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That’s what really makes the tears well in my eyes. The what-ifs crowd my brain—what if I’d gone back in time alone? Would I have known it was the mirror without Ben’s explanations? What would have happened to me at The Villa without my rich hero? Thinking about it makes things spin inside me, and I’m more grateful than ever that Ben was there for me.

Neighbors who witness our arrival soon find their way over with exclamations, and one skinny woman with a blunt bob cut even shouts some hallelujahs over the hubbub. An aunt spots a news truck heading down the street and manages to get everyone inside before the reporters descend. It doesn’t matter. Ben will be an instant local celebrity again, and with me a part of his story now, I’ll get my share of fame too. We spend the rest of the day answering questions and repeating the same ridiculous story over and over, until Ben helps us escape to his backyard and a playhouse way too small for us to fit into.

“You befriended a closet billionaire with no family who died a few weeks later and left all his money to you?” I can’t help laughing over the story he concocts to explain his new riches.

“Should I have gone with drug trafficking?” he asks, his face straight. “And don’t forget the NDA I ‘signed.’ My parents won’t breathe a word about it now.” We laugh together again, and the bond between us tightens. Two people in the whole world know the truth about where Ben’s been, how we met, and how he made his money.

“What are we going to do?” I ask after our laughter dies down and we get comfortable in the small space. We sit with our backs against one wall, side by side with our shoulders touching, and it’s the most comfortable I’ve been since coming back.

“Go on a date,” he answers, turning toward me, grinning from ear to ear.

“We’d be mobbed,” I say. His attitude is contagious, and I smile at him. “But I meant about that man—the one we left in 1901. Should we tell someone?” I ask.

“Who would we tell?” He takes a deep breath and leans his head against the wall behind us, but he still turns to face me and keeps close. “What would we even say?”

“I don’t know,” I admit.

“McKinley was still assassinated that fall. I managed two seconds to look that up—on someone’s phone.” He grins again, and I know he can’t help it. He’s spent too long without that convenience. “We’ll figure something out.”

“You keep saying things like that,” I point out.

He reaches for my hand and weaves his fingers through mine. “And I keep being right.”

I lean my head back too, staring at the plastic ceiling of the playhouse. “Do you miss anything?”

He pauses. “The way you looked in your dresses.”

I laugh. “Well, I don’t intend to ever put a corset on again. But really, do you miss anything?”

“Those corsets seemed to make it easier to take your breath away.”

“Ben.” I turn to face him. Our noses touch. Neither of us moves. We’re flirting and talking like we’re already several dates into a relationship, like we’ve known each other weeks when it’s only been days. It’s weird and right all at the same time. “Are you ever serious about anything?”

“I’m serious about us escaping to somewhere private where we can have that first date.”

“So that’s a no.”

He sighs, turning back to stare at the ceiling. “I miss the actual peace there. I could really write—well, before you came. There was nothing to distract me.”

“What were you writing?” I lean my head against his shoulder. No, I haven’t known him long, yet I feel more comfortable with him than anyone else in my life, maybe even Morgan. There’s a closeness, a bond forged, something I haven’t felt since Aunt Vi died.

“The story of a guy who feels lost in his life … I’ll have to rewrite it. And I’m going to change the ending.”

“Why is that?”

He tightens the arm he has wrapped around my shoulder and moves his other to my waist, hugging me close. “It needs a happily ever after.”

Three days later, he does take me on our first date. We wear hats and sunglasses as we shop downtown while holding hands, restocking Ben’s wardrobe. It’s simple. He grabs a few pairs of jeans and some T-shirts for now. His mom has a few boxes of his things at her house that he’ll need to go through soon. We stop for lunch at a small hole-in-the-wall burger place that’s dim and crowded with enough people that we blend in.

“I looked up some other stuff besides about McKinley’s assassination,” he says. “About the people at The Villa and Mrs. Guthrie.”

I wiggle my eyebrows. “What did she think of us eloping?”

“Unfortunately, I couldn’t find any surviving sources on it—but I’m going to keep looking. William married soon after, an American heiress like his mother wanted, but they had a son and doted on him and loved each other quite a lot, if their love letters say anything.”

I tilt my head, openly ogling the satisfaction written all over Ben’s face that Mr. Allen got his happily ever after. The image of the little boy from my memory of The Villa pops back into my head, and I have the feeling that something I know is tickling my memory. “Quint,” I say without thinking. The name of the little boy I’d played with?

“How did you know his son’s name?” Ben asks in astonishment.