Nothing But Time (45 page)

“Kate, what are you doing home so early?” Brand asked when Kate burst into
the
flat an hour later.  “Is everything all right?”

“Yes,” Kate said pulling o
f
f her coat
and putting on a happy face
.  “I just had good news for you and had to come and share it with you. 
I was talking to
David
this morning and we’ve agreed that he will send you home.”

Brand blinked in
astonishment
, practically leaping off the sofa in his
surprise
. 
“What?”

“
David
is going back anyway.  He’s decided that the life he was meant to live is there.  He said he’d found where he truly belonged in the world and I suppose that’s where
you belong as well,
”
she told him
.

“Kate, this is wonderful!”  The first true smile Kate had seen in weeks split his lips sending a shaft of pleasure through her
.  H
is joy was unmistakable;
she could feel it radiating out from him.  With a laugh, he s
wooped over
to
her to gather in his arms.  As he swung her about, Kate clung to his shoulders taking
delight
from his elation though her heart was breaking.

“I’m glad you’re happy, Brand,” Kate said as cheerfully as she could though her voice caught at the end.  “All I’ve ever wanted for you is your happiness.”

“And I want yours, Kate.
 
It will be
wonderful, you’ll see.  We’ll be so happy there…”
Brand leaned back to look down at the woman in h
is arms.  Her eyes were shining, not with joy but
with tears
,
as she clung to him.  A feeling of dread
knifed through his guts
.  “You’re not coming, are you?”

When she whispered a soft “No”
, Brand felt as if his life was dissolving before him.  He loved Kate, more than he’d ever thought a man might love a woman.  He loved her mind, her spirit.  Even after countless hours reading and watching the television, he knew that even in this time, she was unique.
  She amazed him at every turn, astounded him with the depths of her love.  He had known that she would do everything in her power just to see to his happiness
,
as he would do the same for her.

He’d
just
never imagined that she would forsake her own happiness for that sake of his.  “Why?” he asked, though he knew the answer.

“I don’t belong in your time any more than you belong in mine,” she told him.  “I could be happy there for a
while, maybe even for years but eventually I would come to hate it.  I would hate that I couldn’t do what I love to do there, that I couldn’t truly be me there.  Your time would want to pigeonhole me into a role that I wasn’t raised for.”

“Kate.
”
H
e tried to argue, but she cut him off
,
throwing her arms around his neck and pressing her body against his.

Her kiss when her lips met his was desperate and Brand couldn’t help but give her what she needed.  There would be time to argue with her later.  Instead, he slid his hands over her hips until her caught the sides of her short skirt and gathered it up with his fingers until it was bunched around her waist.  Sliding his hands down her bottom, he grasped her legs and lifted her until she wrapped her legs around his waist. 

Pushing her up against the wall, Brand let all the passion he felt flow freely as he ripped open her blouse to cup her breasts in his large hands.  Tugging down her bra, he bent his head to capture her nipple between his lips while his hands moved to her panties, tearing the fragile string that held the side until the garment fluttered to the floor.

Kate held him tightly as his fingers found her moist core and thrust up inside of her.  She cried out, throwing back her head before lowering her lips to his neck, his ear before forcing his mouth up to meet hers.  Their tongues dueled
urgently
, their passions raging beyond control.  Reaching between them to untie the laces on his loose flannel trousers, Brand braced her against the wall and drove up into her.  Her hoarse cry blended with his own as he withdrew and thrust again and again until she was sobbing for release in his arms.

With one last thrust, she came apart for him, her arms and legs wrapped tightly around him until he, too, found paradise.  Stars burst into small flickers behind his eyes.  The power of his climax almost sent him to his knees.  Forcing himself to remain upright, he cupped one arm under her bottom and the other around her waist before carrying her, still connected to him, into their bedroom.

Though she admonished him about hurting himself, Brand laid her back on the bed, pulling his shirt over his head before crawling onto the bed and levering himself over her.  Without giving her a chance to speak, Brand took her lips in a passionate kiss while he relieved her of the remainder of her clothing.

He made love to her through the afternoon and into the evening.  He played her body sweetly bringing her to the height of ecstasy again and again as he whispered to her of his love and desire.  Surely, she could see that they were meant to be together.  Kate
had
to return with him
.  The love between them demanded it.  If it took all the days until his departure to prove it to her, he would.

***

A knock roused Brand from his sleep and he turned his head to read the hour on the bedside clock. 
4
:45
a.m
.

Wondering who might be visiting so
early
, Brand rolled over to wake Kate only to find her side of the bed empty and cool.  Hearing voices from the next room, Brand drew on a
T
-shirt and a pair of jeans before going into the living room.

“David’s here to get you, Brand,” Kate said softly. 

She’d been crying, he realized as he took in her red eyes and nose.  Crying for him because she had known, when he had not, that they hadn’t days yet before them but hours.  He knew he should be angry with her for not telling him but al
l he fe
lt was heart
ache.

“We should be off,” Fergusson announced
,
clearing his throat.  “Perhaps you’d like to change into
your other clothes before we go.
”

With some surprise, Brand noticed that Fergusson was wearing a smart, beige linen suit like many summer weight suits he owned himself.   In 1876, that was.  “Of course,” he murmured
numbly
and returned to the bedroom to find the clothing and change.

“Here take this.”

Kate looked back at David at those words to see him holding out a small key to her. 
“What is it?”

“A key to the safe deposit box I set up back then at the Bank of London.
I went the other day to make sure it was still available though I had some curious looks given the age of the key.  I explained to them that the key had been handed down for generations before we realized what it was to.  They seeme
d to accept that and gave me this
newer key.  Take it.
I will leave information there for you, let you know how everything goes.”

By everything, Kate realized,
David
meant Brand and her throat seiz
ed once more.  She choked out,
“Thank you,
David
.  I know I don’t deserve this from you.”

“Perhaps not,”
David
sighed
in agreement
.  “But I’ve come to realize that there is much I have done in my life that will change
on my
return to the past, but I belong
there
.
It offers me satisfaction that my own work
here
could not and, while I kno
w I will never be lauded for the magnificence of my mind and
achievements
, I find it was not what you Americans might call a ‘deal breaker’.
”

“I guess not.  You’ll… be careful, won’t you?”

David
laughed.  “
Worry not for the fate of the world, for I have determine
d to follow your
Prime D
irective as well and, other than making myself a wealthy man through investment, I
will
not set a footprint upon the world great enough to change the future as we know it.
”

Kate gave him a
sad
smile crossing her arms over her chest and hugging herself.

Reading the gesture correctly,
David
continued.  “I will watch over your earl
as
best as I can as well.  Are you certain you will not return with us?”

Inhaling, Kate widened her eyes in an attempt to cool the burn of tears in them.  “I cannot,
David
.
  You might belong there but I do not.  I cannot be a part of Brand’s life
in his time, the earl and the maid,
and without that there is nothing for
a woman with no marketable skills
there.
”
 

David shifted, uncomfortable with this more emotional Kate.  “You don’t regret it then?  Going back?”

“No, I think we both found everything we never knew we wanted there, David,” Kate said.  “Good luck, okay?  I hope you find yourself an old-fashioned girl someday.”

With a chuckle, David nodded in agreement
and bent to give her a peck on the cheek
.  “I hope so as well.  Goodbye, Kate, check the box, won’t you?”

Kate shifted her gaze beyond him to where Brand stood
in the bedroom door
.  He was leaned back against
the jam
b
c
asually, arms folded across his chest as he
watched her
. 

With his shirt open at the neck and only loosely tucked into his trousers
, Brand looked nothing like the pin-neat earl she had known in the past
.  He looked like her Brand from that first night in the library, rumpled and sensual
though he still exuded class and power.  Swallowing
back the painful lump in her throat.  “
Please watch over him…”
  Kate’s words were choked off as the first of her scalding tears overflowed and spilled onto her cheeks. 

“I’ll be right outside,” David answered her uncomfortably.

Brand came to her side and took her in his powerful arms, hugging her to him.  “Come with me,” he whispered into her hair as he pressed his lips to the top of her head.

Kate trembled in his arms hearing the yearning in his voice.  She wanted to so badly but it wasn’t a world that welcomed a woman like Kate and she knew that someday she would resent the boundaries.  Brand’s love might be enough to spare her from the
disappointment
but what if it
was
not?   She couldn’t
chance
going with him only to hurt him over and over if she couldn’t find contentment there and Brand didn’t deserve a life with yet another bitter woman ruining it for him. 
Making his life miserable was the one thing she wasn’t prepared to risk. 
“I cannot.”

“Come with me!” he commanded more fi
erce
ly.

Kate leaned back in his arms and reached up to stroke his cheek. 
“I loved
you right from the start, Brand.  Never forget that.
”

“
Damn it, Kate!
” 

“Go, please,” she whispered.  “David isn’t the type to wait forever.”  She would though.  There would never be another who could replace Brand in her heart.  She thought of his nephew Nathan and their talk about meeting again in Heaven.  She could only hope it was true so that she might see Brand again one day.

With a push, she sent Brand out the door
into the predawn darkness
and down the steps to where David waited in his car. 
She was tempted to close the door, to block out the sight of him leaving. 
Unable to help herself, though, she looked back in time to see Brand opening the passenger door to the car only to see him pause as well and turn to meet her gaze.

The burn in her chest was so painful, Kate had to grit her teeth against the overwhelming agony of watching Brand walk out of her life.  H
er h
eart
breaking, she raised her hand in a final farewell.  Brand returned the gesture with a nod and lowered himself into the car
.  In moments,
they were speeding off.  “Goodbye, Brand,” she whispered into the winter air.