Page 42 of Kiss Across the Universe
Alannah stayed right where she was, fury twisting her gut and her thoughts. “You know nothing!” she shot back. “Not about me, not abouthim.” Nor about how useless it was to try to ditch the guy. He would just find her again, no matter where she went on this timeline.
Kit turned back to face her. “Is there something Ishouldknow?” he demanded. Finally,finally, she saw something other than implacable neutrality on his face. “Because if there is, tell me. Maybe it will help me get you home faster and right now, that’s my sole priority.”
“The sooner the better, huh?”
“Yes,” he snapped.
She stared at him, startled. He wasreallyangry. She had missed the signs, but now she could see them. The tautness in his jaw, the narrowed eyes, the flexing tendons in his throat, underneath the smooth, warm flesh.
Then his eye widened. “Watch out, Alannah!”
She’d grown lax. She’d forgotten to watch the man lying on the ground behind them. Alannah threw herself forward, all her instincts switched to escape mode. She flung out her arm. It slapped across Kit’s middle, and she curled it in, holding onto him, as everything in her body leapt toward safety.
Chapter Eighteen
It was the same place. Almost. The same mountain range. But the sun was high in the sky and it was alotwarmer. And the trees were different. The big one she’d sat beside, waiting for the man to track her down, was almost half the size it had been.
Alannah let go of Kit and spun on her heels, alarm tearing through her. “Fuck, fuck,fuck,” she breathed to herself. She’d jumped across time.Fuck.
A wisp of what she thought was fog trailed through the branches of the trees.
“Where did he go?” Kit demanded. The anger hadn’t completely gone from his voice. His puzzlement was keeping it contained, though. “He just…disappeared.”
“I know how it looked,” Alannah assured him.
He looked around the tiny clearing they were in. “This…isn’t where we were,” he said slowly.
Fresh alarm speared her. “What did you say?”
He turned to look at her, his gaze direct. “This isn’t where we were.”
“Mountains, trees, hello,” she replied. How the hell could she get him back to their time without giving away what she was doing? Oh, this was going to be impossible!
“The trees are wrong,” Kit said, turning slowly to inspect everything once more. “They’re too small. And the air…” He looked up at the sky. “The sun is too high overhead and it’s too warm. It’s almost like…it’s summer.” He sniffed. “Smoke,” he said softly. Then, more loudly. “Smoke.” He turned on his heel again. “Wildfire…” he breathed. He pointed northwest. “That way.” He paused, his head cocked. “And coming closer,” he added softly.
Alannah looked uselessly through the trees. “I don’t see anything.”
“You’ll hear it first,” he assured her. “And the smoke will get thicker, long before the fire gets here.” He turned once more, observingeverything.
Alannah’s heart sank.
His gaze came to rest upon her once more. Black eyes, unyielding. “If I look at my phone, what will it tell me?”
“That you have no signal,” she assured him. “We’re out of reach of towers here.” It was the truth, but not in the way he would think she meant.
He pulled out his phone. “No signal, not even a network.” He put the phone away. His gaze came back to her. “Time travel…” he breathed.
Alannah flinched. Then she pulled herself together and tried to laugh. “What? What are you talking about?”
He shook his head. “Someone…I can’t remember who. Said that once you take away the improbable, whatever remains is the truth. Or something like that.”
“‘When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth,” Alannah said. “Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, using Sherlock Holmes as a mouthpiece.”
Kit grimaced. “I’ve never read the Sherlock Holmes stories. Jack London was more my speed, when I had to read fiction.”
“Hadto?”
He lifted a hand. “You’re distracting me.”
