Page 61 of Kiss Across the Universe
“No one would pay to watch sunsets.”
“You’d be surprised,” Alannah told him. “Pitched the right way, people will pay for almost anything. You sell the experience, not the views…although the views provide the experience. Harried executives will fork over the cash to be provided with the Canadian equivalent of ten days in an ashram, so they can avoid their second heart attack.”
Kit didn’t respond.
His silence pushed her into defending herself. “I got to sleep on a soft mattress last night, and I was warm and dry this morning, and all you have is a knife and a back pack. Despite the fact that some asshole is so determined to snatch me and…I don’t know, turn me into…”
She halted, thoughts careening off each other.
Kit moved back to face her. “What?”
“That’s why he wants me,” she said. “Neven was the first. Maybe that’s where Iron Grey got the idea. Grab a time jumper, shackle them in some way, and use them to move around time and universes as much as you want.”
“Neven was the first?” Kit was frowning, his gaze not on her, but somewhere far away. He was adding it up, too.
“Years ago. A couple of…well, old enemies of the family, long gone. They made him jump them to all sorts of places. They were doing it to screw over my family, because Tira hated us that much. Actually, she hated my mom the most, because she could time travel properly and got to have children with her vampire husbands, because of it.”
Kit was staring at her, his eyes slightly wide.
“Old history—you’ll get to hear all the war stories eventually, now you’re in the know,” Alannah assured him. “I know why Tira wanted Neven as a time taxi, but I can’t figure out why Iron Grey wants me for one.”
Kit smiled. He had very white teeth and seeing them was always startling, because he didn’t smile like that very often.
“What?” Alannah demanded, for it felt a lot like Kit was laughing at her.
“You really don’t see it, do you? Or perhaps it’s just that you’re so used to hiding it and staying normal.”
“I have no clue what you’re talking about.”
“You told me Aran uses time to produce income. He goes back to South Africa for raw diamonds. Picks up gold from the ground in the Klondike, a hundred years before the gold rush.”
Alannah shrugged. “Yeah, so?”
Kit threw out his hands. “That’s why Iron Grey wants you. Profit, pure and simple. Or maybe not pure at all. He’ll figure out a way to have fun, too, but I guarantee what drove him to this in the first place was the idea of milking time for revenue, just like Aran does. Money drives criminals and entrepreneurs alike.”
Alannah stared at him. Why hadn’t she thought of that? Shehadgrown up used to the idea of time travel. She’d watched Aran working his schemes for years. Kit had known about time travelling for thirty nanoseconds and had figured this out, not her.
It jolted her to the core. She studied Kit, seeing him differently. Seeingeverythingdifferently. Even the trees around them seemed as though they had shifted and become…significant.
How long had she tried to be purely human and ignored this side of her life?
Too long.
And now it was reaching out to grasp her by the throat.
She had kicked and screamed and tried to pretend she was anything other than what she really was, while Kit had accepted all of it, barely without a quiver, and now had assimiliated the strangeness of her and her family so thoroughly he could come up with answers she could not.
Their surreal conversation should have made this wild landscape feel at odds with it, only it didn’t. With Kit in the mix, having a conversation about squeezing time for the money it could provide while standing between mountains seemed…appropriate. ItwasKit.
“You’re smart,” she said softly.
The corner of his mouth lifted. He hadn’t shaved, so the skin showed a dark stubble, which made his lips seem soft in comparison. “Well, I’m not stupid.”
She leaned forward and stretched up the few inches needed to press her lips against his, delighted that shedidneed to stretch.
His lipsweresoft. At first.
She heard his quick, surprised intake of breath. Then his hands pressed in around her waist. He was kissingher.
