Steve felt such warmth when Kayla rolled up against him the next morning.  She draped her arm over his chest and sleepily snuggled into his t-shirt-clad chest in the last moments of true darkness before the sun’s light just started `to turn the early December morning from black to a navy blueness.  The clock was on her side of the bed, but Steve sensed the time and somehow knew that they had just moments before the alarm went off.  Their legs tangled with each other, and Steve sighed deeply.  Kayla’s hair was so soft under his chin.  He reached for her hand and blinked softly as he placed it over her heart.

“Sweetness,” he whispered into the dark.  Kayla wasn’t really awake yet and responded with a sleepy sound.  He kissed the top of her head and stroked the top of her hand.  “You’re so sweet, baby.”  His voice was gravelly with sleep, but Kayla started to stir.  She peeked up at him through slumberous eyes and smiled. 

“You’re here,” she murmured.

He nodded.  “Believe it or not, I was thinking the same thing about you.”

“I’m not going anywhere.”  She placed a feathery kiss on his chin.  “Ever.”

Steve tipped her chin up so that he could look at her.  Deep and painful regret that this version of her would be supplanted by Prime Kayla’s arrival, never to be seen again spread through him … while at the same time the pang of homesickness that radiated in his belly told him how much he missed and longed for his Kayla to finally arrive here with him in this bed right now.  The mixed feelings were very hard on him.  He needed his wife to help him.  And she was right there.  She was so happy and so content, it was truly beautiful.  He couldn’t do anything about this impossible paradox.  So he let the beauty of what was in this bed right now wash over him.  Steve turned toward his wife, wrapped his arms around her, and kissed her.  Her lips were so soft, so loving.  He never wanted to let her go. 

“I know something is still not back in you,” Kayla whispered softly.  Steve closed his eye.  He hated that she sensed this.  “It’s ok,” she assured him gently.  “I don’t know what it is, but I know that I’m going to be here to help you through what you’ve been through.”  Steve smiled sadly at her and tucked a smooth, straight piece of her hair behind her ear.

“Yeah?” he said sweetly, loving her for her resolve.

“Yeah.”

“I don’t regret what we did last night, Kayla.  That’s not what you’re sensing.”

Kayla nodded.  “I know.”

“You’re always going to be my wife.  I wanted you.”

Kayla ran her hand down over Steve’s ass and around to the front, smiling naughtily.  “I think you still do,”

“Uh oh, I’m found out.”

“You couldn’t hide that thing from me if you tried,” she chuckled.  “Besides, I remember what you’re like in the mornings.”

Steve looked over his shoulder at the door half open.  “Do we have time?”  The alarm went off just a moment later, and Steve knew that the unfortunate answer to that was …

“Afraid not.”

Suddenly, Steve felt a little anxious.  He was still a little unsure of how to navigate sleeping arrangements.  What if Stephanie walked in and found them.  It was why he was wearing a t-shirt and his underwear – but this didn’t feel right, either, though it was better than naked.  He needed pajama bottoms, because if there was something he was not, it was a boxer guy, and he hated sweatpants.

“What is it?” Kayla asked.  “Are you worried about Stephanie?”

“Yeah,” he replied, regretfully pulling himself up against the headboard.  “I … I don’t want her to see us like this.”

“Why?” 

“’Cause I just did her mother hot and hard last night, baby, that’s why.”

Kayla swallowed.  “Are you trying to make me wet?” she stage whispered. 

Steve leered a very suggestive look at her.  “Why, that what you are, baby?”

Kayla rolled out of bed and shivered in her underwear and tank top.  “Yes, congratulations on that.”  Steve felt incredibly masculine with that knowledge.  She reached for her robe and put it on, not because she was modest but because she was freezing.  “Steve, you’re her dad, why would you feel weird about being in bed with me?”  He honestly had no idea.  “You said, yourself, you want to wake up with me.  Don’t you?”  Steve smiled.

“I do, Sweetness.  It’s just,” he scratched at his growing whiskers, “I know I’m her dad, but she’s never had one before, and this whole thing might be weird for her.”

Kayla sat back down and took his hand. “She’s always had a father, Steve.  She had one before you died –” she rolled her eyes and corrected herself, “—left, I mean, and I made damn sure she knew you all the years you were gone.”  Steve vividly remembered his Kayla telling him this on a recent jump.  He knew it as true, too, because she knew him on sight the day she found him.  “I admit, it’s going to be a learning curve.  You’ve never parented a little girl before.”  Steve’s visage changed, and Kayla absolutely saw it, her concern overtaking her arousal.  “What did I say?” she asked tenderly.  Steve didn’t get a chance to answer, because right on cue, Stephanie walked in.  No knock, no tentative checking, just walked into Mom’s room like she always did, because that’s what kids do.  And Steve couldn’t help but smile a little, because he’d gotten his instinct on playing it more modestly than he’d ever done before right.  Not that he wasn’t a little nervous about it. 

“Mama, I’m too tired to go to school.”

Kayla took this opportunity to normalize this family situation for her husband.  The last time Steve had a child she wasn’t a mobile ten-year-old.  Kayla wasted no time, therefore, in getting Steve used to being a husband and a father to a child who knew that both of those roles existed.  “Come’ere, baby girl,” she smiled as she motioned her over with her hands.  Stephanie shuffled her feet over to the bed and, for her part, had no problem plopping down on the end of the bed, head in her mom’s lap, feet on her dad’s.  Kayla srtoked her daughter’s hair and couldn’t help but smile when she saw Steve’s rather contented face at this.

“Do I have to go?”

“Yep, sure do, baby.  But ya know what?”  Stephanie groaned.  “TGIF.”

“Why can’t every day be Friday?”

“Nah, can’t have that, now.” Steve said while playfully rubbing her ankle.  “’Cause then you’d never get to Saturday.”

Stephanie whined a little more, and it was as if she’d been sneaking into the bed of not just her mother, but her mother and father, her whole life.  Steve went for her toes and told her it was time to get these piggies to market, she squealed for him to stop while shoving her foot at him for more, and soon she was back to her room to get herself ready for school.

There would be no showering together, much as they both gave each other clear looks of desire to do just that, but he did lower his mouth to give Kayla’s breast for a final suck and mercilessly fingered her for several moments of deliciously silent pleasure before she regretfully disappeared into the bathroom.  Before she did, he whispered into her ear, “Don’t you ever forget how much I love you and how happy you make me just to look at you.” Then he withdrew his fingers and looked at her with a loving, if not mischevious, smile on his face.

“How do you always know what to say to me to make me turn to mush?”

“It was my words turning you to mush?” Steve asked before kissing her lightly.  “You sure about that?”

“It was a couple things,” she closed her robe and backed out the door, “but it was mostly your words.”  Then she smiled wickedly before sashaying out the door. 

With moments before it was time to go, Kayla stood under the mistletoe in the doorway to the loft as Stephanie got her jacket on in the hallway.  “Uh oh,” she teased, looking up.

Steve smiled and took her in his arms.  “Baby, you don’t need to stand under a damn weed if you want a kiss from me.”

“Then why aren’t you kissing me?”

“Because it’s more fun to watch you be all cute like.”

“Are you going to kiss me goodbye or am I going to have to go to work without it?”

Stephanie made a little noise from the archway, which when they turned to look at her made them smile, because she was looking like they were a fairytale again.  Steve chuckled and shook his head.  “You’re the one who wanted me to wake her up that night like she was Snow White, so I shouldn’t be surprised that you’re standin’ there like I’m about to kiss the bride.”  They all laughed, and he and Kayla shared a very sweet kiss that lingered with love and affection. 

Now it was time to go, they were already running a few mintues late.  Stephanie ran out the door to the car, and Kayla glanced back at her husband with a sparkle in her eye.  Steve wasn’t sure he’d ever seen her so content as when she’d closed that door behind her. 

I made love to you last night, Sweetness.  You were so beautiful.  I couldn’t fight you anymore.  I couldn’t fight me anymore either.  You won’t remember any of it when you get here but I couldn’t help it. I had to fix it.  I had to fix my wife feeling lonely for her husband then rejected by him.  That’s what I did to you when I came back.  I didn’t realize how cruel it really was until I felt it happening to you with my full memory intact.  I didn’t get it then, baby, cause I didn’t know who any of us were.  But I know now, and I felt what it was doing to you, and I couldn’t let it go on.  I wanted it, and I wanted you.  That’s why I’m scared, baby, cause I wanted it.  Not even that I did it but that I wanted to.  I’m scared that you’re not going to forgive me for wanting it and for not waiting for all of you.  But you said something last night that made me finally just do what felt right.  Loving you last night and loving you today and loving you forever for the rest of my life feels right.  I don’t know what made me do it but I kind of told you I’m a time traveler.  You thought it was a game, but I gave you a bunch of what ifs,and your answers were

Steve paused and thought about this quite a bit before he went on.

not what I was expecting.  I said what if I got in my time machine right now and travelled to our wedding but you had to stay here.  You said I’d have to marry you, that it would still be you once I got to you, even if that you I was marrying again didn’t know it.  I said what if I made love to you then told you about how I did that with her, and you said there is no her.  There is only me and how could I not do it?  

The benefit of getting all of this out was important to Steve, even if he didn’t cognitively know it.  The love and relief in being with her radiated like a light inside of him, all while the fear and guilt were chasing after it.  The more he talked to her about it, the more he was able to deal with it. 

God baby what if you don’t take this well?  What am I going to do?  Because I know what a jealous asshole I am.  I want to be there when we have sex.  Any sex. Any anything.  I want to be there for the kisses.  I want to be the man that makes you feel good.  I get it now, how hard it was for you to stop when I proposed and in Chicago, and I’m sorry I took it bad.  What if you won’t understand or forgive me, then you won’teven be able to leave me beause we’re tied together with the jumps and you’ll resent me that you have to keep looking at my god damn face.  I just don’t want you to hurt, Kayla.  I’ve seen how bad you were hurting while I was away, and I know how much pain we’ve both been in since Emily was taken from us. I’m better. You made me better in the lighthouse before we jumped, and the you that’s here in this house with me has made me better.  But when you get here and you find out about this, I’m afraid that your hurt won’t get better.  So I’m saying it, I’m scared.

You know what else I’m scared of?  That I’m so confused.  So last night I just stopped trying to figure itout.  There is no her and you, there’s only you. One you.  That’s what you said last night.  And I believed you.  So we made love.  Waking up with you was beautiful.  I wanted you all morning before you left for work.  Now I don’t know how to live with it until I know how you will.

I love you.  Forever I love you.

Steve hit send before he could change his mind.  Then he surfed around the Internet.  This didn’t hold his attention at all, randomly toggling back to his inbox looking for a response from Kayla, which, of course, there was none.  Now his anxiety started to build.  Because this was Day 13.  And he was worried.  That last jump before this one scared him more than almost anything else that had been scaring him, because he couldn’t be sure she had arrived before he left.  Steve didn’t even realize when he’d started typing again.

I’m breaking apart, here, Kayla, he began a new email.  I can’t believe you’re not here.  It’s 13 days and I’m going crazy with worry.  The only good thing about you not being here yet is that if what I’ve done is going to break your heart, then it can’t break if you’re not here.  But we got to talk, baby.  Cause I had more of those rollercoaster jumps that lasted a few seconds before I finally landed here, and I didn’t see you on any of them.  They were bad.  I couldn’t keep my insides in.  You should have seen Victor Kiriakis’s face when he caught what I put out there, baby! That was the first one, I jumped right after I threw up on him.  Then I jumped somewhere I never did figure out, but I was already in the bathroom. You were there with me, but I couldn’t tell which you it was when I was puking my guts out.  Then we were back at home with Stephanie in the apartment.  Almost all the way back home, baby!  You were there cause Stephanie was talking to you over my shoulder, but it was only a few seconds, shortest jump of all of them.  Then I got here.  Steve desperately needed to tell her about Ava, but he couldn’t make himself say it yet, so he waited.  Did you make it to any of those before I left?  I didn’t have time to let it settle then, but if you arrived after I left, then we’re in some seriously deep sh*t. 

He took a deep breath and changed direction.

We’re calling the cat Kitty now.  Stephanie’s on board, too.  All official with the vet. No one argued with me when I said we had to rename her.  You know something is up there, though, I can tell.  But you’re not saying anything, afraid if you question me I’ll – I don’t know.  You might have thought I’d run the other day, now I think you think I’ll break.  Not sure you’re not right, because a lot reminds me of our littlest girl, and I don’t cope so good, baby.  I’m the only one that knows her.  But Stephanie is so great, baby, she’s so beautiful and smart and funny.  She recruited me for book club.  Every night I’m going to read her chapter of Harry Potter.  Can you believe it, baby, I’m reading bedtime stories!  We’re only on chapter one of the first book, so this is very early in Book Club.  But I’m making like I don’t got a clue who this Dumbledude is.  I thought 10 would be too old but she swears up and down that she’s not.  Guess we breed big readers, I remember Joey likes those board books back home.  Remember how he likes to have that one about the moon in his stroller all the time?  Gets real huffy when he doesn’t have it to chew to hell and gone, doesn’t he baby?  I almost forgot about that.  Jesus, Kayla, I’m starting to forget things.  It’s not right.  We can’t forget their birthdays.  What do you think Emily would have liked her daddy to read to her?  God, I miss her.

Steve stopped.  He couldn’t think of Emily anymore.

Come home.

He hit the send button, got up, and put his nervous energy into working out as best he could.  He found some relatively low-level weights in the bedroom closet and huffed out a very impressed breath.  They weren’t heavy by any means, but there were a lot of them, pairs from 1lb up to 10.  They clearly didn’t just sit there, either, there was plenty evidence of wear.  He hadn’t seen her use them yet, but her body told him that she did.

Her body.  Kayla’s body.  It was different than the body she’d inhabited in the past several years.  Steve didn’t know this body, but when he slid over it, he could feel how she was unquestionably her.  Her mannerisms, her movements, the way she held him.  He wanted her right now. 

Steve looked back to the weights, picked up the tens, and laid on the floor to do some flys and pullovers  He did the best he could to exert some energy while two men in a white, unmarked van with no windows drove up and parked across the street.

Kayla knew things were still not completely right when she left the house that morning, but they were so much closer to right that she couldn’t help but feel like her world was suddenly set back right on its axis.  Her co-workers noticed and even told her it was like she was glowing.  And she was.  Her soul mate was with her, he was real, and the things broken within her felt whole again for the first time since her husband took his last breath on that hospital bed.  She felt golden inside, and it felt good.  Once rounds were over, she sat at her desk and decided to take advantage of the emboldened feeling she had right now and face the task of securing herself a sitter for New Years Eve, just in case it became necessary, which she hoped to God it would not.  The conversation with Kimberly came three days later than it originally did, but it went almost the same.  Kim’s shock was the same, her excitement for her sister possibly moving on was the same, and her disappointment at Kayla’s insistence that this was not a serious date (for her, anyway) was the same.  Also the same, Kim’s answer that she’d be happy to do this if it meant some companionship for her sister. 

“You’ve gotta get back in the saddle one of these days, Kay,” Kim encouraged her.  “This might be more than you think it is once midnight strikes.”

“Ya know, Kimmie, you might be surprised at how content I am right now.”

“Yes, well a little additional attention never hurt anyone’s contentment.”  Kayla rolled her eyes and chuckled.  “Ya know, Kay, you sound different.  Is something going on?”

“Why would you say that?” she asked guardedly.

“Because you sound like something’s going on.”

“Kim—”

“Oh, you like him!” Kim blurted after sharply inhaling.  “You liiiiike him like him!”

“He’s my boss, Kim, I’m just going to the hospital function.”  She was convincing in her head, but the spirit of her happiness over having Steve back was too much to hide, and it came out far too bubbly to believe.

“You’ve got a crush.  Like when you thought Charlie Hanna was the love of your life when you were 14.”

Charlie Hanna?!  That boy was the love of her life upon entering high school, and she hadn’t thought of him in, literally, decades.  The whole concept of this was ridiculous, but if she sounded that giddy right now that she was being likened to the school girl she was when she crushed on Charlie Hanna, then she needed to rein it way the hell in.

“Kim.  Listen.  I’m flying a little right now because I ate about six peppermint chocolates from Godiva that one of the doctor’s brought in.” Not a lie.

“Oooh.  Those are your favorites.”  She sounded disappointed.  She really wanted Kayla to have love again.  Mainly because she genuinely loved her sister, but a very small amount because of the fear that a candle still burned low and dim within her for Shane.  “Ok, well, I’m sure you’re going to be a real barrel of monkeys when you crash.”

“I’ll try to keep it in check,” she laughed.  “Now, is that a yes or no?”

“It’s a maybe, Kay, I have to see if I can get the kids that day so Steph isn’t bored here.  I’ll call you in a little bit.” 

Kayla hung up and sighed.  “Sorry to disappoint you, Kimmie, but Steve is no Charlie Hanna, and my boss is no Steve Johnson.”  She smiled and felt a warm happiness in her belly as she started on the stack of nine charts from rounds.  She focused pretty well on the first, then the second and the third.  As she closed up the fourth and opened the fifth, she licked her lips and remembered how loved she felt falling asleep in her husband’s arms last night.  It was the very last thought destination Kayla would ever have. 

Primary Kayla arrived into her body with a sharp gasp for air and feeling ridiculously ill.  She gasped several more times and clutched onto her desk with extended arms as if the desperate stability might be ripped from her – an effort to keep herself upright, which was more than she’d done on the previous jump.  

Her first destination after the lighthouse was her apartment in Cleveland where the body that had been sitting on the couch watching TV violently threw up immediately upon arrival.  She innately knew where she was and that she was now vomiting on her carpet, but she was gasping for air at the same time and choked.  She was in serious panic for those handful of seconds that she couldn’t get any air before the jump effect spun her away as quickly as she’d arrived. When she next got her bearings she was looking past the back of Steve’s head right into the scared face of her grown daughter in the livingroom of their apartment.  My God, she thought, it had been years since she’d seen it.

“Mom?!” Stephanie cried as she watched Steve sway in front of her.

Kayla wasn’t as ill here, but the vertigo was intense.

“Little Sweetness …,” Steve said with a tone that was unmistakeable.  Then he went down in a rigid heap Stephanie’s arms.  

“Mom!  Oh my God, Mom!  What’s wrong with Papa?!”  Stephanie started to cry. 

Kayla swallowed hard, but the vertigo was not letting up, and she just knew this was going to be another set of chaotic jumps.  She wanted to touch her daughter.  She wanted to connect with her and see Joe before the precious seconds ticked by.  But by the time she’d realized it all it was already too late.

“Ste—phanie—”

“Mom, I can’t hold him,” as she fell to the floor with him, “help me— MAMA?!”

Kayla couldn’t help it when the dizziness was too much for her and collapsed onto the couch.  Even amidst the chaotic din she could see how panicked her daughter was to have both her mother and father basically pass out on her.  With her husband’s now clearly empty body still in Stephanie’s arms on the floor, Kayla irrationally tried to explain it to her.  But just as she was about to leave, herself, the most beautiful sound erupted from the other room.  The sound of her beautiful son crying.  It was a younger cry than when she’d last left him.  She hadn’t heard it in more than three years and thought she was starting to forget what her son sounded like  But the moment his cries reached her ears she remembered.  His tiny little voice lived inside of her just as much as Stephanie’s and Emily’s voices did.  That was her baby boy crying for her to come to him.  The ache in her heart was as painful as the delight in her soul just to hear him.   This was all she was going to get, so she held on to it like it was the last of its kind.  “I love you, babies” was the last thing she said before she felt herself being pulled, once again, into time’s vortex.

When she next opened her eyes she was kneeling over Steve, who was, himself, kneeling over the toilet. 

“DAMN YOU F*CKING ROLF!!!”  Steve roared with such flaming intensity in literally the first second that she’d become aware of herself that Kayla recoiled.  She wasn’t aware of another thing in that room, including when her husband went rigid and left his body, because the effect was so severe she couldn’t focus.  She was so dizzy that she didn’t even know where she’d jumped to, only that it was a bathroom.  She fell over onto her side, clenched her teeth, and suffered the anarchy the jump effect was causing within her destination body.  No physical condition she’d ever suffered was as bad as this, including childbirth.  She somehow felt it when time came after her for the third time, and now she understood Steve’s angry outcry.  Unlike him, however, she was grateful. It was a relief, because this she could no longer take.

By the time she’d arrived to her desk on Friday, December 8^th in the year 2000, she was seriously miserable.  This arrival was a bad one, but much milder than the preivous three.  Unfortunately, the experience of them all in such a short period felt stomach-turning, anyway.  She gasped for air, continued to clutch onto the desk for dear life, and felt a sickening thrill with the racing of her heart.  She had no idea where she was yet and didn’t care, she just wanted to stop jumping now.  She laid her head down on the desk, and tried to breathe.  “Please … please … please …,” she whimpered.  Finally, the nausea dissipated, her heart slowed, and she felt her equilibrium settle to the destination.

“Doctor Johnson?”

The voice in her doorway startled her.  Her resultant gasp startled the man it belonged to even more, causing him to drop his charts and fumble with the coffee in his hands. 

Kayla lifted her head while she subconsciously continued to hold on to the desk.  The man standing in front of her wasn’t just familiar, she remembered him well.  The last time she saw him was at a conference just after she and Steve had left Tinda Lau.  She didn’t remember him being quite so thin, however.  He looked very young. 

“Oh I am so sorry!  I didn’t mean to startle you – I can come back!”

Actually, not young so much as green.

“Rah—um—Raj?”

“Were you sleeping?” he asked as he finally righted the coffee.  “I can do these in the cafeteria, really!” He bent to pick up the charts he’d dropped, and Kayla’s brain started furiously placing the date.  “Sorry,” he sighed, “I need to start doing this on my own, anyway.”

“Are we in med school?” Kayla murmured kind of absently, looking around the tiny office she shared with him and one other resident, whom she also remembered rather well, Stacy Tompkins, because she couldn’t stand the girl.    Her colleague tittered a bit and asked sheepishly if that was a hint.  Kayla didn’t answer him as she finally let go of the wooden desk that had clearly been there since the ‘50’s and continued to take in the landscape so she could pin down the date.  Running a hand through her hair and pulling a section in front of her face to examine it, she narrowed down the timeframe.  “Residency, right?” she said, now looking to him to confirm this.  “What is it, third year?”

“Second,” he corrected.  “Dr. Johnson, I think you need to go back to sleep.”

“No, no,” she said taking a deep breath, “it’s ok.  I’m sorry, I remember now.”  And she did, because it wasn’t until their third year of residency that Raj Kumar had finally started calling her Kayla. “I was, ah …”

“Dreaming?”

“No—Yes!  Kind of.”  Raj gave her a crooked smile.  “I wasn’t feeling very well, sorry.  I’m a little turned around.”

“Ohh.  You do look a little pale.”

She was sure that was true.  She darted her eyes around in a desperate attempt to find the date.  It mattered, because Steve was either working for the Vitalis or he was back in Tuscany under Stefano’s control.  She hoped to God it was the Vitalis.  She knew that meant he was with Ava, which she didn’t look forward to, but anything was better than the thought of Steve in that nightmare torture chamber.  Anything.  Her eyes were drawn back to Raj in the doorway, who was looking at her with apprehension.  Kayla didn’t have time to deal with him, she had to figure out where Steve was and how long he’d been here without her, because that mattered, too; she’d hoped it was only a matter of hours.  But Raj looked so youthfully needy, and he was such a sweet kid, she couldn’t really turn him away.  She knew he would stop existing when she jumped, but right now he existed and was looking at her hopefully and, frankly, a little pathetically.

Kayla straightened and smoothed out the labcoat she was wearing over the blue sweater and black fitted skirt that definitely did not fit her in 2009 .  “You can come in, ya know, if I remember correctly, I’m pretty sure this is your office, too.”  Her smile wasn’t forced, but her calm kind of was.  She needed to locate Steve and realized a moment to take stock was probably a good thing.  Raj entered and sat at his desk.  It was identical to Kayla’s only cluttered with papers and files.  He turned on his computer, and Kayla watched him log on so that she could try to remember what to do with her own.  

“I don’t know how you keep up.  I’ll bet you’re almost done.”  She had no idea what he was talking about, so she just gave a non-commital shrug and smiled.  “I promise I won’t ask again, but can you help me?”

She realized he was talking about his patient charts from rounds.  “I’m not sure, ah … I’m not sure about the cases.”

Raj slapped his forehead.  “I’m such a loser!  You’re sick, hello?  Maybe I can cover for you for a change if you want to go home.”

“Yes,” she breathed with relief.  “Yes, I think I should go, I’m really feeling under the weather.”

Just then both of their pagers went off.  Kayla jumped at the unfamiliar sound coming from her lab coat pocket and fumbled for it.  Raj looked at his, then looked back to her as she tried to remember what to do with it, the model was so old.  “They need someone on six.  I can go, you go home, and I’ll finish your charts.  I owe you.”

That actually sounded fishy to her.  It was never a good idea for someone else to do your charts for you.  “Ah—I’m not sure—”

“Yes, yes, you go home and get some rest!”

It didn’t take too much convincing, as she had no clue what the detail was from the rounds she assumed they’d just conducted together, and none of this felt very real to her, anyway.  She’d do these patients no favors if she tried to complete their charts, so she agreed.  She dropped her fake smile as he walked out the door, however, when, for the first time, she caught sight of the detail surrounding Stacy’s desk.  It was decorated way over the top in all the trappings of Christmas, complete with garlands and a small tree.  She looked down at the chart she’d just been sprawled across to confirm what she already knew.  It was December of 2000.  Her heart sank.  Steve was back with Stefano.  There was no dobut about this timing, because with no choice but to buckle down on these dates for the jump project, Steve had disclosed that it was November when he’d left Ava at the altar and then minutes later been recaptured by Stefano.  That meant he had jumped back to his cell and was being tortured.  Tears sprang to her eyes, and she felt herself start to lose control again.  She got up, paced, and then sat back down.  

“Ok, Kayla,” she said to herself, “think … maybe – maybe he got away.  Maybe he jumped in before that.”  But doing the math, that would have had to have been weeks, and she couldn’t imagine that was the case.  “Oh my God, Shane,” she whispered to herself with her head in her hands, “we’ve got to get him out again.  We’ve got to,” she repeated miserably, “we’ve got to go get him out.”

She allowed the panic to overcome her for another minute, then she finally forced herself to pull herself together.  She wanted very badly to call Shane right now and get the ball rolling on a rescue, but the task was daunting.  The convincing she’d have to do was going to be different now all these years removed.  Suddenly a chill flared right up her spine.  Stephanie.  She had an … eleven … no ten – she had a ten-year-old daughter at home that she hadn’t seen at this age in nine years.  The concept elated her even as her heart sank at the amount of work ahead of her.

Wait.  Wait.  Find him first.  

Kayla looked at the date on the chart again and finally spotted the flip calendar on Raj’s desk.  She got up and checked it, and while she was there she looked on his computer to see what his logon ID was so she could try to extrapolate what hers was (to say nothing of her password).  Like lightning she’d gotten down to business and started figuring out what to do.

First Kayla made a guess where Alice Horton would be nine years ago and figured retired at home was her best bet, and sure enough the woman answered the phone.  She sounded quite a bit older than the last time she’d talked to her eleven years previous to now.

“Mrs. Horton!  Hi, this is Kayla.”

“Kayla?!” 

“Johnson,” she clarified.

“Yes, I—Well, of course, you are.  I mean, there aren’t so many Kayla’s out there, are there?”

Kayla made an amused sound. “Yes!  You’re right, I – it’s just been a while is all.”

“Yes, it has.  How are you, dear?  Did you get my Christmas card?”

“I … did, yes,” she guessed, “… it was … lovely.  You remember me every year.  I’m a little behind on mine.  I, uh, I think.”

“So, what can I do for you, Kayla?”  She sounded quite elderly, but still very alert.  Kayla smiled knowingly.  Alice always did get right down to business at any age.

“Well, I have a question that’s going to sound very strange.”

“Oh?”

“Has, ah … has anyone left a message for me?”

“A message?  Whatever for?”

Kayla sighed.  “Nevermind,” she said dejectedly.  “I think I’m – I’m a little confused is all.  Sorry I—”

“How odd.  There was a young man who called asking me that same question.”

Kayla’s heart skipped a beat.  “There was?  Was it today?!”

“Oh, good heavens, no, it was … now let me see …”

“Did he ask for me?!”

“No, should he have?”

Kayla tried very hard not to be aggressive with her questions, but this was very hard.  “Can you tell me what he said?”

“Well, he asked if there was a message for him, and when I told him I didn’t even know who he was he said he had the wrong number.”  That wasn’t how it was supposed to work.  He jumped first, he was the one who should have been leaving the message.  But this had to be Steve. It had to be.  “Kayla.  What is this about?”

Kayla swallowed tightly.  “I don’t think I can really say.  Right now.  Can you just try to think of when this was?  Maybe yesterday?  If you could remember that I would appreciate it more than you know.”  Alice was silent for an ucomfortable length of time.  “Mrs. Horton?”

“This is about Steve isn’t it?”

Kayla’s mouth dropped open.  “St—about—um—what?” she stammered, literally shocked at this woman’s deduction.  Or was she just trying to be very careful about what she disclosed?

“He sounded so familiar.  I felt like I knew him.  I’d forgotten all about it until you just asked me the same question.  If there was a message for you.  It is, isn’t it. He’s alive.”  Kayla didn’t know what to say.  “Kayla, I think you’d better tell me what’s going on here.”

“I—I’m not sure how to explain it to you.”

“Kayla?  Was that young man who called me Steve Johnson or wasn’t it?”

Kayla was out of ideas on how to proceed next, so she just kind of gave up.  “Yes.  I think it was.”

“He’s alive?”

“Yes.”

“And he’s in some kind of trouble?”

“I think he is, yes.  And it’s very important that you don’t tell anyone.  You have to keep this completely to yourself.  That’s why he called you, because we know you’re trustworthy.

“It is?” Alice was completely intrigued.

“Yes, and so that when I—got here, I could find out where to look for him.”

“By calling me with the information?  Why me?”

“You’re our secret-keeper.”

“Am I!” she sounded confused and impressed.

“I can’t tell you any more, just please, when did you get this call?”

Alice really didn’t remember exactly, but she was reasonably sure it was before last week.  This meant he might have been recaptured, or maybe he wasn’t.  Either way, she was terrified that this undeniable gaping delay in arrivals surely meant nothing good for their stability.  If that call was really from Steve, that is – which how could it not have been? 

Alice called Kayla’s name twice before the sound of the woman’s voice had penetrated the intensity of what was going through Kayla’s head.

“What?” she asked absently.

“I said you need to clear that head of yours and tell me what is going on.”

“Honestly, I don’t think you’d believe me,” she huffed.

“You’re joking.  Kayla.  You’ve just told me that your dead husband is not so dead.  If that doesn’t convince you, I don’t know what would.”

Kayla separated herself for just a moment to assuage her own burning curiosity.  Because this was not the first or even second time that Alice had blindly followed one of them into what would otherwise be crazy.  “You know what, Mrs. Horton, I didn’t really tell you that, you guessed all on your own.  As far as you and everyone else knows, Steve has been dead for a long time.”

“Yes, but he’s not, is he?”

“No, he’s not.  I just – if he didn’t say anything to you on that call, then how did you know?”

“Well, I didn’t,” she said matter-of-factly.  “But when you asked me if there was a message, it was so peculiar.  And I remembered that the same thing happened with that young man that said he was a wrong number.”

“Yes, but, well, he wasn’t even alive as far as you knew.”

“Oh, he wouldn’t be the first in Salem to be not so dead, after all.  Why, look at Hope.  Your own brother.  Even my Mickey came back to us.  Why, I wouldn’t be surprised if I popped back up after being assumed dead, dear.”

Kayla was so tempted to tell Alice to watch out for Marlena in a few years, but the way the slipstream was showing instability she just kept her mouth shut for this timeline she had no investment in and that would cease to exist the moment she left it.  Her husband, however, would continue to exist, and she needed to find him. 

“Mrs. Horton, thank you.  This was more helpful than you know.  Please, please, do not tell anyone about this.  Please, I’m begging you.”

“Well, I—look, if I’m your secret-keeper, then I’d better live up to expectations.”

“Thank you,” Kayla said with equal parts gratitude and desperation, “and if he calls you again, please tell him … that I’m here and I remember Stockholm.” 

When they hung up Kayla was stunned.  “What just happened?”  She didn’t have time to figure it out. If it was last week, then Steve was in Tuscany.  “Please, God, no.”  On the off chance he’d already found her she called her home number.  Steve knew Kayla’s office number and would have answered it if he’d heard it, but the shower had drowned out the sound of the ringing phone. 

Her blood pressure about to spike, Kayla picked up the phone again to call Shane, but she froze upon realizing she didn’t remember his number.  She opened every drawer but did’t find a personal phone book.  She did find her purse, though and realized this was the first jump in which she had a cellphone.  So she fished it out of her purse, and sure enough there was a number for him that was separate from Kimberly’s.  She fumbled through the older model and before she knew what she was doing the number was ringing. 

“This is Shane Donovan, please be so kind as to leave a message.” 

The beep was upon her, and Kayla replied with abject silence.  She had no clue what to say that would not make her look insane.  She didn’t even know for sure that Steve had been recaptured, but the concept was so monstrous, and she was so desperate to get him out as immediately as possible, that she hadn’t thought through what she’d actually say to Shane.  In that moment of realization, she knew this had to be a live conversation.  Nothing she said over a phone would make an impact without body language and the ability to look him in the eye. 

Without saying a word Kayla disconnected the call slammed the handset on her desk and laid her head down heavily to think about what to do next. 

Get a grip, Kayla.  You have to get it together right now!  So she did.  Kayla took a very deep breath and mentally let go of the anxiety.  There was no way to move forward until she did, so she let it go and then got back to business. 

Taking out a legal pad, Kayla wrote out everything she knew about this time.  This was the purpose of the jump project, so that when they arrived anywhere, especially unshared time, they could avoid the hysteria and be smart.  Admittedly, this location in time was a serious shock, but nothing was more shocking than waking up as an 18-year-old girl in 1979 thinking Steve was on a boat on the open sea, so she had to focus, here.  Her first priority actually wasn’t Steve, it had to be Stephanie this time.  She was ten-years-old here, and at – she looked at the small watch on her wrist – 11:27am, she would be smack dab in the middle of the 5^th grade.  She wrote down her address, phone numbers, and where her car would be, simply because the act of writing it down focused her and forced better recall.  She rifled through her purse to get a sense of what might be going on in her life, and looked around her desk for any indication of what her schedule was. Finding nothing written, she assumed based on Raj’s insistence that she go home that she had nowhere in the hospital to be that he couldn’t cover.  Her next responsibility was to pick up Stephanie this afternoon from the school’s aftercare program (which she remembered very fondly as having been very enriching for her brainy daughter).  She had to be positive, so she found the school’s number and called it to double check when pickup time for aftercare was, and that solidified the plan on Stephanie.  An elation did pass through her at one point, the concept of seeing her baby girl at this age very exciting. 

Now it was time to find Steve.  Consulting the calendar she’d now brought over from Raj’s desk, Kayla established Steve’s wedding date to Ava as November 26^th.  The concept turned her stomach, but she had to be focused on facts and not emotions.  If Steve had jumped in before that date then he was not likely to have been recaptured.  He was, however, likely to have been with Ava.  And it finally hit her with a vast relief that if Steve had made a phone call, then he couldn’t have been a prisoner.  The relief was short-lived at what that really meant.  “My God, Steve, how long have you been here?”

“You’ve got mail.”  Raj’s computer screen indicated that an email had just come in.  At first she paid it no attention, but then she cocked her head at it and started to scrutinize it.  And she wondered if he wasn’t the only one that might have gotten mail. 

Kayla had properly extrapolated her Cedars Sinai logon ID, but she had to guess at the password.  She’d recycled passwords for years and had about six she used all the time.  She was warned after the first two that she had only three more attempts before she was locked out, however, so she hoped to God she picked the right one before that happened, because if she had to get Tech Support involved she was going to scream.  Luckily the last one worked, and it felt like nothing short of a victory. 

With a smile on her face she all but giggled at the Windows 95 interface.  She had no idea when computers released what kind of applications and such, but she did know just by looking at it that this was so old.  She almost couldn’t find the browser, but when she fired up Internet Explorer, she was able to finally go to Hotmail.  They’d never used the agreed-upon email address, and Alice wasn’t even clear about her dates, so Kayla was sure this would lead nowhere.  Which was why when she successfully logged on to it she was in utter shock.

Seven unread emails sat in the inbox dating from Sunday, November 26^th to today’s date, Friday, December 8^th.  Happy with relief, they had to be from Steve.  They couldn’t be from anyone else.  But she truly paled at the date range.  It had been a record.  Without a moment’s further hesitation she opened the first one.

I’m here, Sweetness.   Jumped in this morning.  You’re not going to like it.  If you get this, don’t look for me, it’s not safe.  I promise I’ll find you.  I’ll always find you.  Miss you baby.  Love you.  Both of you.

Kayla blinked.  Both of us?  “Stephanie,” she whispered.  He was here!  She thanked God that he wasn’t with Stefano.  But what did he mean it wasn’t safe?  She knew in her gut that Stefano had something to do with this.  But then she looked at the date and wasn’t so sure.  What if Steve had tried to break up with Ava and she’d gone crazy again?  Maybe the threat was from her.  Either way, that was 12 days ago.  That made this Day 13.  There were six more emails there.  Her heart raced as she opened the next one, which was dated four days later.

Hey Baby –

You don’t have to worry, I’ve got everything under control.  Kayla smiled.  I get to see you up close and personal but now I’m not sure that was such a good idea because I actally miss you more. You’re right here but I can’t touch you. “Right where?”  Kayla absurdly looked around the room.  Had he been here?  In the hospital?  Did he see her right now?  She pushed back her chair and ran to the doorway.  Looking down the linoleum-floored hallway in one direction and then the other produced no evidence that Steve was there.  A colleague she didn’t recognize said hello as he walked by, and she kindly said hello back before realizing that this was probably silly.  She sat back down and kept reading.  And you’re so beautiful.  Do you know how pretty you are?  And our Little Sweetness?  I missed so much.  I missed it all.  Please get here soon baby.  I need you.

Love, Steve

Mention of their daughter and the fact that he’d seen her made her feel something very sentimental.  It was very dear and gave her a physical sensation very much like homesickness.  Her eyes stung with overwhelming poignance.  Steve had seen not just her, but Stephanie, too.  It sounded like he was keeping himself hidden from them.  The whole tone of the email had squeezed at her heart.  “Where are you, baby?”

The next email answered that question.  It wasn’t immediately clear, but by the end of the email she’d figured out that he was hiding somewhere that Stephanie had sniffed out.  This didn’t surprise Kayla in the least, her daughter was always as reckless as her father.  That landlady of yours is loco.  Mention of Mrs. Lopez made her laugh.  She was pretty sure that however this happened, it was related to the non haunted nature of her house.   She was laughing out loud at the story that probably went with this.  She was also ecstatic at the fact that he’d been in her house.  Maybe even still there.  She almost went for her phone to try calling again, but stayed focused on finishing what he’d written to her. 

… I almost made love to you last night.  On the kitchen floor.  Kayla’s heart stopped for a moment.  I know what we said, and I know what we thought was right, but damn, baby, you are persistent.  You don’t take no for an answer.  And I’d be lying if I said I wanted you to, because I didn’t.  Her face solemn with this discovery, Kayla felt very strange.  The amplification effect latched onto it.  She was jealous of herself, and she was angry, at whom she didn’t know yet, possibly also herself, because she was sure that what he said about her persistence was not exaggerated.  You should have seen the look on your face when I was trying to put you off.  It broke my heart. I was hurting you.  Her anxiety kicked up, mostly without help, as she read the rest of his painful confusion splayed out before her in the form of this email.  His guilt was apparent as she took it in, not sure now how to feel about his desire for this other version of her.  This you loves me just the same as you do.  The 1979 you didn’t know me, you had fallen in love with me all on your own. But this you was married to me.  This you watched me die.  This you is the you you are now in six more years.  Same girl.  What am I supposed to do?  I’m either gonna hurt her or I’m gonna hurt you. 

The moment she finished it she opened the next one.  Kayla, I did something this morning, and I can’t take it back.  I’m afraid you’re never going to forgive me.  That’s when she knew.  She didn’t have to read any more, she knew where it was going to lead.  But she did read on.  Her jealousy flared at the fact that he’d been intimate with her before she’d arrived into herself, but her heart also broke at Steve’s obvious confusion about what to do.  His tension was so clear, his guilt so fraught, that it was impossible for her not to feel for him. Because she’d been there.  She’d been in the position of wanting the destination man that was still, to her, her husband.  Needing his love – and needing to give him hers.  She’d been there, and she’d felt what he’s now feeling.  The proposal.  Somehow she was able to make herself stop then.  But Chicago …  She tried to lie to herself, but she couldn’t.  She knew the truth.  And the truth was that if he’d said the words she needed, that he loved her, too, she would have made love to him.  It was true no matter how much she wanted it not to be. 

Kayla read on.  Read how Steve had pleasured her into orgasm.  Read that he’d tried not to but couldn’t take how the rejecton was affecting her.  How much pain this her had been in.  And she knew how true that was, because she’d already felt that rejection from him.  More than once.  Being told she was nothing more than a one night stand on shore leave when she knew it wasn’t so roared into her head, and she had to shake it away.  Remember when I didn’t remember you yet, and you wanted us to make love?  I said no, that it wouldn’t be right.  It was that same look on your face.  It was so cruel.  Kayla could hear her husband’s voice break as she read the words.  I was there but I wouldn’t let you have me.  And here I am now doin’ that to you again!  Kayla couldn’t help it when she stifled a sob.  But she read on and wiped the tears away as she read how he couldn’t take the pain he was inflicting on her and made it better before he’d damaged her – and liked it despite himself.  Kayla I feel guilty. I feel like I did something wrong.

“So do I,” she whispered, feeling like a hypocrite for the mixed feelings coursing through her.  When she read the next sentence, her silent tears stopped and her breath caught in her throat.  Think back to December of 2000, baby, and tell me, if I’d shown up and refused to make love to you, would you be ok with that?  You’re this Kayla in six more years.  When I hurt her, I’m hurting you.  Even if you don’t remember it when you get here, I’m hurting you.  

Suddenly, things that were hazy and confusing had become so much clearer.  Because she knew the answer to that question. 

She read the next email quickly, almost removed from herself.  Because the last sentence of the one before it had truly sent her reeling.  Unless he was sick or somehow traumatized, Kayla would not understand a Steve that remembered her refusing to make love to her.  She would not understand why a Steve happy to see her and sleeping naked in her bed and kissing her and fingering her would refuse to let her express her love for him in kind.  And she understood what Steve had put the Kayla who rightfully belonged here through these last few days.  And why he had to make it right.  For her. 

Kayla read and absorbed everything about Sam and spotted the New Years Eve party invitation on the edge of her desk.  She flinched when Steve used the term “cheated” to describe his sexual activities with her destination self but positively blanched when she read that there was something else that happened that was haunting him. 

She knew before she even read the next email that this was where it was all headed. So when she read the words, I made love to you last night, Sweetness, she didn’t react.  She didn’t read on right away, but she didn’t cry either.  She didn’t whimper, she didn’t get mad, she didn’t anything.  Because she was numb.  It had finally happened to one of them.  Sex with a destination partner.  Before the other one got there.   

You were so beautiful … I had to fix my wife feeling lonely for her husband then rejected by him … I couldn’t let it go on … I wanted it … I’m scared that you’re not going to forgive me for wanting it and for not waiting for all of you. 

There was something about the raw honesty he was giving her here that made her feel the devotion she knew he had to her and to their marriage.  And she could feel his fear in these written words just as surely as she could feel his touch if she closed her eyes.

I said what if I made love to you then told you about how I did that with her, and you said there is no her.  There is only me and how could I not do it?

 These words that had been hers were powerful, because she agreed with them. 

God baby what if you don’t take this well?  What am I going to do … I get it now, how hard it was for you to stop when I proposed and in Chicago, and I’m sorry I took it bad.  What if you won’t understand or forgive me, then you won’teven be able to leave me beause we’re tied together with the jumps and you’ll resent me that you have to keep looking at my god damn face. 

“Oh Steve.”  A tear silently fell over her cheek.  It was for his pain as much as her own.  She read through the rest of the email, read how she’d been able to ease his pain since leaving Emily behind, and just wished now that he would be able to ease hers. 

So we made love.  Waking up with you was beautiful.  I wanted you all morning before you left for work.  Now I don’t know how to live with it until I know how you will.

I love you.  Forever I love you.

Kayla laid her head in her hands and cried.  She didn’t know how she’d be able to explain herself to Raj and Stacy, to say nothing of Sam, if any of them walked in.  But she took the moment to express these emotions that had to be expressed, and no one did come in.  Meanwhile, the amplification effect continued to exploit her vulnerability.

She finished up the last email, reading more of his angst and taking in everything he’d said about the nightmare jumps.  She couldn’t help but smile at this Book Club that apparently had just started yesterday, but that smile was short-lived when the email abruptly ended with a plea desperate in its simplicity to come home.

Kayla had read all seven of the emails, each one harder than the next.  And truthfully, she wasn’t sure how to feel.  She vascillated between anger at Steve to anger at herself to anger at Rolf to elation to jealousy.  She knew as well as Steve did that this was probably going to happen eventually.  They had agreed that it wasn’t cheating, it was survival.  This exact situation was the perfect example of survival more than any other single jump in any timeline, shared or otherwise.  And she knew that when part of her felt betrayed that it was not true.  Because he and her destination self had been right; she remembered what it was like when she was the one faced with saying no to the man that loved her – and that she loved.  That she needed.  She remembered how it felt when her husband didn’t know her.  When he was rejecting her. When she was throwing herself at him.  Did she wish he would have waited for her?  Yes.  But the thought of Chicago made the tears well back up. 

The artificial intensity of her feelings made her blood pressure skyrocket to real and very dangerous levels.  This was not something that had happened before, or maybe she’d just never noticed, but her body was reacting with actual and diagnosable anxiety.  Her chest started to hurt, and her breaths were short.  This side effect had never been so severe as the anger, jealousy, sympathy, and worry all converged within her.  The physical effects shocked her, which made it worse.  The part of her that was a doctor made her go for the pulse in her wrist, and the truly shocking rate that she couldn’t even count was an immediate wake-up call.  The self-awareness was like a hard shove of a dislocated shoulder back into its socket, and suddenly, the amplification effect dissipated, allowing her to get her emotions into check.

“What the hell was that?” she asked herself out loud.  Another check of her pulse made it clear that she was normalizing, and she was finally able to think rationally.  Adrenalin still coursed through her, however, and it made her shake.

This.  Was wrong.  All of it was wrong.  It had to end.  And she was going to end it.  She closed Hotmail, turned off her computer, and left the hospital.

Steve had been watching the van that was obviously watching him for an hour.  He’d almost forgotten about them.  It was almost two weeks of watching.  Recently he’d gotten a bit more lax, as the more days that went by without a sighting, the less likely that a sighting would happen.  Then he saw it.  A cursory glance out the front window revealed the windowless van directly across the street.  It was the first time any vehicle had been parked there, let alone a kidnapmobile.  He couldn’t believe it.  It took two weeks for these guys to finally come here to look for him.  He wondered how long those idiots had been combing Manhattan. 

He tore himself away to check every door and window, including the one to the loft, and make very sure they were locked, which they were.  Halfway down the stairs from having checked the loft door Steve heard a sound that made his stomach lurch.  Someone was now rattling the knob of that very loft door he’d just checked, himself, not one full minute before.  Had he been seen?  Steve froze on the stairs.  He knew that you couldn’t see in through the honeycombed blackout blind that hung over the door’s window, nor could he be spotted from his position on the stairs if that door opened.  But if he moved any farther down the steps then he could be seen through some of the kitchen windows, so he stayed very put for now.  One by one, doors and windows were being jostled around the whole house.  He heard every one of them, and told himself what a smart goddammed dude he was for being as careful as he had been.  It hadn’t been overreacting, and it hadn’t been for nothing.  Get rid of her.  The words rang in Steve’s ears like the horror of those photos of his ravaged wife.  His girls were in trouble.  They were collateral damage that monster and the people that worked for him didn’t care about.  The odds of Kayla being robbed right now by some random asshole were far lower than the odds of an agent of Stefano Dimera coming to collect his property.  

Only one thought drove Steve: His wife and daughter were in danger.  And if anything happened to them, Steve was going to kill those two men.

After several minutes of silence Steve went back upstairs to look out the window.  No one was in the small backyard, so he carefully poked his head out from the stairwell, confirmed that no one was visible out the kitchen windows, and watched out the front curtains as the man climbed back into the driver’s side of the van. 

Steve’s mind raced with this new situation.  Steve was an investment that Stefano wasn’t going to let go of.  He knew first hand that the world knowing he was alive was no deterrent from controlling what the madman perceived as his.  Steve knew how it worked, now, and realized that Kayla’s phones might actually be bugged.  He couldn’t take any chances and resolved not to call any of her numbers, nor email her known addresses.  The only safe means of communication was going to be the secret email address, because no one had any idea that it existed other than himself.  Unless … what if they’d already monitored the Internet traffic from here?  Can they do that yet?  “It’s Stefano, if he can imprint people, he can bug a computer.  F*cking Rolf.”  There was only one option.  When Kayla got home, he had to tell her the rest. And they had to call Shane.

It was only moments later that the bluesmobile came barreling up the driveway like a bat out of hell.  What was she doing home?  This was the worst possible scenario, because there was no way they weren’t watching every move she made.  His eye was on the men in the van as Kayla came up the walk, because if they so much as touched her, he was going to kill them.  Moments before she reached the door he darted behind it to ensure he was out of eyeshot when it opened. 

Nothing happened.  He heard the keys, but the door wasn’t opening. What was going on?  He almost called for her, but if he did she might respond, and he couldn’t have that.  So, he waited very impatiently as his panic rose.  On the other side of the door Kayla had no idea that the van across the street didn’t belong.  All she knew was that her habit of not removing the keys of previous domiciles from her keychain had finally gotten the better of her.  Finally she found the right one, entered, and closed the door behind her. 

“Baby,” he said softly.

Kayla jumped out of her skin.  She whirled around and gasped when she saw Steve standing in the corner looking very much like the man she’d last seen on very brief jumps, and before that more than three years ago.  He looked so different than the man she’d just left in the lighthouse.  His body was different, his voice was different, and his hair was shorter than she’d ever seen it.  She stared at him wide-eyed.

“Shh!  Baby, shh, it’s me, you’re ok!”  Before she could say anything Steve locked the door and pulled her to him in the corner, which was out of eyeshot of any window.  “Shh,” he put his fingertips to her open mouth.  They were soft against her lips, and she couldn’t help but stare at him.  He was here.  She knew he would be, but the feel of him so close was real.  She mumbled his name, but he shushed her again, too focused on his own agenda to really see what her face was telling him – that she’d arrived.

“Sweetness, we’re in trouble,” Steve whispered.  “Stefano’s goons are out there.”

Kayla swallowed.  “His … what?”

“His men.  The ones I told you about.”  Kayla leaned her head toward the front window, but Steve pulled her back to him.  “What are you doin?!  Baby, listen, I told you it’s not safe!”  He explained what had happened before she drove up.  He was talking a mile a minute, his tone hushed.  She wasn’t completely clueless, she’d read all of his emails and knew that he’d been hiding here, she just hadn’t known which batshit crazy person he was hiding from.  Now she did.  That didn’t make what he was saying completely clear, though. 

Kayla was silent as Steve furiously laid it out for her, and now on top of everything else going on in her head as she tried to adjust and suss it all out, she was scared, too.  Finally Steve stopped talking long enough to notice the look on his wife’s face. 

“Kayla, are you listenin’ to me?”

Kayla nodded, her eyes fixed on his.  “I’m listening.” It was only the second thing she’d said to him in this timeline.  “Are you?”  She didn’t know why she didn’t just tell him it was her.  But the longer she’d gone without the opportunity to say so, the more she willed him to see her.

Steve was very annoyed now and took her by the wrists.  “Didn’t you hear a goddamn word I said?  We’re in trouble here!”  What the hell was wrong with her?  Suddenly, the look in Kayla’s eye changed.  She touched her fingertips over his face before curling her fingers into the long stubble of his beard.

“Don’t you know who I am?” she whispered.

Every inch of Steve’s skin prickled with realization, and his face softened.  “Kayla,” he whimpered softly.  He took her hand from his cheek, brought it down over his heart, and held it there.  The whereabouts of the men outside momentarily forgotten, he let the relief wash over him, knowing his wife had finally arrived.  “Sweetness.  Do—” he fought to keep his voice from breaking.  “—Do you remember Stockholm?”  Kayla nodded with a knowing shrug.  “Say it,” he insisted with a desperation that scared her.  I’ve asked you so many times.  “I need to hear you say it.”

“What is this, 20 questions?”

Steve let out a shuddering breath and clutched her to him tightly.  He repeated her name over and over.  He felt a sadness that the Kayla that belonged here was gone, just as he suspectd he would.  But he felt such happiness and true relief that his own Kayla was finally here that all he could do was thank God for her arrival.

“I can’t believe you’re here, baby.”  He rubbed his face against the side of her head.  “I can’t believe you’re finally here.” 

Kayla wapped her arms around him and thrilled at the deep emotion she felt from him.  “It was a bad one,” she said. 

Steve nodded.  “Me, too.”  He stroked his hand down the back of her head, the tactile feeling of her silky hair calming him slightly.  But the guilt and fear were very quickly weeding through him, and he had to tell her.  He had to get this out before the malevolent roots smothered his resolve.  “Baby.”  He kissed her cheek then laid his forehead against it.  “I have so much to tell you.”  He was still holding her tightly, and his arms felt so good.

“I know.  I already know.”

“No, there’s more.  Not just about Stefano.” 

“Steve, I know already, I—”

“Shh!  Not here.”  Steve craned his neck toward the livingroom window and told her to follow him.  He’d started to take her to their room, but he remembered that the curtains weren’t drawn completely in there, so he led them up to the loft where they could talk freely.  Kayla registered her old house as Steve dragged her through it, but she’d have to appreciate her surroundings later. Right now it wasn’t about the place, it was about the two of them. 

Steve didn’t want to let go of her hand, but he went to the door’s window to check the backyard before turning to face her again.  Then he had to pace.  He was so amped up with anxiety and fear that now he couldn’t look at her.

Kayla saw what Steve was going through and didn’t want this for him.  She knew exactly what was happening and needed to help him right now.  She stopped his pacing and took his hand.  His heightened feelings were preventing rational thought right now, and all they did was continue to escalate.

“Steve, calm down, it’s ok.  I know why you’re upset.”

“No you don’t,” he insisted.  “We have to talk.  You have to know where we are and what’s happening, but first – baby, I—Something happened.  I—did something—we—Jesus, Kayla …”

“I read the emails.”  Steve’s blood turned to ice.  Right there where he stood with his hand in Kayla’s, his blood ran absolutely cold.  “I read everything you wrote.  I know you slept with me last night.”  She was shocked when her eyes began to sting.  It wasn’t what she was expecting, because she’d made peace with it before she’d left that desk.  Still a tear very quickly ran down her cheek.  She was still at peace with this. Why was she crying? 

“Kayla,” he drew out her name in a tearful plea.  “No … Noooo.”

The tone is her husband’s voice was too much.  The pain and guilt were too much.  Kayla threw herself into Steve’s arms and kissed him.  The intensity of it was so unexpected and passionate that it took Steve’s breath away.  She covered his mouth with hers and let her tongue search out his.  When she found it, the reassurance was astounding.  Steve succumbed to her in spite of his confusion and let their mouths express the love inside of them.  Steve’s hands rubbed at his wife’s back fiercely, while Kayla’s hands fisted the front of Steve’s button-down shirt.

“I forgive you!” she tearfully insisted between kisses.  Steve couldn’t spreak. “I know why you did it.  I do,” she wiped her hand across her face, resenting herself for crying before kissing him again.  “I know you love me, and  I forgive you!  Please!”  She moved her lips to the spot below his patch.  “Don’t do this to yourself!”  Then she tenderly kissed his patch.  He shuddered when she did.  “Don’t do it!”  She went back to his lips, and the reuinion they both felt in each other’s touch was truly beautiful.  Finally they came up for air, both of their faces wet with tears.  Steve took her face in both palms and wiped them with his thumbs.  “How?”  he asked incredulously.  “How can … You read them all?”

“Every word.”

Steve wiped his right cheek on his shoulder.  Kayla swept her fingers across it, too.  “And you weren’t … mad at me?  You weren’t upset?”

“No, I was.  I was very upset.”  She refused to look at the floor, and she was glad when he didn’t either.  “I felt like I told you I would probably feel.  I was devastated.”  Steve furrowed his brow with more emotion that he’d hurt her, but Kayla wanted to be honest.  She had to be completely honest with him about this or they would be damaged.  She knew it on a gut level, and she trusted her gut.  “Can we sit down?”  Steve nodded.  “Wow, look it’s our couch.”  The non-sequitur was so genuine in how she blurted it that he couldn’t help but laugh.  Taking in their surroundings upon arrival was something Steve had already done; for Kayla it was the first time back in this house in … he wasn’t sure how long anymore.  He’d know if he thought hard enough but right now he wasn’t able to put two thoughts together. 

“How long’s it been since you’ve seen the place?”

“I dunno, about five years, maybe?  We were only in the condo a couple years.  Better school district for high school.  I always missed my little house.”  She ran her hand over the fabric of this old couch, then looked back to him.  The momentary tangent helped steady both of them.  “I was upset,” she picked up the conversation.  “I don’t want us to lie to each other about this, we have to be honest or it’s going to eat us alive.  But I’m not upset like that anymore.  I don’t even know why I’m crying, because I wasn’t crying when I left the hospital.”

“Is that where you jumped in?”

Kayla nodded.  “I was panicked this time.  I didn’t know where you were.”  Her voice tightened to a squeak, the concept of Steve in captivity again too much for her.  “I thought Stefano had you again.”

“Shh, baby.”  He took her in his arms.  “He doesn’t.”

“I called Alice Horton and figured out that you’d called her,” she sniffled.

Steve straightened.  “How, baby, I never said anything, just hung up.”

“You asked her if there was a message for you.  I asked the same thing, and she’s the one who said, wait a minute, is this about Steve.”

“Are you serious?”

“Yeah,” she nodded incredulously, herself.  “But, Steve, you jumped first, you’re the one who is supposed to leave the message about where you are, I’m the one who’s supposed to pick it up, I jumped after.”  Steve eyed her guiltily, then leaned back and scrubbed a hand down his face.  She was right.  “Listen, that doesn’t matter, ok, just, nevermind right now.”  Steve glanced just his eye back at her as she continued talking.  “I was upset.  I was – everything.  I was every feeling.  I was angry and kind of happy at the same time.  I remember what it was like missing you, and I was happy for myself that her sadness was over.  My sadness.  Was over.  But I was angry, too.  At you for making a memory that important without me.  At me for feeling the anger when I could see that you didn’t have a lot of choices.  And … we’ve been so far apart from each other since we lost Emily.  We hadn’t made love in so long, and … ” Steve knew where this was going.

“You were already afraid I’d never make love to you again.  Then when I do, it’s with the other you.” 

Kayla shrugged her agreement and felt ashamed for it.  But she felt it, nonetheless. “Yeah.”

“I’m sorry.  I’m so sorry, Kayla.”  He sounded so dejected.  “I couldn’t hurt you anymore.  I’m so good at hurtin’ you, I couldn’t take it.  And you don’t know what it’s like, you were you!  You weren’t someone who didn’t know me, you knew me, and I knew you, and you didn’t feel any different.  You felt just like when I came back.  It wasn’t any different.”

“I don’t know what it’s like?  Yes, I damn well do!  You proposed to me!”  She was right, and now he didn’t know if he should feel worse or better.  “You asked me to marry you on that roof like it was supposed to be!  It was beautiful, Steve, and then you were there, loving me, and I loved you, too!  That’s how I can forgive you.  Because I do understand!” 

Steve breathed her name and kissed her.  Her whole body stirred as she kissed him back. 

Kayla pulled away and finished her final thoughts.  “I don’t want to dwell on this.  It’s over, it’s done.  For now.”

“For always.”

“No.”  Steve reacted badly to this.  “This could happen again.  We both know it.  We have to be honest about this.  I don’t want you to feel any more guilt about this jump.  But I-I-I think we need to talk about this again.  How we do this.  Because you said it wasn’t so clear anymore, right and wrong. That’s what you said, and I think you’re right.  I think there are times that maybe it’s right.  I think what you did here on this jump – I think this one was right.

Ava.  Her name came unbidden, and he flinched.  Kayla mistook it.

“I can’t take how much this ate at you, baby,” she said tenderly.  “You were suffering, because you didn’t know how to stop from hurting me.  I don’t want that for you, and I don’t want it for me, either.  So, yes, I forgive you.  

“I slept with Ava.”  Steve barely got the words out.  His voice wasn’t his when he did.  He didn’t know whose voice that was, but it wasn’t his, and when he heard the words he’d said, he thought he might die.

Kayla thought she might die, too.  It’s haunting me.  Now she knew what that thing he couldn’t say was.  “Ava,” she said with a calm so pregnant with affect that it painted the room red.  “You slept with Ava.”  It was a statement.  “Here.”

Steve shook his head upon his hunched up shoulders.  “I didn’t want to,” he rasped.  “I didn’t want it.  I didn’t.”

“Oh my God,” her voice shook and her eyes instantly went bloodshot with tears she would not let come. 

“Please,” Steve begged.  “Please, Sweetness, let me explain.  Please, baby.”  The desperation in his voice was unbearable.

Bloody hell, Kayla!  Shane’s words when she kicked him off of her rang in her ears. And she knew.  She knew what must have happened.  Her blue eyes pierced through the truly awful feelings stirring between them, and when she found the shame and regret blazing in Steve’s green eye, she was able to calm.

“Ok.”

Steve didn’t understand. “Ok?” he asked, clearly confused.

“Ok,” she said with a dead, scary calm.  “Explain.”

Steve blinked.  “Really?”

“Before my heart breaks into too many pieces to put back together. Yes.  I want you to explain.”

“I arrived … in her bed.  It was a—a hotel, actually.” His voice shook.  “In Vegas.  We were supposed to—”

“Get married.  I remember.”

“Yeah.  And she was – on me.  We were—”

“F*cking,” she said bitterly.

“Kayla.”

“Go ahead you can say it.  You were f*cking her.”

Steve lowered his eye, but then looked at her again and nodded solemnly.  “I didn’t want it.”

The difference between her indictful tone and his remorseful one made her drop her head into her hands.  She was being so unfair.  “I’m sorry.  I – that woman, I just – I need a shell.”  Now her shoulders started to shake.  “I need another shell.”

Steve took her face in his hands and tilted it up to look at him. He was suddenly very intense as he locked onto her watery eyes.

“I didn’t want it!  Do you hear me, Kayla, I felt … violated.”  Kayla’s breath caught in her throat.  “I told her no. I told her to get off of me, but she was so wrapped up in her own damned—pleasure—that she didn’t hear how drastically things had changed under her.”

Suddenly their positioning mattered to Kayla.  She didn’t know why, it was kind of ridiculous, but she felt a sudden possessiveness and ownership over whatever sexual position Ava had all but usurped from her.  “She was on top?”

Steve took this without a blip.  “You want the details?”

“Yes!  Tell me!  I need you to tell me!”

“Yeah, I’d just jumped three times in seconds, was sick as hell, didn’t see you in any of them, and was so panicked that I was jumping before you were getting there that I was out of my head by the time I landed in that goddamn hotel bed with her on top of me!”

“You were inside her.  Then what?  Tell me, I need to hear it!”

“Yeah, I was inside her.  And all I wanted was out.  I knew right away I was having sex and that it wasn’t with you.  It made me sick.  I told her no, but all she wanted was her f*ck!”

Visions of Steve in that bed with Ava in the compound assailed her, but she didn’t break down, because releasing them on the beach that night in Hawaii was very real.  She no longer held that anger inside herself.  That didn’t mean the memories, themselves, were gone.  And it really didn’t mean this new act with Ava wouldn’t affect her. 

“Where were your hands?”

“Holding her up by her tits,” he confessed boldly but with no pride.  I tried to push her off of me, but she wanted that rush, and she didn’t even hear me sayin’ no!”  There was no question that what Steve said was the truth. She could hear in his voice how painful this was for him.  That this sex act was not of his own free will. 

“Did you come?!  Did she make you come?!”  She couldn’t think of another time she’d been so terrified of an answer to her question.

“No!  Not me.  Not me, Kayla.  She made Nick come before I got there.  I could feel that I’d already done it.  Before I got into my body.”

“You weren’t there for it,” she said softly.  She knew what that felt like.  She wasn’t there for the rape, but she felt it had happened once she arrived.   “You didn’t come.”

Steve shook his head.  “But she did.”

Kayla’s heart did begin to crack, but it stopped abruptly when he said the next horrifying words to her.  “She didn’t see me.  She didn’t care what I might have felt like, she just wanted to get off.  She wanted her f*ck, and she was gonna use me until she did.”  A chill shot through Kayla.  Use him.  Ava used him.  Just like all those women in Chicago had used him.  Oh, God, Steve.  “When I felt her come, I wanted to die.”

In this moment, Kayla would have given anything to take her husband’s pain and fear away.  The vein in his forehead was pronounced in tension, and she couldn’t have him feeling this way.  They embraced and held each other fiercely, releasing the tension as they did.  She whispered loving words into his ear and that none of it mattered.  “You didn’t sleep with her, you suffered through her.”  Steve stifled a sob that she understood.  That she somehow loved him anyway.  “You were violated.  I know what that’s like.”

“It wasn’t the same,” he said softly, still holding her.  She knew he meant the same as her rape.  “It was against my will, yes.  But there was a time that happened, it’s part of the real timeline.  It’s not the same now.  It’s a violation now.  But I don’t want you to think that it’s the same thing that happened to you, because it’s not.”

Kayla dug her head into his neck.  “Someone hurt you, baby.  It doesn’t matter if it didn’t hurt Nick. It did hurt you.” 

“God, baby.  I love you so much.”  Then he told her again.  He told her he loved her over and over, and Kayla would never tire of hearing it.

Their embrace melted into tender kisses that deepend with all the feelings running through them both.  Steve needed to make love to his wife, make her feel how much he needed her.  Kayla wanted him inside of her.  For so many reasons, she needed him.  To heal him, to claim him, and to express her love for him.  To feel his soul, to consummate the emotional reunion they both felt in their hearts, and to feel the safety of their connection.  The air in the room had developed a charge as their sexuality reacted to their emotions. 

“I need you,” Kayla whimpered.

“I need to be in you!” Steve replied with an intensity that hardened him to impressive rigidity.  He pinned her beneath him on the couch and let himself grind against her aggressively as he latched onto the spot on her neck that made her wet whenever he sucked on it.  Kayla cried out and held her husband’s head there for more. 

“Yes!  Now!  I want you!”

Steve unbuttoned her shirt to expose her breasts, pulled the cup of her bra down, and slid his tongue over her nipple.  Kayla moaned and then she gasped when he sucked it into his mouth.  The heat between her legs needed the hardened length that still hid inside his jeans, and she started pawing at him to find his waistband.  Steve wasted no time in helping her.  Now unbuttoned and unzipped, Kayla released his erection, and the feel of his taut skin in this time, palming it for the first time, was heady. 

The knock on the door made them both freeze.  Their arousal wasn’t just something that made them want the sex, they absolutely needed it.  It was visceral, and they were starving for it.  But that knock brought them crashing down into the reality of their situation. And their situation was very dangerous, indeed. 

“What do we do?” Kayla whispered.

Steve kissed her lips with a quick peck and then got up off of her.  “I hide, you answer the door.  They know you’re here, I saw them as they watched you come inside.”

“Kayla should have ben scared, but she wasn’t.  She was angry and this interruption of something she needed like she needed to breathe.  “What do I say?”  Steve was impressed by her fearlessness and smiled at her.  But his expression turned painful as he stuffed his rock hard penis back into his jeans and zipped.   “Oh, baby, that must have hurt.”  Now she was angrier.

“Not as much as it’s gonna hurt them if they touch a goddamn hair on your or Stephanie’s heads.”

Kayla straightened herself out, but her eyes were still red.  “Are you sure it’s them?”  Now the doorbell was ringing.

“Positive.”

They descened the stairs as Steve hastily told her to remember who she is here.  It occurred to him somewhere in the back of his head that he didn’t even know how long she’d been here, but he didn’t have time to dwell on these details yet, he’d find out later.  “I have one bag, it’s in the closet in your room.”

“Our room.”

“And it has a shitload of money in it.”

“What?!”

“Later!  You’re a widow, Kayla.  You’re a single mother, you got it?  I’m dead, I’ve been dead ten years, and you haven’t seen me since the day you buried me.”

“Ok,” she said very confidently.

“You act like it.”

“I will,” she repeated with absolute conviction.

Steve stayed on the stairwell as Kayla headed for the door, and it was actually much harder for him to relinquish this control when she did.  It was up to her now. 

“Who is it?” she called as she looked through the peephole.

“Meter reader, ma’am.”  His voice was neither friendly nor authentic.  And she also knew that of all the years she lived here, no meter reader had ever knocked on her door. They just went about the business of reading her meter on the side of the house.

“Yes?”

“Speak with you, please?”

Kayla looked back through the archway, but Steve was obscured in the stairwell.  She swallowed and steeled herself to who she was here.  She opened the door just enough to reveal herself and nothing else to a man wearing a blue windbreaker.  His demeanor alone screamed of something not right.  “Hi,” she said neutrally.  “Can I help you?”

“Ma’am, I’m here to read the meter.”

“Ok, go right ahead.  You know what to do, it’s right over there,” she angled her head, hoping she remembered right. 

“There’s a problem with the wiring from the house to the box.  I need to check it.”

“Check it?”

“Yes.”

There was no way this man was coming inside her house.  “I don’t understand, it was fine last month.”

“It’s the heavy rains, ma’am.”

Kayla screwed up her face in her best confusion act.  “Really?  I had no idea that could happen.  What is it the wires come loose or something?  Do they flood?  That is really interesting, can you show me?”

No!  Steve wanted to scream at her not to do that.  She couldn’t leave the house any nore than she could let him in. Dammit!

“You wouldn’t understand, ma’am, you’d better just let me come in.”

“Don’t be silly, I’m a doctor, I know a lot about how wiring works.  Did you know there are 31 pairs of spinal nerves, eight cervical nerves, 12 thoracic, five lumbar, and five sacral nerves branching out from the spinal cord.  Then there’s the one at the coccygeal region.  And all of them are so complicated that you can’t even name them in one convention.  If I can understand that wiring enough to perform surgery on them, I think I can understand the wiring in an electric meter.”  Absurdly, Kayla wondered if she’d had her surgical rotation yet and if he’d have done his homework to know that.

“Ma’am, it’s not the box, I need to see inside your house.”  She didn’t make any eye contact, but she saw the second man in the white van across the street watching them.

Kayla crossed her arms.  “Do you have any identification?”  He turned around and pointed to his back.  Big, yellow block letters said, “Meter Reader.”  His black slacks and black shoes didn’t match his claims, however.  “Aren’t you supposed to have a badge or a lanyard or something?”

“Huh?”

“Ya know what, look, I’ve had a really bad day.  I lost a patient today,” she turned on the waterworks, which were  actually pretty believable given the redness of her eyes, which this terrible excuse for an impersonated meter reader did notice, “and I’m feeling really sick about it.  I really don’t want to deal with anything right now.  I’m sorry, just – can you please come back tomorrow?  It’s been very hard on me, I’m PMS’ing, and my boyfriend is probably going to be checking on me soon, and I just need to pull myself together.”

“Your boyfriend?” the man said.

“Your boyfriend?” Steve whispered in the stairwell.

“Yes,” she said snidely, as if offended that this workman she didn’t know from Adam would question her like it was any of his business.  “He’s going to be here in a little while, I need to get dinner started, and – why am I telling you this?!”

“Uh …” he turned around to look at his partner but then caught himself like a check swing before his head swiveled all the way around.  Kayla had unnerved him.  He had been sure Johnson was here.  Now he wasn’t sure.  That or he was being played.

Kayla sensed exactly what this man was thinking.  He wasn’t sure how to proceed, and she’d definitely confused him, but there was a very real threat that emanated from the man.  He wanted Steve, and he’d hurt someone to do it.  He’d hurt her. He’d hurt Stephanie.

“Ok, forget the badge, if you’re not going to come back tomorrow, then just come in and get it overwith.”

What?!  No!  Steve was so impressed with his wife but he was also not sure what the hell she was doing.

The man showed no emotion past the momentary confusion he’d allowed to come through a moment ago, and entered the house.  Steve was ready to kill him with his bare hands if he had to.  For now he stayed put until he knew where in the house the enforcer was headed.  He took a step into the livingroom, and Kayla cleared her throat.  He stopped and looked at her.

“Don’t you have shoe-covers?”

“What?”

Kayla clucked her tongue.  “Don’t you guys carry shoe-covers?”

“We don’t usually enter people’s homes.”  He was quick.

“Well, I don’t have a cleaning lady, I clean this floor myself, and it’s muddy out there.  If you don’t have shoe-covers, then will you please take off your shoes?”  Kayla sensed she’d possibly gone too far, because the look in his eye was infused with something.  But he did comply.  She was shocked.  “Thank you,” she said politely.  “What’s your name?”

“I won’t be long,” he said.

“Ok, go check.”  The man looked around and headed for the kitchen.  “Excuse me, where are you going?  The box is on the side of the house, right here,” she pointed to an area behind a chair where a lamp was plugged in. 

“I need the fuse box.”

No you don’t, you need an excuse to case this place, looking for signs of my husband. Do you think I’m stupid?  “Why?”

“That’s how it works.”

He was playing with her now.  She was sure of it. 

“That’s in the hallway.”  She had no idea how she remembered that.

“I need to check the kitchen.”

Steve made two fists and got ready.

Just as she was about to insist that he leave her house, Kayla’s cellphone rang. It was in her purse, which was laying ironically beside the man’s shoes on the floor where she’d dropped it before Steve took her upstairs.  Steve had a very distinct feeling that it was Sam.  Great.  Kayla, however, had no idea.

“Excuse me,” she said as she went for the phone.

“Hello?” she answered, her voice heavy with affect.

“Kay?” Her heart raced at the voice on the other end.  “Are you alright?”

“Shane …” 

Shane?! 

“I … Hi,” Kayla replied.  I just—”

“Did you call me?  You didn’t leave a message, and … well, it was all very strange, and … really not like you.  And I just … thought I’d check up on you.”

Kayla saw the man scrutinizing her, and she knew this was her chance to convince him that Steve Johnson was not here.  “Thank you,” she said in a sweeter tone than before.  “It’s been a bad day at the hospital,”

“Oh?”

“Yeah, I … I can explain when you get here.”  She glared at the man with a do you mind? look.  Then she bravely turned her back on him and said in a falsely private way so that he damn well heard her, “Shane, I’ve got the meter reader in my house.  But I need to tell you about it all. Get it off my chest.”

Steve was speechless.

“When I get there.”  The statement was clearly a question.

“Yes.  Tonight.”

“You … want me to come over?”

“Ok, yes, 5 o’clock, I’ll have dinner ready.”

Shane was a very smart man.  He knew a code when he heard it.  “You’re not ok right now are you?”

“Um … not, uh … not really.”  

“I’m on my way.”

“No!”  She prayed the man was still watching her and put on a big show of wiping her eyes and tightening her voice.  “I want to clean up first.  Please.  I really do mean it, please, wait until dinner.  I just need to decompress.”  Then she sniffled and looked back at the man with relief but displaying a show of annoyance that he was still there.  “Really,” she took a deep breath, “I’ll be fine.  These things happen, and it’s part of my life now.  Something tells me it’ll never really stop being part of it.”  Shane struggled to put together what she might be trying to tell him, but the enforcer took it exactly like Kayla wanted him to. 

“Are you gonna get to it or what?” she whispered loudly with her hand over the mouthpiece.

“Kay, I don’t mind telling you, I’m worried about what you’re trying to tell me.”

Kayla took advantage of this like a gift.  “Mm,” she smiled into the phone, “Me, too.”  Steve didn’t have time to feel any jealousy over the implied I love you, here, because he knew it was a big show for the goon’s benefit.  He had no idea why Shane called or how he was reacting, but he honestly didn’t care at this moment, he just couldn’t have admired his wife’s actions under pressure more. 

For his part, Shane swallowed, because her voice did actually affect him with the affection it seemed to hold for him.  “Thank you for understanding, honey.”  Only that made things very clear, because she never called him honey.  See you in a little while.”  Then she blew a kiss into the phone and hung up.”

“Is there a reason you’re staring at me?” 

“I apologize, ma’am.  Where is that fuse box?”

She took him to the hallway where he opened the box, her heart beating madly with the knowledge that men’s belongings were in the room just over their shoulders.  Would he insist on going in there?  She could tell him they were her boyfriend’s.  All kinds of scenarios popped into her head and how she would explain them. But she couldn’t deny, he was scaring her now, and her bold resolve was going to crack if he didn’t leave soon.  Lucky for her, he closed the fuse box door, and told her he had what he needed.  He headed back to her front door, put on his shoes, and headed out. His exit was very abrupt with a cursory, not to mention fake, apology for disturbing her, and when she closed the door behind him she let out the breath she’d been holding for nearly ten minutes.  Steve came out from the hallway and watched with Kayla through the gap in the curtains as the man got in the driver’s side of the van, started it, and drove away. 

Kayla hadn’t realized how hard she was breathing, but she was.  The stress of her arrival had hit its breaking point, and the tension of every moment since she’d walked in that door had left her wound up tight.  They hadn’t said a word by the time she finally looked at Steve.  She knew he’d heard everything, and his face told her that he  was feeling the same way.  The tension was so thick that for a moment, all they could do was feel their hearts pounding. Then they both ignighted.

They attacked each other with aggressive, raw sexuality.  Kayla’s tongue swept into Steve’s mouth as he grabbed Kayla’s ass and pulled her forcefully into him so that she could feel his hardness.  She moaned lustfully into their kisses and couldn’t grab on hard enough to his body.  Their instincts were so connected to one another that Steve knew Kayla was going to jump into his arms before she did it.  He held her by her bottom as she wrapped her legs around him, carried her that way up to the loft before collapsing on top of her on the floor. 

“Is this where you made love to her?!” she panted as Steve unbuttoned her blouse and took it off of her.

“No, the bedroom.  That’s where I made love to you, Kayla.”

“Make love to me again!”

“Every day!”  He kissed her exposed sternum then belly.  “I’m gonna love you like this every damn day!”

Kayla deftly unfastened his jeans and aggressively  tugged them down over his ass to to reveal his raging erection, then he whipped the shirt off of his body.  It wasn’t fast enough for Kayla, covering his dagger in wet kisses while she stroked his long, thick cock, eliciting sighs from him that became grunts of pleasure.  It felt so good he could barely control himself.  He reached under Kayla as she lifted her hips off the ground so he could unzip her black pencil skirt.  “Do you know sexy you look in this?!”

“Sexy enough to take off of me!” she replied as he tugged it down.  Her underwear came with it, and Steve had to sink himself inside of her as soon as possible.  Steve kicked off his jeans, Kayla shimmied out of her blouse, and Steve unhooked her bra until finally they were naked in each other’s arms.  Kayla arched her back, offering her breasts to him, and he took them with the hunger of a starving man as he began devouring them.  She peaked to an unbearable hardness, and her core pulsed with anticipation. 

He wanted to slip his fingers inside her. He wanted to lick her into ecstasy.  But he was desperate to feel her surround him in her wetness.  Steve kissed her neck,then her lips, then he looked her in the eye.  “I love you, Sweetness!”  Then he entered her with the force that drove him and immediately started pumping into her.

“Yes!” she cried.  “God, yes, Steve, yes!”  The sound of Kayla’s coital cries excited him more than he thought possible.  Had he ever been this horny?  “It’s been so long!  God, Steve, it’s been so long!” 

Steve’s body covered Kayla’s completely as she writhed beneath him.  “Baby,” he panted desperately.  “Kayla!”  It was all he could say before losing the ability to speak as he pounded into her.  Their connection was that powerful. 

Kayla was floating in sexual ecstasy, the pleasure of his cock stroking her over and over sending her into a frenzy.  “So good!” she moaned in unabashed sexuality, “you feel so good inside me!”  Steve was in ecstasy, too.  The pleasure was spread across his face, and Kayla suddenly felt very possessive over that pleasure. Not just possessive – protective.  Something very wrong happened to him two weeks ago, and now she was going to make it right. 

Kayla stayed his hips and leaned her head up for a kiss.  He gave it to her, then felt that she wanted to roll over and change position.  So he let her, eager to feel her mount him.  When she did, though, he saw in her eyes what she was doing.  “Oh, Sweetness …”

Kayla lowered herself onto her husband’s raging erection and closed her eyes to how he filled her.  When she opened them, Steve was staring up at her, love in his eye.  Wordlessly, she took his right hand, then his left, and placed them on her breasts.  Steve molded his palms to them and rubbed his thumbs over both of her nipples.  In no time at all, her desperation had returned.  She leaned against his strong arms and took very secure purchase as she began riding him.

The feel of his wife gliding back and forth over his erection was intoxicating.  Her actions were deliberate and succeeded in exactly what they’d set out to do.  Reclaim the position that someone else had taken from them and hurt her husband with.  They did not break eye contact as Kayla rocked back and forth.  “I see you,” Kayla said.  “I love you.”

“I love you, too,” he panted.  “And I wanna see you shake on top of me.”

Steve’s words sent her almost to the edge.  Her hot sheath gripped his cock in the first pulses of an orgasm that teased her from over the next rise.  Steve wanted to see her orgasm rip through her body in this position so badly that he began thrusting up into her with wild abandon as she rolled her hips to meet them.  He could feel how close she was and had to kiss her before she came.  He knew it would be only seconds, because he knew his wife.  She was leaning her full body weight against him for leverage to rub her clitoris against him, so he lowered Kayla down to him, kissed her lips with carnality, then pushed her back up.  She enjoyed what he’d just done and smiled.  Then she picked up intense speed as the orgasm quickened.  “You come hard, baby, I wanna see it!”  Kayla moaned out her final screams of pleasure in measured pants, then finally threw her head back in an climax that shook her entire body just the way Steve wanted it to.  He watched her her come on top of him as her erotic gasps filled his ears and made him feel like a man.  Kayla enjoyed every wave.  She knew her husband was watching her and never wanted him to stop.  The last spasm of her vagina clutched at his cock, and she finally looked down at him.  The look on his face was exactly what she wanted to see.

Steve brought her face down to his and kissed her passionately.  Then he tore himself from her lips and whispered hotly in her ear.  “You’re beautiful when you come, Sweetness.  Thank you.”  Then without warning, Steve flipped them over to their original position.  “Now I’m gonna make you come again.”

This time it was Kayla who had no words.  He slipped inside of her again, and the sexual intoxication was immediate.  Her orgasm made her g-spot crave him the moment his tip rubbed against it. 

Steve was just as drunk on the sex as his wife was.  He felt her surrounding him, and the desperation to come was so strong that he wasn’t going to last more than another minute.  He felt the pressure that had been building search for release, and she felt his, too.  She moaned and whimpered, and never wanted it to end.  The stimulation to her g-spot was only making her crazier with every stroke.  Steve spread her wide for himself and hammered against her while rubbing her still sensitive clit.  When she hit that point of no return, she held herself back to make the orgasm she knew was coming that much better. It was torture, but it felt exquisite.  “F*ck me!” she cried out, causing him to growl.  He wasn’t gentle with her as he slid in and out of her tight sheath with fast, rough strokes.  And she wanted what he was giving her just the way he was giving it, only she wanted more. 

“You want me to f*ck you?!”

“Yes!  Harder!  F*ck me harder!”

“You’re tryin’ to make me come, baby!”

“That’s right!  Only I can do that!  Only I make you come!”

Steve leered at her lustfully and pinned one wrist above her head to the floor.  Then without being asked, she brought her other one up to meet it, and Steve held both of those delicate hands securely in his one large one.  This raised her breasts up, and he couldn’t resist taking a moment while he continued to thrust his cock inside of her to alternately bite her nipple, then lathe it with his tongue.  “You first!  You come for me while I f*ck you, then I’ll make you feel me!”  She gave her trust to him freely, and he was going to make sure she saw stars.  Steve sucked hard on the spot where her neck reached her shoulder, squeezed her right breast, and felt it when she froze.  “That’s it, baby, come on!  Come on!”  One more thrust and that spot inside her couldn’t take any more.  She finally let the orgasm she’d been holding back rip through her with such intensity that if her hands weren’t pinned she’d’ve she dug her nails into the flesh of Steve’s back.  Instead she could only scream his name.

Steve never let her go and never stopped pistoning his hips into her, prolonging her pleasure as long as he could until he finally found his own climax and came hard inside of her.  “Give it all to me,” she panted.  “You’re mine, and I want it!”  Steve gave it to her, his groans wild with every white stream of cum shooting out of him.  Every last bit of his semen left his body, all of it for her. 

The last of their orgasms shook through them, and Steve finally stopped pumping.  He released Kayla’s delicate wrists, she wrapped them around his neck, and Steve collapsed on top of her.  They stroked each other’s bare skin and let out little moans of contentment as they came back down to earth.  Moments later, Steve was still on top of his wife and began kissing her tenderly while supporting himself on his forearms.  “Sweetness,” he whispered.  “Oh, Sweetness.  Kayla.  You’re so beautiful.”

Kayla kissed him back, their reunion so long in coming.  “I love you,” she whispered back.  “I love you so much.”  She felt an utter peace cover them.  For the first time in so very long, she felt … almost whole.

“I love you more,” Steve replied.  Their lovemaking was frenzied, but his kisses were so gentle.

“Oh, I doubt that, Mr. Johnson.”

Steve smiled.  As he stared down into her beautiful blue eyes, he became very serious.  “Why did you marry me?”

Kayla met his eye and positively saw his soul.  “I’ve answered this question before,” she said softly.  “The answer is still the same.  Because you’re the only man for me.”

Steve kissed her chin, her forehead, and then her lips; he still had not moved from his position.  It made her feel very safe.  And he knew it.  So he stayed there, their naked bodies wrapped up in each other while their recoveries radiated warm in their bellies.  They weren’t out of the woods yet, because they both knew that those men would be coming back, and things were about to get complicated.  But right now, in this attic loft, they held each other, loved each other, and basked in the reunion that had finally set both of them right.

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Chapter 126 >