Strange.
Then another time she had the distinct feeling she was being followed. She had been walking through downtown with her mother one afternoon, but every time she turned around she had seen no one.
She paid close attention to the news for any sign of Dane. Not that she knew what his calling card was; she didn’t. She hoped for something—anything—showing her he was still around. She had to admit she had a feeling he had been nearby when there was a double homicide of two unidentified men in her apartment complex, one building over.
And she even thought he had something to do with the fact Conner ended up dead only a day after the café shooting. He had died of massive internal bleeding, so the doctor said, but she had her suspicions there were other forces at work. Like Dane.
Skye insisted on being her father’s personal assistant at Ransom Research and Development, much to his dismay and despite the fact he had a personal secretary already. It was the only way she could keep a watchful eye on him.
She had stopped at her favorite coffee place, The Bitter End, and picked up two coffees and a couple of scones. Her father’s favorite was the dark rich brew, no sugar, while she preferred the latte with an extra shot of espresso.
“Skye, dear, that’s really not necessary.” But he took the cup from her anyway.
“Sure it is.” She spread paper napkins on his desk and gave him one of the blueberry scones.
“You’ve certainly been hovering over your mother and me since that café incident.” He sipped his coffee thoughtfully as he leaned back in his chair. “What gives?”
“Nothing.” She shrugged, putting on her best innocent look, and sipped her latte. She sank into the chair opposite his desk, broke off a corner of the scone and popped it in her mouth. God, how she missed delightfully fattening pastries and lattes.
“You make a very poor liar.” Setting aside his cup, he picked up his pen and scribbled in his notebook.
“Dad, there is something I need to talk to you about.” Before she launched into her prepared speech, she stood up and shut the door quietly. He didn’t even notice.
“Hm?”
“I know about the time bender,” she said.
He dropped his pen and looked up at her, momentary surprise flickering across his face. “I was wondering when you were going to bring that up.”
Shock flickered through her as she stared at him. And then it occurred to her why he would know that. She had seen him in Brazil. “You remember, don’t you?” She sat down again, leaning her elbows on her knees.
“I do.” He tented his fingers and looked thoughtful.
“Are you planning to sell the bender to the Chinese?”
“Heavens, no.” He smiled then as he leaned his arms on the desk and laced his hands. “After I saw you in Brazil, I did a little snooping. Found out Conner’s master plan. I had never planned to sell it to anyone, but Conner managed to leak the fact we had developed a time-traveling device. I started getting calls from some man interested in purchasing it, so I lied. Told him I was selling it for mass production. And who better than the Chinese?”
“You know he and Charles Ridgewood stole the journals, right?”
“I know, but it doesn’t matter much anymore, does it?”
“Why’s that?”
“I destroyed the time bender project. All of the plans, the journals, my notes, the prototypes, everything. I even went back to Brazil and destroyed the lab there. Tia says hello, by the way.” He winked. “So you see? I took your warning to heart.”
Skye couldn’t help it, she burst out laughing. “Oh, Daddy. I’m so glad to hear that. I can’t tell you how relieved I am.”
“I realized, Skye, dear, that bending time is not for me.”
“Good.” She stood up. “I think I’ll go see Mom. I told her we’d go shopping this afternoon.”
“Okay, but this entire conversation is our little secret.”
“Of course it is.” She picked up her coffee and the remains of her scone. Rounding the desk, she kissed his cheek before heading for the door.
“Oh, and Skye?”
“Yeah?”
“What happened to that young man you were with?”
“I don’t know, Dad.”
He gave her a small smile and nodded, as if he understood perfectly. “I’m sure you’ll meet again.”
She sincerely hoped so.
* * *
Late that night, Skye sat in the middle of her living room floor staring at the pregnancy test on the coffee table. The plus sign in the round window stared back at her. It was true—she was pregnant. She sighed wistfully and placed her hand on her abdomen.
“Hello in there,” she whispered. “Sure hope I can find your dad.”
She started making plans to raise the child alone and she had yet to tell her parents. How could she explain that to her mother?
Classical music lilted through the apartment, soothing her. The scent of vanilla and cherry blossom candles filled the air. The small flames flickered throughout the darkened apartment. She rose, walking to the patio, glancing at the digital clock on the wall. The pale green dial read two minutes after three in the morning.
Skye whisked open the French door and paused, letting the cool late autumn air hit her in the face. It had been nearly two weeks since the last tear she shed. But it didn’t change anything. She thought of Dane every damn day since his disappearing act.
Perhaps he had melted into society. A nameless man, never to be found. She couldn’t find him in any phone directory. She didn’t know where to look. For all she knew, he wasn’t even in the country.
She’d lost the man she loved. And it hurt like hell.
Dane was gone from her life forever. Leaving her with the memories of everything that had happened between them. How could she forget Dane with his cocky grin and deep dimples? Memories of his face flashed through her mind.
Dane riding on his horse through the stark white snow to save her from the madman. Dane with his glistening chest hovering over her, his body nestled between her legs, sunlight spilling over his sleek torso. His fiery, depthless, pale green eyes. Dane with his spiky black hair, his gruff voice, his caustic comments.
Skye puffed out a breath, trying to expel the lump of tears in her throat.
A soft rap at her door startled her out of her desolate thoughts. It sent her heart racing in her chest. Who in the hell could be knocking on her door at three in the morning? She stood on the threshold of the door, cocked her head and listened.
The knock sounded again, this time a little louder. She charged toward the door, not even thinking to look out the peephole before unlatching the deadbolt and swinging open the door, intending to unleash her fury on the late-night intruder.
But when the door swung open, her heart skipped a beat. She stared wordlessly at him and blinked her surprise. She suddenly felt lightheaded, almost faint. Standing in the breezeway in the yellow glow of the porch light was Dane Fortune.
Good God…
Her brain couldn’t function beyond that and she stood there, one hand on the door, the other balled in a fist, and stared at him. Words froze in her throat. He stared back at her with those haunting eyes, his jaw set in a firm line.
He wore a black, button-down shirt, unbuttoned at the top and she could see the sprinkling of chest hair. It teased her, taunted her and beckoned for her to touch, to taste. His hands were shoved deep in his faded jeans…jeans that hugged his thick muscular thighs ending in scuffed black boots. Realizing she had given him a thorough once-over, she lifted her gaze back to his face, expecting to see that smug smile. But he wasn’t smiling.
“I was nowhere near your neighborhood,” he said at last, his voice rumbling that deep baritone in his chest she loved so well.
She blinked, unsure of what to say. Words failed her. Had he remembered?
“Can I come in?”
Wordlessly, she stepped aside and swung the door wide. Dane brushed past her, so close she cou
ld smell the scent of his cologne. Something clean and cool and delicious. A scent making her want to rip his shirt off and slide her mouth all over his skin.
Desperate, she shoved away the fantasy. She watched him take two more steps and pause, turning to look at her in the shadowy darkness. She swung the door shut and twisted the deadbolt. A mixture of silvery moonlight and pale yellowish light from the streetlamps poured into the open French door, surrounding his sexy, lean form.
It had been weeks—though it seemed an eternity—since she’d last seen him, but he hadn’t changed. He was still the same tall, gorgeous man she remembered. The only difference now was he’d had a shower and clean clothes. In fact, it was odd to see him wearing regular street clothes. She longed to run her fingers across his smooth jaw, to feel his roughened cheeks. Despite him being clean shaven, she could still see the shadowy outline of his facial hair.
“Skye, I…” He clamped his mouth shut again.
She waited, her heart a painful cadence in her chest.
He glanced around, his eyes gazing over the shadowy lines of her furniture. “Nice place.”
She only nodded. What could she say to him besides small talk? She couldn’t very well tell him he had broken her heart the day he ran out of the café. Even if he didn’t know who she was and what they’d been through. He hadn’t remembered.
Still, she wished she wore something a little more flattering than a pair of old boxers and an oversized T-shirt. She held his steady gaze. Her jaw muscles flexed and she waited a breathless moment.
“You remembered, didn’t you?” Her voice sounded hollow to her own ears.
He held up his right hand, showed her the silvery S-shaped scar on the heel of his hand. “You could say that.”
“How long ago?”
“A few weeks.”
Weeks? He waited weeks to come here?
“I should have come sooner,” he said, as if he could read her thoughts. “But I wasn’t sure.”
“About?”
“Seeing you again.”
“Oh. Right.” She chewed her lower lip, unsure of what to say next. “So why did you come?”
“I couldn’t stop thinking about you.” He turned away, his hands shoved deep into his pockets. “I saw you in a dream one night. I was drowning and you saved me.”
She gasped and he looked at her over his shoulder. “I…had the same dream.”
“Somehow we’re connected that way. My guess is it has to do with the time bender.”
Skye knew he had to be right. It certainly wasn’t the first dream they’d shared and probably wouldn’t be the last.
“And I had a visitor. A certain Druid by the name of Elwyn.”
“Elwyn came to see you?”
“In that same dream…when I reached for you, I heard her voice. She told me to regain that which I have lost.”
“And have you?”
“I don’t know yet.”
He surveyed her apartment, looking at the family photos on the walls, the tattered sofa from her college days she hadn’t bothered to replace. She watched him as his eyes dropped down to the coffee table and paused.
Shit!
She had forgotten it was there. He reached down, picked up the test, stared down at it. Her world wavered in that one long, agonizing moment while the discovery sunk in. Her heart beat furiously in her chest, her ears.
“How long have you known?” He didn’t—wouldn’t—look at her.
“A while.” She sounded timid, shy. “Since…Stonehenge.”
Even from this distance, she could see the fire flashing in his eyes. “Stonehenge?”
“Naise…she told me.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” He almost sounded angry.
The words rushed out of her then. “I didn’t believe her. I had to find out for myself. I didn’t want to tell you, Dane, because…” She paused.
“Because why?”
She pursed her lips. “I think you know.”
He tossed the test on the table. “You knew I’d stop us from coming home. Didn’t you?”
“I guess so.”
“And I should have too. Do you know how many times I’ve saved your life since then? And your parents?”
Fear trickled through her. “Are we safe? Is it over?”
“It’s over.”
Something, though, told her it wasn’t. That he said it to make her feel better. She stepped toward him, holding out her hand. “Let me see it.”
He placed his palm in her hand and she ran the pad of her thumb over the scar.
“That day I saw you at the café,” he said. “When you stood between me and your mother…” He shuddered out a breath. “Jesus, Skye you look just like her.”
She couldn’t look at him, couldn’t meet his gaze. All she could do was stare at the scar she had put on his hand. A lump formed in her throat and she knew any minute now she was going to break down.
“I had every intention of killing her that day. And you, too.”
Her pulse fluttered as a sick feeling crept over her.
“But something you said stopped me.”
She looked up at him finally, meeting that gaze. “What was that?”
“You told me I wasn’t a killer and that I was a good man.”
And wasn’t it true? He had saved her life from Sovold on the cold mountain in the futuristic Ice Age, he had rescued Tia’s mother and sister from certain doom. He had stood with her and Naise against Ridgewood at Stonehenge. A man who was a cold-blooded killer wouldn’t do any of those things.
“You are,” she whispered.
“When I walked out of there that day, I couldn’t understand why I couldn’t do it. When I went to bed that night, I saw Elwyn. As soon as I woke up, I remembered things. Pieces of conversation. Flashes of memory. And finally it all came back to me.”
“Everything?” she squeaked.
“Yes.”
“Did you…have anything do with Conner’s death?”
“You could say I helped him along.”
“My father…he destroyed it all.”
He kissed the back of her hand. “I’m glad.”
“So am I.”
His mouth danced over one brow then the next. His warm hands slipped up her back. In the darkness, she could see his pulse beating furiously in his throat. Her hands slid under his shirt, feeling the sinew of muscle beneath his coarse chest hair.
“Now we can start our life together,” he said.
“Our life?”
“Yeah, ours.” He placed his other hand on her stomach. “All three of us.”
“Are you proposing then?”
“Only if you’re accepting. I’ll take you anywhere you want to go for our honeymoon. A real vacation, none of this time-traveling nonsense. So are you going to answer my question or what?”
She smirked. “What question? I heard no question. You’re just assuming with that cocky attitude of yours that I’ll marry you. But I never heard you ask me if I would.” She poked him in the chest and gave him a smug smile.
“Ha, ha. Very funny.” He reached for her hands, held them between his. “Skye, I want you. I want to marry you. I want to wake up every morning with you next to me.”
“That’s still not a question. You’re just declaring your wants to me. Not asking.”
He grunted. “You’re not making this easy,” he said through clenched teeth.
“Nope.”
He hesitated.
“Just say it. You know you want to. Say, ‘Skye, you are the most gorgeous goddess of a woman—’”
“Goddess?” he interrupted, one dark eyebrow quirked.
“Shut up. ‘—goddess in the world and I want to spend the rest of my life with you.’”
“That’s not a question either,” he interrupted again.
“Shut. Up. I’m getting there. ‘I will spend the rest of my days worshipping the ground you walk on. I will do your every bidding and follow your every whim—’”
“You’re pushing it.”
“I’m not finished yet.”
“Yes, you are,” he snapped.
She opened her mouth to continue her self-indulgent tirade when he covered her mouth with his, shutting her up completely. Her arms slid around his neck. He didn’t allow the kiss to last long when he pulled back.
“How can I ask you if you won’t stop talking?”
She shrugged, grinning.
“All right, then. I’ll ask you. Skye, will you marry me?”
She stood on tiptoe and pressed her forehead against his. “Yes, Dane. I will.”
Tipping her head back, she slanted her mouth over his, kissing him. Her chest heaved against him as he trailed lazy kisses across her jaw, down her throat and back up again, pulling her closer.
“But you know,” she panted as he nibbled her earlobe. “You’re going to have to ask me again. We can’t very well tell our children their father proposed because I made you, now can we?”
About the Author
Michelle Miles writes in several genres but finds she enjoys creating other worlds best of all. She finds time to write in the wee hours of the night. She began her writing career in serialized fiction before breaking into e-publishing with her first contemporary novella, Talk Dirty To Me. She is a member of Romance Writers of America and is a native Texan residing in suburban Fort Worth.
You can visit her website at www.michellemiles.net for all the latest info and to sign up for her monthly newsletter, The Monthly Grind. She’s also the Thursday blogger at www.southernfriedchicas.com. When she’s not writing, Michelle is an avid hockey fan.
Look for these titles by Michelle Miles
Now Available:
A Bend in Time
Talk Dirty To Me
Coming Soon:
Nice Girls Do
Even nice girls can be bad….
Nice Girls Do
© 2007 Michelle Miles
Cara Davis wants to be a nice girl. She really does. So she quits her job at the strip club and takes on a job at The Bitter End coffee shop. She even dates the owner’s very nice—and nice looking—son David.
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