A hurt look flashed into her eyes. The pain seemed to go straight through him, making him feel like a brute. “I am willing to answer other personal questions, however. Do you wish to know if I sleep naked? Which side of the bed I favor? Boxers or briefs?”
The pain in her eyes changed to amusement. “Of course I want to know the details on all of those questions, but how about we start with the most pressing concern—who stabbed you, why, and how come you’re not rolling around in pain now?”
“I don’t know who stabbed me,” he admitted, finishing the impromptu lunch. “I suspect it was one of my cousins, but I didn’t see my attackers either time, so I have no definitive proof.”
“So you are related to Mrs. Faa?”
“She is my grandmother.”
Kiya looked surprised by that, genuinely surprised. He frowned, trying to decide if his family had neglected to tell her that fact, or if she was an exceptionally good actress. “Which means Gregory is your cousin?”
“Yes. As are all my grandmother’s other grandsons. I have no siblings.”
“But…” She picked off a bit of strawberry from her plate and popped it in her mouth. He watched the movement with avidity, wondering if her lips tasted like the sweet berries. “But that doesn’t make sense. Mrs. Faa said something about her family being very tight. Why would your own cousins stab you?”
“I am mahrime,” he said simply, and waited to see what she would do with that information.
“You too?” She gave him a smile that he felt right down to his testicles. “They keep saying I am, as well. I take it that means not hip to the family code and all that.”
“With regards to mortals, yes. In your case, it means that you are a half-breed. As, I believe I’ve mentioned, am I.”
She frowned, and began to gather up all the leftover containers. “That again? I told you that’s not at all politically correct.”
“Nonetheless, it’s accurate. I have a Traveller father and a mortal mother. I assume your mother was the Traveller, since you were not taken in by family after her death.”
“My mother didn’t travel around a lot. At least, not that Carla told me,” Kiya protested. “And you know, you’re kind of overdoing that whole mortal thing.”
“What mortal thing?” he couldn’t help but ask.
“The thing where you refer to people as mortals, like you aren’t one. And yes, I remember that you said you aren’t, but that doesn’t make any sense. You look perfectly normal to me. Well, the ball of light named Sunil aside.”
“Regardless, I am not mortal, nor am I normal. Nor, for that matter, are you.”
“I’m as normal as they come, babe,” she said blithely.
“I really do not have time to sit here and explain what Travellers are, or why it is I know that you are one,” he said sternly, then leaned back against a tree and contemplated her. By the saints, she was captivating. The way the sun gilded her skin, burnishing her hair and warming her body so that her scent, the intoxicating scent of a sun-warmed, sensual woman, reached his nostrils, binding him with little silken cords of desire. “Travellers are an ancient people. They originated in India, and later moved north and west until they were found in every country in Europe. Some migrated to the British Isles and Scandinavia. Others went to the New World with the explorers. My family remained in what is now Romania for several centuries before my grandmother brought us to the United States.”
“Uh-huh,” she said, disbelief written clearly on her face. “So you’re like, what, super-Gypsies? Sorry, super-Romanies?”
“We are not Romany, although many suspect we have common ancestors if you look back far enough, and many facets of Travellers have been used to describe the Rom.”
“Such as?”
He looked at her for a moment, trying to gauge whether she was playing him along. Her eyes were as clear as the sun-washed summer sky above them. “Travellers have been persecuted for centuries, as have the Rom. Both are feared and shunned because of their nomadic lifestyles. Even the word ‘traveler’ in some places means the Romany people. But that is a misnomer, since they do not have the skills that we possess.”
“What skills are those?”
“We tend to be migratory, have tight-knit extended family units, shun outsiders, and we are thieves,” he said simply. “Time thieves.”
Kiya’s delicious mouth hung agape for a second or two. “You’re kidding me.”
“I wish that I was.”
“I don’t believe it,” she said, her face obstinate. “How can you steal time?”
“The same way you steal anything else.”
She stared at him, her gaze locked to his. Genuine disbelief was clearly readable in her eyes, affirming his suspicion that his family hadn’t told her who they—or she—was.
“Prove it,” she said finally.
He didn’t hesitate; he didn’t stop to ponder the repercussions of his actions. He simply pointed to something over her shoulder, and when she turned to look, he stole ten seconds of her time.
“You’re kidding me,” she said.
“I wish that I was.”
“I don’t believe it,” she said, her face set in an expression of obstinacy. “How can you steal—holy garbanzo beans!”
“No jebus?” He pulled a half-dollar out of his pocket and pressed it into her slack hand, closing her fingers around the coin.
“That was…I mean, we just said those things…and then it was happening again. Like super déjà vu.” She sucked in a large quantity of air. “Just like what happened this morning!”
He sat up straight. “What happened this morning?”
“That thing that you did. Making me déjà vu. That happened this morning.”
He made her describe exactly what happened, grinding his teeth when she did so. “That bastard.”
“What bastard?” she asked, suddenly looking down at her hand. “Why did you give me fifty cents?”
“One of them stole your time. Andrew or Gregory, that is.”
“What?” Her voice was shrill with panic. Without thinking, he put his arm around her and pulled her tight against his side. “Someone stole my time?”
“It’s all right. It sounds like it was only a few minutes.”
“But…but…” She shook her head, and leaned into him, clearly seeking comfort. Unfortunately, his body didn’t realize that, and began celebrating the fact that the woman who was beginning to consume his thoughts was pressed against him, all warm and soft and smelling good. Parts of him that were previously warm and soft quickly became otherwise.
She turned her head, her nose brushing against his. “Someone stole my time, Peter. I don’t know what to do about this.”
It was more than he could resist. He dipped his head toward hers, and allowed his lips to caress that sweet, sweet mouth. Her lips parted on an inhalation of pleasure, inviting him to explore the delights that lay within. It would have taken a stronger man than him to turn down such an offer.
“The raccoons have ceased mating. It was most interesting while it lasted. Did you know that the male—merciful goddess! I am being so embarrassed at disturbing you at the time of your great seduction! I will most very immediately take myself off to see…er…something. Carry on, Peter-ji.”
Peter didn’t stop at the interruption. He couldn’t. He kissed Kiya gently at first, tentatively, almost hesitantly to make sure she was fully on board with the idea of the kiss, but when she started making little happy noises in the back of her throat, he unleashed his passion, deepening the kiss until his mind and body and, hell, even his soul were caught up in the sweetness that was Kiya.
“Holy hand grenades, do you know how to kiss,” Kiya said against his lips as she came up for air. “That was the best kiss ever. My whole body is tingling. However, there’s a rock digging into my back, and although I don’t mind the fact that we got kind of carried away, we are out in the open where anyone can see us.”
It took him a second or two to
come to his senses enough to realize that they were lying prone, entwined like lovers, and that poor Kiya was bearing the brunt of his weight.
“If I didn’t know better,” he grumbled, rolling off her and helping her to sit up, gently massaging her back where she had lain on the rock, “I’d say you have cast a spell over me. But you don’t know how to cast glamours, do you?”
“Glamours?” She looked thoughtful, which was so endearing, he just wanted to kiss her again. “That’s a word that means something magical, right? I remember seeing it in a book about vampires that I read last summer. I didn’t think they were real, though.”
“Vampires, or glamours? It doesn’t matter—both are real.”
Her eyes widened. “Get out of here!”
“Why? Is it Sunil? He won’t harm you.” He leaped to his feet regardless, swiftly searching the area for the threat that she had obviously seen. There was nothing but a small family of rabbits rustling about in the shrubs.
“I didn’t mean get out of here literally, you know,” she said, getting up to straighten her shirt. “I meant it like ‘you’re kidding.’ But you aren’t kidding, are you?”
“No.” He bent to gather up the remains of their picnic, handing Kiya her blanket before proceeding to a trash can in the motel parking lot.
“You know, I think I’m just going to let the idea of vampires and glamours go for right now, because there’s only so much my brain can process in a day, and right now it’s full of the idea of time theft and Indian balls of light who enjoy watching raccoons go at it. Hey, where are you going?”
“I have work to do,” he said, pausing to look back at her. “You may try all you like to distract me with your sweet mouth, and those delicious-looking breasts, and your legs and such, but I won’t have any of it. I am a member of the Watch. I am above such things.”
So saying that, he marched back, pulled her tight against his chest, and kissed the daylights out of her.
“No, I can see that you are strictly business,” she said, laughing against his mouth.
He frowned at her.
She licked the tip of his nose.
“You can’t leave me like this,” she said, quickly taking his hand and not releasing it when he tried to politely shake her off. “I have oodles of questions, and besides, I want to not distract you again sometime in the very near future.”
“You cannot come with me,” he said sternly, altering his path and leading her to her car.
“Why? Are you going to a men’s room or something?”
“No. I’m going to Lenore Faa’s camp, so that I might discuss with Andrew and Gregory the theft of your time.”
“Oh, you really can’t go there,” she said, clasping his hand with both of hers, and digging in her heels.
“Why not?”
“Because of what happened last night. And what I heard this morning.” She paused, thinking. “What exactly did happen last night? You didn’t get around to telling me that.”
“I didn’t tell you because I had no intention of telling you.” He tried to pry off her hands. It just made her hold on tighter.
“Nothing like the present to take care of pesky chores,” she said cheerily. “Tell me now.”
“No.”
“I’m not going to let go until you do.”
He gave her a haughty look, one filled with manly intent. “Do you seriously believe that you can dictate to me, a member of the Watch?”
She suddenly released his hand, leaning forward into him, teasing his lips with her tongue, while at the same time boldly stroking her hand down his chest. “What if I ask nicely and said please?”
“Do not delude yourself into thinking I can be swayed by physical temptations,” he said firmly as he led her over to a small wooden picnic bench that had been chained to a tall fir tree at the edge of the parking lot. “I am made of sterner stuff than that.”
“Yes, you are,” she agreed, giggling under her breath. “What were you doing at Mrs. Faa’s RV last night?”
“I went to confront the family, hoping to save them embarrassment by having the guilty person surrender himself to my custody.”
“What guilty person?”
“If I could tell you that, I wouldn’t have need of the vial.”
“No, I meant what’s someone in Mrs. Faa’s family guilty of? And just what’s in that vial you keep yammering on about?”
He jerked back, giving her a stern look that she utterly disregarded. “I do not yammer! I have never yammered in my life!”
“Uh-huh. What’s in the vial?”
“DNA proof that one of the members of Lenore Faa’s family is a murderer.”
Her eyes widened in alarm. She was silent for a moment before saying, “You’re serious, aren’t you? I can see you are. But really, Peter—a murderer?”
He nodded, and briefly explained about the murders he had been investigating the last few months. “The latest one finally gave me the evidence I need to pin down the perpetrator of the crimes.”
“I can’t believe—” She shook her head, her hand on one of his. “I just can’t believe that one of them is a murderer. Rude, I agree. Nasty, if you’re talking about Andrew. Very cliquish, oh, hell yes. But a murderer? Someone who would take an old lady’s life? That’s just…appalling.”
“I am in full agreement. Which is why it’s important I retrieve that vial before the DNA is destroyed or damaged.”
“So that’s why you were at Mrs. Faa’s camp last night? You figured one of your cousins took it when they stabbed you?”
“That was one reason why I was there. I had arranged to meet my boss at a rendezvous point near the camp, but before I found him, I was ambushed.”
Her face was drawn with worry and concern. That fact warmed him like nothing had in many decades. “And that’s when you got stabbed a second time?”
He nodded.
“That’s really horrible. I don’t know why I think it’s any less evil that your own cousins would stab you, but when you compare that to outright murder…it’s just awful, Peter. You have to stop it.”
“I intend to do so.” He looked away from her, struggling with himself as to whether he should put into words the feeling that he had battled for so many decades, since the time his beloved mother had died. “It is the twenty-first century. It is time for Travellers to break the bonds of tradition that keep them outside of society. We could do so much together, Kiya—we have powers that could benefit the mortal and immortal worlds alike. But Travellers have never wished to share their skills that way. They’ve never given back, and the time of taking has to come to an end.”
Kiya’s gaze was steady on his. “You know what you are?” she asked after a moment’s silence, her fingers tightening where she had clasped his hand.
“A man?”
“You’re a hero, that’s what you are. An honest-to-god hero. If you were in a comic book, you’d be…I don’t know, Timey-Wimey Man or something.”
A warm glow began deep inside him at the look of admiration in her eyes. No one had ever admired him before. Fear, yes, that he’d seen in the eyes of the people he tracked. Loathing and hatred and anger were all familiar reactions to his presence. But no one had ever looked at him as if he were a knight in shining armor. Kiya’s admiration made him feel simultaneously extremely uncomfortable and just like he really could do anything he set his mind to.
“I wouldn’t go that far,” he said, basking for another second or two in the shy smile she gave him. “It’s common sense, really. By excluding ourselves from the world, Travellers do nothing but create an atmosphere of suspicion and fear. And now, with some members feeling they answer to no law, they are a danger to their own kind.”
“Because people will think that all of them are like that? Murderers, I mean?”
He nodded, giving her hand a squeeze before releasing it. “It’s why I hope to reason with Lenore Faa after I prove to her that one of her own kin is responsible for such heinous crimes a
gainst mortals.”
“Good luck with that.” She stood in thought for a moment, allowing him to drink in her delicious scent. “Something’s bothering me—you keep saying her name like you’re not part of that family.”
He shrugged. “I’m not. I’m mahrime, as I told you.”
“So because your mom wasn’t part of the family, that makes you an outcast? That’s really heavily incestuous, you know.”
“You need only have two parents who are Travellers to be considered part of a family, not parents who are members of the same family. To have a mortal parent is what pollutes your blood and makes you impure to Traveller eyes.” He glanced at his watch. “I must leave.”
“Hold on there, Bobalooey. I have about a gazillion more questions, not the least of which is why you gave me fifty cents when you stole my time. Not that I mind you doing it, because you were showing me, although I’m really skeeved out about the idea that someone can do that to me without me knowing.”
He stood up, pulling out his cell phone to consult notes he had made earlier. “That was payment for the time.”
“Huh?”
She looked so adorably confused, he couldn’t help but give her one more kiss, a swift one this time because he had work to do. “All Travellers pay for the time they steal, and always in silver. It helps avert the consequences.”
“It does?”
She looked even more confused, but hardening his heart—and ignoring the demands of his groin—he walked away from her to see what sort of shape his rental car was in. He’d track down his two cousins and have a chat with them about stealing Kiya’s time before demanding that they turn over the murderous member of the family.
But before he did that, he’d take advantage of Kiya being away from the camp to search her tent. Although he hated the idea that she might not be as innocent as he hoped she was, he couldn’t rule out the possibility that she might be working for his enemies.
It was enough to send a chill down his spine. He knew exactly how his family would discard Kiya when they were done using her. She’d be lucky to escape with her time—and life—intact.
NINE