Page 26 of Kiss Across the Universe
Aran wondered if perhaps the busted lock was completely innocent. Maybe she was in town buying hardware to fix it. Maybe she’d kicked it in while having a temper tantrum. The stars knew she had something on her mind these days that wasn’t making her very happy.
This could all be perfectly innocent and explainable, except that Kit was convinced that it wasn’t.
Aran moved upstairs, Kit trailing him, and straight into Alannah’s old room. The strewn clothes and bras hanging out of her duffel bag were pure Alannah, too. Aran moved around the room, while Kit stood just beyond the door, wearing an awkward expression.
The door had swung half-closed while Aran moved around the room. Hanging on the back of it was Alannah’s handbag.
Aran’s gut tightened. He took the bag off the hook, opened the door once more, and held the bag out for Kit to see. “Her handbag. She doesn’t go anywhere without this. I bought it for her. It’s her favorite.”
Kit considered the bag. “Looks well loved,” he agreed, rubbing the back of his neck.
“No, you don’t understand,” Aran said. “This is a 1923 Hermes Kelly bag. It’s worth…I’ve got no idea. I won’t tell you how much I paid for it, because the current market value is fucking outrageous and I’d be embarrassed to mention a figure.”
In fact, he had bought the bag from Hermesin1923, long before the style of bag was called a Kelly bag, because Grace Kelly hadn’t even been born, then. It had cost him a few francs. But Alannah, who knew her status symbols, had been beside herself with joy over the bag, when he’d given it to her for her birthday.
“But that’s the thing,” Aran continued. “She didn’t care how much it was worth. She just loved the bag and used itlikea bag, instead of putting it in a hermetically sealed vault and waiting for it to increase in value before she sold it to buy a house.”
Kit gave a half-laugh, wearing a baffled expression. “A bag is worth ahouse?”
“Thisbag is worth the down payment on one,” Aran told him. “And ‘lannah took it everywhere.” He hefted the bag. “I really think there is a kitchen sink in here, too.”
Kit gave a bemused smile. Then his smile faded. “She would have taken it with her if she was in Canmore.”
“Or Calgary,” Aran said in agreement. He hung the bag back on the hook behind the door. Kit was talking him into this. He was starting to worry that the busted door didn’t have an innocent explanation. That even though Aran could see Alannah on the timescape, shewasin trouble of some sort.
He could just jump to where she was. There might be a bookmark on the timescape that would take him straight to her. Only bookmarks weren’tthatprecise. He could land in the middle of Canmore and still have no idea where she was.
And he couldn’t jump away with Kit watching him like he was, expecting Aran to produce…who the hell knew what. Intelligence that would tell them both where Alannah was right now?
Only there was no way to tell Kit he knew she was in Canmore. Not without some evidence that would make sense to a normal human.
Aran moved out of the room, and up along the corridor to the top of the stairs. The little kiddie gate cutting off the reading area from the stairs and the hall was still in place from Thanksgiving. He spotted the bright neon orange stuffie that India adored, lying on the floor by the armchair.
Automatically, he headed in that direction, stepping over the gate. It was hardwired into him now to pick up anything that might lead to one of the twins tripping, or get in the way of one of the triplets, or worse.
He bent and picked up the stuffie and grew still.
“What’s wrong?” Kit said instantly. The man had to be taut as a wire to notice Aran’s alarm straight away like that.
“Alannah’s cell phone. It’s on the floor here, next to the armchair.”
Kit almost bounced over the gate. He hurried around the chair and bent and picked up the phone. He turned it over and over. “That’s explains the no-answering.”
Aran curled his hands into fists. “I can maybe accept Alannah leaving without her bag. Maybe. Butnother cellphone. Shelivedon that thing. Her contact list is a who’s who of Hollywood and she was always texting or talking tosomeone. She absolutely would not leave it behind.”
Kit swiped at the screen. “Not if she had any choice.” His tone was bleak. “PIN protected.”
“Try 10-15,” Aran said.
Kit tapped four times, then looked at Aran and raised his brow.
“My folks’ anniversary, which is a family secret.” As they’d been married in Nepal in a ceremony that the US government was still trying to decide was legal or not. The Canadian government hadn’t batted an eyelid. Menages were legal, here.
Kit swiped through the screen. “Your calls, my call, and a lot of other names I don’t know, and some I actually do know. I’ve seen them on TV. But no unlisted, unregistered numbers. It all looks perfectly normal.”
“They didn’t reach her that way, then,” Aran muttered.
Kit handed the phone back to Aran. “I’m going to find her.”
