Nancy Warren - Perfect Timing - Those Were the Days / Pistols at Dawn / Time After Time

SYLVIA COULDN’T believe she’d done it.

After he’d left her room, she’d cursed herself, trying to talk herself into following him. She’d never expected to convince herself, though. And the fact that she had—that she’d actually ended up outside Tucker’s door—both delighted and baffled her.

Fantasy, she reminded herself. She wasn’t even born yet. This wasn’t real, no matter how much it might feel real. This was just a chance. A chance to be in charge. A chance to work out the demons of her personal past here in the temporal past. Because right now she should have no demons. Martin didn’t exist any more than she did. All that mattered in this world was her and Tucker and that zing of desire she’d felt arc between them.

Fulfill the promise embedded in that zing, and she could go back to her own time with a new confidence. The kind of confidence she’d wanted to take with her to Los Angeles, leaving her sexual shyness behind with Dwight in San Francisco.

That had to be why the guard had sent her here, after all. Because she was certain he had sent her. All that talk about the past, and then the business with the coin. She didn’t know how he did it. But she was absolutely certain that the exhibit guard was responsible.

Only time would tell if she should thank him or curse him. But as she stood there looking at Tucker, her heart was filled only with gratitude. And desire.

“I convinced myself I needed to come after you,” she said, distilling the lecture she’d given herself in her room to its most basic components.

“I’m glad you did,” he said.

“Are you?” she moved toward him, her voice low, her body humming.

“You may think me very ungentlemanly, but I’ve craved you from the first moment I saw you.” He’d moved even closer to her as he spoke, and now he was mere inches away, so close she could feel the heat of his skin, and the scent of him made her light-headed.

More than his proximity, though, it was his words that thrilled her, firing her confidence. “Kiss me,” she said boldly, forcing the demand out before she could stop herself.

He didn’t give her any time to change her mind. The request had barely left her lips when his mouth blocked any further words. His lips were soft, yet firm, and captured her fully. One hand snaked around her waist, and the other held the back of her head, holding her captive as his tongue sought entrance and explored the heat of her mouth.

Her body reacted, melting against him even as her head screamed for her not to give in, to take charge. To take him.

But the connection between mind and body had been severed. She was losing herself to the sensations. His mouth. His hands. The way his fingers stole down the pajama top, managing to combine skill and fumbling as he unfastened the buttons and freed her breasts.

His hands cupped them, his thumbs rubbing her rockhard nipples. She tilted her head back and lost herself to the pleasure. And it was good. His touch, the heat that coursed through her, the trembling in her belly. Nothing dangerous. Nothing scary.

But also nothing in her control.

It’s okay to give up control when you want to. The words ricocheted through her head, and she told herself they were true. Martin had taken her control away. Here, she was giving it freely to Tucker.

His mouth left hers, and she gasped, sucking in delicious air to cool the heat raging within her. A heat that didn’t dissipate when he pressed his mouth to her neck and started kissing his way down, lower and lower, his lips caressing the curve of her breasts even as his fingers kneaded and pulled, igniting a fuse that ran from her nipples all the way down to between her thighs.

She pressed her legs together, not sure if she was trying to quell the need building there or satisfy it. All she knew was that she couldn’t keep still, and she writhed against him, desperate for his touch.

His lips didn’t disappoint, as he continued his southward journey. His tongue played across her skin, tickling her navel as he teased and promised with his lips and hands.

His fingers tugged at the soft drawstring on the pajama bottoms, and she gasped a little when they came loose, then pooled around her feet. She hadn’t worn her panties, instead rinsing them out and hanging them in the bathroom to dry for the morning. Now she heard his gasp as he saw her naked before him.

He eased his thumb between her thighs and found her clit. She tossed her head back, her eyes closed as he stroked her, her entire body shaking from the thrill of it. She wanted to lose herself to him in a way she’d never done before. Certainly not with Dwight. Not, for that matter, with any man before.

But then he did the unthinkable. He bent his head closer, his breath tickling the soft skin of her inner thighs. And with his tongue, he teased and tasted her.

She froze. Fear and revulsion fought to take over, and she fought back. Not with Tucker. She didn’t want those feelings with Tucker. The sense of being lost, of losing herself. Of having to take whatever was given even if she didn’t want it at all.

But she was. She was standing there taking it even though inside her head she was screaming for him to stop. She felt a tear trickle down her cheek, and she knew that she’d lost the battle. She’d foolishly believed that Tucker was different. That even though she’d come in here with Tina’s plan of being in control, that she could surrender to him and still not lose herself.

She’d been wrong, and now everything between them would be tainted.

Tucker. Dear Lord, not this. Not when a fantasy had been laid at her feet. This was her fantasy, and she was determined to take it back.

It wasn’t real. It wasn’t real.

And as she repeated that mantra in her head, her heart pounded in her chest, fear fighting courage, until she had to force the word out in a single breath even as her hands cupped the side of his head. “Stop.”

He looked up, his eyes soft but surprised. The surprise faded quickly to alarm, and he was on his feet, his finger brushing away a tear. “My darling,” he said. “Forgive me. I was too bold. I thought—”

She pressed a finger to his lip. “Shut up,” she said, then kissed him hard. She fumbled for his belt and loosened his pants. “The bed,” she demanded, determined to take control. To take back this moment, and not let anything about Tucker be tainted with the revulsion she felt for her stepfather.

He hesitated, but when he looked into her eyes, something seemed to shift. He pressed a kiss to her lips, then scooped her up, carrying her bridelike to the bed and laying her there.

She refused to stay down, though. She climbed to her knees and then, with a soft hand on his chest, she laid him back, then straddled him. Leaning forward, she captured him with a kiss, her hands stroking his chest as she went to work on the buttons of his shirt.

Her pulse pounded in her ears, a testament to her nerves. But she wanted this. Wanted to take this man on her terms and prove that she could do it. And so she pushed onward, stroking his shoulders as she eased off his shirt, delighting in the way his muscles tightened as she ran a finger down the smattering of hair leading to his navel.

She eased his fly open, then tugged his pants down, noticing with delight how he lifted his hips to help. He was rock hard, and that fact both thrilled her and urged her on.

“Sylvia,” he whispered.

“Shh.” She pressed a finger to his lips. “No talking,” she said, then replaced her finger with her lips.

With one hand, she took his and pressed it between her thighs, easing him back and forth until he took up the motion, his fingers sliding in and out and making her even hotter and wetter than she’d been before.