Kiss Across Worlds (Kiss Across Time Book 7) Page 11

  London tackled the salad first. However, the dressing was an unimaginative vinaigrette and she petered out before the salad was half-gone and reached for the wine glass once more. The wine had made a warm glow in her middle. She could stand to feel more of that.

  Kristijan was eating—again!—and concentrating on it. He had no trouble with the rolls. He ate them with clear relish.

  Remi watched Kristijan eating with a peculiar focus, frowning. He would find the sight of Kristijan performing such a basic human function as eating as much of an oddity as she had. Clearly, the right conditions for eating were not a frequent occurrence in the vampire world.

  Kristijan sat back, his plate nearly cleared. “You’re not eating,” he observed, looking at her plate.

  “Mm.” She drank again.

  “Would you like something else instead?”

  London almost laughed. “No.”

  “Leave her be, Kristijan. She’ll get more than enough calories from the wine she’s tossing back,” Remi said.

  London gripped the glass tightly. “Are you going to contest it?” she demanded of Kristijan, ignoring Remi.

  His brow lifted. “The divorce? Do you want me to?” He sounded genuinely curious.

  “I expected you to,” she said flatly. “I thought you would…” Kill me. She bit her lip. Then she drank again.

  “London.”

  It was a command for her to look at him. London took a breath and lifted her chin.

  He was just sitting there, the plate pushed to one side, his hands laced together on the empty mat. “All I ask of you is to give me this two weeks. Stay here and be my wife for these two weeks as normal. Then you can have your divorce. Uncontested, on whatever terms you want.”

  Her breath shuddered as she sucked it in. She trembled. Had she heard right?

  Kristijan shook his head. “I mean it.”

  Was her incredulity that easy to read?

  Then, because this was too critical to misunderstand, London sat up in her chair and gripped her hands together just as he was doing. “Say it again,” she said. “I need to hear it again.”

  “Kristijan, don’t,” Remi said softly.

  “You can shut up,” London snapped at him. She looked at Kristijan. “Say it.”

  Kristijan’s mouth turned up at the corner. Just a little. “Two weeks here, with me. Then you’re free to live your life however you want. I just need these two weeks.”

  Her hand shook as she reached for the glass. Her breath was coming in little pants. Her eyes stung with hot, betraying tears. She blinked rapidly and hid the evidence behind the upturned glass, deliberately draining it.

  “That’s a mistake,” Remi said softly to Kristijan.

  Kristijan shook his head. “It’s correcting a mistake. We’ll talk about it later, Remi.”

  The implication that they would have private moments later would normally have chewed at her chest. It didn’t, now. London poured another glass, taking her time, because her hand shook so much. The heat was spreading through her.

  Freedom. He was going to let her go. She just had to keep up with the odious pretense of being his wife for two more weeks and she was free.

  London sat back in the chair and cradled the bowl of the wine glass against her chest. “Is there desert?”

  “Isn’t there always?” Remi asked, sounding bored. “If I never see another plum in my life I will be happy.”

  Kristijan rang the bell.

  It didn’t surprise her to see the plum slatko put in front of her. The dessert was rich and sweet and it was exactly what she needed. London could feel the heaviness of her limbs. She needed a jolt of sugar. More wine would help, too. For now, she ate the plums, which she usually refused.

  Kristijan was watching her steadily.

  She smiled at him. “If I am to be a wife for two more weeks, you had better take me through the expectations. What is the big public appearance to be this time around?” She reached for the wine again.

  Kristijan looked at Remi and raised a brow.

  London hid her irritation. There was always some sort of public event, even if it was something as simple as dinner at a village restaurant—anything that would ensure London was seen at Kristijan’s side. Did Kristijan have to staff out the arrangements? And make it so obvious he barely cared what the event was to be?

  Remi shook his head. “Nothing’s booked yet,” he said softly.

  Kristijan pushed aside his untouched bowl of plums. “Is there something you would like to do?” he asked her.

  London stared at him. The urge to laugh bubbled up from her middle. She just barely held it in. “I would like?” she repeated woodenly.

  Kristijan frowned. “Like. You must surely know what you like doing. There’s an animal shelter at the end of the village. We could pet puppies. Kittens, too.” His gaze shifted towards Remi, then back to her.

  London looked at Remi, puzzled. The man was frowning.

  “London?” Kristijan said, nudging her.

  “There’s an animal shelter? Here?” She gripped the glass. “I’ll…have to think about it.” She had never been asked what she wanted to do, before. She was at a loss to know what she could do in this little place. How had Kristijan known she loved giving abandoned animals attention therapy? It was one of her favorite Saturday morning activities.

  She just didn’t know if she wanted to do that with Kristijan standing next to her. It would…spoil it.

  Hastily, she finished off the glass and put it back on the table carefully. “Is there anything else you need from me?” she asked him.

  Kristijan frowned again. “You’re going back to your room?”

  “Probably the best place for her,” Remi observed.

  “No one asked you for your opinion,” London told him. She got to her feet and stood still, waiting for the room to right itself. “Ooh.” The effects of the wine were far stronger than she had thought when she had been sitting down.

  Kristijan stood and moved around the table, passing behind Remi, who was watching her with his narrowed, miss-nothing gaze.

  “I knew there was a reason why she deigned to speak to me directly,” Remi muttered. “I’m not sure if I’m pleased it’s merely alcohol that did the trick.”

  Kristijan caught her arm and London gripped his, steadying herself. “I think…I drank more than I realized,” she admitted. She made herself look at him, braced to see withering contempt in his eyes.

  Warm understanding glowed there.

  Her heart squeezed and she drew in another ragged breath. That warmth! How long was it since she had seen anything like compassion or caring in his eyes?

  “Come on. I’ll get you back to your room. You can have your coffee there,” he said.

  “Make it a whole pot’s worth,” Remi added, getting up. He left the room, shaking his head.

  “Come,” Kristijan coaxed softly.

  “Don’t do that,” she whispered, her throat hurting.

  “Do what?”

  “Don’t be nice to me. I can’t stand it.”

  He was guiding her from the room, under the big arch, heading for the corridor that would take them through the house to the bedroom suites in the west wing. She was walking straight enough, yet slowly. If his arm hadn’t been there to hold, she wasn’t sure she could have managed either.

  “Why do I let you get to me like this?” she murmured. “Still? You think I’d know by now. Know better, I mean.”

  His fingers tightened around her arm. “We all have our weaknesses.”

  “You? Have weaknesses?” She halted. She couldn’t look at him and walk at the same time.

  Kristijan turned back to face her. “I’m looking at one of them,” he said softly.

  Her heart rolled over, almost weightless with surprise and…warmth. “Kristijan,” she breathed. She was his weakness? How had she not known that? London searched his face and peered into his eyes. He didn’t look as though he was lying. His gaze was steady. The warmth
was still there, reminding her of the early days when they had first met, when spending the day in bed was perfectly natural, when even a walk to the park would end up with them in each other’s arms, oblivious to trees and people and birds….

  London realized she kissed him only after she did it. The touch of him against her was so familiar, so achingly sweet, that she didn’t immediately pull away from him. Horror didn’t touch her. Neither did disgust. This was the Kristijan she had once known and it was heart-breaking to glimpse that man after so many years of missing him.

  Kristijan gripped both her arms and eased her away from him. He didn’t thrust her away as she expected him to do. He didn’t scorn her, or tear strips from her with a pithy observation about hypocrites.

  He brushed her hair from her forehead. “Time for coffee,” he told her, his voice low.

  “Here, these might help,” Remi said from behind her.

  London tore herself out of Kristijan’s grip and spun to face Remi. She swayed and she felt Kristijan’s hand on her back, steadying her. Her heart was thudding too fast.

  Remi’s expression was implacable. He held out his hand. A bottle of tablets laid on it. She couldn’t read the Serbian—she only spoke enough of it to get by—yet the red and white colors and the safety cap told her what they were. “Aspirin,” she whispered.

  Remi gripped her wrist and pulled her hand up. He slapped the bottle into her palm. “Don’t drop them,” he said curtly and walked away again. At the doorway into the drawing room, he looked back. “Time to get back to work, Kristijan.”

  “I’ll be right there,” Kristijan assured him.

  All the warmth in her chest and her belly congealed into a cold lump. London gripped the little bottle tightly. “Yes, you’d better get back to your…business affairs,” she said woodenly, turning—slowly—to face him.

  Kristijan’s gaze roamed over her face. Then he nodded. “I’ll have a pot of coffee sent to your room. Good evening, London.”

  Before she could respond, he moved away, following Remi, leaving her standing alone in the middle of the wide passageway, swaying with the effects of wine and adrenaline and far, far too many shocks for one evening.

  Chapter Ten

  The heavy glass of single malt felt good in his hand. It reminded Neven he was still awake, although the ache of real exhaustion was pulling heavily at his limbs and throbbing behind his eyes. Days could last a long time when leap-frogging across time zones. It was after nine at night in Božidarko, while it wasn’t even supper time here on Martha’s Vineyard and the sun was blazing. It was an oddly hot October day.

  A small sea breeze wafted across the long acre of grass, shifting the top branches of the ancient oaks. The breeze, redolent of sand, seaweed and salt, made the patch of shade beneath the umbrella pleasantly cooling.

  The scotch helped enormously, too.

  “Everything I thought about Kristijan, every assumption I made, has turned out to be wrong,” Neven told the four adults sitting around the big outdoor table, picking up the strings of the conversation that had been interrupted while Taylor refilled Neven’s glass. “As far as I can tell, the man’s life is a complete wreck. His wife hates him, so much that the offer of an uncontested divorce made her almost pass out in shock. And Remi…” He frowned.

  “What about him?” Sydney asked softly.

  Neven had not been able to find Remi when he had followed him to the drawing room, leaving London standing the passage alone. Remi had probably used vampire speed to cross the house and leave through one of the external doors. The only question was, why? “He peeled me away from London after dinner. Then he was gone,” Neven said. “I have no idea where he went. He seems to have complete freedom to come and go as he pleases, which I suppose is understandable given that he and Kristijan were lovers.”

  “That’s your answer, then, isn’t it?” Alexander said. “You said that London kissed you.”

  “Fell against me, is more accurate. She got herself wasted inside thirty minutes.”

  He kept returning to that moment when she had been jolted into looking at him as if he was a human being. Why had he said what he did about her being his weakness? It was true enough. Elle had always held a special place in his heart for teaching him how to survive time travelling jumps, even if he hadn’t seen her since. Only, why had he told London that? The softness in her expression when he’d spoken it, showed how tense and braced she had been before then.

  “Even so, Remi saw the kiss, yes?” Alexander pressed.

  “Yes, but…” Neven gripped the glass, feeling the pattern on the side dig into his skin. “You don’t know Remi. Even if London had tried to pull me into her room, I don’t think he would have blinked. Nothing moves him. And besides, he knows I’m not Kristijan, so he has no reason to be jealous of anything.”

  “Except you look exactly like Kristijan,” Veris pointed out softly.

  “Only better,” Sydney added.

  Alex looked at her, puzzled and amused. “He looks older than Kristijan.”

  “Yes,” Taylor said, with a tone of complete agreement.

  Neven felt a small laugh bubble up from an unexpected corner. “That’s a good thing?”

  “Oh, yes,” Sydney said, with the same tone that Taylor had used. She nodded firmly.

  “Well…” Neven said, still puzzled.

  Veris was smiling. He seemed to understand. Then he stirred and glanced at the sun. “We had a quick look for shunting yards and sidings around Božidarko, as soon as you sent the text message. The ones that are there are far too public and open, so I don’t think they’re a possibility. However, Taylor and Sydney will ferry us over when it’s daylight there, to have a look around. In the meantime, Neven, no offence, I think you need to put that glass down and go and get some sleep.”

  Neven drew in a deep breath and let it out. “You might be right.”

  “You should sleep over there, though,” Alex said. “You should be where they expect to find you.”

  “Can you hold it together for one more jump?” Sydney asked.

  “Probably,” Neven said. “Although, the last thing I want to do is go back. It’s a seething pit of tripwires and hard feelings. It’s not my life, yet I feel wretched about it, anyway.”

  “That’s because you’re a nice guy,” Veris said. “Don’t let them wear that away from you.”

  Neven glanced at the big man, startled. “They?” he asked, as he hauled himself to his feet and picked up the suit jacket from the back of Sydney’s chair. It was far too warm here to wear it. Even Veris had raised his brows when he first saw the suit. “Saville Row,” he had murmured, his brow lifting.

  Now, Veris lifted his massive shoulders in a tiny shrug. “They,” he repeated. “Remi is no picnic. Then there are all the men that look to Kristijan and Remi.”

  “And an entire village that depends upon them for revenue,” Taylor added.

  “Don’t forget that London is making her own demands, too. She may not know it, only she’s adding to the pressure,” Sydney said.

  Neven draped the jacket over his arm. “No wonder I’m so tired,” he replied.

  Sydney got to her feet. “Maybe I should jump you there, instead. It wouldn’t do for you to go astray. Not now.”

  “Thank you, but you don’t know the coordinates inside the house. I’ve been mapping them all afternoon.” He tapped his temple. “I’ll be fine. I have enough energy to jump and to climb into bed. Goodnight, everyone.”

  They murmured farewell. He stepped out from behind the shady table, bent his knees and jumped.

  The bedroom in the house outside Božidarko was cool, deeply shadowed and unlit. After the heat of Martha’s Vineyard, it was a pleasant change. He didn’t bother turning on a light. He dropped the jacket over the bench at the end of the bed and stripped. There would be nothing like pajamas in the closet, as Kristijan had never needed them. As he slept naked whenever he had the choice, Neven had no need to find a substitute.

&n
bsp; He padded over to the door of the bedroom and turned the lock. He wasn’t expecting visitors, although in this household, middle-of-the-night arrivals might be common and he desperately needed sleep.

  When he climbed into the bed, he discovered that the sheets were of course the most extravagant, high-thread count, silky cotton on the market. They could only be status symbols to Kristijan. It wasn’t as if he used them.

  Neven made himself comfortable, then deliberately cleared his mind of everything that was circling through it. As the thoughts returned, he thrust them away, again and again, focusing with his mind’s eye on the thick black nothingness that lay beyond the timescape. It was an absence of anything, including light. It was inert and lifeless.

  He realized he had fallen asleep only when he woke, sometime later, lying in exactly the same position on his side that he had settled into. He had not moved an inch.

  How long had he been asleep? It was still dark in the room. His sense of time, which was far more accurate than the average human’s, thanks to years of time travel, told him that not a lot of time had passed while he slept. Perhaps an hour, perhaps a bit longer.

  What had woken him?

  The cover moved against his shoulder and a hand settled on his bare hip, just before he felt Remi’s length slide up against his back and buttocks. Remi was not warm. Neither was he cold. He was the same temperature as the sheets and the room. He was also naked. His chest against Neven’s shoulder was bare, as were his thighs, nudging the back of Neven’s.

  Neven’s heart pounded. “What are you doing?”

  “Spending the night with my lover, as the world naturally expects me to do.” Remi’s hand stroked the flesh over Neven’s hip, the tips of his fingers curving down over his hipbone, sliding deeper. Their direction was unmistakable.

  Neven gripped Remi’s wrist and rolled onto his back. Remi let him hold his hand up, beneath the satin cover, as Neven fumbled with the lamp on the nightstand and switched it on. The light was a low pool of yellow.

  Remi had his head propped on his hand. He watched Neven with a neutral expression.

  “I’m not Kristijan,” Neven said. “Not your Kristijan.”