Timeslip Read online

  Timeslip

  By Clare London

  Published by JMS Books LLC

  Visit jms-books.com for more information.

  Copyright 2020 Clare London

  ISBN 9781646563883

  Cover Design: Written Ink Designs | written-ink.com

  Image(s) used under a Standard Royalty-Free License.

  All rights reserved.

  WARNING: This book is not transferable. It is for your own personal use. If it is sold, shared, or given away, it is an infringement of the copyright of this work and violators will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

  No portion of this book may be transmitted or reproduced in any form, or by any means, without permission in writing from the publisher, with the exception of brief excerpts used for the purposes of review.

  This book is for ADULT AUDIENCES ONLY. It may contain sexually explicit scenes and graphic language which might be considered offensive by some readers. Please store your files where they cannot be accessed by minors.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are solely the product of the author’s imagination and/or are used fictitiously, though reference may be made to actual historical events or existing locations. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Published in the United States of America.

  * * * *

  Timeslip

  By Clare London

  All I can say is, that Sunday wasn’t a dark and stormy night. Far from it.

  In fact, the autumn air was cool and dry, and the wind had settled into a gentle breeze through my bedroom window. It was around midnight, and I’d huddled up in bed after a hot shower, reading what the papers had laughingly called “a good book,” but which was boring me slowly to sleep.

  Maybe I should have been out clubbing, visiting friends, going to the movies. Something that twenty-year-old single men like to do, gay or not. After all, I was a sociable guy, right? I joked around at work, I chatted with the girls on reception, I bought cakes on colleagues’ birthdays, I enjoyed the scandals from the latest TV reality shows.

  But when I went home to my own place, that was just what it was—mine—and I was happy with that. I liked company and dating, don’t get me wrong. But there wasn’t a hell of a lot of point to it when I hadn’t met anyone I really wanted for a very long time. My recent social life consisted of a few fun parties and a couple of casual relationships. But never anything that lasted.

  Did I say I was happy with that? Well, I was, more or less. Enough of the navel-gazing. I yawned and wriggled down in the bed to get even cosier.

  And then he was there.

  A man, standing at the foot of my bed. Smiling at me.

  My heart hammered, and for a second I couldn’t speak past the lump in my throat. I darted a glance at the bedroom door. It was closed. So was the window, apart from the thin opening at the top to let in the fresh air. How the hell had he got into my second-floor flat, let alone my bedroom?

  Perhaps I was hallucinating. The cheese on toast I’d had for supper had been pretty pungent. Would pulling the duvet over my head look too weird? Well, no weirder than an uninvited man suddenly invading my personal space. And smiling at me.

  “Hi,” he said. He wasn’t flirtatious, like someone trying to pick me up in a bar. His smile wasn’t predatory. It was…warm with familiarity. Had to say, it was having a very warming effect on me. He was tall and lean, his dark hair tousled and his chocolate-brown eyes gazing at me as I clumsily pulled myself to sitting. He was wearing a smart dress shirt with a pale stripe, and suit trousers that were creased at the tops of his legs as if he’d been in them all day at a desk. No necktie, and the top button of his shirt undone. The clothes didn’t hide the shape of a very fit body, or the confident way he held himself. He was good-looking in that haven’t-noticed-it-myself way that some self-assured men have. Super good-looking. And despite the suddenness of his appearance, he seemed perfectly relaxed, his arms by his sides.

  “Hi there, gorgeous,” he said.

  I blinked hard. I knew how I must look—tousled hair, hadn’t bothered shaving that second time before bed. I was wearing my favourite “Joe Internet” T-shirt, with ingrained tomato sauce stains on the misshaped hem, over a rather old pair of striped boxers. To say nothing of my Disney sleep socks, which thankfully were hidden under the sheets. “Um…hi.”

  His eyes narrowed, though he was still smiling. “What’s up? I know I’m late, but I couldn’t call you.” For a moment, he looked puzzled. “I can’t recall the reason. Anyway, I’m sorry.”

  I just stared. I was waiting for the Twilight Zone theme to stop playing in my head. “Um. It’s okay.”

  “Are you sure?” He rubbed a hand across his eyes and peered around the room. “I’m not sure what time it is, I’m afraid. Did I wake you?”

  I shook my head. This was bizarre, but no point in antagonising him further.

  “Good.” He looked reassured. “We both need our sleep, we have a long week ahead of us. There’s a hell of a lot of preparation to do for the Sherringham presentation. Much as I like you bringing me my morning cup of green tea, I’d better pass on it tomorrow. Need to get in early to the office.” He must have noticed my mouth hanging open because he frowned and took a step toward me. “Kevin? Is something else wrong?”

  I shook my head again, feeling like one of those dogs on the back shelf of a car. “No. No problem. Um…” Inspired conversationalist, that was me. “‘Night, then.”

  He smiled again. “Good night.”

  And he came right over to the bed and put his hand on the coverlet, as if to turn it down. On the other side of the bed. The empty side. The one beside me.

  I think I might have yelped because his head jerked back up. I know I pulled the sheet up to my chest like some virginal heroine in a romance novel.

  “There is something wrong.” He looked concerned now. “Are you really annoyed?” He kept his hand on the sheet but he didn’t move any closer. An expression of confusion flickered across his handsome face. “I don’t understand.”

  You and me both. I could smell a familiar cologne; the fresh laundered scent of his clothes. “Look. It’s just…” That conversational finesse of mine was way gone by now. I sucked in a breath, trying to calm my fast-beating heart. “I don’t know what you’re doing here.”

  This time, his expression wasn’t one of confusion but distress. The dark eyes widened, and his face flushed as if something had hurt him. As if I had, I suppose.

  “I mean…” What did I mean? “I wasn’t expecting you. Tonight. Here.”

  The change of phrase seemed easier for him to accept. He let go of the sheet and took a small step back, his puzzlement returning. “I can tell. I know what’s happening here.”

  “Do you?” I blurted out.

  He smiled, though a little sadly. “There’s still a lot about each other we need to learn.” Then, before I could anticipate what he was going to do, he leaned over me, cupped my face, and touched his lips to my cheek.

  He was no ghost. Definitely. The caress was gentle, and his palm warm on my skin. His lips were moist and firm. Real lips. What’s more, my whole body flushed with a heat that owed nothing to the sleep socks and everything to desire and deeply held emotion. My hand lifted from the bed to touch him in return.

  “Marcus…” I whispered.

  And then he was gone, just like that.

  I sat there for minutes, not moving, not getting up to close the door after him or anything. Because it had never been open in the first place. I peered into the dim light of the bedroom for a while, but there was no hint left of him, no shadow, no lingering aura.

  It was like he’d never been here at all.

  I did
n’t actually touch my cheek like they do in the films, but I could feel the imprint of his lips for a long time afterward. And I was in shock.

  You see, I knew him. I expected to see him first thing tomorrow morning, at the start of a new working week. I had a cubicle a few yards down the corridor from his office at the accountancy practice where we both worked. He was bright, determined, technically brilliant, and just as handsome as he’d appeared here tonight.

  But I’d never have dared say anything about that aloud.

  He was my boss, Marcus Armstrong. And he’d barely spoken a dozen words to me since we started working together.

  * * * *

  Colin stuck his head around the entrance to my cubicle, his blue eyes wide. “Armstrong’s only just arrived! No one knows what’s happened, why he’s late. On a Monday, of all days. Bernard’s taking bets on alien abduction. We can’t think of any other reason he wouldn’t be at his desk as usual by…”

  “Exactly 7:02,” I said.

  Colin’s eyes narrowed. “That’s very precise, Kevin.”

  “Yeah, well.” I resisted glancing out of the window beside my desk, but I knew what I’d seen. Marcus Armstrong, coming from the station, crossing the busy main road and then the car park, smartly suited, carrying his case, cool and always in control.

  I wasn’t usually known for punctuality, but having slept badly last night, I’d come in around six fifteen, when the office was empty. I finished plenty of work, but I still found time to browse the view from my window. There was a lot of entertainment to be had, watching the world go by, wondering what other city people were doing with their life. I was lucky having a cubicle with a view, but not so lucky with an attitude that got bored way too easily with balance-sheet analysis.

  Over the past couple of months, I’d watched Marcus Armstrong arrive at work at the same time every day, without fail. Never a variation in time or routine. He’d wait for the lights to change, cross the road, then stride into our building.

  Public transport was okay, I supposed, but then I had no other option. I was sure Marcus’d have a shiny prestige car, but when I suggested it to Bernard, he just wrinkled his nose and said Armstrong was a tight bastard who didn’t believe in spending money, his own or the company’s. Bernard still resented the fact that Marcus hadn’t signed off on a new computer for him last month.

  Marcus would march past my own cubicle to his own office, without looking my way. Well, occasionally he did, but I’d assumed that was because something outside the window caught his eye. One morning, his step faltered for a second, and I thought he’d speak to me. But he strode on regardless, arriving at his desk at—I didn’t need to check my clock but I did, every time—7:02 A.M. exactly.

  And I sat there in my messy cubicle, with a pencil behind my ear and coffee stains on the computer printout in front of me, wondering. Not about figures, I can tell you. Just…how the hell Marcus managed to be so precise when there were so many things in life to distract a bloke’s best intentions, whether he was as regimented outside work, whether he’d really seen me that morning but couldn’t face cracking his schedule just to say hi to a minion like me…

  Anyway. He was always a fine sight for me, in a selection of suits that weren’t designer or anything, but fit him well. Polished shoes, stylish hair. Confident stride, broad shoulders, slight whiff of understated cologne. Walking embodiment of Mr Executive. In everyone’s mind—and in most of the water-cooler gossip—Marcus Armstrong had been recruited straight onto the partnership path.

  But today? He was at his desk before the firm’s official opening time, of course, but according to his own rigid schedule? He was late.

  Anyone might wonder what had brought that on.

  Colin waved his hand in front of my face. “Earth to Kevin? You’ve got a really pathetic look on your face.”

  “It’s called concentration, I wouldn’t expect you to recognise it. I’ve got the Sherringham account billings to finish by lunchtime.”

  Colin rolled his eyes. “Shit, yes, I’ve got the portfolio summary to collate for the client meeting on Friday.”

  “Who’s running that meeting?”

  Colin went pale. “He is. You don’t think I’ll actually have to sit in, do you? I thought I could just run off the reports and leave them for Ellen. She’s his junior manager on this one. Though she’s coughing today in anticipation of a serious, previously unknown throat virus arriving Thursday night.”

  I grinned. My friends and colleagues were all presumably mature adults, but the thought of a meeting with Marcus Armstrong had them regressing to nervous school kids. Not just them, but the whole office. People were terrified of Marcus. You could see it in the way they avoided passing his door, the way their voices hushed when they spoke his name. He was brighter than anyone else, didn’t suffer fools at all, and in the six months since he joined us, had apparently never cracked a joke. No one dared challenge him; no one dared to be late, inappropriate or—God forbid—inefficient. No one shared gossip about him, even if they could have found something juicy to work on. Instead, they avoided him and his ire at all costs. Sherringham’s was our largest and most prestigious client. Marcus had been appointed their manager, and woe betide us if the annual presentation didn’t go as smooth as silk.

  I mean, I could see what people meant, how fierce he could be. When he first started, he sent some of my reports back with a curt note to correct them. Immediately. They weren’t wrong, just…a bit sloppy, I guess. I should have been crushed I’d appeared on his radar, when most of the other staff told me to keep my head down if at all possible. I mean, I was crushed, of course.

  But sometimes I heard him talking with excitement to a client on the phone, or approving of a clerk’s work that had been done really well, and I saw the sparkle of passion and satisfaction in his eye. I’d seen him work late on stuff someone else had messed up, until it was up to his standard and wouldn’t embarrass either his team or the firm. I’d heard him stand up to a fellow manager whom we all knew was useless but no one had ever had the nerve to confront. And occasionally—very occasionally—I’d seen him watching people in the office who were laughing or joking and I’d seen a glimmer of softness in his eye.

  Maybe I was projecting things onto him. Maybe I was just…not crushed, but crushing. He was gorgeous. Did I mention that? I wondered about him, on a personal level. Whether he was single or attached, gay or straight. Whether he was human at all, dammit.

  Whatever the reason, I’d spent a lot of my time thinking about Marcus Armstrong.

  * * * *

  I didn’t get any warning apart from my internal phone ringing twice then disconnecting. The display flashed Colin’s extension. It was our usual warning of trouble ahead. The next minute, Marcus Armstrong was at the entrance to my cubicle.

  I stared in shock, not just because I was probably in trouble, but because I was looking at the man who’d appeared so strangely in my bedroom last night. No question it was the same man. He wasn’t wearing his jacket this morning, and his tie was slightly loosened, but he was still a picture of fine grooming. God knows how he managed it, when I always looked like I’d gone three rounds with a hedge, even when I tried to start the day smart. His jaw was shaved smoother than smooth, the sinews of his neck were strong, the skin dusky. His eyes were as dark as they’d been at midnight, and just as intense. One single lock of his thick hair fell artfully over his forehead.

  He coughed pointedly.

  I surreptitiously ran a hand through my tousled hair. His eyes flickered over me, and he frowned. Had I forgotten to iron my shirt that morning? Or maybe my “surreptitiously” needed more work.

  “Cooper, isn’t it? You’re working on the Sherringham accounts, I believe.”

  He must have known damn well I was. What had I messed up now? “Yeah. I mean, yes, Mr Armstrong. I’m on the billing.”

  “You’re on the investment portfolio.”

  I blinked hard. “Um…no. That’s not me. That’s one
of the other guys, Colin Walsh—”

  “That wasn’t a query, Mr Cooper. It was a statement. You’ll prepare the copy reports and bring them to the client meeting on Friday.”

  “I don’t think so,” I said without thinking.

  It was as if the air sucked out of the cubicle. “Excuse me?”

  “Look.” I thought I saw his pupils dilate. There was nothing else in his eyes except anger. No recognition of me beyond annoyance at a minion’s insolence. “I don’t know anything about the investment side. Why the hell would you want me in on an important meeting like this one?”

  He drew a deep breath, as if preparing to give me the tongue-lashing I was inevitably due. And then, for the first time ever in the office, I saw him hesitate, confused. “I…I’m not really sure.”

  “Marcus? Are you okay?”

  “It’s Mr Armstrong to you,” he said, but distractedly. “I just thought…it was you I needed…to…”

  “To…?”

  “To bring on board with the presentation.” He seemed to have snapped out of it. “A large proportion of the work was done on the investment side, Cooper, and I need someone to reconcile the billing with the team’s time sheets.”

  “And I’ll do? Just any random bloke in Accounts you can find?” I was hurtling toward the unemployment cliff like a lemming, but I couldn’t seem to rein myself in.

  “Any random bloke?” He gave an odd, rather ragged laugh. “Just…have the work prepared and be there. I don’t have the appetite for your bizarre sense of humour.” He rubbed a hand over his eyes in an uncharacteristic gesture of uncertainty. “I don’t have the energy for argument this morning, either.”

  “Maybe you didn’t sleep too well last night, Mr Armstrong,” I said, even more recklessly.

  He flushed. “That’s enough, Cooper.”

  “Yeah. Sir.” I found myself holding onto my desk for support. That movement of his hand over his face, that familiar tang of cologne he wore…”I’ll start working on it. But first, I’m going for coffee. You want one?”