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  Padma slowly raised her head off the table. She then lifted Kyle’s Glock 9mm pistol from her lap, pointing it directly at him. Kyle froze.

  “Who…are…you?” asked Padma.

  Kyle took a breath, unprepared for the confrontation. “You’re not going to believe me.”

  “I’m not going to believe you?” asked Padma hysterically. “What part, exactly, am I not going to believe? The part about my husband dying then magically resurrecting? Or the part about the fact that you look and sound exactly like my husband, and you know things that only my husband knows, but you are not my husband.”

  “Do you mind if I put some clothes on before we have this conversation?” asked Kyle.

  Padma raised the gun. “Do you mind if I put two rounds in your heart and one between your fucking eyes like my husband taught me?” Padma shouted, “Sit the fuck down and start talking!”

  Kyle pulled out the wooden chair opposite Padma and sat down. He folded his hands on the table, took a deep breath, and exhaled.

  Kyle turned the inside of his arm toward Padma. “You remember the day I got this tattoo—it was three days ago—the day we were married. It was the happiest day of my life.

  “The thing is that, for me, that day didn’t happen three days ago—it happened seven years ago.

  “Forty-eight hours after we were married, on September 11, 2001, four commercial airliners were hijacked by Muslim terrorists. Two of the planes hit the Twin Towers. The towers were completely destroyed. You were killed when the North Tower collapsed.”

  Padma’s burned out expression didn’t flinch. Her eyes were locked on Kyle. The gun was aimed directly at his chest.

  “You tried to call me to say goodbye before you died,” Kyle continued. “I was on the flight back to Fort Bragg after our honeymoon. You couldn’t reach me, so you called a stranger to make sure I got the message. You told the stranger to tell me that you loved me. That was all.

  “I went to Afghanistan to hunt the terrorist responsible for the attacks. His name is Osama Bin Laden. My mission failed. Bin Laden escaped.”

  Kyle’s gaze left Padma’s eyes and descended to her coffee cup on the tabletop.

  “I broke down. I was a wreck. Years later, I was recruited by my mentor, General Craig, for a mission…”

  Kyle paused, taking a breath.

  “It’s crazy… It’s so crazy that I don’t believe it myself. I don’t believe that I’m actually here with you,” he said.

  “Keep talking,” Padma said.

  “There’s a facility at Area 51 that General Craig runs… It can send people through time.”

  Kyle looked up from the table into Padma’s eyes. Her expression was frozen.

  “The mission was to prevent 9/11 from happening. ‘9/11’ is what we call it in our time. I was sent with a partner back from the year 2008 to this year—2001.

  “That’s when everything went wrong. We arrived late and my partner was DOA. We were supposed to arrive several weeks before 9/11 so we would have plenty of time to kill the terrorists. Instead, I arrived alone the morning before.

  “In order to complete the mission, I recruited my younger self. The day before yesterday, when you stepped out of the SoHo Grand for a cigarette, I was across the street, watching you. When you went for coffee, I went up to your room and met Kyle. The mission Kyle told you about when he left—those orders came from me.

  “I knew where all the terrorists were supposed to be sleeping that night. Kyle and I divvied up the list and went hunting.”

  “On the news—the assassinations—that was you?” asked Padma.

  Kyle nodded. “Both of us—yes. Something went wrong. I don’t know what. He wasn’t supposed to be on that plane yesterday. I don’t know what happened. I can only assume that he couldn’t get to everyone on his list. He must have improvised. I would have.

  “I was supposed to return to 2008 after my mission. There’s a gadget that sends me back. It’s in my pants pocket. I disobeyed my orders. I couldn’t leave you.

  “I understand this is crazy, but there’s evidence of everything I’m telling you, starting with Kyle’s body in the morgue. There’s also the keycard log from when I entered your hotel room, the gadget that sends me back to 2008, as well as this guy I abducted in Weehawken…”

  Padma’s eyebrows rose.

  “…It’s another long story.”

  “There’s one more thing,” Kyle said. “Reach into the side pocket of my backpack.”

  Padma kept the gun aimed at Kyle while she carefully reached into the backpack. She pulled out a piece of paper, folded in quarter.

  “Open it,” Kyle said.

  Padma unfolded the paper. It was the drawing of a leaf floating on a pool of water she had made as a teenager.

  Padma got up from her chair.

  “Don’t move,” she said.

  She ran into the living room and snatched the framed drawing of the leaf on the pool of water from the wall. She walked back into the kitchen and set the two drawings on the table side-by-side. She dropped into her chair.

  “Holy fuck,” she said.

  “I took it when I left for the mission,” Kyle said.

  “So…I am your husband, but I am not your husband. You are my wife, but you are not my wife.”

  “So you’re a time traveler from the future?” said Padma.

  “That’s right.”

  “And you’re the one who got my Kyle killed?”

  “Yes.”

  Tears welled and flowed down Padma’s face. She held up the gun.

  “Why shouldn’t I kill you right now?”

  “Because I’m the only Kyle you have left.”

  Padma held the gun for a full minute, then slowly lowered it and set it on the table. She raised her hands to her face and began to cry.

  “You killed my Kyle,” she sobbed through her hands. “My Kyle is dead.”

  Kyle watched Padma, feeling sick. Her tears seared a hole in his chest. Though he had saved thousands of lives, he had wounded the life he valued the most. After what seemed an eternity, he finally spoke.

  “Beloved, your Kyle is still here.”

  Padma did not move. Her face was planted in the palms of her hands.

  “I am older than I was when I got this tattoo, but I am still that man. Every memory, every feeling, everything that makes Kyle is here. Both of us loved you completely. One of us remains, here, now, still completely in love with you.”

  Padma lifted her wet, swollen face from her hands.. Tangled strays of long black hair hung in front of her eyes. She looked at Kyle’s face and naked torso, examining him. He didn’t look a day older than when she last saw him two days before. His face was that of the handsome young soldier in dress uniform whose picture had been shown on the news. His powerful body was every bit as taut as she remembered. Still, she heard something in his voice and felt something in his touch that was foreign.

  “So, you’re 40 years old?” she asked.

  “Yes.”

  “You age well,” she said, managing a smile.

  It reminded Kyle of the conversation he’d had with his younger self two days before.

  “I’ve had some work done.”

  Padma nodded. “I want your doctor when the time comes.”

  They smiled, meeting eyes.

  “How are you different than my Kyle?”

  Kyle looked down at the table. His expression turned to pain.

  “This one has some wear and tear.”

  Padma reached across the table, lifting Kyle’s chin. She looked into his green eyes. This Kyle’s face looked identical to her Kyle’s, though she could see the hurt in his eyes and hear it in his voice. She took his hand. He grasped hers and held it tight. Tears began to well in
his eyes.

  “Your Kyle is still in here,” he said, placing his hand on his chest. He choked up. “I came back to save you, beloved. I would do anything for you. Please believe me.”

  Tears streamed down Padma’s face. She rose from her chair and came to the wounded warrior. Standing next to him, she cradled his head against her chest.

  “I know that,” she said. “I know your pain. I lived it too.”

  Kyle wrapped his arms around Padma’s waist, held her tight and cried into her shirt. Padma held his head and stroked his hair. She had never seen this vulnerable version of Kyle before. The Kyle she knew was superhuman—an elite Special Forces operator, powerful, smart, and confident. She felt enormous pride for Kyle the warrior. The exposed man in her arms was summoning unfamiliar feelings from her.

  Like Kyle, Padma was a super-achiever. She had never been attracted to men she considered weak. Her nurturing reaction to Kyle’s defenselessness surprised her. She held her man close, protecting him.

  Padma kissed the top of Kyle’s head, then leaned down to kiss his lips. Kyle raised his face to meet hers, returning her warm, loving kisses. She took his hand to lead him back to the bedroom.

  “C’mon,” she said.

  7 West 75th Street

  New York, NY

  September 12, 2001

  11:30 hours

  Timeline 002

  Kyle and Padma lay in bed, intertwined. Though bone-tired, neither wanted to sleep. They had both lived through the other’s death. Neither wanted to miss a single moment.

  Padma kissed Kyle, then sat up. She reached into her nightstand and pulled out a pack of American Spirit cigarettes and a small brass elephant-shaped lighter. Before she lit up, she turned to Kyle.

  “Do you mind?” she asked.

  Kyle smiled. “Not one bit.”

  Padma loved a cigarette after sex. She found this cigarette, after sex with a time traveler, to be particularly satisfying.

  The Kyle of 2001 had hated it when Padma smoked. It was the only thing about her he wanted to change. The 2008 edition of Kyle embraced every atom of Padma, including the blue-white smoke that blew from her gorgeous full lips. Padma smiled, acknowledging the changed man. She wondered what else was different about this Kyle.

  “I’m getting some ice water—can I get you anything from the kitchen?” he asked as he got out of bed.

  “I’ll have a sip of yours,” she said.

  Kyle returned from the kitchen with a glass in one hand and his Glock pistol in the other. Padma’s eyes widened. He sat the glass down on the nightstand, then ejected the gun magazine and checked the chamber. It was empty.

  “For future reference, the next time you want to shoot me, you’ll want to chamber a round.”

  “Good to know—thanks,” she said with a wink.

  Kyle sat the pistol and magazine on the nightstand next to the brass elephant. Padma rested her cigarette on a glass ashtray and took a sip of water. Kyle climbed back into bed. Padma turned and rested her head on his chest. Kyle stroked her hair.

  “Kyle?” she asked.

  “Yes?”

  “You know the future,” she said.

  “I know a future, not this future,” Kyle answered.

  “But you know the broad strokes—companies, economics…”

  “Yes—what are you getting at?”

  “Tell me some big things that happen.”

  “Let’s see…Apple becomes one of the world’s biggest companies.”

  “Shut the fuck up! Apple is dead!” Padma exclaimed.

  “No, really—next month they launch something called the iPod, then they’ll come out with iTunes—it totally changes the music industry. CDs become obsolete. In a few years, they launch the iPhone. The stock is trading at a couple hundred dollars in 2008. I think the stock split in 2005.”

  Padma’s eyes grew wide. That morning, on September 12, 2001, Apple stock was circling the bowl at $17. If the stock would trade at $200 in 2008 after a split, its valuation would have increased by 23 times!

  “What else?” she asked.

  “In 2007, the housing market collapses. Lehman Brothers goes bankrupt in 2008…”

  “Wait a minute—back up. Lehman Brothers goes bankrupt?”

  “Right.”

  “That’s crazy!”

  “Well, I time traveled here from 2008—Lehman Brothers going bankrupt doesn’t seem like the craziest part of this story.”

  “I’m not so sure about that,” replied Padma.

  “Something called ‘credit default swaps’?”

  Padma’s face blanched. Kyle could feel her heart race against his chest. She began breathing rapidly.

  “What’s wrong? Are you OK?”

  Padma put her hand on her chest. She sat up and looked Kyle in the eye.

  “Do you have the slightest idea what this means?”

  “Not really, no.”

  “It means we’re going to be the world’s first trillionaires.”

  Harpo Studios

  1058 West Washington Boulevard

  Chicago, IL

  September 11, 2008

  10:10 hours

  Timeline 002

  Padma stood in the stage wings of The Oprah Winfrey Show, waiting to join Oprah for her interview. It was the seventh anniversary of the American 11 incident and the death of her husband, Major Kyle Mason.

  Padma was wearing her signature jet-black pant suit with a white Nehru collar blouse. Her long black hair, normally pulled into a tight ponytail at work, was set loose to flow freely down her back.

  Padma was now 42. She had grown even more beautiful with time—almost imperceptible lines and shadows made her face blossom. Her physical appearance was enhanced by a serene, majestic countenance that she had grown into as the world’s most successful CEO.

  A producer, a bearded man dressed in black with a skullcap of receding red hair and a headset, stood with Padma in the shadowed wings. Oprah made Padma’s introduction.

  “I am very honored to have with us today the CEO of Wild Industries. As you know, Padma Mahajan is not only the wealthiest woman on the planet, myself included…”

  The audience laughed.

  “…she is the also the widow of Major Kyle Mason, the hero of American 11. Padma was married to Kyle for only 48 hours before his life and their marriage ended tragically on September 11, 2001. Padma has never spoken publicly about her relationship with Kyle until now. Please welcome Padma Mahajan.”

  The producer standing next to Padma signaled for her to go onstage. Padma walked out into the bright stage light and applauding audience. She beamed and waved to Oprah’s excited audience of fellow women.

  Oprah hugged Padma, and they took their seats.

  “I want to thank you for being here today and sharing your story,” said Oprah.

  “It is my pleasure,” replied Padma. “Thank you for having me.”

  “Before we talk about Kyle and your relationship, I’d like to talk about you, because you are one phenomenal woman.”

  “You are very kind,” Padma said, smiling, as the audience applauded.

  “You are the CEO of Wild Industries, one of the world’s largest companies, and you are also the world’s wealthiest woman. Forbes estimates that you are worth, wait a minute, I need to check to see if I’m reading too many zeros here—there are a lot to count, let me tell ya…”

  The audience laughed again.

  “You are a trillionaire—a trillionaire!”

  The audience gasped.

  “How much is a trillion?”

  “A trillion is a thousand billions,” answered Padma.

  “Whew,” Oprah said, fanning herself with her hand, “that’s a lot of money.�
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  “I have been very fortunate.”

  “How’d you do it, Padma?” Oprah asked. “How on Earth did you make so much money, so darn fast?”

  “It’s a combination of homework, common sense, and just plain luck. For example, when Steve Jobs returned to Apple, it was a good bet that he was still the genius that he was in his first tenure. I didn’t bet on the company. I bet on the man.

  “In our most recent housing crisis, the conventional wisdom was that housing prices would go up forever. I thought that was ridiculous and I took a short position.”

  “Tell me what that means,” asked Oprah, “because I hear words like ‘derivatives’ and ‘credit default swaps’ and it absolutely makes my eyes glaze over.”

  “I think financial people make this much more complicated than it actually is,” answered Padma. “A credit default swap is simply insurance—in this case, insurance against a loan defaulting. What happened in this particular situation is that Main Street banks made home loans to people who couldn’t repay them. Those loans were bought up by Wall Street banks and sold to investors. Though the loans were junk, credit agencies gave them triple-A ratings, which meant the cost of insuring them was very cheap—only pennies on the dollar. I bought a lot of that insurance.”

  “And the insurance companies and investment banks went bust when the music stopped playing,” said Oprah. “The insurance companies couldn’t pay up.”

  “That’s exactly right.”

  “The American taxpayer,” Oprah continued, “ended up footing the bill to keep those big companies afloat—you took some heat for making so much money from American taxpayers.”

  “I fully appreciate taxpayers’ frustration, though I think it is important to keep a couple things in mind—the first is that I didn’t create the perfect storm—if the big investment banks had not pushed these junk products onto their clients while the credit reporting agencies were simultaneously giving them junk triple-A ratings, none of this would have happened. The other thing to be aware of is that these big banks sold this stuff to their investors while simultaneously betting against their own clients by buying their own credit default swaps. I think it’s one thing to take advantage of a perfectly legal situation. It’s another thing entirely to perpetrate a fraud—I think that’s just unconscionable.”