But I’d love to collaborate if possible.” Mark was a brilliant mathematician and he might be of great help. Unfortunately, she couldn’t share any of her results as of yet. “I’m just getting started and don’t have anything to share.”
“What mountains?” he asked.
“Washington,” she said, lying almost easily. She’d been spending too much time with immortals who thought everything should be secret. At least the queen was on her side and wanted to share results with humans if necessary. How odd. A realization smacked Promise in the head. She was no longer human.
Then what was she? She was immortal but not an immortal being. Huh. Fascinating.
“Promise?” Mark asked. “Are you listening?”
“Of course.” For goodness’ sake. She’d lied again. The outer door opened. “I have to go. I’ll be in touch.” She clicked off as Ivar walked in, dropping weapons on the duvet near the window.
“Who was that?” Ivar toed off his combat boots. His eyes were a dusky green, and his shoulders tense. Lines fanned out from the sides of his generous mouth, making him look exhausted.
“Mark Brookes,” she said, tilting her head to study him. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing is wrong.” Ivar reached her and took the laptop, gently placing it on the bedside table. “I’m just tired. The healing cells are working constantly on my brain, and they take a great deal of energy. Add in training with knives and dealing with crazy Benny, and I could use some sleep.” He sat on the bed and dragged her onto his lap, kissing her deeply. “What did Brookes want?”
“He wants to collaborate on the grant proposals,” Promise said, her voice husky. Ivar could kiss. Her entire body went from tired to full burn.
“Oh.” Ivar kissed her nose. “I guess we should announce the winners of those grants so people stop working on them. Hey. By the way, congrats. You won a grant.”
She grinned. “No kidding.” Her funds were apparently unlimited now, anyway. “Does the money go to the university?”
“It does, and it’s unfortunate you don’t,” he said, rubbing his chin on the top of her head. “Unless you really want to go teach for a couple of decades. Then you’ll have to disappear for a while, though.”
She shook her head. “No, I’m on this teleporting problem and can’t think of teaching until I solve it. But it’s nice the university will get the funds.” She’d done a good thing for her alma mater, and that satisfied her. A moment or two to bask in that victory was all the time she had, though. Her closed laptop mocked her. “I checked the news, and there haven’t been any more reports of kidnapped physicists.”
“We have guards stationed around the world protecting whomever we think needs it,” Ivar said, raking his hand through his long hair. “There have been a couple of attempts, but we have good resources in place.”
That was sweet. She swallowed. “I have to talk to you.”
“Ditto.” He smiled. “I teleported today.”
Her breath caught. “No way.”
“Way.”
He was quick and funny. She hugged him as much as she could from his lap. “That’s so wonderful. Let’s go somewhere.” Before she had to give him the bad news.
“Not yet.” He yawned. “My control wasn’t great. I’ll need a couple more days to get it down, but I’m close. Then we can go anywhere you want.” His chin lowered, and his gaze ran over her face. “You’re tense. What’s going on?”
She gulped. Giving bad news was often a normal day for a theoretical physicist. “The math doesn’t work, Ivar.” She used his name and not the Viking nickname to make sure he understood the seriousness of her statement. “I’ve worked the equations back and forth, studying all that we’ve learned.” And using theories she’d created along with Kane Kayrs in the application of traveling through dimensions via wormholes. “You can’t take Quade’s place, and you can’t set him free. The results of either eventuality could be catastrophic. I’m sorry.”
* * * *
Ivar set Promise on the bed and backed away, his gaze on her. No way had she said what he’d thought. “There has to be some mistake.”
She shook her head. “No. I tried to avoid Newton’s first law, and so did Kane. But it’s true. There’s a status quo in the configuration of the, let’s call them bubbles, right now. After Ronan’s broke, the other two probably, as much as we can theorize, used gravitational pulls to find a new normal. Every world is connected, or you wouldn’t have been able to go