Out of This World Read online

  “I’m really confused,” I said in a smaller voice than I’d have liked.

  “That makes two of us.” Kellan took my hand. “Come on.”

  “To the couple?”

  “Oh yeah.”

  They were sitting in the dining room. Well, the guy was sitting. The woman was straddling his lap, kissing him as if she planned on sucking his lips off and making them hers.

  “Ahem,” Kellan said, and they jumped apart. “Hi.”

  The young woman stood up and straightened her blouse with a sheepish grin. The blouse was already buttoned crooked. And because I was now Supergirl, I could see that her bra was all askance. Yeah, definitely seeing waaay more of people than I’d like.

  “Serena,” she said, and thrust out her hand.

  The Harry look-alike stood and pushed up his glasses. “William.”

  We shook their hands and introduced ourselves, too. And then Kellan asked where they were from.

  “Far,” Serena said. “Took forever to get here.”

  William nodded.

  “Far like…back East far?” Kellan probed.

  “Farther,” William said, and took Serena’s hand. “So what about you two? How long are you staying?”

  “Until Monday,” I said. “You?”

  “Same,” was the noncommittal answer.

  I wanted to ask if they’d seen the lightning yesterday, if they’d suddenly found themselves equipped with odd, inexplicable powers, but something about them sort of said “Don’t ask.”

  And I got goose bumps all over again.

  “We’re starving,” William said. “I bet you guys are, too, given all that you’ve been through since the swap.”

  The swap.

  The swap?

  Kellan and I looked at each other. We’d been doing that a lot since we’d gotten here.

  “The swap?” Kellan repeated.

  “You know.” Serena simulated either having an epileptic seizure or being zapped with a bolt of electricity.

  Or…lightning.

  Kellan tightened his grip on my hand. “The swap of what exactly?”

  Serena glanced bemusedly at William, as if she couldn’t believe we didn’t immediately grasp what she was saying. “Um…nothing.”

  “No,” I insisted, “you meant something.”

  Serena, chewing on her lower lip now, shook her head.

  And my goose bumps grew to full-fledged mountains as a deeply rooted certainty grew in my belly: We were truly the only ones who didn’t know what the hell was going on.

  “Kellan?” I said as casually as I could, gesturing to the door. “A minute?”

  “Oh, absolutely.”

  I tugged him out of the dining room and into the hall, where we stared at each other for yet another long beat.

  “Okay, I’m now officially freaked out,” I whispered, and started to have trouble drawing air into my lungs.

  Kellan pulled me around a corner and pinned me back against the wall, lifting my chin with his hand. “Deep breaths.”

  I realized I was panting, nearly hyperventilating. “They know what happened.”

  “Yeah, they do. Keep breathing, Rach.” He waited me out, holding me between him and the wall, stroking his thumb over my jaw, holding my gaze with his incredible blue one, until I could breathe without feeling like I was going to pass out. Finally I nodded.

  “We’re going to figure this out,” he promised, his hands still on me, wrapping me in a hug I desperately needed.

  I’m not sure when I felt the nature of the embrace change from comfort to, well, way more than comfort, but suddenly I became vibrantly aware of how he had me sandwiched between the hard wall and his equally hard body. Taking his bloodied hand in mine, I ran my thumb over his knuckles.

  He made a sound of pain, and I met his gaze.

  “I’m fine,” he said.

  A new mantra with us apparently.

  “You don’t sound—”

  “Fine,” he said again, letting out another rough sigh when I pressed up against him. Hmm. Maybe that hadn’t been a moan of pain at all.

  Kellan shook his head. “Ignore me.”

  But I’d spent a lot of time ignoring things I shouldn’t. My own heart, for instance. Kellan’s heart. It was easier, far easier, to do that, because when it came right down to it, I was one big, fancy chicken with my feelings. Always had been.

  Not exactly a pleasant revelation to have about myself. “Kel—”

  “No.” He made a rough sound of exasperation, and if I wasn’t mistaken, there was also some humor in there as well. “Not here.”

  “But—”

  “Later, Rach.”

  I squirmed a little, and he made the dark, erotic sound again, the one that melted my bones. He had me pinned, the length of him against me, so that I couldn’t move a single muscle.

  Not that I wanted to move a single muscle, because Kellan’s body was to die for, and in this position—that is, me flat against the wall and him flat against me, one thigh between mine, his hands holding me still—there was no place I’d rather be.

  Well, except alone with him somewhere, with him buried deep inside me…

  “Listen,” he whispered, and I realized William’s and Serena’s voices carried from the dining room through the wall.

  I looked at the plaster, and gasped. “I can see through the wall!”

  “What are they doing?”

  It took me a moment to focus. I still wasn’t used to being able to do this. “They’re hugging.”

  “Hugging?”

  “He’s backed her to the wall. He’s going to kiss her. Omigod, he’s going to—”

  “What?”

  William cupped Serena’s face with a gentle tenderness that made me feel like a voyeur. “They’re looking into each other’s eyes and talking,” I whispered. “But I can’t hear what they’re saying. Too bad my ears didn’t get the superpowers.”

  “Yeah, just what we need. More insanity. Here.” Kellan pressed his ear to the wall, and I followed suit.

  “They didn’t know.” Serena’s voice came through clearly. “How could they not know?”

  “Marilee didn’t tell them.” William sounded surprised. “That seems highly unlikely.”

  “Not to mention unethical,” Serena said. “You can’t pass off an ability to an unsuspecting. That’s just bad form.”

  “Honey, not everyone is as open as you are. Maybe…”

  “Maybe what?”

  “Maybe Marilee had her reasons,” William said.

  Reasons?

  Abilities?

  An unsuspecting? My god, I really had ended up in the Twilight Zone.

  I might have gone running into that dining room to demand answers, but one, Marilee came down the hallway.

  She looked as cool as ice, as always, carrying a tray that was loaded with freshly cut fruit and the promised casserole.

  “Sorry,” she said, slightly breathless, still not looking at us. “Here’s some—”

  Kellan yanked me close.

  “What—” I started, but saw his warning, and his intent.

  He didn’t want Marilee to realize we’d been eavesdropping, and there was only one way to explain us standing there.

  He kissed me.

  Hard.

  Deep.

  Wet.

  “Oh!” Marilee gasped, apparently finally looking up. “Um, excuse me.”

  She vanished into the dining room.

  And yet Kellan kept on kissing me. And kissing me. And kissing…

  The guy so knew his way around the inside of my mouth that I actually lost track of things, pulled him close and enjoyed.

  Chapter 12

  Kellan’s view of things

  I f anyone had told me in high school that someday I’d have Rachel Wood pinned against a wall, kissing her as if she were the next best thing to air, I’d have laughed up a lung.

  Yeah, she was that far out of my league.

  But then again, her