Stolen Dreams (12 page)

 

With a frown, she inched her way
back into
the pouch. This time, however, their backs were turned to each other.
Sheer exhaustion overcame Shara's nervous condition, and she eventually
fell asleep.

 

A very vivid dream awakened her just as dawn was breaking.
Her name was being called, but she couldn't tell where the voice was
coming from. A frantic search through a house of doors, then a snowy
forest, led her to the foot of an erupting volcano. The ground was
shaking violently and fiery lava threatened to burn her alive, yet she
couldn't make herself run away. Whoever was calling her was inside the
volcano and she had no choice but to go to the caller.

 

The
flowing
lava parted and made a path for her to climb the mountain. As she
reached the top, the shape of a man formed amid an explosion of
volcanic ash. The burning figure held out his arms to her and called
for her to join him. She turned to flee back down the mountain, but the
lava had closed the path. She was trapped on the rim of the volcano,
surrounded by fire. The only escape was to awaken from the nightmare.

 

As
she lay there, breathing heavily and trying to sort out the dream from
reality, she realized she was truly suffering from excessive heat, and
the ground did seem to be quaking beneath her. The next second she
found the cause.

 

Gabriel was still turned with his back to
her, but
he was trembling and scratching at the skin on his arms and chest. His
breathing was raspy and labored. Tentatively she touched his shoulder
and was stunned by the intense heat radiating from him. "Professor?" He
didn't answer. "Gabriel, are you ill?" He kept his back to her.

 

She
raised herself up on an elbow and saw that his eyes were squinted shut
in an expression of severe pain. She gently placed her hand on his
cheek and his forehead. "You're burning up! You must have picked up
some virus during the time-hop. Come out of here," she ordered, tugging on his arm.
"We've got to cool you down."

 

She
found it easier to get out and drag the pouch off of him than to get
him to move. The first thing she noticed was that his penis was so
engorged it was purplish and jerking involuntarily. Dragging her gaze
upward, she saw several long, angry welts where he must have scraped
himself. She knelt beside him and forced one of his eyelids open. The
cornea was blood-red.

 

With an inhuman growl, he suddenly
pulled her
down beside him and smothered her mouth with his. She squirmed and
pushed, but her efforts were futile against his incredible strength. He
used every part of his body to hold her in place for his unexpected
assault. She was completely enveloped by him and his overwhelming heat.
The moment he freed her mouth, she cried, "Please, don't—"

 

Again
he
uttered the animalistic snarl and, in a deep gravelly voice that seemed
detached from his body, said, "I ... must." With one savage yank, he
tore the top of her suit down the middle.

 

She could only
assume that
the high fever had twisted his mind and caused him to act out some
horrid hallucination, but giving him a reasonable excuse did not lessen
her panic. It was quite clear that she couldn't stop him or defend
herself. She could, however, try to prevent any serious injury. Though
she didn't help him remove the remains of her bodysuit, she stopped
fighting him.

 

In a matter of seconds, he rammed himself into
her,
roared a sound that was more pain than pleasure, then collapsed on top
of her.

 

Shara was repulsed, furious, and terrified that his
seizure wasn't yet over. She felt bruised and debilitated.
But beneath it all she was also shamed, for, despite the violent
intrusion, her body had opened and welcomed him, and wanted to hold him
inside for much longer than it had taken him to gain his release.

 

"Get
off me!" she demanded with a shove that had no effect on his dead
weight. He seemed to be unconscious, and she could barely breathe.
Using her whole body, she gave him a heave that sent him rolling onto
his back. His shaft was still erect and swollen, but not quite as
enormously as before. Shara touched his neck and found a rapid yet
slowing pulse.

 

The amazing thing was that his damp skin felt
cool.
She had never heard of such an extreme fever coming and going so
quickly. His breathing appeared to be almost back to normal also. She
raised one of his eyelids and noted the redness had gone away. The only
symptoms left of whatever ailed him were the scratches on his upper
body.

 

She yelled at him, talked to him, nudged and shook him.
When
he still didn't awaken after several minutes, she began to worry anew.
Could the strange fever have left him in a coma? However would she
manage without him in this frozen wasteland? In desperation, she
decided to try to reach his unconscious mind directly.

 

As her
fingers touched his temple, she remembered that his jammer would
prevent her from reading or sending him her thoughts. She grasped the
gold earcuff and gave it a tug, but it held tight. Before she could
figure out how to remove it, Gabriel's hand clamped over her wrist.

 

"What
are you doing?" he asked in a normal, yet accusing voice that inferred
he knew the answer.

 

Shara stuttered a moment before she could defend
herself. "I thought you were in a coma. I was trying to help."

 

His
disbelief was evident. "I told you I'm a light sleeper. All you have to
do is speak to awaken me."

 

"Speak?
I did everything but drag you out into the snow. Up until a few minutes
ago, you were terribly ill—burning up with a fever. Your eyes were all
red, and you ... you ..." She was so angry, she couldn't find the words.

 

"I
what?" he asked, obviously not at all convinced by her explanation.

 

"You
raped me!"

 

"Hah!
Now you've gone too far. I would never commit such a barbaric act. Why
not just admit why you were trying to remove my jammer and forget
trying to fabricate an excuse? Did you think you could plant a
suggestion in my mind to go along with your scheme to change history?"

 

She
couldn't believe he had no recollection of any of what had just
happened, let alone accuse her of taking advantage of him. "I'm not
making this up. You were feverish and having trouble breathing, and ...
and scratching yourself. Look at your arms."

 

He glanced down
where
she pointed, then at his erection. "I can't explain how I got the
marks, but I certainly don't appear to have had a release in the last
few minutes."

 

'That's nothing compared to what you looked like
before! How do you think you got out of the pouch? And who do you think
ripped my clothes off?" She grabbed the torn bodysuit and shook it in
front of him, but there was still a hint of doubt in his eyes. "And
this," she said, discarding the last of her modesty and bringing his
fingers to the inside of her thighs
to discover the ultimate proof. "Do you see another man in this tent
who could have left this behind when he was done using me?"

 

For
several seconds he was dumbfounded. His gaze darted from one piece of
evidence to another, but he saw only clues, not answers. His last words
to her before they went to sleep haunted him: I've never forced myself
on a female before. I'm not going to start with you. Shaking his head
in confusion, he muttered, "I really don't remember."

 

Shara
stared
into his eyes for several heartbeats, then replied quietly. "I believe
you. I thought it might have been some sort of virus picked up during
the time-hop, but I don't seem to be affected, and I've never seen a
virus leave the body so swiftly. You have a lot more practical
experience than I have. Perhaps it would help if you saw how you
behaved. If you will allow me to touch your mind, I'll show you my
memory of exactly what happened."

 

He hesitated, always fearful
of
allowing anyone access to his mind, but if he had committed the offense
the evidence implied, he needed to try every avenue to learn what
caused him to behave so insanely and to prevent it from happening
again. "All right. It's worth a try. Just so you understand, I will
receive everything in your mind, unless you consciously block it from
me. It's entirely up to you to control what you want to send. I'm
incapable of separating new information from past memory. And please
don't speak aloud while my jammer is off; it causes such echoes I can
barely comprehend anything. Ready?" His hand lifted to his earcuff.

 

"Yes.
I mean, no. Please get dressed first." Though he was no longer in a
fully aroused state, his nude body was still a formidable
distraction.            
 

 

He
complied, but could not resist one lingering look at the gifts nature
had given her, before she concealed them. His preference would have
been to forget about clothing completely for the remainder of the time
they were alone there. He had always found the various usages of
clothing in different cultures of great interest, possibly because he
had grown up in a group that had no need for it.

 

Then again,
considering Shara's negative attitude toward coupling with him, it was
probably best to put the only available barrier between them. Although
he could never remember having any difficulty controlling his body's
physical reaction to a female, dressed or undressed, subduing his
arousal had become a full-time effort around Shara.

 

And he
didn't like it one bit.

 

As
soon as they were both dressed, they sat down across from each other
and he removed the jammer. Pressing two fingers against his temple, it
was instantly apparent to her how vulnerable he was. She could have
easily wandered through his thoughts at will until she knew every
detail of his life. The unlimited power he had handed her made up for
his earlier distrust a hundred times over. She let him know she
appreciated his faith in her and promised to be careful not to abuse it
if at all possible.

 

Shara re-created the scene for him, from
her point of view, from the time she awakened until she reached for his
earcuff.

 

"Drek!"
he whispered as he replaced the jammer and she backed away from him. "I
thought I was dreaming .. . only you came to me . . . you were willing."

 

Shara
straightened her spine and looked at him warily. "Tell me about the
dream."                 
 

 

He
frowned. "I didn't even realize I'd had one until just then. It's not
clear. There are only flashes. I was hot, too hot, and somehow I knew
you could cool me. I called you, you came, and the fire went out.
That's it. An apology is hardly adequate under the circumstances, but—"

 

"I
had a dream also," she interrupted, and he stilled. As she described
the images she had had, he began nodding his agreement.

 

"Yes,
that was it," he exclaimed. "Fire and lava, explosions of volcanic ash.
Until you described it, I forgot why I was so hot. The fever might have
caused me to have such a dream, or the heat I was radiating might have
triggered it for you, but as long as I was wearing the jammer, we
shouldn't have shared the same dream. And I definitely should not have
been so deeply unconscious that I would act it out without being at all
cognizant of it afterward."

 

"It wasn't exactly the same dream.
I wasn't aware that it was you calling me."

 

"All right. Any
other variables to consider?"

 

As
long as they were analyzing it as if it were a scientific experiment,
she could separate this man from the one who had raped her. "I wasn't
having any physical difficulties, nor was I unaware of what was going
on." She frowned and shook her head in dismay. "Something's very wrong
here."

 

"Did the dream arouse you?" When she lowered her
lashes, he
prodded. "From what you showed me, I didn't have any problem entering
your body. Were you prepared for me?" He had picked up a brief
sensation of pleasure from her before she blocked it. "Shara, this is
important."

 

She crossed her arms in front of her and met his
gaze. She resented having to admit that her body had betrayed her again. "Yes. My body seemed to be
well prepared. But that doesn't mean I find that sort of act exciting."

 

"I
wasn't implying that you did—only that your body was responding in a
manner opposite your conscious will, similar to what happened to me,
but on a much less aggressive level."

 

Shara maintained her
defensive
pose. She had touched his mind and knew he hadn't purposely raped her,
but she had also discovered that he didn't have the mental power to
force a physical response from her. "So can we draw any conclusions as
to what happened?"

 

"I've only once seen a man show the same
symptoms
and behavior that I exhibited, and the cause couldn't possibly apply to
me. Thus, your theory that I contracted a strange virus is probably the
best one we have. I feel fine now. More than likely it was an isolated
incident."

 

Shara wanted to believe that. The only problem was
that
it didn't explain her responsiveness. Why was she drawn to him against
her will? Why did his nearness constantly cause her to behave in such
abnormal ways? Since she met him, she'd been angrier, more frustrated,
and more passionate than she'd felt in many years.

 

It was all
unfamiliar, and terribly uncomfortable.

 

By
the end of the day, they had completely dismantled and rebuilt the
tempometer, analyzed and reanalyzed every alternative, then chilled it
outside to determine if external temperature had any effect on the
device, then did it all again. Their original hypothesis was proven
when they saw that several of the tiny chips changed color and
contracted slightly when exposed to the icy weather.