Kiss Across Chaos (Kiss Across Time #10) - Tracy Cooper-Posey Page 0,16
of there before he did anything even more stupid, and slid and staggered down the steps to the icy pavement, his heart thundering and his head aching.
When Taylor phoned, Jesse was more than happy to abandon the scene she was writing. “You usually jump over to talk,” Jesse pointed out. “I could put the kettle on. I’ve got good coffee now.” She glanced at the time on her laptop. “Wow, it’s later than I realized. I should stop for dinner, anyway.”
She had taken all of yesterday afternoon to walk to the nearest supermarket and carry eight bags of groceries back. She’d eat in from now on. Not that it would stop any of the family from reaching her if they wanted to.
Yesterday morning she had found fresh croissants and coffee waiting beside her laptop and her backpack on the chair, telling her Aran had been there. Oddly, his uninvited visit had not bothered her. She was used to the family popping in and out, and she had implied he should return the pack.
Only, the smell of good coffee wafting to her while she wrote convinced her to do something to fix the coffee situation that didn’t involve French style patisseries. Especially genuine Parisian patisseries.
She had sent Aran a carefully inelegant and casual text. Thanks 4 returning my backpack…croissants were divine.
He hadn’t replied but she didn’t notice until later that night, when she stopped to fix dinner. She was still trying to figure out if him not responding was a good or a bad thing.
Taylor said into Jesse’s ear, “No, I don’t want to jump there right now. It’s…well, it’s a awkward mother thing, Jesse.”
Jesse laughed. “You’re not awkward.”
“I feel awkward,” Taylor admitted. “Only, Aran hasn’t returned my texts for two days now, and…well…”
Jesse squeezed the phone. “Doesn’t Aran always take a while to get back to you? He takes weeks to respond to me.” When she bothered sending him messages at all, which she hadn’t done for a very long time.
“That’s where the awkwardness comes in,” Taylor said, with a deep sigh. “Veris said he and Brody sort of argued about Aran in front of you at Thanksgiving, and you must have noticed that Aran isn’t…well, around, these days.”
“Yeah, I’d noticed,” Jesse said, keeping her tone light.
“And normally, he takes his time getting back to me but this time it just…feels different. And I can’t figure out if I’m being a paranoid mother or if something is…I don’t know. A tremor on the timescape? But I’m worried, Jesse.”
Jesse bit her lip. “But you won’t come here to check on him,” she finished.
“Because I’m his mother,” Taylor said in a rush. “He’s a grown man. I won’t crowd him like that.”
Jesse rubbed her brow. “You’re asking me to do it, instead,” she guessed.
“Asking, yes. Not insisting. I know it’s an imposition, Jesse. But Aran talks to you and Marit and Alannah more frequently than he does to us, so maybe it won’t feel so invasive if you do it. You’re already in Washington.”
Jesse held her tongue. Taylor really had no idea how little Aran talked to any of them. Instead, she said, “I can try phoning him.”
“Is that what you normally do?” Taylor asked hesitantly.
Jesse sighed. “I would normally send a text.” She hesitated. “He hasn’t answered mine from two days ago, but I didn’t think anything of it. He usually doesn’t answer.”
She could almost feel Taylor’s worry spike.
“I’ll go around and see him,” Jesse said firmly. She hesitated again. “But you’ll have to send me the address.”
“Thank you, Jesse,” Taylor said, her voice wobbling. Jesse wondered if she was crying. Could vampires cry? She wasn’t sure about that. It was a question to ask one of the vampires, when they were very mellow, and in the mood to talk. “I’ll hang up and send the address right now.”
Jesse put her phone down and flipped her laptop over to the maps. When the address popped up on her phone screen, she plugged it into the maps app, then consulted the D.C. bus schedules. Her heart sank. It would take her three hours and four buses to get across the river and into Georgetown, at this time of night. There were twenty-minute waits between each bus…and it was already below thirty out there.
She picked up her phone. A phone call was going to have to do. She pulled up the text she’d sent Aran two days ago and tapped the phone number to make it dial.
Even before the call connected, a feminine-sounding