistened with tears, but her face was determined. “You’re coming with me, or I’m not going.”
He could argue with her for whatever little time they still had, but as he gazed upon her, he realized he didn’t want to. It was her choice and her right. Her life to give away however she wished. Hadn’t he done the same with Wescott? His uncle didn’t own him—and Theo didn’t own Emmeline.
He pressed her hands to his lips and kissed her cold fingers, and he knew she understood.
“Now what?” he whispered.
She pressed herself against him and murmured, “Home. Home.Home.” Her eyebrows dipped. “It’s not working. My powers—I don’t know how to—I can’t get us out.”
He kissed her forehead. “You can do it. I believe in you.” She only needed a bit more time. When she’d made her passages, it was one of two options: immediate, in a moment of panic, or it took her some minutes and a few tries. Now, he had to buy her those tries.
He looked past her to the darkness that lay below the last lights on the ship’s bridge. Had they grown duller? The orchestra was still playing somewhere, a cheerful tune entirely surreal for the situation. And then a rush came, overpowering the music. Not the rush of water, but of people. An army spilled out across the deck, swarming the grand staircase entrance down by the bow. Simple black and brown clothes and covered heads, dozens upon dozens of them, overflowing the ship like ants from a collapsed anthill.
The rest of the third-class passengers. They finally got here.
Emmeline looked back, following the noise. The crowd was rushing toward them, toward the ship’s stern, the last place of safety.
“We have to go.” Theo took Emmeline’s hand and started running.
***
In the lounge, only a few people remained, clinging to the ship as if it represented their life’s fortunes. Emily had read about all the people not wanting to leave; either because they didn’t think theTitanicwould truly go under, or because they were afraid to get into the boats, or they’d simply resigned to their fate. But seeing them was different. She wanted to run to them and shake them out of their stupor, get it into their heads that the shipwasgoing down, and they should dosomething.
But she didn’t. Instead, she and Will went to the bar, where she dug through an assortment of alcoholic drinks, finally landing on a spicy-smelling cognac, and poured Will a glass. “Here. You’re going to need it.”
“I can control myself,” he said.
“Not for the nerves.” She lowered her voice and leaned in. “I’ve read about one man who had a good amount to drink, and when he went down with the ship, he didn’t even feel the coldness of the ocean. He paddled around for hours until they pulled him up on a boat.”
“You’re suggesting getting drunk will save us?”
She pushed the glass to him. “Saveyou. I can’t do it.” She patted her stomach. “Imagine that kind of bad influence.”
Will hesitated, then made a sip. “So, what do we do?”
“We’re gonna go back through the portal. The same way I got here, the one Emmeline created. It leads to a beach in Dorset. Nice warm, sunny day, too. You’ll like the change.”
“Where is it?”
“That’s the problem.” She bit her lip. “In the third class quarters. In the bow.”
Will did a longer, stronger sip. “The flooded bow?”
“Yup.”
He swirled the rest of his drink, eyes glazed over for a moment. “How far away is it?”
She rolled out the plans and pointed to the approximate point on F Deck.
“That’s way too far below,” he said. “We’d have to swim against the water’s flow. We wouldn’t even get halfway there before …”
“Will.” She covered his hand. “I don’t know if I can get you on a boat.”
“Then you won’t.”
“Sylvia will kill me, and we barely got out of the frenemies zone.”
A corner of his mouth quirked up. “Did you?”
