Time and Again

unusual. Are you married?" Where had that come from? she wondered, and immediately turned her attention to the fire.
    He was glad she wasn't looking at him when the grin split his face. "No. It wouldn't be wise for me to want you if I were."
    Her mouth dropped open, and she twisted around to look at him. Quickly she rose and began stacking the dishes on the tray. "I should take these back in."
    "Would you rather I didn't tell you?"
    She had to swallow once, hard, before she could speak at all. "Tell me what?"
    "That I want you." He closed his hand over her wrist to keep her still. It amazed and aroused him to feel her pulse hammering. His word-by-word perusal of the newspaper hadn't given him an inkling of how men and women interacted in the here and now, but he didn't believe it could be so different.
    "Yes-No."
    Smiling, he took the tray out of her hands. "Which?"
    "I don't think it's a good idea." When he stood up, she stepped back and felt the heat from the fire on her legs. "Caleb-"
    "Is this a special occasion?" He traced a fingertip across her jaw and watched her eyes go as hot as the flames behind her.
    "Don't." It was ridiculous. He couldn't make her tremble with just a touch. But all he had done was touch her. And she was trembling.
    "When I woke up and saw you sleeping in the chair in the firelight I thought you were an illusion." He rubbed his thumb gently over her bottom lip. "You look like one now."
    She didn't feel like one. She felt real, shatteringly real, and terrified. "I have to bank the fire for the night, and you should go back to bed."
    "We can bank the fire for the night. Then we can go to bed."
    She squared her shoulders, furious at the realization that her palms were sweating. She would not stammer, she promised herself. She would not act the inexperienced fool. She would handle him the way a strong, independent woman would, a woman who knew her own mind. "I'm not going to sleep with you. I don't know you."
    So that was a condition, Cal mused. After thinking it over, he found it rather sweet and not completely unreasonable. "All right. How long do you need?"
    She stared at him. At length she dragged both hands through her hair. "I can't figure out if you're joking or not, but I do know you're the oddest man I've ever met."
    "You don't know the half of it." He watched her bank the fire carefully. Competent hands, he thought, an athletic body, and the most vulnerable eyes he'd ever seen. "We'll get to know each other tomorrow.
    Then we'll sleep together."
    She straightened so quickly that she rapped her head on the mantel. Swearing and rubbing her head, she turned to him. "Not necessarily. In fact it's very unlikely."
    He took the screen and placed it in front of the fire, exactly as he had seen her do earlier. "Why?"
    "Because-" Flustered, she fumbled for words for a moment. "I don't do that kind of thing."
    She recognized genuine astonishment when she saw it. It was staring at her now out of Cal's dark blue eyes. "At all?"
    "Really, Hornblower, that's none of your business." Dignity helped, but not a great deal. As she swept up the tray, the bowls slid dangerously, and they would have crashed to the floor if he hadn't caught the end of the tray and balanced it.
    "Why are you angry? I only want to make love with you."
    "Listen." She took a deep breath. "I've had enough of all this. I did you a favor, and I don't appreciate you insinuating that I should hop into bed with you just because you've-you've got an itch. I don't find it flattering-in fact, I find it very insulting-that you think I'd make love with a perfect stranger just because it's convenient."
    He tilted his head, trying to take it all in. "Is inconvenient better?"
    She could only grit her teeth. "Listen, Hornblower, I'll drop you off at the nearest singles bar the minute we can get out of here. Until then, keep your distance."
    With that, she stormed out of the room. He could hear the dishes crash in the kitchen.
    He dug his hands in his pockets again as he started upstairs. Twentieth-century women were very difficult to understand. Fascinating, he admitted, but difficult. And what in the hell was a singles bar?

CHAPTER 3
    He felt almost normal in the morning. Normal, Cal thought, if you considered he hadn't even been born yet. It was a bizarre situation, highly improbable according to most of the current scientific theories, and deep down he clung to the faint hope that he was having some kind of long, involved dream.
    If he