A Place in Time (Rum Runner Island Book 1)

by JoAnn Ross

  “I’ve got a hard head,” she said absently as she wondered what a man who was seemingly so rigidly honest could be hiding.

  Kirby remembered feeling like this before. When she was six years old and the summer carnival had come to the island and Nate had talked her into going to the fun house, which hadn’t been any fun at all. Her nerves battering away inside her, she’d gingerly made her way through the dark and narrow hallways, waiting for some unknown monster to pop out of the shadows.

  That was when she’d discovered that the monsters you can’t see are more frightening than any monster you might have to face.

  “I’ve already discovered the hardness of your head myself.” His dry tone suggested he was not talking about her skull. “There. All done.”

  “You have a very gentle touch.” And didn’t she want those hands on her? Everywhere.

  “Your mind was so far away I doubt if you would have felt me attacking you with a hammer and chainsaw,” he said mildly.

  He left the room again. She heard brief snatches of a conversation she assumed was with her brother. He returned a moment later.

  “Nate is concerned about you,” he related. “I assured him that you were as well as can be expected, under the circumstances. I promised that I would not leave you alone. He’s going to contact your deputy and tell him that you’re taking medical leave for the next two days.”

  “That’s ridiculous. I’ll be fine.”

  “I seem to recall telling you the same thing. Before your brother had to send me home from the lab because I hadn’t heeded your advice to stay in bed after a head wound.”

  “I hate having my own words thrown back at me,” she complained.

  “Which is only logical…” Sebastian took a deep breath before adding, “I also informed Nate that I was going to tell you the truth about my mission.”

  “Nate knows?”

  “Everything. He cautioned me against telling you, then, when he realized I could not be dissuaded, wished me luck.” After reclaiming his spot beside her on the bed, he sat for a long, silent time, as if seeking the words to explain the unexplainable.

  “I don’t really know how to start,” he confessed.

  “Why not at the beginning?”

  He laughed at that, but the sound held little humor. “The beginning,” he mused. “All right…

  “It all began,” Sebastian started slowly, carefully, “in a galaxy, far, far away.”

  21

  “I don’t believe it.” Kirby stared up at Sebastian, her eyes wide, her headache forgotten during the telling of his outrageous tale.

  “I can understand how it might be difficult to believe such a story,” Sebastian allowed. “But it is true.”

  “You actually expect me to believe that you’re an alien, come here from another planet.”

  “Logosia,” he agreed. “But since my mother is an Earthling, I suppose that only makes me half-alien. And although genetically Earthlings and Logosians are nearly identical, terran physical genes usually prove dominant, so my body is human.”

  “You’ve no idea what a relief that is,” Kirby said dryly.

  She rubbed her arms with her hands to ward off the sudden chill caused by his calm words, his honest gaze. If she didn’t know better, she’d think he was actually telling the truth.

  The problem was that Sebastian truly seemed to believe he was some kind of intergalactic space traveler.

  “Let’s go.”

  When she would have left the bed, Sebastian stopped her by putting a broad hand on each shoulder. “Go? Where?”

  “To the mainland.”

  “I thought the ferry wasn’t operating.”

  “That was during the blizzard. It might be back in service now.” Though, she considered, with only one round trip a day in winter, they already would have missed it. “But I’m the police. I’ll commandeer Wiley Palmer’s lobster boat.”

  “Why would you wish to go to the mainland?”

  “We need to get you to the hospital. You obviously suffered a more serious head injury than we thought that day I found you lying on the road.”

  “My head is fine, Kirby.”

  “Sebastian, listen to me.” Her eyes widened, imploring him to reason. “What you’re suggesting simply isn’t possible.”

  “Not in this century,” he agreed. “But it will be. At least on Logosia.”

  “Logosia.” She combed a trembling hand through her hair, ruffling the strands in a way that made Sebastian long to reach out and smooth them back again. “I’ve never heard of a planet called Logosia.”

  “I explained that,” he said patiently. “It’s in another galaxy.”

  “Far, far away. I know. And you’re a member of the ruling family, descended down from the Ancient Ones, who wrote a book of laws based on the ideals of truth and reason.”

  “That is true.”

  “Right. And your sister’s a xenoanthropologist, while you’re an astrophysicist, and you’ve been experimenting with ways to travel without a spaceship using antimatter, astro-projection, and some kind of quantum physics you discovered in a book Nate still hasn’t written.”

  “That is also correct.”

  “And somehow, you managed to lock on to my thoughts and beam down, just like Star Trek. But the solar flares warped time, so you ended up nearly two hundred years before you’d planned to arrive.”

  “Exactly.” He’d known she was intelligent, but he hadn’t expected her to grasp the logistics so quickly.

  “That does it. We are definitely taking you to the hospital.”

  “And risk them putting me in the psycho wing?”

  “You were reading my mind again.”

  “I’m sorry. But it was a very strong thought.”

  “And a very serious problem. Because you’re obviously hallucinating.”

  “I swear to you I’m not.”

  “If you’re hallucinating, you wouldn’t necessarily know it. You’ve must have suffered a serious head injury, Sebastian. You don’t know what you’re saying.”

  “I assure you, Kirby, my mind is crystal clear.”

  “If you really are from Logosia, two hundred years in the future, how do you explain knowing about Star Trek?”

  “Those films are classics,” Sebastian argued. “Rosalyn has all eighty-six of the movies on holodisc in her library.”

  “There are actually eighty-six Star Trek movies?”

  “They were making number eighty-seven when I left Logosia,” Sebastian divulged. “The plot was carefully guarded, but there are rumors that the crew is getting a new ship.”

  “Which wouldn’t be necessary if they didn’t keep destroying it,” Kirby muttered.

  “We agree yet again. The Logosian Council of Arts declared the films illogical, with flawed science wrapped in a dangerous diversity social message, and banned their distribution on my planet more than fifty years ago. However, a hard-core group of fans, such as my sister, remains. So Federation traders smuggle them past customs to supply a very efficient black market.”

  “Eighty-six,” Kirby repeated softly. “Nate would be in seventh heaven. The week before Star Trek Beyond came out, he went to a Star Trek film festival in Portland that showed all the previous eleven movies in a row. People camped out for days for the best seats.”

  She waved that idea off and shook her head. Then flinched at what he knew to be pain. “This is ridiculous. You almost had me believing you.”

  “I have not lied to you, Kirby.”

  “Prove it.”

  He had never met a stubborner woman. Except, perhaps, Sebastian considered, his sister. For all Rosalyn’s quiet poise, she could prove frustratingly intransigent at the most inconvenient times. Such as her discomfiting search for those ancient, heretical diaries. And of course there had been that time when Zoltar Flavius, ambassador to Galactia and a man twice Rosalyn’s age, asked their father for her hand in marriage.

  At the coaxing of his terran wife, Xanthus Vardanyia
n had agreed to permit Rosalyn to select her own life-mate. Which proved a disastrous political mistake when his sister refused to even consider a marriage contract with the powerful, wealthy ambassador, who, like Xanthus himself, was descended from the Ancient Ones.

  News of Rosalyn’s refusal had spread throughout Logosia, as well as the rest of the galaxy, like flashfire. Since women were not empowered to choose their own destiny, such freedom was considered abhorrent by old-line conservatives and vastly encouraging by proponents of female rights.

  Unfortunately, Rosalyn’s freedom of choice had proven to be Zoltar Flavius’s public humiliation. A powerful man with a temper that was decidedly un-Logosian, he’d effectively gotten Xanthus Vardanyian removed from the governing body of city-states. Sebastian had suspected that his father’s forced retirement had been the cause of his fatal heart failure.

  Once he’d finished with her father, Zoltar had directed his fury toward Rosalyn. But before he could succeed in getting her dismissed from the institute, on the way back to Galactia, his space pod had been hit by a meteor shower, effectively putting an end to both the ambassador’s life and his plan for vengeance.

  “I’m waiting,” Kirby’s voice broke into his thoughts.

  “Oh. Yes.” Deciding to use the same method of proof that had won Nate over, Sebastian concentrated on sending his atoms across the room.

  Something was definitely wrong. Try as he might, he couldn’t generate sufficient energy.

  “Oh, my God!” Kirby stared at the sparkling pieces of matter hovering above the very spot where Sebastian had been standing only a moment before. “I don’t believe it!”

  “Neither do I.” Sebastian ceased trying and pulled himself together. Sweat glistened on his brow, above his upper lip. His shirt was drenched. “Even a fourth-level Logosian should be able to project himself across such a small space. But I find it impossible.” He rubbed his temples, where his blood was pounding. “This is most disturbing.”

  “Is that how you reached me out in the forest without leaving footprints?”

  “Yes. But at the time I did not have so much trouble.” He crossed his arms and pondered that for a moment. “I don’t understand.”

  Since he often thought better while moving, he began to pace. “Perhaps it was the adrenaline when we were in the forest,” he mused. “I was aware that someone was trying to hurt you. I also knew that I had to move quickly.”

  “Adrenaline can give people an amazing rush,” Kirby agreed. “I’ve read of cases where one-hundred-pound mothers have lifted cars off their children.”

  “I believe that must be the answer,” Sebastian decided absently.

  A terrible thought was teasing at the back of his mind. If he couldn’t manage to project himself across the room, how was he ever going to return home? Even with the assistance of the accelerator and the transporter he and Nate had finally completed last night, he needed his skills operating at top speed.

  “You really are from another planet, aren’t you?”

  “As I told you I was.”

  “You took your sweet time telling me,” she complained. “All this time, I’d written all those UFO sightings off as hysteria, perhaps caused by the solar flares. But the proof was right here, in my home, in my bed.”

  “Yes. But I am not three feet tall or green-complected. Nor am I dressed in Reynolds Wrap.” He paused to ask the question he’d been considering since that tavern incidence. “What is Reynolds Wrap?”

  “It’s tin foil. You know, shiny and silver. We use it to wrap leftovers in.”

  “Ah. Tinanium sheets.” Sebastian nodded. “My mother’s cook does the same. But she often forgets to label them, making what’s inside the packages a mystery.”

  “That happens on earth, too.”

  A significant little silence settled over them.

  “Sebastian?”

  “Yes?”

  She was looking up at him, helpless fascination mingled with longing. “I can see that you’re not green, or silver, and you don’t have a face like a vacuum cleaner hose, but you said you were only half-Logosian, and your body, like your mother’s, is completely human. Does that mean…”

  Color flooded her face as her voice tailed off. “Never mind.” Suffused with embarrassment, she turned away.

  He didn’t need to read her mind to know what she was thinking. The feminine invitation had been gleaming in her soft blue eyes.

  Slowly, deliberately, Sebastian crossed the room on foot and reclaimed his place on the edge of the bed. “Are you asking if I make love like the men you’re accustomed to mating with?”

  “Yes. Though that isn’t the word we tend to use on earth. You might want to try sleeping.”

  “Sleeping is not what I have in mind at the moment.”

  “It’s an idiom.”

  “Ah. Well, then, yes. We are, once again, on the same thought plane.”

  “Well?” She looked up at him, silent, questioning.

  “I don’t know what kind of man you’re accustomed to,” he reminded her. “So, I suppose there’s only one way to find out.”

  Her lips curved into a soft smile. “I was rather hoping that you’d come to that conclusion.”

  He was being unfair to her. Sebastian wanted her, with every fiber of his being. And even more remarkable was the knowledge that he loved Kirby Pendleton even more than he wanted her.

  But he couldn’t stay. And he couldn’t take her with him. So where did that leave them?

  Nowhere, Sebastian acknowledged grimly. Nowhere at all.

  “Kirby.” His voice was a rasp of agony. “I don’t want to lie to you. Even if we share our bodies, this cannot go anywhere.”

  “Too late,” she answered on a short, shaky laugh that was every bit as unsteady as her pulse. “It already has.”

  Wrapping her arms around his neck, she pulled him down to her and pressed her mouth against his. Hard.

  22

  Sebastian wanted to take things slowly. Carefully. And not just for her but for himself, as well. He wanted to savor the moment, to create a memory that would unite them through the light-years that would soon separate them.

  Her lips were soft and trembling but avid and mobile beneath his. And so, so sweet.

  Scents. Remarkably, love had scents. They rose from her warming flesh, surrounding him in a dense, fragrant cloud. He breathed in the intoxicating scent of her hair and knew that he’d never see flowers again without thinking of this woman.

  Tastes. Amazingly, love had tastes. The honey taste of her lips, the sweet, moist, sunshine taste of her warming flesh. These and countless other seductive flavors lingered on his tongue, spun in his head.

  Feelings bombarded him. Emotions too numerous to catalogue rushed over him, until he felt as if he were drowning in them.

  “I’ve been dreaming of this,” she whispered as she slipped her hands beneath his sweater and ran them over his back. “I’ve been dreaming of you.” She pressed her lips against his neck. “Wonderful, fanciful, lovely dreams.”

  Her breathless admission excited him. Tangling his hands in her hair, he kissed her hard and long. Need poured out of him and into her. Love flowed out of her and into him.

  Beneath him, Kirby’s body was soft and pliant, but he could feel the strength there, as well. Kirby Pendleton was forged steel wrapped in shimmering folds of silk. Sebastian found the combination impossible to resist.

  For fifteen of his thirty-one years, Sebastian had always regarded the taking off of one’s clothes as little more than a prelude to Logosian style intercourse. But now, as he pulled her blue uniform shirt loose and began to unfasten it, one button at a time, he realized that undressing Kirby was every bit as sensual an experience as the heady taste of her kisses.

  With fingers he wished were steadier, he maneuvered each button through the hole, then folded back the material slowly, tenderly. He smiled when he saw she was wearing the peach confection she’d worn in her erotic dream.

  “
You can’t tell me this is regulation for members of the Rum Runner Island police force.” As he’d done in the dream, he ran his finger over the lace trimming the bodice.

  “No.” Kirby sucked in a deep breath as the light touch left a shimmering trail of heat. “It’s not.”

  “Good.” He lowered his head and pressed his open mouth against her breast, dampening the silk in a slow, sensual way that caused a corresponding dampness between her legs. “I like knowing that there’s a sexy, feminine part of you that you keep hidden away.” When his teeth closed, taking a nip of silk and nipple, Kirby moaned and moved against him. “I enjoy being the man to discover your private secrets.”

  The fire was building. Utilizing every atom of his hard-learned self-control, Sebastian banked it. For now.

  He released the buttons on the cuffs of her shirt. Her body arched as he drew it away. And then his hands moved to her belt. A man’s belt, Sebastian thought, smiling at her thinking she could possibly ever conceal so much vibrant femininity with these stiff masculine trappings.

  The belt gone, he unfastened the wool pants and drew them slowly over her stomach, her hips, down her legs, inch by maddening inch, following the path with his mouth.

  Her wool socks followed. When he lifted her legs, one at a time, placing a sizzling kiss against the arch of each slender foot, she gasped.

  He whisked the peach top away.

  “I knew it,” he murmured against her mouth as his hands fondled her breasts. Just as he’d done in their shared dream that first night together.

  “Knew what?” she said on a ragged moan.

  “That your skin would be even softer than that silk.”

  And then his mouth was everywhere, creating heat and flames wherever it lingered. On her breasts, her thighs, the back of her knee, the beauty mark at the base of her spine, her shoulders. And even as Kirby waited for Sebastian to take, he continued to give.