Today's Reading
INTRODUCTION
Welcome to 1870 Scotland. If you're new to the Rip Through Time series, here's a little intro to get you up to date. It might also be helpful if it's been a while since you've read the previous books. If you're caught up, just skip this and dive into chapter one.
Our tour guide on this journey is Mallory Atkinson, Vancouver police detective. In 2019, Mallory was visiting her dying grandmother in Edinburgh when a midnight jog took her into an Old Town alley. She saw what seemed to be a glitching haunted-tour hologram—a young blond in period dress being strangled by a shadowy figure. At that same moment, Mallory was attacked. When she woke up, she found herself in the body of that young woman she'd seen: Catriona Mitchell, nineteen-year-old housemaid...in 1869 Edinburgh.
Soon Mallory was living Catriona's life, working for Duncan Gray, a doctor and surgeon forced to take over his family's undertaking business after his father's death. Gray's about as suited to undertaking as Mallory is to housekeeping. Luckily Gray has a side gig—as an early forensic scientist helping his childhood best friend, Detective Hugh McCreadie of the Edinburgh police. Mallory soon proved that "Catriona" had a hitherto undiscovered talent for detective work along with a keen interest in forensics, and so she became Gray's assistant.
As the former housemaid, Mallory lives in Gray's town house, along with his older sister, Isla. The Gray family is a little...eccentric. Gray has his forensics. Isla is a talented chemist. Formidable eldest sister Annis is all about business. There's also Lachlan, the older brother who dumped the family business in Gray's lap. Mallory hasn't met him. Nor has she met their mother, who cheerfully lives abroad, seeing the world after her husband's death.
The household also includes thirteen-year-old parlormaid Alice (former pickpocket), groom Simon (formerly accused of a double murder), housekeeper Mrs. Wallace (former con artist), and the new maid Jack (former...something). Yes, Isla has very odd hiring practices.
Gray, McCreadie, and Isla all know Mallory's time-traveling secret, which makes life much easier. So does Mrs. Wallace, which doesn't change the fact that she's sure Mallory is going to murder her darling Isla and Gray in their sleep.
This particular adventure is going to see Gray, Isla, McCreadie, and Mallory off to a Highland wedding, accompanied by Alice and Simon. We're leaving Edinburgh and the larger cast of characters behind, so that's all you should need to know to get caught up. On to our story...
CHAPTER ONE
There's nothing quite like a Highland wedding. I say this as if I've been to dozens. I've gone to two, both times as my grandmother's plus-one, attending the weddings of happy couples I'd never actually met and had to keep checking a note on my phone to remember who they were.
This time it's different. Okay, I'm still a plus-one. And I still don't know the happy couple. But instead of keeping notes on my phone, I have them written on a piece of paper, stuffed deep into the voluminous pockets of my equally voluminous layers of Victorian dress.
The last wedding I went to in the Scottish Highlands was June 2016. This one is also taking place in June...1870.
There's a story there. A long one. The short version is that I passed through time at the fickle whim of some unknown cosmic force. My nan named that force Fate and said I am exactly where I was always supposed to be. Which is apparently in the body of a buxom blond twenty-year-old housemaid instead of an athletic brunette thirty-one-year-old police detective.
I have yet to appreciate that part of the switch, but I must appreciate where else I landed—in the household of a chemist and her doctor-turned-undertaker brother, who works in early forensic science. Along with their police-detective friend, they know my story, so I'm no longer scrubbing chamber pots. I'm the assistant to that forensic scientist, Dr. Duncan Gray. I'm also, apparently, his plus-one for this wedding, which is for Detective Hugh McCreadie's younger sister...Iona? Fiona? It's in my notes.
At the moment, we're in a coach, heading into the countryside. For propriety's sake, Gray should sit beside his sister, but since no one can see us in here, we've maneuvered McCreadie to sit beside Isla instead. He's across from me—to make room for both Isla's skirts and mine—and Gray is beside me, separated by a decorous handspan gap between my skirts and his thighs.
...
