She traced his collarbone with her fingertips. She’d nearly drifted off to sleep when Søren spoke.

“When did you start watching Doctor Who?” he asked.

“Oh, I don’t really,” Nora said. “Zach’s favorite show when he was a kid. He’s been showing the old episodes to Fionn. I’ve watched it with them a couple times. Just the ones with the guy with the long scarf. The new ones are too scary.”

“Does Fionn like it?”

“He loves it. Last visit, I played Sarah Jane Smith and Zach was a Dalek. Fionn’s always the Doctor.” She raised her head and looked down at him. “Why do you ask?”

“It never would have occurred to me that he would like Doctor Who. He’s only three.” Silence again. Then, “Zachary’s a good father to him.”

“He is.”

“I hate him.”

Nora laughed. Søren did, too, a quiet self-deprecating laugh that turned into a soft groan. He rubbed his forehead.

“Being apart from him is harder than I ever dream. Why did I do this to myself? To you? To us?”

She reached across him and on the nightstand lay her keys. She grabbed them and held up a key.

“Here,” she said. “Here’s my TARDIS key. Take it. Hop in. Go back in time and stop yourself from conceiving Fionn. Would you if you could?”

He took a long breath then reached out, not to take the keys but to stroke her face.

“I thought so.”

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Cyrus lay down next to Paulina and pulled her to him. He kissed her. That was all. Nothing but kissing and more kissing for as long as he could stand it and as long as she could take it. Her small delicate hands moved over his shoulders and back, under his t-shirt to find bare skin to touch. As he kissed her, she made small soft murmurs of pleasure, beautiful sounds he wanted to record and put on his phone to play back tomorrow and the next day and every day until their wedding night.

They were both tangled in the covers and it was killing him not to feel her skin on his. He dug for the sheet and yanked it out of the way, found her long bare legs and stroked her thigh. She was a runner, like him, and had long strong thighs, and every time he stroked upward, toward her hip, he felt her muscle tense, and every time he stroked downward, to her knee, she relaxed.

He liked tense better. Cyrus slid his hand slowly up her leg, from knee to thigh to hip. He tickled the trim of her silky panties and the even silkier skin his fingers found everywhere he touched her. He slipped a finger under her panties, just to touch the smooth curve of her hipbone. Paulina tensed again, even took in a quick breath, but she didn’t tell him to stop.

“Nervous?” he asked her.

“Yeah.”

“It’s all right. The second you want to stop, we’ll stop. And we’re not gonna go too far tonight.”