Page 91 of Kiss Across the Universe
Everyone turned to look at him.
“Nyara, you remember Kit?” Taylor said.
“Yes, but I didn’t think…” Nyara gave Kit a small smile. “I didn’t realize you were a full member of the family, Kit. My apologies.”
“I’m not,” Kit said easily. “I’m just learning all this stuff. Circumstances forced Alannah’s hand. Now I know.”
“There was more to it than that,” Remi said firmly. “I think if Kit hadn’t been around, Mixon’s experiment would have been successful.”
“Thatmakes you a full member of the family,” Rafe said. “Long may you live to regret it.”
Chuckles ran around the room.
Kit rubbed his jaw. “I think I’ve been following most of this, although I have a few thousand questions I’ll be asking later. But this one I think only you can answer. If your time is in our future, then why didn’t you know about Alannah’s abduction ahead of time and warn us?”
Nyara and Kieren exchanged glances.
“We learned about the abduction only a few hours before we jumped here….were pulled here,” Nyara said. “Mixon and his people are muddying time, Kit. They’re changing history with their untrained travels. They’ve been setting up time waves and mini ripple effects that have had my Agency chasing its tail for weeks, trying to learn the source. When we tried to trace it back, we found dozens of different points of origin. And when we jumped back to investigate directly, often the past had been changed again by the time we got there. We were chasing ghosts. It was hard to know what to believe. But…”
She looked around the room. “You are all important to us, and not just because of what you do in our time. We have come to know you and like you. In a way, you are already a part of our time. So when we found evidence that suggested Alannah had been abducted and was possibly Mixon’s first attempt, we prepared immediately to jump here. What we didn’t know was that you, Kit, were involved. That changed everything.”
Kit rubbed the back of his neck. “Okay…” he said, sounding awkward.
Nyara smiled at him. “Time can get very complicated,” she said, her tone sympathetic. Then she glanced around the room once more. “That is as much as we know. Mixon and his cult are from our time, but are raidingthistime for their slave travelers. By great good fortune, thanks to an unexpected ally, Alannah avoided the fate so many travelers have met. But now you can go back to your lives, while we deal with the cult in our time.”
Veris got to his feet. “That isn’t good enough,” he said flatly. “There is nothing to stop these people from coming back at us, over and over. They have the advantage of knowing our history. They know what we will do, where we will be.”
“Butyouhave the advantage of a natural shield,” Kieren said, his tone deep and rumbling.
Veris frowned. “What?”
“Alannah will explain it to you,” Kieren said. “The shield you have sought to build for so long has been with you all the time.”
Her father’s gaze swung to settle on her. His very blue eyes narrowed.
Alannah could feel her innards sinking even deeper.
You will know what to show them, when they are ready to learn. Kieren’s voice in her mind was as deep and assured as it was when he was actually speaking.
Alannah glanced at her father’s scowling features and wondered if Kieren was right.
Chapter Thirty-Five
The house rapidly emptied afterthat. Nyara and her people jumped back to their own time. Remi, Neven and London returned to Brittany. Alexander stayed to supervise and help with Aran’s and Jesse’s first feedings, but Sydney and Rafe went back to Spain.
In the rapid exodus, Alannah lost track of Kit. She didn’t know if he had been taken back to Canmore as part of the multiple jumps everyone was doing to return people to their own place and time.
Rafael had left a big pot of jambalaya warming on the stove, and the smell pulled Alannah into the kitchen. She scooped up a half-bowlful of the delicious concoction and ate it too fast and burned her mouth.
She still felt sick, afterwards. It wasn’t hunger making her feel this way.
She rinsed the bowl dispiritedly.
“Hey,” her father said behind her.
Alannah jumped and turned. Both her fathers stood at the door, Veris a step inside, Brody leaning against the doorframe.
“Where’s Mum?” Alannah asked.
