It's About Time

by Charlotte Douglas

  Thrusting away thoughts of a future without her in his arms, he groaned and buried his fingers in her thick, honeyed hair. One by one he withdrew the offending hairpins until her tresses tumbled free about her flushed face.

  When she lifted moist, eager lips to him, he crushed his mouth to hers, mingling their breath. Her heart thudded against his ribs, driving the air from his lungs, while her hands slipped up his chest, opening his shirt, pulling it from his shoulders.

  Panting for breath, he raised his head. Blue green eyes met his.

  “Don’t stop, please,” she murmured.

  He could barely hear the words, soft puffs of breath against his cheek.

  “I need you.” Her faint voice sounded thick with desire.

  “God knows, I do not want to stop.”

  “Then don’t.”

  As he bent to kiss her once more, she caressed the muscles of his arms with light, feathery strokes, ran her fingers playfully down his chest, then dipped her hands lower.

  “I must seem bold and brash compared to the women you know,” she stated with characteristic bluntness.

  “To be honest—” he raised an eyebrow and assumed a serious face “—I like bold women.”

  At his statement, she grew still. “Have you known many?”

  “Just one. And I’d like to know her better.”

  Her laughter, a crystalline sound like water bubbling over rocks, broke the quietness of the oak grove. “I think that can be arranged.”

  Every nerve hummed with desire and he restrained himself from taking her there and then.

  “There’s an old Chinese proverb that says, ‘May you receive what you wish for.’” Her gaze never wavered, although a tinge of pink darkened the ridges of her cheeks. She drew up her knees and rolled her stockings down her calves and over trim ankles, drawing them off in a slow, sensuous gesture that almost shattered his restraint.

  “We have too little time to waste on decorum.” He grasped the hem of her chemise and tugged it over her head, freeing her breasts. Red welts from her corsets crisscrossed her skin and he smoothed them with his fingers in slow, languorous circles.

  As she pressed against him, the hardened nubs of her nipples seared his skin, and she dropped her hands to his jodhpurs and undid the buttons.

  Mischief gleamed in her eyes as she freed him of his boots and trousers. “I doubt the late Queen Victoria would approve of my behavior.”

  The gulf breeze flowed over his bare skin but had no cooling effect on his ardor. Loosening the drawstring at her waist, he gently stripped away the last of her garments. “She would advise you to lie back and think of England,” he teased.

  “You are all I can think of now.” She trailed her hands down the indentation of his spine, drawing him to her.

  Beneath him, her tanned body glowed golden in a shaft of sunlight spilling through the branches. Dear God, he loved this woman, loved her enough to spend the rest of his days with her and cherish her every minute of them. But in a matter of days, perhaps only hours, Victoria would be lost to him for all time.

  He poised above her, rigid with desire, longing to enter her with one sure, powerful thrust, to claim her as his own, yet fearful of sending her back to the future carrying his child.

  As if she’d read his mind, she brushed his cheek with the back of her hand. “I won’t get pregnant. I told you, the women of my time know how to prevent it.”

  The lie came easily to her lips. If he wouldn’t return with her, at least, with any luck, she might have his child, a reminder always of the only man she’d ever loved.

  As he caressed the warm, moist heat of her, all thought of past and future disappeared, vanquished by his touch. Pleasure erupted like fire, flowing through her veins, consuming her in its blaze.

  He lowered his hips to hers and she gasped when he entered her. Clasping him closer, she tightened her body around him, ascending to a height of awareness that blocked all sensation but the pulsing thrust of him.

  For one instant time stopped, the sun stood still, the wind held its breath. Deep within the core of her, electricity exploded, jolting her with its intensity, and the only sound was her voice blending with his as they plummeted together into forever.

  * * *

  DRESSED in her shift, Tory leaned against the rough bark of the oak, watching Rand unpack the basket the hotel chef had prepared for them. She wished she had a camera to capture the look of him—tousled hair, bare feet, breeches only partly buttoned, riding low on his narrow hips. Would she remember the scent, the feel of him when she returned to her own time? Her hunger for him began to build once more.

  He removed a bottle of champagne from an oilcloth bag filled with cracked ice, then worked the cork loose. After pouring the bubbling liquid into crystal flutes and handing her a glass, he sat beside her.

  “A toast.” He raised his glass. “To the woman I love.”

  She raised the wine to her lips, but she couldn’t drink with emotion closing her throat. She blinked away tears. “Ask Emma to send you back with me.”

  He set his glass aside and reclined with his head in her lap. “You know that wouldn’t work.”

  She laced her fingers through his thick, fine hair. “Why not? Men enjoy the same rights and privileges in my time that they do in yours.”

  “There’s a difference. Because I’m accustomed to women’s dependency, I believe a man must support the woman he loves and give her all the comforts and luxuries she deserves.”

  “I have comfort and luxuries. I want you.”

  He closed his eyes, unable to face the love shining in hers. How could he explain that he was bound to the customs of his time? That he could no more rely on a woman to support him than he could commit murder? That he had grown accustomed to power and wealth and that he would shrivel and die if he couldn’t offer them with all their advantages to the woman he loved? Would she think him shallow and money hungry, or would she understand? He decided not to risk it.

  “If our lives are doomed to unhappiness, as Emma suggests,” he said, “at least we’ll have today to remember.”

  A smile fluttered at the corners of her mouth, red and swollen from his kisses. “It was memorable, wasn’t it?”

  A shaft of jealousy stabbed him. “And were the others memorable, too?”

  “Others?” Her smile faded.

  “Obviously I’m not the first.” He hated himself for the truculence in his voice. Who was he to throw stones?

  Her smile returned and love for him sparkled in her eyes. “I wasn’t a virgin, if that’s what you mean.”

  He struggled against closed-mindedness and lost. “Who was he?”

  “No one important.” She ran a teasing finger down the bridge of his nose. “I was only eighteen, at college and away from home for the first time in my life. He was a fraternity man, a senior.”

  “Did you love him?”

  “I was young, impressionable—I thought I did. I was dazzled by his good looks and important position on campus. He pursued me until he got what he wanted, another score for the frat house competition, then dropped me. When I understood what had happened, I was happy to be rid of him.” Her voice faltered. “Does it matter that much to you?”

  As he gazed at her face, he realized nothing mattered but her, that she loved him and that tomorrow he would lose her.

  “I was engaged once,” he confessed.

  “The mysterious Selena?”

  He nodded. “Her father and Uncle Cyrus were partners. From childhood we were encouraged to marry. Then, four weeks ago, Selena eloped with a man twice her age—and three times my fortune.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  Sunlight danced on her golden hair, kissed the burnished skin of her shoulders and illuminated her eyes. He sat up and gathered her in his arms. “Don’t be. She didn’t break my heart. She only wounded my pride. I’d never known real love until I met you.”

  When they broke from their embrace, he reached into his pocket and extracte
d an ivory-handled penknife. “I want to leave you something for the future, something to remember me by.”

  He slowly opened the blade and reached toward her. The tempered steel flashed in the sunlight as he buried the knife in the bark beside her head. Then, with painstaking care, he began to carve.

  “What is it?” she asked.

  “Day after tomorrow is Valentine’s Day, and you’ll be gone. But if this tree survives the next hundred years, you can find it again when Emma sends you forward in time.”

  She watched him work, enjoying the firm, steady movements of his hands. When he brushed away the debris and sat back to admire his handiwork, tears rolled down her flushed cheeks.

  “Thank you. It’s beautiful.”

  He pulled her into his arms again and stared at the message to the future he’d scored deeply into the oak.

  Inside the carved heart he’d engraved, Rand loves Victoria—for all time.

  Chapter Eleven

  “I’m sick of wearing black.” Wrinkling her face in distaste, Tory eyed the jet-beaded evening gown Emma had spread across the bed.

  The little woman balled her fists on her hips and glared at Tory with exasperation. “You’re supposed to be in mourning for your parents.”

  “That’s—”

  “Old-fashioned? Of course it is, but when in Rome...” Emma turned and started rummaging through the bureau drawers. “Where’s your corset?”

  “I tossed it into the bay.” She’d taken great delight in watching the receding tide carry away the instrument of torture.

  “You what?” Emma made a clucking sound with her tongue and shook her head. “No matter, there’s another here somewhere.”

  “And if there isn’t, I’m sure you’ll just poof one out of thin air.” Tory lay on her stomach at the foot of the bed and watched Emma scour the room. “How can I consume an eight-course dinner if I’m tied up so tight I can’t swallow?”

  “Ladies aren’t supposed to have appetites,” Emma said with a sniff. “Ah, here it is.” She extracted a stiff undergarment from the bottom drawer.

  Tory rose reluctantly and lifted her arms while Emma tightened the offensive corset around her midriff. She had an appetite, all right. In fact, she was starving. She sighed with pleasure, remembering the long, leisurely afternoon making love with Rand beneath the oaks. What a delicious way to burn calories.

  But her happiness dissolved at the thought of her remaining time ticking quickly away. By this time tomorrow, if Angelina and Jason had been united as planned, Rand would be only a memory.

  Damn the Victorians and their attitudes toward women. If their society was different, she might stay, knowing the love she and Rand shared stood a chance of lasting a lifetime. If only Emma could help. But although she possessed extraordinary powers, even a fairy godmother couldn’t change the entire turn-of-the-century culture to ensure one woman’s happiness.

  Fidgeting against the confines of the corset, she adjusted the weight of her petticoats. She might learn to accept these ridiculous clothes if she could at least have the satisfaction of her work. Fat chance of that, either.

  The women she’d observed at the hotel were little more than mannequins for their stylish clothes, waited on hand and foot by servants, forced to retire to drawing rooms after dinner while the men smoked cigars, drank brandy and discussed business and important events of the day.

  Better Rand remember her as she was now than as the unhappy shrew she’d become if she remained. Better she remember him as he’d been that afternoon than grow to resent him as her own personal representative of repressive male society. For someone who called herself a facilitator, Emma had done one heck of a job screwing up their lives.

  Yet the pleasant-faced woman standing before her smiled as if she hadn’t a clue to the misery she’d caused. Tory sighed. In spite of everything, she couldn’t resent the time she’d spent with Rand.

  She lifted her arms, then pushed them into the narrow cap sleeves as Emma settled the silk gown over her head. When she turned toward the cheval glass, a stranger peered back at her, an elegant Victorian lady with golden hair arranged in a bouffant crown held in place by exotic wisps of black feathers. The constrictions of the corset molded her figure into an hourglass shape, accentuated by a fitted bodice and a skirt with tucks, pleats and a sweeping train.

  When she observed her handiwork, Emma’s nose wrinkled. “You’re too brown for a woman of your class.”

  Tory mistrusted the contemplative sparkle of Emma’s amethyst eyes.

  “Leave my skin alone—”

  Too late. A sensation like a thousand tiny needles swept over her body, and when she looked in the mirror again, her complexion gleamed flawlessly white.

  “So much for my hard-earned Florida tan,” she grumbled.

  “Randolph Trent is an extremely wealthy and powerful man,” Emma scolded. “Although you’re returning to your own time soon, he must maintain his position and reputation in society. Since you are posing as his cousin, anything you do or say will reflect on him long after you’re gone. I hope you’ll keep that in mind this evening.”

  Tory nodded as she tugged on black kid gloves that reached above her elbows. Why ladies insisted on covering their arms while baring their shoulders and half their breasts, she’d never understand. She longed to rebel, but Emma spoke the truth. She must do nothing to offend Rand’s friends. The last thing she wanted was for him to think badly of her. She tried not to think how her leaving would affect him.

  “Move along now.” Emma shooed her toward the door. “You mustn’t keep the others waiting.”

  “Aren’t you coming?”

  She shook her gray curls. “It was kind of Mrs. Fairchild to include me, but I’ve already sent my regrets. The less I’m seen by humans the better.”

  “But my chaperon—”

  “Mrs. Fairchild and Angelina will fill that responsibility for me.”

  Tory closed the door behind her with a sigh. Her life was out of control, like a runaway train with Emma at the throttle.

  * * *

  “BY DAMN, that’s a handsome woman,” a man behind Rand exclaimed.

  With a fierce tightening in his chest and a telltale stinging beneath his eyelids, Rand watched Victoria descend the stairs to the lobby. When he’d seen her naked in the sunlight that afternoon, he’d believed she could never look more beautiful, but the sight of her on the staircase robbed him of speech and breath.

  Her halo of golden hair, the creamy translucence of her neck and shoulders—unadorned except for a cameo nestled on a black velvet ribbon in the hollow of her throat—and the austere lines of her black gown made the other women in the lobby look like strutting peacocks.

  “I say, Trent,” Jason Phiswick whispered loudly at his side, “your cousin is a stunner.”

  “Should I be jealous, Jason?” Angelina asked as she joined them.

  Jason whispered his answer in Angelina’s ear, and with an approving laugh, she clasped his arm possessively. But Rand’s concern was for Victoria.

  He met her at the foot of the stairs, lowering his voice so others wouldn’t hear. “You look pale. I hope the afternoon wasn’t too much for you.”

  Her aquamarine eyes danced as she shook her head. “Too much? Quite the opposite.”

  He shot her a devilish grin. “I’ll see what I can do to remedy that.”

  When he offered her his arm, the desire to throw her over his shoulder and carry her upstairs to his suite, dinner party be damned, overcame him. But the sight of Angelina, laughing and smiling as she stood with Jason and her parents, reminded him of their mission. He faced a long evening with Victoria within his reach, but beyond his grasp.

  “Let me introduce you to the others.” He resigned himself to sharing her company.

  Tory greeted Angelina, who seemed happier than ever in the company of Jason, a short, stocky young man with deep brown eyes, blond hair and a pleasant disposition.

  “And this is Mrs. Fairchild,” Ra
nd said.

  A large woman, dressed in violent purple, reminded Tory of Barney the Dinosaur in color, size and bovine features. The stout matron looked down her nose through a golden lorgnette, her lips puckering with disapproval. “Caswell? I don’t believe I know your family.”

  For Angelina’s sake, Tory ignored the woman’s rudeness. “Why should you? My parents lived in Atlanta, and I understand you’re from the Midwest.”

  “Atlanta?” Mrs. Fairchild repeated as if Tory had said leper colony, then turned away.

  Her husband’s reaction was more friendly. “Any relative of Trent’s is welcome at our table. Isn’t that right, Angelina?”

  The pretty young woman flashed Tory a brilliant smile. “I’m so glad you could join us.” She leaned over, whispering so the others couldn’t hear. “There’re not enough young people here to suit me—most everyone’s my parents’ age.”

  The vivacious girl before her was as different as night from day from the unhappy ghost Tory had previously known. She had to save Angelina from her accident, not only because Emma would then restore Tory to her own time, but because such a girl didn’t deserve the misery her premature death had caused.

  “Victoria.” Rand interrupted her thoughts. “This is Phineas Thibault, another business associate of mine.”

  A tall, dark-haired man with hawklike features offered her his arm. “May I escort you in to dinner, Miss Caswell?”

  As they entered the hotel dining room, Tory caught her breath. The room looked like a set from Martin Scorsese’s The Age of Innocence. Crystal chandeliers cast a warm glow upward toward ceiling panels of Tiffany stained glass and down on a roomful of elegant people. Men in snowy, starched shirts and dark evening clothes and women whose pale shoulders glowed above rich, jewel-toned fabrics gathered around tables gleaming with fine china, sterling silver and dozens of lighted tapers. Huge epergnes of hothouse blossoms decorated the room, and the delicious aroma of roasted meats and hot breads mingled with the flowers’ fragrances.

  Tory found herself seated on Fairchild’s right at the far end of the table from Rand, who’d been given the place of honor beside Mrs. Fairchild.