Time After Time Read Online Free

fallen logs. The sound of her pursuer crashing through the brush behind her gave her all the incentive she needed to push herself beyond her normal limits.
    "Damn!" she muttered sharply when she tripped over an exposed root and fell painfully to her knees.
    Before she could struggle to her feet, rough hands grasped her under the arms, and then she was being dragged into a thick clump of flowering bushes.
    In panic, she dug her nails into the hands holding her, kicking back at her attacker with her bare feet. Sucking air into her lungs, she was preparing to scream bloody murder when her assailant finally spoke.
    "Stop that," a disturbingly familiar voice snapped in her ear. "Ouch! You little fool, will you kindly take your claws out of my hands?"
    Leah froze. After a moment, she turned her head slowly, a frown of confusion adding creases to her normally smooth brow. When she saw the man who still held her, she murmured in disbelief, "Mr. Gregory?"                                                                  
    Chapter Two
    I have had a dream—past the wit of man to say what dream it was.
    A Midsummer Night's Dream —Act IV, Scene 1
    M r. Gregory," Leah stammered again; then her voice dropped to an astonished whisper. "Mr. Gregory, you're wearing your pajamas."
    He stared at her for a moment in blank silence, then his eyes began to sparkle with amusement. "Only the bottoms," he said, chuckling softly. "I don't believe you. You're being chased through the primeval forest by an overly amorous gladiator, and all you can do is scold me for not being properly dressed." His green gaze slid purposefully over her body. "What exactly do you think you're wearing?"
    As she glanced down at her gown, they heard the sharp crack of a branch breaking nearby. Putting a finger to his lips, he jerked his head, indicating the area immediately behind them. "Time to make our move," he whispered.
    As silently as possible, they crept through the woods, away from the direction of the noise. When they had gone approximately a hundred yards, he paused and raised his head to listen. After several seconds, he was apparently satisfied that they could no longer be heard, because he grabbed Leah's hand and said, "Now we run like hell."
    Which they did, as quickly as they could go in their bare feet. Leah had no idea where they were going, or what they would do when they got there. She simply allowed him to drag her along behind him. Almost at the same moment that she had decided she couldn't go an inch farther unless he threw her over his shoulder and carried her, he pulled her to a halt on the bank of a small stream.
    Then a peculiar thing happened. Leah seemed somehow to split into two separate beings. She found she could view the two figures on the grass from some indeterminate spot above them. With unabashed interest, she studied the man kneeling beside the stream, admiring the bare, muscular chest that gleamed in the golden sunlight. The fluid lines of his body gave her a deep, real pleasure. Seconds later she frowned and became conscious of feeling exasperation toward the woman—herself—who lay on the grass beside him.
    Instead of joining her in open admiration, this Leah was complaining.
    "I'm tired, my feet are bruised, my knees are scraped and I have at least two thousand scratches on my legs," she muttered as she lay on her back, gasping for breath. "This doesn't make any kind of sense. I don't want to be here... and I wish I knew what in hell was going on."
    He dipped his hand in the stream and bent down to splash water on his perspiring face and chest. "I assume we're in a dream."
    "Yes, I did grasp that," she said irritably. "I've just never had a dream like this."
    He turned toward her, his lips curving upward in a crooked smile. "Maybe it's my dream."
    "No." She shook her head, instantly dismissing his suggestion. "No, if it's a dream, it's definitely mine. It was probably that cucumber. I know better