“Sorry.”
“Why?” he asked, glancing back at me as he scanned our surroundings.
Was he expecting more borgs already?
“I’m sorry for whining. Or being mopey. Whatever. You’re wounded—”
“So are you.”
“You’re hurt worse.”
He rolled his eyes, stopping at a door to unlock it.
Room 25. Would this be a safer place?
“It’s not a competition. I wouldn’t want to walk on my foot sliced open.”
“You were beaten, and shoved around, and, and…” I followed him inside.
“And I’d do it again. You feel bad for me? Fine. Nurse me back to health if it will appease you.”
Now who had the attitude? Or did he ever slack in that department?
He tossed his jacket to the chair and let the bag of our things from the store drop to the single table. Much like the last room, this place had a stretched-out rug covering every inch of the floor. Not as plushy. Or maybe that was because I was standing on a tender foot.
Only one bed stood waiting for us, and the bathroom door was off the left wall, rather than the right like the last place. How…cookie cutter. Were all hotels designed exactly the same?
“Don’t get pissy at me,” I warned as he ripped open a small box and shook out pills from the bottle inside it.
“I was minding my own business, and now…” I gestured at the room, then him. “Now I’m stuck in an alternative reality—”
“This is reality.”
“—with an arrogant asshole who thinks he can shut me up with a kiss and—”
“Get over it.” He strode to the bathroom. Even with pain holding him at a slower pace, he sauntered. The cocky bastard.
“Get over it?” I cringed. Did I really sound that screechy? “You want me to get over it?” I repeated as he came back into the room with a glass filled with water. Get over jumping time or his kiss? I focused on the smaller point, gunning for a fight. Something to just lose my temper at and yell. After the rush of the violence at the last hotel, I needed to just…lash out.
“I don’t know how you were raised, but you can’t just expect—force—a kiss on me to suit your own needs like that.”
He’d mocked nodding through my lecture, swallowing back the pills and stalking toward me.
“You ask for my affection, not demand it. You don’t just assume you’ve got the right to—”
He’d stepped right up to me, in my face. Damn him, he was so tall I had to look up. His presence was so overwhelming, I didn’t want to go on, curious what words he could sling back at me.
“You kissed me right back. Don’t whine about manners with me.”
All right. He had me on that point. But that was beside this point. That he’d, well, that he’d…
How hypocritical could I be? Yeah, I was correct on the principle of it. But I’d lusted after this infuriating man since he’d woken up and claimed that lip lock. I’d wanted more of his mouth on me, and here I was sassing that he’d taken privileges unwarranted?
You little…liar, you.
The impulsive urge to argue, to lash out, faded.
“Don’t get high and mighty with me.” He backpedaled yet maintained eye contact with a mocking sneer. “You’re what, eighteen, twenty in 2071?” A scoff left his lips as he gave me his back again. Without the jacket covering him, the shards that hadn’t fallen out yet protruded through his shirt.
I’m so heartless. Here I was getting snippy about petty BS, and he was still wounded.
“Twenty,” I couldn’t help but retort.
His head bobbed as he twisted open a bottle from the bag. He brought it to his lips, his neck stretching at the lift, flexing the corded muscles there.
Finished, he winced, like he’d had something sour, and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “So excuse me. You’re from a time after the patriarchy died. Women ruled. Time of the queens.”
Technically, the last queen was like five years before I was born, but he wasn’t wrong. Where I came from, men deferred to women, females ran the companies of the world. Mothers, sisters, and aunts were the breadwinners, and no man would ever deign to touch a woman without consent. It was a…well, it was an obsessively structured and formal society. That was probably the vaguest and nicest way to describe it.
He fluffed his hand in the air. “Sorry I’m not being delicate to your way of thinking, which, by the way—” He paused to chug another hiss-inducing drink. “Your way of thinking that’s just as fucked up as everyone else’s.”
His knee knocked into the bed as he began to pace. Such a simple bump into something cushioned, and he groaned.
“Sit down,” I ordered. “You’re bleeding.”
“Oh, yes. Hail to the princess. She who speaks must be obeyed.” He mocked a bow.
“No need to be a wiseass.” Unless that’s the only way you come. Lucky me. “Sit.”
I went to the bag and grabbed the first-aid kit he’d bought. Cracking it open, I saw items I could figure out easily enough. Aunt Helen and I hadn’t always had a health scanner at home, and the ones we could afford were basic. Tweezers, gauze, bandages, cream. I could do this.
“What are you going to do if I don’t?”
I whipped my face up to glower at him. Was he deliberately daring me now?
“I’d…”
I couldn’t let him bleed and suffer, especially when he’d kept me from harm. You anti-hero heroic ass. “Please?”
He grunted and chugged more of his drink. My quieter tone must have done it. He slouched, letting gravity fell him to the corner of the mattress.
I brought the materials to him and set them on the bed to his side. Propping my wounded foot to the mattress, I sighed at the relief of not putting weight on it.
So, so much better.
Standing with my one foot on the floor, I hopped closer to him.
“Can you…uh…can you take your shirt off?”
How I wished I could say that differently, in another setting. Meeting him in a normal way. Then again, if I’d encountered him in my time without his mission bringing him to me, would he have been interested beyond a hello? My head hurt at the idea of never having met him.
“My shirt?” he checked.
I couldn’t speak, staring at him with this newfound realization he was so…temporary in my life.
I expected another retort, but he simply set his bottle between his knees and yanked the black tee off.
Shards stuck out in a few places, and where they didn’t, scratches ripped furious lines.
“I’m right, you know.”
I glanced at the ceiling, fishing for patience. His smug tone chased away the sadness and sympathy seeing his wounds brought. A know-it-all was the ultimate mood breaker.
“Uh-huh.” I started with tweezers and an antiseptic wipe to remove the pieces of mirror lodged in his flesh.
“I am. Matriarchy, patriarchy. Dictators, republics. It doesn’t matter. Men or women, young or old, human or borgs, it doesn’t fucking matter. Whoever’s in power will always beat down on the inferior. Then there’ll be another revolution or two, or six, the tides will turn, and then, ta-da! Someone else’s turn to abuse power. And you want to know why?”
I swallowed, focusing on removing the next shard. Sure, I listened to his bold words and deep voice. I begrudged him for being…well, dammit. He was right.
“You want to know why?” he repeated. “Because greed triumphs. I’ve seen it all, sweetheart.”
I pursed my lips. His quickness to name me something so cutesy and affectionate was just another facet of sexism. Yet…I kind of liked it. From him, at least. Endearments were considered insults from my time.
“I’ve witnessed the men in power. And yeah, they’d dominated for a long time. I’ll give you that. Plenty of dumbasses too. But I’ve also seen firsthand what women did in charge. I mean, Everly, the poverty they caused for over forty years! The failed—manipulate
d—Environmental Revolution in 2032. That crisis still hasn’t been amended in your time. Doesn’t it just…piss you off?”
I didn’t answer. It wasn’t that I didn’t agree. I did, but it was a hard truth to swallow. I’d never heard someone so worldly put it so bluntly.
“All kinds of cultures and governments. It doesn’t matter who’s supposed to bow down to whom. People, across all ages.” He flung his arm out to gesture an encompassing arch.
“Stay still.” I shoved his shoulder to keep his trapezoid from bunching. “Last piece.”
He slouched, giving up on the theatrical moves. “It doesn’t matter where and when, humanity is a big fucking joke,” he grumbled.
I wiped at the cuts, finished with the bits of mirror. They sat in a layer on a cloth, tiny and red. Other than the sounds of the small towelettes brushing over his broad back, the room was silent. Too quiet. After his explosion of philosophy, I had zero idea what to say. He was right, but that was only due to my ignorance. I hadn’t traveled across centuries to witness what humankind did at different times, but I could so easily understand how he’d collected such a perception of people. I’d only witnessed what I could in my short lifetime, and it was a jaded view.
He hadn’t said I was incorrect, for thinking he’d crossed lines with me by kissing me, nor had he admitted he’d taken liberties. More of an impasse, a generalization that no one should be superior to another. Equality, for as lofty of a goal it could be, was a good thing, after all.
“At least,” he said, calmer now after a long stretch of nothing, “that’s my opinion of the big picture.”
“Noted.”
He barked a laugh at my deadpan reply. “How’s your foot?”
I smirked. That was oddly charming. Here I was “playing nurse” and tending to his extensive cuts, and he was concerned about my one small injury.
I appreciated him moving on to a lighter worry, though. “It’ll be fine.”
“It will be. Really. Once we jump through time to return you to your year, the injuries will go away.”
“How does that work?” I paused in smoothing bandages over his cuts to trace my fingertip along an older scar at the top of his shoulder.
He shivered, just barely, and I bit my lip at the thrill of…tickling him? Teasing him?
“You have scars.”
He cleared his throat. Took a drink, too. “Some of those are old. Before I got into the time jumping business.”
“Business?” I put the last bandage on the smallest cut and leaned around him to snag his drink.
“Uh…” He twisted, reclaiming it. “I didn’t offer to share.”
I pouted.
He grinned, raising the bottle to his lips, and took a drink.
“That’s not fair.”
“First…” He pushed one finger at my shoulder. Not hard, but I fell back to the bed anyway. Leaning on my elbows, I watched as he stood and moved my leg, setting my foot to the edge.
With small rocking motions, he eased the shoe off my foot.
“Ow. Ow. Ow.”
“Blood’s rushing back in.”
“Uh-huh. Ow.” I didn’t squirm as he pulled the bandages off and checked the slice on my sole.
“It is a small cut.” He used one of the bandages out of the box and secured it over the opening. His thumb pressed into the flesh near my toes, and I let my head drop back.
“Like that?”
I moaned. He pressed in again. It felt like heaven. I plopped back to the mattress with a sigh.
Then he let go.
I whined, not even caring what that made me. Needy? Sure. Even one more minute of that massage would have been better than him teasing with that teeny taste.
“Scoot over,” he said, nudging my calf with his bottle.
I tossed his words back at him. “I didn’t offer to share.”
“Fine.” He climbed onto the bed, groaning like a bear at what I assumed were more aches and pains. Sprawled across the mattress as I was, there was nowhere for him to go except—
“Hey!”
Over me.
Kneeling then crawling, he aimed for the head of the bed without me moving out of the way.
I sat up, knocking into his forehead, and he toppled to the side, nearly spilling the bottle. His gasp cracked me up. Bending upright to laugh harder, he overcompensated leaning the other way. Then he did upend his drink as a dribble spilled to the floor.
“Clumsy fool…” he muttered around a smile.
“You?” I wriggled free, sitting against the back of the bed.
“Nah. Not yet.”
“You’re drunk,” I accused.
“Nah. Not yet.”
“Stuck on repeat, I see.”
He righted himself to sit next to me. As he sighed, relaxing, I swiped the bottle.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa.” He lunged over to grab it back, but I held it up and away. The result? He caged me to the bed. Not at all a bad spot to be. Within his arms, under his solid weight… His hot breath whispering across my cheek and surrounding me in his smoky scent. It was the most secure I’d ever physically felt.
Hypocrite is thy name, Everly. I’d thought to chastise him for being a sexist male, and now I was mentally simpering for his dominance. This jump in time had messed with my logic.
“It’s strong,” he warned, looking down at me.
It seemed like he was sober, clear-eyed, and serious. Until he swayed, reaching for the bottle again.
“Must be. Or you’re a lightweight.”
He narrowed his eyes while quirking one brow. Such a silly expression that I bit back a laugh. Scooting up higher, he eyed the bottle I held high in the air, then me. Then he tickled my side.
In the end, he got the bottle back. I accepted his offer of a sip, and once again, he was right. Whatever it was, it was more potent than anything back home. Goodness.
While I suffered the acidic aftertaste, I listened to his throaty voice lecture me about the failed prohibitions he’d experienced in his travels, except he called them missions.
“So, this is your job?”
“Unconventional”—he cracked out a long yawn—“career, but yeah.”
“Missions to reclaim marces? So Edward’s agents can’t get them?”
“In a nutshell.” Another yawn.
“You’re wasted.” I nudged him gently with my elbow.
He set the bottle on the little table next to the bed, nestling into the pillow he’d made with his arm behind his head. “Not surprising. After jumping time so much. All I ate was that bar. And I can’t even remember the last time I slept for more than an hour since I started this mission.”
“Sounds like you’re working too hard.”
“Not hard enough if I managed to get us stuck in freaking 2020.”
Stuck…for how long? He could get me back home, right?
The longer I wasn’t there… I frowned, staring at the wall ahead.
I’d miss more classes. Aunt Helen would worry, maybe stop by and see I wasn’t at home. I’d never really gathered close friends, always feeling like I didn’t fit in. Losing my brain-numbing and boring job at the recycling plant wouldn’t be anything to cry over, either.
“How do we get unstuck here?” I asked.
No reply.
In the moment I’d worried, he’d fallen asleep.
I turned, studying him as he rested. Free to look my fill. To appreciate the sharp angles of his stubbly jaw, the faint wrinkles creasing bracketing his eyes. I dared to trace a small cut on his lower lip, and his head rolled toward me.
Holding my breath, I waited to make sure he was still out.
I watched him sleep, as creepy as that probably was, and snuggled in closer. Mindful of his injuries, I drew the blankets up from the foot of the bed, tucking in tight to his side.
For no other reason than staying safe. That was my reason, and I was sticking to it.
Because before I could drift to sleep, I wondered if more borgs would find
us.
Chapter Ten
When I woke up, disoriented was the understatement of the day. Of the year. Decade. Okay, the century, since that was the common denominator in my life now.
Heat spread along my side, on top of my upper back, and mostly under my cheek.
I blinked slowly, wondering if the dream I’d had of a cold-then-hot-then icy shower was a premonition of my day.
Waking fully, without moving from the furnace that seemed fitted to my body, I inhaled deeply. Smoky spice. A scent that was becoming all too familiar. And arousing.
Jake.
I lifted my head to find him still sleeping. Stubble had darkened more on his rough-hewn face, a sinister shadow on his jaw just inches from mine. Without shifting any more, I got comfortable to stare.
Again.
I’d done it last night, watching him sleep. Looked like I’d found a pastime to occupy me during this weird time jump. He and I were strangers in the better sense of the word, but there was no way I could ever forget him. The lines and scars on his face and chest, how muscles pulled tight even in his rest. He frowned in his sleep, those inviting lips—warm and impatient, I recalled—tugging down into the sexiest scrooge face ever.
I rubbed my thumb near the fresh cut on his lower lip, too sleepy to care if I was assuming too much permission to feel him so intimately. Too lazy to worry about falling so deep into his allure.
He groaned, sliding lower on the pillow at my touch, yet, he didn’t open his eyes. I kept my hand where it was, cradling his chin.
“How’s your foot?” he murmured in a drowsy rasp that I couldn’t help but react to. Heat, a simmering fire, rose low in my belly.
That his first words were a question after my wellbeing was sweet. The fact he didn’t bother opening his eyes as he woke and spoke charmed me more. He knew it was me draped over him in a more-than-cozy sprawl.
I mumbled a sound of so-so.
“Checked it earlier.” He sighed, which turned into a yawn, and then he opened his eyes. Burned me raw with his lazy whiskey stare. I couldn’t look away. He’d snagged me in that stare.
“You’ve been up?”
“Yeah. Had to take more painkillers in the middle of the night.”
In the Wrong Year (Double-Check Your Destination Book 1) Page 8
