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sup-
    posed to say. Thanks for the kiss? Um, nice lips? Did you know
    there are over seven hundred species of bacteria living in the
    human mouth?
    So I laughed again. “I’m pretty sure there are rules against
    this sort of thing at astronaut boot camp.”
    “I sure hope so,” said Wilder, “or it wouldn’t be nearly as
    fun.”
    He’s dangerous, I reminded myself. And this is not the
    experience you left home for. You should run away.
    I didn’t move.
    36
    C h a p t e r 6
    Would he have kissed me again?
    I lay in my bunk staring at the tiny black dents in the white
    ceiling tiles, wondering how anyone can sleep after her first kiss.
    Or first eight.
    It might have been more, but we’d heard a noise (a security
    guard?), and I hurried back to the dorm. Though once the risk
    of capture was past, I wondered what wouldn’t be worth another
    kiss. I rolled over, pressing my fingers against a smile, and that
    was the kiss. My bare feet searching for cool, untouched spots
    at the bottom of the bed, my hand full of blanket, the press of
    my collarbone into the pillow. Every touch, every motion was a
    reminder of Wilder’s kiss.
    I didn’t want to fall asleep and miss a single hour of
    remembering. But once I did, sleep was lively with dreams.
    Wilder wasn’t at breakfast. I’m positive about that, since I
    checked a few times. (Maybe forty-eight.) He came to the tail
    end of calibration, looking sleepy, his hair wet. He winked at the
    instructor and took the chair beside me.
    “Hey,” he whispered to the guy sitting on my other side.
    “Are you checking out my girl?”
    “Wha . . . what?” the kid stuttered.
    “Not that I blame you,” Wilder said, “but have some respect
    for the lady.”
    I hid my face with my hand.
    When the bell rang for lunch, I hurried off so Wilder
    wouldn’t think I expected to eat with him. But then he was
    Shannon Hale
    walking beside me.
    “May I escort you to lunch, Danger Girl? I noticed you
    have a penchant for cheese—”
    Wilder stopped, staring at a man in the atrium wearing
    flip-flops, long cargo shorts, and a washed-out Hawaiian shirt,
    his hair a little long, his beard a little bushy. He was juxtaposed
    by three large suited men, buds in their ears.
    Dr. Howell approached the Hawaiian-shirt guy. “Hello,
    GT. Shall we talk in my office?”
    He nodded at Wilder before following Dr. Howell.
    “Who was that?” I asked.
    “My dad,” said Wilder.
    Dr. Howell had called him GT. I remembered the name
    George Theodore Wilder from Wilder’s papers.
    “Does he always dress like that?” GT was not what I imag-
    ined when I thought billionaire.
    “Yeah, it’s a power play. Come on,” he whispered, taking
    my hand.
    Another first. It felt like a surrender to let someone take
    charge of my one hand, but the surrender came with a thrill.
    He walked quickly away from the cafeteria. “I need out of
    all this for an hour, and I want you with me, okay?”
    “Okay,” I said.
    We ran into the parking lot. Wilder opened the driver’s
    side door of an expensive-looking red convertible. He gestured
    me in, and I scooted down the bench.
    “And this car is . . .”
    “Dad’s.” Wilder reached under the dash for a magnetic box,
    pulled out a spare key, and started the engine.
    “I don’t do stuff like this, you know.”
    38
    Dangerous
    “That’s what makes you so enticing. One of the things any-
    way. There’s also your black magic eyes.”
    “And my cunning mind and rapier wit, right?”
    “Hey, baby,” he said, chucking my chin, “all the guys want
    you for your mind. Isn’t it refreshing to be with someone who
    only cares about your body?”
    I laughed. It was becoming my default response. “You
    know, I’m not going to be that girl who gets pulled in by your
    cheap lines.”
    “ My lines? You’re the one who gets things steamy discuss-
    ing microscopes.”
    “Are you only capable of talking to me as if an audience
    were listening?”
    “Okay, Peligrosa.