“LET ME KISS YOU HERE—AND HERE….”

Adam didn’t hear her soft protest. He was on fire, filled with smug triumph, an artist at seduction.

Between one breath and the next, the pain hit him in the groin. It lasted an eternity that was only fifteen seconds on the dashboard clock. Gasping for breath, he dared to straighten up, terrified the pain would strike again.

“I think maybe we ought to go back now,” he said, trying to prepare himself for the next attack.

“Adam?” Sameh’s voice was tentative. “There’s nothing wrong with you. I just wanted you to let me go, but you wouldn’t listen. Even in this time in history, you should know to pay attention to what the other person is saying. I used an energy bolt, just a small one, really. I aimed at your arms, but I guess I’m not very good at it.”

Adam felt exhausted and confused. If he had the sense God gave a goat, he’d cut and run—fast. Instead, he said, “Will you have dinner with me on Monday?”

Dear Reader,

Some would say I’m a dreamer. Others label me an incurable optimist, because I believe in love and happy endings. I also believe that whatever happens is exactly right for growth, and I try to incorporate that belief into my writing. And if that philosophy should involve a man rooted in the present and a woman not quite from this planet, hey, what better combination than growth and romance in one explosive package?

Not Quite an Angel is my personal, tongue-in-cheek fantasy about the future. Sameh Smith may be a klutz, but she’s an evolving klutz. Adam Hawkins can’t figure her out. He tries to be cynical, but with Sameh around, cynicism just doesn’t work. Neither do any of the other tried-and-true investigative methods he’s perfected as a P.I.

I had such fun writing this story. It made me laugh, but it also touched my heart. I hope it does both for you. You can e-mail me at bobbyhut@shaw.ca or drop me a note via Harlequin Reader Service. I’d love to hear from you.

Very best, always,

BOBBY HUTCHINSON

Not Quite an Angel

When the centuries behind me like a fruitful land reposed;

When I clung to all the present for the promise that it closed:

When I dipt into the future far as human eye could see:

Saw the Vision of the world, and all the wonder that would be.

—Alfred, Lord Tennyson from “Locksley Hall”

Contents

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER ONE

2500 A.D.

AS SHE CLIMBED the stairs to the Central Awareness building, Sameh’s stomach gurgled under the new silver tunic she’d put on especially for this meeting. Her stomach was empty because she’d been too nervous this morning to join the other students for breakfast; she hadn’t wanted to see any of them before she met with the tutors.

All her blockmates knew about it, of course; it had been posted on the audio computer yesterday. They’d all been able to read her aura and see the anxiety she was feeling last evening. If she’d seen them this morning, they’d all have commiserated with her—telepathically, of course—and in spite of the love and encouragement each one of them would freely extend, Sameh knew she’d end up feeling even more like an alien and a failure than she already did, as well as good and annoyed with the whole lot of them. Sometimes it seemed that their concern bordered on the sanctimonious.

Sameh Smith, cancel that thought. It’s not worthy of you, and you know what power thoughts have.

The echo of Great-Grandmother Kendra’s admonishing voice reverberated in Sameh’s head, the way it always did when she let her petulant temper get the best of her.

“Cancel, cancel,” she reiterated, but some stubborn demon in her mind went right on being negative in spite of the reprogramming. Well, she had a right to be annoyed, she told herself, pressing her lips together and frowning. After all, she was the only one who’d been summoned to the tutors’ joint session this morning, and she was pretty sure it wasn’t because they wanted to tell her she was doing well. She snorted at the thought.

Emphatic negative. Quite the opposite of doing well. She was the class failure, no competition. Not that her fellow students ever compared themselves to anyone else—such behavior was unthinkable among awareness devotees, but she knew that every one of them had mastered Wisdom 101 and Early Psychokinesis long before they had the three decades she did. Not that three decades were much; Great-Grandmother Kendra had twelve decades, and she didn’t seem to be planning to leave her body for a good long time yet, thank the stars. Still, Sameh was despondent with her own slow progress in the disciplines.

She brushed at a spot on the thigh-high skirt of the shimmering tunic, wondering distractedly how she’d managed to get dirty between Omega Compound and Tutors’ Pavilion. She should have taken the moving sidewalk instead of the path through the park. But the morning was pretty, so she’d wandered over along the path by the inner lake where an Aggie robot was planting lilies. She adored lilies. Maybe she should have enrolled in Agriculture instead of Awareness. She had to smile at the thought, imagining the horrified expression on Great-Grandmother’s face if she had.

Great-Grandmother had always made it very plain she wanted Sameh to follow in her footsteps, in spite of the fact that ever since Sameh was a child, it was history that fascinated her, not awareness. Fine as a hobby, Great-Grandmother had insisted. But for a life’s work… History was better left to men. Women needed to prepare themselves for managing the planet.

Sameh reached the top step of the Tutors’ Pavilion and paused a moment, drawing in a deep, calming breath to dispel the butterflies in her stomach. Like most of her other attempts at reality creation, it didn’t seem to work. She presented her ident fingerprint to the robot at the door, and walked slowly inside.

“Come in, Sameh.” The voice was deep and infinitely soothing, and its very timbre dispelled at least some of her nervousness, just as it was designed to do. All the tutors had perfected voice-cell interaction, using sound to influence emotion. It was one of the few subjects Sameh was good at, although of course she hadn’t reached anywhere near the level of the tutors. And it wasn’t something she’d learned, anyway; she’d simply inherited Great-Grandmother’s compelling, husky voice, and an intuitive understanding of phenomonics, the individual soul notes to which each person responded.

Of course the tutors knew telepathically the exact instant she arrived in the anteroom, and the wall slid open before she could touch the control with her mind. Not that her attempt at telekinesis would work, anyhow; she succeeded only about once in every ten tries at opening doors or windows with her mind, and even then, the strangest things tended to go wrong. Sometimes the doors slammed shut too soon as if a gale was passing through, and last week there’d been that window she’d opened in the classroom that insisted on going up and down like some demented perpetual-motion device.

Well, her problems at the disciplines were undoubtedly why she was here this morning. The tutors wanted to help, she knew that; they were also totally nonjudgmental, but still, just being called in to see them meant they were concerned about her progress, didn’t it?

Well, she was concerned herself about her progress, damn it to Pluto. She hadn’t mastered precognition or telekinesis. She was only moderately, sporadically good at teleportation—sporadically being the operative word. And as far as healing went—well, her efforts had been nothing short of catastrophic. And it was healing that really appealed to her, which was also probably why trying to master it scared her almost catatonic. Healing made so much more practical sense than some of the other disciplines.

Like retrocognition, for instance. So far, she’d only been able to recall two of her past lives, and both of them were nothing to boast about. What good calling up all that old garbage did her was beyond her perceptions, Sameh concluded. As far as she could figure, she’d spent an inordinate amount of both past incarnations pursuing bodily pleasures in the most embarrassing fashion, not learning the lessons she needed in order to progress.

That was exactly why Great-Grandmother had pulled rank to get Sameh enrolled in Higher Awareness this lifetime. In the eternal scheme of things, Great-Grandmother Kendra proclaimed, chances for advancement were limitless, but Sameh seemed to have already wasted a deplorable amount of opportunity. This incarnation, didn’t she want to progress?

Sometimes Sameh wondered about that. So far, progression hadn’t been a heck of a lot of fun.

“Sameh, dear child, come in.” The three tutors, two female, one token male, all greeted her with hands outstretched, and she felt loving reassurance flow through their fingers into hers—positive energy projection, another subject that was pretty much hit-and-miss with her.

She knew they were scanning her aura, and there wasn’t a damn thing she could do to hide her apprehension and her sense of inadequacy; her innermost feelings were right there, in her colors, plain as day for them to read. She could sense jagged edges and flashes of scarlet with touches of gray surrounding her, and she also sensed the tutors smoothing her aura with their minds, calming her down, replacing the shocking evidence of her recent thoughts with clean, glowing pink.

She suppressed a sigh, and Alpha smiled at her, radiating sympathy and support. Beta waved her to a chair, and Gamma teleported a soothing cup of herbal tea toward her, not spilling a single drop. Sameh remembered her own most recent clumsy attempts at teleportation and shuddered as she retrieved the brimming cup out of the air and took a long, reviving drink.

She’d tried to teleport a plate of vegetable analog, marinated in a rather oily sauce, to the communal dinner table a few nights ago. Jenko, her good-looking male tablemate, had made her giggle. She’d lost concentration, and the plate had tipped halfway across the room, and before she managed to right it, four of her tablemates were liberally oiled down—and not particularly amused, although of course they weren’t angry with her.

Anger was residual fear that students of awareness worked at eradicating, but sometimes Sameh guiltily longed for a good honest dose of rage in her fellow students. Turning her own bouts of anger to understanding was just one more thing she hadn’t yet mastered.

“Sameh, the tea…” Gamma’s gently amused voice roused her. Once again, her attention had wandered, and a stream of tea had slopped on her tunic. She hiked the hem up enough to cover the stain, at least while she was sitting down. Gamma couldn’t possibly be looking at her legs, could he?

“We’re concerned for you, Sameh,” Beta began. “We realize you’re experiencing frustration, which of course is blocking your progress in almost every endeavor. We’re here to help, and we thought that perhaps together we could come up with a more positive approach to awareness attainment for you.”

“We have a suggestion,” Gamma chimed in. Sameh had always felt most comfortable with Gamma, even though he was male. He was the youngest of the tutors by at least fifty decades, and there was a definite sparkle in his clear green eyes when he smiled at her. She knew the tutors had evolved beyond sexual desire, but she sensed that Gamma liked her, in a purely platonic, fatherly fashion, of course. They all loved her; they were masters of universal love, but to Sameh, Gamma’s like was something special.

“I’d welcome any help you could give me,” she said with humble dignity, feeling both relieved and grateful. Her edginess and bad temper had all but disappeared, thanks to their subtle manipulations of her aura, and she was able to relax in the floating contour chair. Swinging one leg back and forth, she recalled being a child on a swing, back on the agrofarm where she’d grown up….

Like magic, the clear, vibrant colors surrounding the tutors became visible to her. If only she could relax more often; she knew the major part of her problem was trying too hard, which produced resistance. This naturally blocked the flow of psychic ability.

“You’re absolutely right,” Alpha said, reading her thoughts and then nodding her curly dark head. “One of the most difficult lessons is learning not to try.”

Sameh reminded herself how transparent she was around these three. Unless she threw up a block, they knew what she was thinking every moment. And a block would just further convince them that something was wrong. “Maybe I’m just not a candidate for awareness,” Sameh blurted out. “I have the desire, but I can’t seem to master the techniques.”

Confessing seemed to lift a heavy weight from her shoulders.

“Desire is all,” Beta intoned in her mellow tones. “Ask and you shall receive instruction.”

“I do ask,” Sameh said with a plaintive note to her husky voice. “But then I’m always afraid I won’t understand the answers. And usually I don’t, either.”

“The answers are there, inside you, waiting for you to discover them. All you need is confidence,” Alpha reminded her a trifle sternly.

Easy for her to say.

“We have a suggestion,” Gamma said once again. “Of course it’s entirely up to you. As you know, we never do more than suggest.”

Alpha nodded agreement, and Sameh wished they’d just get on with it. Gamma grinned at her, that flash of mischief in his eyes. “We are a tiny bit sluggish at getting to the point, I agree.” Sameh blushed. “Well, Sameh, the consensus we’ve reached is that we feel you’d progress much better after a respite in a totally different environment. Constantly trying defeats the very purpose of your studies, and we sense a weariness in you, child. Depletion of the vital energies can lead to—”

Alpha interrupted. “Yes, yes, she knows all that, Gamma. Let’s cut to the kernel here. Now, Sameh, you’ve heard of our Reachback program, of course?”

Sameh nodded, mystified at what seemed an abrupt change in topic.

Reachback was a program she’d been fascinated with, because it involved history. The techies had experimented with sending advanced graduates back to the late twentieth century in an effort to accelerate the awareness development of certain groups living at that period and perhaps avert some of the environmental problems that had proved so difficult to clean up over the centuries. It involved fooling around with probable realities, which was a discipline Sameh hadn’t yet encountered in her studies. But for some reason the program hadn’t been a success. She’d heard on the gossip network that it had been abandoned.

“That’s absolutely accurate, Sameh.” Beta nodded her golden head. “The idea was sound, the technique foolproof, but we underestimated the impact that our students would have on that era. It was just before the New Age Revolution, you see, and awareness was viewed almost as an aberration in those days. After several bizarre incidents, we came to the conclusion that sending advanced graduates back there wasn’t the best idea. They tended to frighten even the early seekers for truth, to say nothing of the general populace.”

Beta was somber, but Sameh caught the flickers of amusement on Gamma’s face. “The nineties people began to think our Adepts were angels, you see,” he explained. “And unfortunately one of the Adepts became so caught up in the frenzy, he began to believe his own PR. It was a fiasco, and of course we couldn’t have that, not at the very dawning of the era of self-determination. They were all recalled.”

Sameh felt a pang of sympathy for the citizens of the 1990s. She knew all too well how inadequate a bunch of Adepts could make a person feel. And she even had a working knowledge of some of their techniques, which at least kept her from mistaking them for angels.

Again, Gamma had monitored her thoughts. “Your understanding of that problem is exactly why we wondered if maybe you might like to take a little trip back to those times, Sameh. That, and your fascination with history.”

It took a moment for Gamma’s words to register, and then Sameh’s heart gave such a lurch she could actually feel the tunic over her breasts flutter. She sensed her aura expanding, pulsing and glowing with excitement, and her breathing became quick and shallow. A trip. A trip back in time. Holy miracles, was she hallucinating?

The tutors watched the effect of their suggestion. “We do have an assignment for you,” Gamma added, “so the journey won’t be entirely free of responsibility. It involves research. You know I’m working on detailed biographies of the seminal people of the New Age?”

Sameh didn’t know. She shook her head.

“In celebration of our bimillennium, we’re compiling docudata for the history roms that trace the events leading up to the Four Hundred Years of Peace. But we’re finding that our source material is woefully sketchy on several influential souls.”

“Why not just tap into the reincarnational records?” Sameh asked.

Alpha gave her a patient smile. “It would be a simpler solution, I agree, but you know we can only look into past lives with the consent of the present incarnation, and unfortunately, all the individuals concerned are not presently incarnate,” the tutor explained. “We would violate the privacy laws.”

Sameh nodded. She knew that, of course. Her brain wasn’t working properly. Her thoughts were racing. “But…but why, why…me?”

Gamma sat back in his chair and steepled his fingers under his chin. He was wearing a rather garish ring, gold set with an immense, perfect crystal, and he toyed with it as he answered her question. “We feel you have a rare gift, Sameh, in that you understand and appreciate vulnerability and uncertainty and primitive human emotions more than most of your fellow students. Unfortunately we Adepts tend to lose sight of the basics.”

Sameh was dumbfounded. They were actually saying she was better at something than the others were? Even knowing the unlimited dangers of this feeling of being better, she still couldn’t help but be elated by Gamma’s words. A warm glow spread from the tips of her sandaled feet to the top of the riotous golden curls on the crown of her head.

She released her empty cup into the air, not even realizing she was successfully teleporting it over to the dishchute until Gamma ducked playfully as it sailed past his right ear. Sameh blinked in astonishment. It was one of the few times she’d managed perfect execution.

“We’ve checked and it seems you didn’t have an active incarnation during the late 1900s, which means you will avoid the awkwardness of meeting a former version of yourself. If, of course, you decide to accept our assignment.” Alpha sounded a trifle smug at having thought of an earlier incarnation being around then.

Sameh shuddered at the thought. Living with one version of herself was tough enough, never mind meeting another one.

“The choice of whether to go or not is always yours, as you know. Freedom of choice is what awareness is all about, after all,” Gamma reminded her, but Sameh could see by the heightened pink and silver in all of their auras that they were eagerly waiting for her answer.

“But of course I want to go. I very much want to go,” she managed to blurt out, wondering for just a split second exactly what her assignment would consist of, and whether or not she’d be able to accomplish whatever it was they expected of her.

“The assignment is pure research,” Gamma reassured her. “And there are those back there with whom you’d be most compatible, so loneliness won’t be a problem. Most compatible, indeed.” Gamma gave her that twinkling grin, and she could have sworn he winked at her.

“This could be a dangerous undertaking for you, Sameh. Not in the physical sense, of course,” Beta pronounced. “The techies assure us that the transport system is perfectly safe, going and returning. But in other ways, many of which even we can’t anticipate, it could be risky for you. Lonely. Foreign. The nineties were a period of great turmoil. And it’s going to be terribly difficult, for instance, to slow your vibrations to match those of the natives. As far as we can determine, there were only a handful of old-soul Adepts incarnate back then. Like attracts like, of course, so you’ll probably encounter them, but basically you’ll be with the totally unenlightened, which is what defeated the other travelers.”

Beta frowned. “You’ll be away from the guidance data banks, and although we’ll try to contact you telepathically, if we succeed we won’t be able to assist you in any physical way. If you decide to accept, you must be aware there are risks. Perhaps you should take an interval to consider it?”

“No, I want to do it. I really want to do it.” Just the idea of being away from the disciplines for a while lifted a heavy burden from her heart. She was so tired of struggling with them, every day, day after day…and failing. She jumped up from the floating chair, and was halfway to the top of the pyramid before she realized she was levitating. Now how many times had she struggled with the levitation exercises and not managed to elevate herself even an inch? If only she could remember what she’d done just now…or not done, she corrected herself.

All the tutors were smiling when she landed a little awkwardly on the cushioned floor. She turned her ankle and stumbled, and then had to grab at the chair for support, but she refused to let herself feel clumsy. She was far too excited to get upset about a little slip here and there.

“When can I leave?”

They were all looking at her and smiling, shaking their heads at her impetuosity. “Meditate on it, Sameh,” Alpha suggested. “It’s a big decision. If you still feel the same way after meditation, we’ll begin briefing you on what you’ll need to know.”

Sometimes Sameh considered meditation a colossal waste of hours. She was an instant too late with the mental block that would have prevented the tutors from mind reading such blasphemy. Damn her undisciplined mind, anyway. She blushed a furious scarlet, and they all politely pretended they hadn’t caught the treacherous thought. “I’ll meditate,” she promised with a contrite sigh.

“Good. Whenever you’re ready, notify Central and we’ll meet with you again.” They rose in unison, dismissing her. She took their hands and held them to her face in the traditional loving gesture of farewell.

She wasn’t absolutely certain whether it was her efforts or theirs that slid the invisible door panel neatly open and then closed it behind her, but she didn’t dwell on it. Instead, she effortlessly skipped all the way down the steps and into the gardens. The smile that spread across her face brought answering smiles from the Aggie robots as she bounded past the lilies, her lithe, slender body managing heights above the ground she’d never dreamed she’d master. Usually as earthbound as a caterpillar, she felt like a butterfly, light as down, fragile, shimmering with breathtaking color, filled with an elation too heady to contain.

Certainly she could fly.

THE ROOM WAS SILENT for long moments after Sameh’s departure.

“Do you think we should tell her all the implications of this trip?” Alpha’s aura reflected her concern.

Beta shook her head. “She has enough problems with self-image. Loading her down with the responsibility of salvaging some of our New Age beginnings will only tend to block her natural abilities, which are considerable. She has more raw talent than any student we’ve had in eons. I only wish she had more confidence in herself.”

“She’s a born worrywart,” Gamma remarked, affection plain in his tone. “And in this case, ignorance is bliss.” The other two rolled their eyes heavenward at his archaic use of language. Gamma’s interest in history affected his slang.

“Well, I only hope the child is tough enough for this assignment,” Beta remarked with a shudder. “The nineties aren’t my idea of a pleasant decade to visit.”

Gamma snorted. “Sameh may look fragile, but don’t lose sight of the fact that she’s Kendra’s great-grandchild. She has the same core of purity and steel running through her veins that her great-grandmother has. And Kendra’s given her approval. She knows the girl better than any of us. She’d never have allowed us to mention it if she didn’t feel Sameh was the person for the job.”

The others were silent. They knew, of course, that Gamma and Kendra were lifelong friends. If he and Kendra felt Sameh was equal to the challenges facing her, so be it.

All that remained was the tricky task of briefing Sameh without revealing to her the vast implications her assignment could have on the successful and peaceful evolution of all their ancestors into the New Age.

CHAPTER TWO

“OH, GOD, ADAM, that’s wonderful, don’t stop….”

Her eyes were shut tight, her pretty face contorted with the erotic sensations Adam was creating in her naked body.

“You’re beautiful, honey.” Julie? Judy? He wasn’t sure which, so he was careful to avoid calling her by name. “You’re lovely, here, and here…and down here.”

“Oh, Adam…let me…I need to touch you, too….” She moaned and wriggled out from under him, running a fevered hand over the muscles rippling under the slickness of his sweat-soaked skin. “You’re so strong, I adore your chest, all this hair…and this…”

She began using her teeth on his nipples, tugging gently but effectively. Sprawled on his back across the bed, Adam Hawkins let her explore his body with her clever mouth for several more minutes before he flipped her effortlessly beneath him and took control of the lovemaking.

A quick, unobtrusive glance at the bedside clock had told him he had exactly thirty-three more minutes before he needed to be back at the office. It was a fifteen-minute drive even in light traffic, and he was going to have to shower.

With the expertise of long practice, he brought her to climax in less than five minutes. Another two for his own release, with five left over for the necessary post mortem….

“Oh, God, honey, I felt that one all the way down to my toenails. You’re sooo good at this, Adam. I never met a guy who could make me come this way right off, y’know? Especially over and over like that.” She sighed and wriggled with satisfaction. “It usually takes a time or two, sorta getting used to each other, know what I mean?”

Adam nodded, hoping she was going to run down soon, but she took a deep breath and went right on, words spewing out of her mouth like soap bubbles. “I’m so glad you came over here when I asked you, I was kinda scared to, but I couldn’t stand to be alone, not today. Where’d ya get all these scars from, anyway?”

She was beginning to bore him. “Old war wounds.”

She traced the raised line of jagged tissue on his side with a long scarlet nail. “From Vietnam? Boy, you musta been shot up good. How’d it happen?”

“Just bad luck. Out on patrol.” It was the simplest answer, even though it wasn’t strictly true. To stop any further questions, he kissed her swollen lips and ran a hand down the luscious curves that had attracted him to her the first time she’d come to enlist the services of the firm.

She’d been about to marry a regular sleazeball with two convictions for battering women and three wants for non-payment of child support. It had taken Blue Knights exactly three days to come up with the guy’s rap sheet. Adam had been with her when she confronted the dirtbag with the evidence, and he’d dared the lowlife to take a swing at him. Of course he hadn’t, much to Adam’s disappointment.

She’d been devastated at the collapse of her romance, the way they always were, and she’d also been the one to initiate the comfort Adam had been administering for the past two hours. That, too, was the way it usually worked.

He had twenty-one minutes left. Good thing he’d perfected the fastest shower in L.A. He gave her a last, lingering kiss. “Darlin’, you’re the best. Wish I could stay all afternoon,” he lied. “But I’ve got appointments, and the secretary’s leaving early.” He swung his legs free of the musk-scented sheets and stood up.

“Why not come over later? I’ll fix us something for dinner. I make wonderful spaghetti sauce.” She gazed up at him, and something in her eyes set off warning bells in Adam’s brain.

When they started offering to cook for you, it was past time to say goodbye. He’d perfected this part of it, too. He sat down again beside her and took her hand. “Look, darlin’. I’m going to be up front with you here. This afternoon’s been great, but I’m a dead loss when it comes to relationships.”

Her lips trembled, and Adam hoped to God she wasn’t going to cry. Why the hell did they have to cry? Jeez, he’d known her less than a week.

“You’re a beautiful, special kind of lady,” he told her gently, looking deep into her eyes. “You deserve a guy who’ll give you everything you need and want, and I’m not him. See, baby, I’m a loner. I’m selfish as hell and not reliable, pushing forty and not about to change at this late stage in my life. I can’t promise any tomorrows, so I figure it’s best if we don’t see each other again. I’d feel like I was taking advantage of you, and you’re way too good for a shabby ride like that.”

She pouted and argued and pleaded, which made Adam despise himself and her, as well, but by the time he left, she’d accepted it.

He breathed a sigh of relief as he loped down the stairs and out into the fierce California sunshine. The leather seat in his red convertible burned through the lightweight fabric of his trousers, and he swore under his breath as he tipped his sunglasses down over his eyes and wheeled into traffic.

Eight minutes left. He was going to be late, and Bernie wasn’t in the office to cover for him. He’d have to ask Janice to stay until he got there, and she was going to give him the worst side of her bitter tongue. He cursed under his breath as he dialed the mobile. He must be getting old. These “working” lunches weren’t as much of a kick as they once had been.

Forty minutes and one traffic violation later, he strode into the impressive offices Blue Knights had taken over when the celebrity security business had started bringing in big money. As far as Adam was concerned, he still got nostalgic for the tiny hole-in-the-wall joint he and Bernie had rented when they started out, but even he had to concede that in Los Angeles, appearance was everything.

He shot the secretary a look that had served to intimidate the local Mafia, but Janice Monk just sniffed and gave him the slightly contemptuous, knowing once-over she’d perfected during the eighteen months she’d worked for Blue Knights. “It’s about time you turned up, boss man. I believe I told you I have a dentist appointment this afternoon. I was supposed to leave at two-thirty and it’s after three. I’m billing you triple time because the dentist is going to charge me for being late. He happens to have an opening now, but I hope you realize you’ve disrupted everyone’s schedule.”

She gave him a long, accusing glare. “Ms. Temple’s in your office. I brought her Perrier and ice and she asked where the gin was so I got it out for her. The file on Delilah McDonell’s on the desk—Temple works for her, remember? There’s lipstick on the collar of your shirt, just on the right side. I certainly hope you’re practicing safe sex, boss,” she went on without a break, ignoring the lethal look he shot her. “You been tested recently? Even condoms aren’t foolproof, you know.”

Son of a bitch, he ought to fire her. She’d been getting under his skin with smart cracks like that one since the day Bernie took her on. Trouble was, she now knew more about the day-to-day details of running the business than he and Bernie combined, and she was utterly reliable. Also smart. A few times she’d come up with ideas that were, he hated to admit, brilliant.

And she was safe. He’d taken one look at Janice Monk and known the two of them would never be sexually compatible, which was a great asset in somebody you were around every working day. It was relaxing.

Not that Janice was unattractive. She was twenty-eight, a little on the plump side, but plump could be downright sexy. Behind the half glasses she usually wore perched on the end of her nose, she had big brown eyes and a great deal of frizzy hair that changed color every few weeks. Just now it was a rich mahogany, and she’d tied a huge yellow polka-dot bow around it. She wore minis almost exclusively, and her legs were good. Excellent, in fact.

No, the reason he didn’t want to take Janice to bed wasn’t physical; it had to do with a certain way she had of looking at him that made him feel she could see some invisible side of him nobody else knew was there. She made it obvious she didn’t particularly like what she saw. Which was fine with him; he appreciated honesty. They might still have gotten along fine if only Janice could keep her opinions about his private life to herself. The fact that she didn’t made her a regular pain in the butt.

“I’m leaving right now. There were several messages for Bernie, and three for you. They’re all on your desk.”

With a curt nod to her, he headed down the corridor to his office. The door was shut, and he stopped to take a deep breath and wipe the scowl off his face before he opened it.

The tall, bony woman sitting in his comfortable leather chair glanced toward him, nodded, then took another deep swallow of the colorless liquid in her glass. The bottle of gin was sitting in front of her, and he could smell the alcohol despite the air-conditioning. She must have poured herself a good stiff shot.

“Violet, good to see you again.” He crossed the room and shook the clammy hand she offered, then sat down behind his desk, glancing down at the file Janice had placed on his desk blotter. Violet Temple worked as bookkeeper, chauffeur and sometimes cook for Delilah McDonell, one of Hollywood’s aging but still legendary stars. Blue Knights had arranged celebrity security half a dozen times for Delilah, getting to know the members of her household in the process,

Adam had never been good at small talk, so he cut straight to business. “How can we help you, Violet? Your boss in need of security again?” Violet shook her head. Adam guessed her to be in her late forties, and she’d had her thick salt-and-pepper hair cut too short on top. She looked a bit like a basset hound with a brush cut, with her droopy, faded eyes, long-jawed face and prominent ears.

She drained her glass and set it carefully on the desk before she spoke. She had a voice that didn’t match her appearance at all, a breathy, little-girl voice unfortunately modeled, Adam figured, on Monroe. He found it both irritating and incongruous.

“Delilah doesn’t know I’m here and I don’t want her to know. I want you people to do a special job for me, and I want it to be private. Confidential,” she said, barely above a whisper. She was obviously nervous, even after belting back a good few ounces of his gin. “I understand Blue Knights does private investigations as well as the security you provide for the stars?”

Adam nodded, wondering what the blazes Temple could have gotten herself into. Not a romance, surely, although you never knew. “We do a great deal of private investigation, most of it of a confidential nature,” he assured her. “Want to tell me who it is you want investigated, and why?”

Violet’s narrow mouth set in a grim line. “Her name’s Sameh Smith,” Violet all but hissed. “Not plain old Sammy, you understand. Sam-ay.” She snorted disdainfully and then belched, patting her mouth with her fingers. “Oops. Excuse me. Delilah’s secretary, Loretta? Well, she died, you know. Cancer. Almost three months ago, March fifteenth.”

Adam didn’t know. Loretta had been a self-effacing wisp of a woman who made the arrangements for security over the telephone. He’d only met her a couple of times. He waited impatiently, hoping that Violet would link up these scattered bits of information so he could make some sort of sense of them.

“Anyhow, after Loretta died, Delilah hired this woman, this Smith woman, to take her place.” Violet sat forward in her chair, narrowing her eyes at him. “I warned her, there’s something fishy about Smith, but once Delilah gets an idea in her head, there’s no changing her mind.” Violet made a disparaging sound in her throat. “And I’m not the only one who doesn’t like her, either. Mr. Wallace doesn’t trust Sameh Smith any more than I do.”

So old Tyrone was still hanging in there, Adam reflected. Tyrone Wallace had been McDonell’s live-in lover when Blue Knights did the last security stint, over a year ago now, and Adam had met him and liked him. Wallace was distinguished-looking, and if he was a little stuck on himself, what the hell. He’d been an actor, after all, and Adam had met enough actors to know they all had egos the size of the Goodyear blimp—particularly the ones like Wallace who hadn’t been all that successful at it. Tyrone Wallace had given up acting and gone into selling investment securities or some such thing.

Adam didn’t figure Wallace was busting his ass pounding the pavement as a salesman, though. He had it made with McDonell. She seemed to adore him, and God knew she had enough money to afford him. She wasn’t acting much anymore, but she’d had three books on the bestseller lists for months at a time, and she was a big item on the lecture circuit, so she sure as hell wasn’t hurting for money.

“What is it exactly that bothers you about Ms. Smith?” Apart from the fact that Delilah likes her and you’re dead jealous, Adam mused.

“She’s not what she pretends to be,” Violet snapped. Her breathy voice was giving way to a certain shrewishness. “Oh, she’s one smart bimbo, I’ll give her that, but I’m not as easily taken in as Delilah. She’s up to no good, that one.”

Adam had to curb his impatience. “Anything more specific? Stealing the cutlery, poisoning the houseplants, little things like that?”

Violet glared at him. “There’s her references, if you want to know. I tried to check the references she gave, and it turns out every single person on the list is either dead or senile. What are the chances of that happening? And when I brought it to Delilah’s attention, she laughed at me.” Violet’s lower lip quivered.

“You figure Smith had something to do with those deaths?”

Violet shook her head, but the gesture was reluctant. “I wouldn’t go so far as to say that. I don’t trust her, though.”

Adam persevered, bored but thorough. “You think she might do Delilah physical harm?”

Again, Violet shook her head. “Not physical exactly. But some other way. She’s got some kind of power over Delilah. She knows all about that junk Delilah writes about, parapsychology and New Age and reincarnation, all that airy-fairy stuff. They talk about it until it’s like to drive me crazy. And things happen when she’s around, odd things.”

For the first time, Adam felt some real empathy with Violet. He was familiar with Delilah McDonell’s interest in the twilight zone; during the last security job Blue Knights had done for her, he and his staff had become acquainted with Delilah’s entourage of crystal-gazing sycophants and fans of the bestselling books she’d written dealing with the so-called paranormal. One of the kooks had asked earnestly what Adam felt he’d done in a past lifetime to make him want to be a private detective in this one.

Times like this, Adam wondered himself.

Violet either wouldn’t or couldn’t be any more specific about anything. Over the next quarter hour, Adam took down particulars about Smith’s routine in the McDonell household. She lived with Delilah, as did Violet, each in a suite of rooms in the rambling multimillion-dollar rancher Delilah’d had built in Hancock Park, one of the most desirable neighborhoods in Los Angeles.

Adam asked what times Smith was likely to leave the house, what she looked like, whether or not she had any visitors. Violet ranted like a loose cannon, forgetting her whispery voice altogether in an outpouring of bitterness. Adam finally got a description, but it took forever.

It sounded as if Smith wasn’t hard to look at. Blond, deep blue eyes, curly hair, five-seven, about a hundred and ten pounds. Some demon made him want to ask Violet what Smith’s bra size was, but he curbed the impulse. And no, she didn’t have any visitors at all, nor did she receive any personal mail that Violet knew about.

“What does she do with her spare time?”

Violet shrugged. “She jogs every morning. She reads stuff from Delilah’s library. She has her own television. She doesn’t go anywhere that I know of.”

“We’ll need to get hold of the garbage that comes from both her office and her private quarters. You can tell more about a person from their garbage than you can from their résumé.”

“I can get that for you.” It seemed Violet had done some snooping on her own; she also had Smith’s social security and driver’s license numbers, which was a big help. Adam jotted down a few notes; he’d already decided to pass this jewel on to his partner, Bernie Methot. It would serve Bernie right for taking the afternoon off and leaving Adam to cope with clients like this one.

At the first opportune moment, Adam got to his feet and assured Violet that Blue Knights would conduct a thorough and discreet investigation. After another ten minutes of rambling complaints, Violet finally took the hint and left, handing over a hefty deposit.

As the door closed behind her, Adam was sorely tempted to make use of the gin, but he decided to go with roast beef on rye, extra mustard and fries on the side, instead. All that exercise earlier on had given him an appetite.

Ahh, sex and food. Two of life’s simple, uncomplicated pleasures, always available for a hungry man like himself to enjoy.

“LIKE EACH OF YOU, like all of us on this green planet, I’ve always been hungry for understanding.” Delilah McDonell’s rich, well-trained voice, amplified by the sound system, ebbed and flowed through the large, packed auditorium, and on the rapt faces of the audience, Sameh could see the interest, the hope, the adulation her employer’s presence and words aroused.

“I’ve told myself I want to know how the universe works, what life’s really all about, what meaning and purpose there is in this game that we call living. What I didn’t realize was that the understanding I was so hungry for would come through agony, through the pain of losing my dearest treasure, my only child, my daughter, Maggie.” Delilah’s voice vibrated with her suffering, and she touched a chord in each of her listeners’ hearts as she bared her very soul to them, sharing, giving.

Delilah McDonell was a symbol to these searchers after truth, an almost mythical figure they revered. She obviously had power, Sameh reflected, and the wonderful thing was that she never seemed to misuse it, which was unusual here in the nineties. To acclimatize herself, Sameh had watched news reports on television for weeks after she arrived, and it was curious how power seemed to corrupt almost everyone it touched.

“Maggie’s death awakened me,” Delilah was saying in her thrilling voice. “It was as if I’d spent many years paying lip service to an intellectual thirst for knowledge without really allowing my heart into the game.”

Delilah was talking tonight about her first book, Waiting For A Miracle, the heartrending story of her daughter’s death from cancer at the age of twenty seven. Sameh’d read it, of course. It was an important historical document in her time, and she’d also had to study it as part of her preparation for this trip, but actually hearing Delilah speak about it was an immense thrill.

In the book, Delilah had described with deeply felt honesty how her devastating journey through disbelief, terror and anguish to hope and, at last, acceptance had eventually led her to venture forth on a much wider odyssey, a search for spiritual meaning in her own life.

That quest had taken on epic proportions and led to the writing of other books. She’d traveled to India and talked with gurus, she’d explored reincarnation with Tibetan monks, she’d been hypnotically regressed to past lives, she’d delved into the whole California craze for psychic readings, astrology, spiritual growth. And as she went along, Delilah wrote about her experiences with humor, humility and total candor. Her books sold in the millions, helped only in part by the fame she’d enjoyed as a Hollywood actress.

Sameh stood backstage tonight, awed by the waves of energy radiating from her employer. She absorbed the simple, heartfelt words that mesmerized the diverse audience, storing them away in her memory for the notes she was keeping for Gamma.

“The old girl’s really on a roll tonight, huh? She’s a nut case, but she sure draws the crowds,” a stagehand whispered close to Sameh’s ear, and she turned to defend Delilah, irritated at his attitude. But he wasn’t looking at Delilah at all. Sameh realized that he was standing beside her, far too close, staring at her breasts. She could smell his fetid breath, and the sly hunger in his flushed face horrified her. Some of these nineties men were positively archaic in their attitudes toward women.

Without bothering to answer him, she made her way quietly down the backstage steps and then through the door that opened into the darkened auditorium. She slipped into the seat Delilah had reserved for her in the front row, beside Tyrone Wallace. Sameh looked up at the stage, then turned to Tyrone, determined to overcome her instinctive dislike of the man, thinking how proud he must be of this remarkable woman he lived with.

Impeccably tailored, smelling of expensive cologne, he was surrounded by a gray cloud of boredom and indifference. He was slumped in his seat, staring down at his lap and cleaning his fingernails with a small penknife. Not for the first time, Sameh wondered why Delilah was so in love with this man.

CHAPTER THREE

“I SHOULDA STUCK to chasing junkies down dark alleys.” Bernie Methot tossed a file folder onto Adam’s desk and plopped his compact body into the leather chair, sighing as he lifted first one leg and then the other until his size-thirteen feet rested comfortably on the desk. Bernie, at five-nine, had the feet of a very tall man, and his favorite one-liner was that only one other portion of his anatomy matched their size.

Four days had passed since Adam’s appointment with Violet Temple. He’d turned the investigation over to Bernie as planned, not without some resistance on his partner’s side. Adam had had to trade off, taking over surveillance on one of Bernie’s infidelity cases.

Bernie ran his beefy hand through his thinning brown hair. “How’d you make out with the Tombasinis’ peep show?” Mrs. Tombasini wanted times, dates and places concerning Mr. Tombasini’s latest in a string of mistresses. Mrs. T was a regular customer; she paid top dollar and never considered divorce. Instead she collected yet another piece of expensive jewelry from her contrite husband each time Blue Knights came up with the goods.

“Those two are twistos,” Adam growled. “They both get off on this crap. Victor didn’t even bother closing the drapes this time. Bottom floor, Vista Motel, all the lights on. The guys an exhibitionist.”

“What was the lady like?”

Adam shook his head. “Built. I don’t know where he finds them.”

“Mrs. T probably pimps for him.” Bernie sighed. “Any coffee in that pot?”

“Yeah.” Adam poured a mugful and handed it to him. “I started thinking maybe I should have gone with the Temple case after all. This divorce stuff makes me feel like a peeper.”

Bernie gulped down half the inky liquid in the mug and shoved the file folder across the desk with his foot. “You can have it back, free and clear. This one’s got me stymied.” Adam waited, an eyebrow lifted in inquiry.

Bernie finished the coffee and lowered his feet to the carpet. Reaching for the folder, he dumped the contents in an untidy heap on the desk.

“At first the lady checked out on all counts. I put her social security number through the computer, and there’s no prints on file, no criminal record, right? Straight arrow. Checked out the employment agency that recommended her—” he rifled through the papers and tossed one over to Adam “—Elite Personnel. No problem. Quite the opposite. Smith registered forty points over the highest score ever recorded on the aptitude test she did for them. They figure she’s some sort of genius. No record on her before April of this year, but they also gave glowing reports on her personal interview sheet. Sounds like she could charm the robes off the Pope if she set her mind to it. Like Violet said, her references sounded great but couldn’t be verified—they came from cities in Canada and most of the people on her list are dead. Anyway, Elite was so impressed with the lady, they sent her right over to McDonell.”

“Credit cards? Medical insurance? Internal Revenue?” Adam rhymed off the sources of information they routinely checked.

Bernie’s broad forehead puckered in a frown. “That’s where this thing gets complicated, Hawk. She’s got two credit cards, both applied for and issued between April third and April fifteenth, this year. Insurance payments, same drill, same week—April third. First payments to Internal Revenue, also made early April. I did my damnedest to find some record, somewhere, of our girl before April of this year. I checked hospital records all over the country and I had a friend over at the department delve into the IRS’s private snoop section on the computer. No dice.”

Adam had great respect for Bernie’s ability at this sort of thing. Bernie had worked as a detective for the LAPD before joining forces with Adam, and his hobby was computers. What he couldn’t access one way, he invariably found out in another.

“There’s absolutely no trace I can find of Ms. Sameh Smith before April of this year.” Bernie tossed the folder down in disgust. “It’s as if she parachuted in from outer space.”

Adam was intrigued. For once, here was a case with a new spin. If Bernie couldn’t track down anything about her, there was something peculiar going on. “So besides outer space, you got any other ideas about what’s up with Ms. Smith?”

Bernie shrugged. “I figured maybe we got a nut case who’s been institutionalized for most of her adult life, but that theory doesn’t hold water. According to all accounts, this gal’s bordering on genius, great at her job, well adjusted and trustworthy. Besides, if by some miracle a person like her had just graduated from loonyland, there’d have to be medical records.” He threw up his hands. “Nada. Zilch. I checked whatever’s out there to check. You got any bright ideas, Hawk?”

Adam thought about it. One possibility came to mind, but it was pretty farfetched. “Maybe we got ourselves a clandestine foreign agent, building herself a background so eventually she can be fed into government?”

Bernie rolled his eyes and whistled.

Adam agreed, but there weren’t that many possibilities here, at least not that he could think of. “I know, it sounds like star wars, but it’s the only thing I can think of that makes any sense. Like you say, people in this day and age all leave some kind of paper trail.”

“Except her.” Bernie shook the file and a packet of photos fell out of the folder and spilled across the desk. Adam picked them up and studied them one by one. “I got those from the surveillance van. She runs every morning. We clocked her at six miles—she goes like a bat out of hell and doesn’t even sweat.”

“She sure doesn’t look like a bat out of hell.” Adam studied the color photo of the lithe young woman in silky purple shorts and singlet, running along a sidewalk. Some trick of the lens made it look as if she was floating above the ground. She looked both fragile and powerful, a long-limbed, gently curved gazelle with a purple headband holding back a riotous mop of golden curls. He couldn’t quite see her face, and he reached for the other photos and flipped through them until he found a close-up.

She seemed to be staring straight into the camera. Adam felt the wide-spaced, sapphire blue eyes were somehow reproaching him, as if their owner was fully aware of being photographed.

“She looks a little like Goldie Hawn,” Bernie volunteered. “You see those reruns of Laugh In? Gad, that woman acted like a dipstick on that show, but they say she’s really one very smart cookie.”

Adam wasn’t listening. He was studying the pictures, one after another, concentrating on her hands, her throat, the curve of her breasts, the long, slender legs, bare beneath the brief running shorts. Always, he returned to her face.

He wanted her. He wanted this woman.

The intensity of his reaction caught him entirely by surprise, and for a moment he forgot Bernie, the office, the very reason for the photos. Excitement and a long-lost sense of exhilaration stirred in his belly.

He wanted her, and so he’d have her. It had always been that way with Adam Hawkins and women. There was no reason to believe Sameh Smith would be any different. “Maybe we ought to work together on this one, Bern. I’ll call Violet and arrange a meeting with our Ms. Smith. We can get to know her a little and maybe find out what her game plan really is.”

Bernie nodded. “Sounds okay to me. We can always say we’re promoting the celeb security part of the business, out there doing advertising for good old Blue Knights. She doesn’t have to know you’d gut yourself with a dull knife before you ever agreed to do any kind of public relations.”

Adam reached for the phone.

SHE WAS WEARING a floaty skirt that almost reached her ankles, with a long white thing over the top. She kept shoving the sleeves up. Her narrow feet were nearly bare in sandals that consisted of two straps across her instep and one on her ankle. Her toenails were polished a pale pink, but she didn’t appear to be wearing any makeup.

A tiny pulse throbbed in the hollow of her neck, just above the neckline of the sweater. She had huge, remarkable eyes, clear and deep blue and filled with gentle humor—at least until she’d met Adam’s gaze, when the humor faded into wary alertness. She’d led them into a small sitting room located near the front door of Delilah’s mansion when they’d arrived half an hour before. She’d disappeared only a moment ago, heading for the kitchen to bring them tea. Violet had cleverly chosen a time for them to call when everyone else in the house was out.

“Would you loosen up a little, Hawk?” Bernie’s whisper was exasperated. “You’ve sat there like a stone faced idol without saying a goddamned word since we got here. I’ve had to do all the talking. I thought we were in this together.”

Adam looked over at his partner, inexplicably annoyed and edgy. “You don’t seem to need any help here, Bern. You’re doing fine on your own.” Adam’s voice was laced with sarcasm. “I’d have a hard time getting a word in, the way you two go on.” Bernie had talked a blue streak, except he hadn’t asked one single leading question. He and Sameh Smith had been yakking non stop for the past ten minutes about gardening, Bernie’s second passion after computers.

She’d laughed at Bernie’s gardening jokes in that soft, smoky voice that seemed to make every one of Adam’s nerve endings stand at attention. She’d asked Bernie all about Blue Knights as if Adam wasn’t even present, she’d chatted a bit about the work she did for Delilah, and all in all, revealed not one personal detail about herself. She was maybe one of the most appealing, awkward, ingenuous women Adam had ever come across—or the best operative he’d ever met.

Her slender body seemed at odds with itself. She moved like a teen who’s grown too fast and hasn’t quite learned how to work the machinery. Adam had to remind himself that her driver’s license had stated she was thirty years old. She seemed absurdly young and gauche.

She’d knocked a pillow off the couch, bent to pick it up and banged her hip on the low table, jogging it and slopping water from a bowl of fresh flowers all over the glass surface. She’d absentmindedly taken a handful of her skirt and mopped up the spill, not missing a beat in her conversation with Bernie about fertilizers. Then she’d sat back down and lifted and lowered, lifted and lowered the wet hem of skirt in an effort to dry it.

Adam had felt short of breath. He’d had to tear his eyes away from the flash of pale thigh, irritated beyond measure at his body’s reaction to her.

“Here we are. I forgot to ask if you both take cream and sugar.” She walked slowly into the room, balancing a silver tray and frowning down at it like a child entrusted to serve the grown-ups.

“Nope, we both drink it— Watch out—” Bernie’s warning was accompanied by a hasty lurch out of his chair in an effort to keep her from falling headlong over a footstool.

She must have kicked it out of the way at the last possible moment, because it sailed across the room with considerable force and landed near Adam. She had to have played rugby at some point to have put that much steam behind the damned thing.

Adam stared at it without moving and then, one eyebrow raised, returned his attention to Sameh. She was intent on her task. She managed to set the tray down without doing more than slopping some of the tea out of the pot. She poured, then smiled at Bernie and set his cup on the low table beside his chair, and handed Adam a cup and saucer. A rivulet of hot liquid dribbled off the saucer and down onto his trousers. Adam ignored it.

Sameh looked down at the stain and then at him, a tiny frown contracting the straight line of her dark eyebrows. Once again, he stared deep into those superb blue eyes, wondering if it was unbelievable guile or true innocence he saw behind the thick lashes.

“Sorry,” she murmured. She snatched a cotton napkin from the tray, leaned over and blotted clumsily at his pant leg. The action sent bolts of sexual awareness through him. She gave his leg one final pat, turned away and sat down on the sofa, curling her legs beneath her and cradling the cup she’d chosen for herself between her hands. Adam struggled to maintain his composure as white heat coursed through his groin.

“You lived in L.A. long, Ms. Smith?” Adam kept his face impassive, his tone neutral. It took some doing, because his heart was still beating a little faster than usual, but if Bernie wanted him to participate, he’d at least ask questions that might lead somewhere, instead of playing friends and neighbors.

She gave him a steady look, and then shook her head. “Hardly any time at all. I haven’t had a chance to really explore the city yet, either. There was rather a lot of catching up to do with Ms. McDonell’s notes.”

“Where were you from originally?” Adam caught Bernie’s warning glance and ignored it. If this was starting to sound like an interrogation, too damned bad. One of them needed to take control of things.

“I grew up on an, umm, farm. In the country.”

“I see. What part of the country?”

“The western part.” She wasn’t at all flustered, the way he thought she’d be. “What about you, Mr. Hawkins?”

“New York. You ever been there, Ms. Smith?”

She shook her head and frowned. “Please, Ms. Smith makes me nervous. Why not just call me Sameh,” she suggested, turning her attention to Bernie. “How about you, Mr. Methot? Have you ever been to New York?”

“Enough with the Mr. Methot here, too. It’s plain old Bernie, okay?” She nodded, and he went on, “I was in New York on my honeymoon once, for five days that felt like a century.” He held out his fingers one by one. “First day, I got in a fight with a cabdriver. Second day, Frances, that’s my wife, almost got mugged in the park. Third day, I got the flu, had to stay two extra days to the tune of two hundred fifty a night plus call in a doctor who barely spoke any English. He figured Frances was somebody I’d picked up in Times Square. It’s a wonder I’m still married. I think you gotta be born there to appreciate New York.”

Adam frowned at his partner. He couldn’t believe the way Bernie was responding to this woman. He’d never told Adam this story about visiting New York, and Adam could have sworn he’d heard all Bernie’s stories at least twice.

Sameh laughed. “Your wife must be an exceptional person to stick with you after that,” she teased. “You have any children, Bernie?”

Adam recognized the flicker that passed over Bernie’s face a moment before he answered, and something in his own gut reacted in sympathy.

“Two kids, a girl three and a boy eighteen months. You like kids, Sameh?”

“Children are miracles,” she said softly, and her voice as well as her eyes seemed to glow. “There’s nothing I like better than children.”

“You oughta come over and meet my kids, then, and Frances, too. Tomorrow’s Saturday—why not come over and have dinner with us? You busy tomorrow evening?”

Adam couldn’t believe he’d heard properly. Since Corey was born a year and a half ago, he doubted that Bernie and Frances had invited anyone except himself to dinner.

Sameh turned the full force of her smile on Bernie, and Adam felt the radiant warmth of it from where he sat. “Oh, I’d be so pleased to come. Thank you for inviting me. I really haven’t met many people here, and I miss being around children. What time is best?”

“Come early, you can meet the kids before they go to bed. Why don’t you come over in the afternoon? We usually eat early, anyway.” He paused for a long moment, his smile fading and an uncomfortable look settling on his face. “I should warn you that my son, Corey, has cerebral palsy.”

Sameh reached over and took Bernie’s hand in her own. “That makes him an extra special little boy then, doesn’t it? I look forward to meeting him.”

Bernie supplied his address, and he and Adam left. There was silence in the car as Adam deftly wound his way through traffic, heading back to the office. He drove even faster than usual. He was both astounded and furious at his partner, and finally he was unable to contain his anger any longer.

“Good God, I can’t believe you did that back there, Bern,” he burst out, squealing the tires as he rounded a corner. “Asking Smith to your house for dinner is plain dumb when we have no idea who or what she really is. Exposing Frances and the kids to somebody you don’t even know—and you’ve told me Frances is really on edge these days, anyway. And what the hell’s wrong with your eyesight? This is one gorgeous woman. What if your wife gets it into her head there’s something going on between the two of you? Jeez, Bern, what the hell got into you, anyway?”

Bernie was singularly unperturbed by Adam’s tirade. “My nose tells me that spending any more time investigating Sameh is a big fat waste of time. She’s no criminal, Hawk. Anything but. She’s sweet and honest and…I don’t know, I just felt real brotherly toward her back there. I vote we give this Temple woman her money back and tell her she’s way off base.”

Adam shot his partner an incredulous look. Bernie’s nickname in the LAPD had been Wrench, because once he got hold of a case, he never let go until he cracked it. “So how do you explain all this stuff about Smith not having an identity until last April? I thought we agreed that was weirder than hell. And she was pretty damned evasive today when I tried to pin her down, too.”

Bernie flicked the radio on and settled more comfortably into the leather seat. “You want to investigate her, you go ahead. In fact, you can work on it tomorrow night at dinner, my place, five-thirty. It’ll give you a chance to be around her on a casual basis, maybe practice some of that lethal charm of yours, Hawk. Looks to me like you could use some practice, too. Sameh was pretty underwhelmed by you, far as I could tell. You losing your touch with the females or something?”

Bernie was dead-on about Sameh’s reaction to him, Adam concluded. She’d taken Bernie’s hand in both her own at the door when she said goodbye. She’d folded those same hands behind her back when she turned to Adam, and there was a peculiar expression on her face, as if she’d assessed him and found him seriously wanting.

Now why should that even begin to bother him?

ADAM WAS NO LONGER a guest at the Methot household; he’d long ago become one of the family. When Bernie answered the doorbell that Saturday evening, three-year-old Kate spotted Adam from down the hall and came charging to meet him. “Unca Adam, Unca Adam’s here.”

Adam bent and caught her in full flight, lifting her high over his head and obliging her with the usual airplane ride before he set her back on her feet. She ran down the hall and into the kitchen. “Mommy, Unca Adam’s here. Corey wants to see him, too. Corey wants plane ride, too.” In a moment she was back, pushing the specially padded stroller that held her baby brother.

With familiar ease, Adam loosened the straps that held the little boy in the chair and gently lifted him up, just as he had Kate. Corey’s legs were scissored, his back arched, his finely shaped dark head unsteady on his fragile neck. A wordless, high-pitched squeal came from his throat, and his body moved spastically as he did his best to convey his delight at being in Adam’s arms.

As always, the child’s fragility was terrifying to Adam. He supported the thin baby on his shoulder, oblivious to the drool that trickled down his shirtsleeve. No matter how often he held Corey, the impotent rage and unbearable sorrow he’d felt from the first threatened to overwhelm him, and he had to struggle for control as he gave him a gentle hug and settled him again in his padded chair.

“How you doing, Tiger? You holding your own with that big sister of yours?” It took immense effort to grin down into the beautiful chocolate brown eyes as he fumbled with the straps and adjusted the pillows. Corey cooed at him, head bobbing as he favored Adam with his sweet, heartbreaking smile.

“Go on into the living room, I’ll get you a beer,” Bernie said. “The women are holed up in the kitchen doing something to the roast. Fran says we’re going to eat as soon as she feeds the kids.”

Adam wheeled the stroller into the large, colorful room. Soft music played on the sound system. Sunshine streamed down through a skylight, and couches and chairs covered in poppy-strewn black cotton formed dramatic contrast to the off-white walls and sand-colored broadloom. There were plants everywhere, and Frances’s distinctive paintings, in vivid primary colors, hung on the walls, some framed, some not.

There were toys underfoot, the colorful plastic shapes constituting a land mine for the wheels of the stroller. Adam bent several times to move building blocks and farm animals out of Corey’s way, talking the whole time to the baby. He was picking up a ball when Sameh came in.

“Mr. Hawkins, hello again,” she said, handing him a brimming mug of beer. Only a few drops slopped onto the carpet. “Bernie sent you this—he’s carving the roast.”

Again, the timbre of her voice seemed to reverberate in his soul. He took the mug, thanking her and grazing her fingers deliberately with his own. Her dress was long and loose, printed with what he thought were watermelons against a light green background. When she moved in front of the window, he could see the hazy shape of her long legs and narrow waist through the fabric.

“My name’s Adam.” He parked Corey conveniently close to the sofa and sat down, taking a long slug of the frothy beer before he looked at her again. “I thought we got on a first-name basis yesterday.”

She nodded without saying anything and sat down in an armchair a few yards away. With the sunlight streaming down over her, her hair was liquid gold, a halo of brightness around the lovely lines of her face. The lightweight fabric of her dress billowed and then settled around her, contouring her body, outlining long, firm thighs, a flat belly.

He had a sudden vivid mental image of those legs locked around his waist. Deliberate in his insolence, he measured her breasts with his eyes, her hips with a thought as to how they would adjust to his own. In his mind, he entered her, imagining her heat, the tautness of her around him, and as he caught her startled blue gaze, he knew without doubt that she understood exactly what he was thinking. He held the look, knowing his eyes were filled with sexual speculation.

A delicate blush rose from her neckline and suffused her face. She slid a little awkwardly off the chair and down onto the floor, close to Corey’s stroller. She unfastened the straps, her fingers clumsy but tender, and then she lifted the baby and cradled him against her, like a shield between her and Adam. She talked in a low, soothing tone to Corey, nonsense words that Adam couldn’t decipher.

The soothing sounds gradually became a rhythm, and then a song, and after a moment, the stiffness in Corey’s body seemed to ease to an amazing degree, and he relaxed against her, crowing up into her face, trying to bring his little fist in line with her cheek. Sameh buried her face in Corey’s neck, blowing kisses into the soft skin, making the baby chortle with joy, ignoring Adam.

Kate came running into the room, closely followed by Frances. The little girl ran to Adam and clambered up beside him on the sofa, intent on showing him a new doll.

Frances planted an affectionate kiss on Adam’s cheek before she also took a seat beside him on the sofa. “Hello, old friend.” She gave him one of her wide smiles. Her fiery hair was drawn back into a long, smooth braid, and her pale freckled skin was flushed from cooking. She wore her usual uniform of faded jeans and bulky sweatshirt. She was even thinner than when Adam had last seen her.

“Things got a little hairy in the kitchen, as they have a habit of doing when I’m the cook, so I didn’t get a chance to talk to you when you got here. Three things all started burning at once. Fortunately, Sameh lent a hand and we salvaged the gravy, but it was a close call.” The severe lines of strain that had appeared around her eyes and at the sides of her wide mouth after Corey’s birth weren’t as obvious tonight. Her gray eyes slid from Adam to Sameh and her son, and a wistful half smile tilted her mouth.

“You’ve certainly charmed that young man, Sameh.” Corey lay in Sameh’s arms, as relaxed as Adam had ever seen him. Sameh smiled at Frances, never losing the rhythm of the wordless song Corey obviously loved. The sound of her low voice was mesmerizing, even to Adam.

“Me, too,” Kate suddenly chirped, scrambling down from Adam’s lap and plunking herself as close to Sameh as she could. “Sing me, too,” she demanded, patting Sameh’s arm.

“Perhaps Sameh will sing you a little song later at bedtime, Kate,” Frances suggested. “Right now, you two rascals are going to come into the kitchen with me and have some dinner.”

“She, too,” Kate insisted, twining both chubby arms around Sameh’s neck and refusing to let go. “She, too, have dinner wif us.”

“Stop strangling her, Kate, and maybe she’ll be able to swallow dinner.” Frances rolled her eyes. “This from the kid who still makes strange with her own grandmother. You’ve got the magic touch, Sameh. These kids of mine adore you. You must have had a lot of experience with children.”

Frances scooped her daughter into her arms, and Sameh rose to her feet, still holding Corey. “I spent a lot of time in the nursery,” she said. “Could I maybe help you feed them?”

Frances turned to grin at her. “Looks to me like you really don’t have much choice. I have to warn you, this is not a delicate procedure. You’re liable to need a shower afterward.”

Both women laughed. It had been a while since he’d heard Frances laugh like that, Adam thought as he watched them leave the room. Sameh bumped the corner of a chair awkwardly with her hip and then knocked the doorjamb with an elbow as she followed Frances into the kitchen with Corey in her arms.

Adam shook his head. The woman’s body must be an absolute road map of bruises. He thought about deciphering that map, and had to take a long, cooling draft of his beer.

CHAPTER FOUR

DINNER WAS FUN, Sameh found, in spite of the glass of wine she spilled almost as soon as she sat down. Adam was seated to her right, and more than a little splashed on the sleeve of his shirt. When she tried to blot it with her napkin, somehow a lot got on his trousers, as well.

Unfortunately it was red wine, so there were bound to be stains. She apologized, feeling clumsy and embarrassed, and it was Bernie who slowly put her at ease, relating stories about calamities he’d had himself while eating.

“Remember the time we were in that fancy restaurant on the Oregon coast, Fran, when I asked for horseradish to go with the prime rib?” Frances nodded and rolled her eyes at the memory. “It was fiery stuff,” Bernie explained, “and it made me sneeze. I grabbed my napkin, let go with a doozy, and didn’t realize I’d scooped my tie up inside the napkin until Fran started laughing. My classy navy blue silk tie was polka-dotted with flecks of horseradish, and the snooty waiter looked at me like I’d just parachuted in from Lower Slobovia.”

Sameh laughed with the others, a little confused because she’d never read about any earth area called Slobovia. With laughter, though, came relaxation. She ate vegetables, sipped her wine and deftly deflected questions about herself by asking Fran about the dramatic paintings she’d done, which adorned the walls of the dining room.

Sameh was very aware of Adam Hawkins, however, sitting at her right. He said something to Bernie, and Sameh glanced at him. His gene pool definitely emphasized physical attractiveness, she mused. Apart from being tall, broad shouldered, long legged and obviously fit, Adam also had compelling features. But here, too, there was more than a hint of the savage in Adam Hawkins, a slight bend to the otherwise well-formed nose, a bend that suggested physical violence of some sort, a touch of cruelty in the tilt of the long, narrow mouth, stubbornness in the square jaw.

As she studied him, she was suddenly aware of his clear, intense red aura. Although she tried not to, she found herself glancing his way again and again, because she’d never before seen anyone as surrounded by red as the man at her side.

Well, red signified vitality, Sameh told herself, swallowing a final mouthful of vegetables. Vitality, and—be honest here, Sameh. She choked on a bit of crusty roll and had to take a gulp of her wine to wash it down.

His kind of red was pure, unadulterated sexual energy, she admitted to herself, struggling to get her breath. He had sexual energy of a type she’d never encountered before. The men she was used to, cultured men from her time, had all long ago lost the raw intensity that shimmered around Adam like a force field.

“You all right, Sameh? You going to need resuscitation?” His voice was low and taunting, his lips almost touching her ear, curved in a cynical smile, and she jerked away, knocking her fork off the table. “I’ll get that for you.” He leaned over, his dark head almost in her lap this time, and retrieved it.

Fran got up to check on the children, and Bernie carried plates and cutlery into the kitchen.

Adam’s aura was touching hers now, intermingling with her own, and she could feel the raw power he exuded. It made her feel prickly and uncomfortable. He was a dangerous, primitive man, she’d known that from the first moment she set eyes on him. The problem was, she had no idea how to deal with such a man.

“So how’s your work going with Delilah?” His green eyes were on her, and she met his gaze and held it. The other afternoon he’d made her nervous by doing this very thing—sitting totally still and just watching her, not revealing by the flicker of an eyelash what he was really thinking. She’d caught odd traces of those thoughts, however, in spite of his defenses.

“Working with Delilah is a great privilege,” she said with firm assurance. “She’s a warm and fascinating woman. It’s an honor for me to be able to work with her on her new book.” She knew he thought her an imposter in her job with Delilah, which was perceptive of him. He mistrusted her, which he had every right to do. She wasn’t exactly what she was pretending to be, that was certain.

Even worse, he seemed to consider her dangerous in some way, a concept so preposterous she could hardly believe her own perceptions. Was he really misguided enough to think she was capable of serious wrongdoing?

“Uh-huh. I’m sure Delilah’s interesting, all right.” Even now, with those seemingly polite words, he managed to convey both a high degree of skepticism and not a little sarcasm. “I’m afraid I’ve never read any of her books. I’m not really into this New Age stuff.”

His attitude infuriated her. He could use a little of Delilah’s philosophy and a lot of the maturity of New Age thinking. He also wasn’t honest. She was about to ask him point-blank why he and Bernie had both lied about their reasons for coming to see her, but Frances came back just then with Corey in her arms.

“This party animal’s determined we’re not having dinner without him supervising,” she said, planting the pajama-clad boy in an armchair close to the table and padding him with pillows so he couldn’t slip out. Corey cooed with delight.

Adam turned and winked at the baby. “That’s the way, tiger. Don’t let them stuff you into bed and leave you there. You have to keep an eye on them every minute. We’re about to have apple pie and I’ll bet you want a taste, right?”

In a split second, Sameh could feel the change in the force field surrounding Adam. Aggression became compassion, and she could feel the enormity, the purity, of his love for Corey, as well as the rage he harbored at destiny for putting such a burden on this beloved child. It showed her a whole new side of Adam Hawkins, a side that she found enormously appealing. Without conscious thought, Sameh put her hand on Adam’s arm and smiled at him.

For the first time, she saw a flicker of uncertainty in his emerald green gaze, but it was gone instantly, and for the rest of the evening, his defenses were again in place.

When it came time to leave, he turned to her and said, “Do you have a car?”

Sameh shook her head. She quailed at the very thought of trying to navigate the chaos of Los Angeles traffic. Lord knew she’d had enough problems using the automated sidewalks and people porters in her own time, never mind learning to drive a car here in the nineties. “I always use taxis,” she explained. “They’re really very reliable, and the drivers tell me the most amazing stories.”

He lifted an eyebrow and gave her that disconcerting green stare again. “I’m sure they do, but you won’t need to call one tonight. I’ll drive you home.”

His arrogance was enormous, but refusing seemed both petty and rude, which was how she ended up alone with him in his shiny red sports car thirty minutes later, parked with the roof down on an isolated promontory overlooking the ocean.

“THAT VIEW’S REALLY something, isn’t it?” Adam shuffled through his box of CDs and selected Leonard Cohen. He’d researched carefully over the years and it seemed a vast majority of women found old Lennie’s sepulchral voice and obscure lyrics as sexy as hell. “I live not far from here, and I never get tired of the ocean and sky.”

Adam intended to accomplish two things. He planned to both interrogate and seduce Ms. Sameh Smith, not necessarily in that order. During dinner the seduction portion had taken alarming precedence.

Sitting beside Sameh had been challenging. The sticky wine stains on his trousers and shirt had been minor annoyances compared with the sexual desire she stirred in him, a desire so fierce it had taken all his control to suppress it enough so the others wouldn’t notice. Sitting at the dining table with a large napkin across his lap helped a lot.

Now, all he needed to do was create the proper mood. He was counting on the silver-dappled ocean, the star-studded sky—the smog had lifted because of the breeze—and the car’s elaborate sound system to supply a generous amount of ambience. After that, well, as he’d just told her, his house wasn’t that far away when things got steamy. His heart beat fast and hard, anticipating the sex. He had no doubts whatsoever about his ability or his technique; after all, both had been honed to perfection by constant practice over a number of years.

He reached across and took her hand in his, stroking her fingers one by one, exploring her palm with his thumb. In another moment, he’d bring her hand to his lips and bite at the tender pad just below her fingers. Then he’d slide an arm around her shoulders and— He froze, and his X-rated version of the next few hours fizzled.

“You and Bernie took pictures of me and checked my identity.” Her deep throated voice was soft, her words a statement rather than a question. “You don’t trust me, Adam. You’re investigating me.” She was looking right at him, straight into his eyes. He could see the hurt in her expression. “And tonight I realized it was even worse than that,” she burst out. “Why in the galaxy would you believe I might ever harm Bernie or his family, or Delilah? What is there about me that could possibly make you think I could be dangerous to people I respect and like?”

It was clear she wanted an answer.

Adam was still holding her hand, trying to figure out how in the hell she knew any of this. Bernie wouldn’t have spilled the beans. No matter how infatuated he might be with Sameh—and he was totally gaga over her, no doubt about that; he seemed to consider her his long-lost sister or something—but he’d never in a million years rat on an investigation. Adam would bet his balls on that.

Delilah, then? He discounted Delilah right away. She didn’t even know they were investigating her new secretary. And Violet sure as blazes wouldn’t announce it over afternoon tea—Violet was paying the shot to Blue Knights.

When you don’t have an answer, counter with a question.

“What makes you think I’m suspicious of you?”

She gave him a look that squelched him. “Don’t play word games, Adam. I read it in your thought patterns, of course. Bernie was embarrassed. He knew that you were wrong about me from the start. But for you to actually believe that I might do something…something—” she searched for a word ugly enough “—something…malevolent…” She withdrew her hand from his and scowled at him. “That’s truly disgusting of you, Adam.”

Adam frowned at her. “Hold it, hold it just a damned minute. Go back a little. Did I hear you say you read all this in my, uh, my thought patterns?”

She bobbed her head, and her blond curls bounced and settled again. The moon was full, and its rays caught strands of her hair and streaked them with silver like a halo. “I didn’t catch all of it. I’m not exactly an expert at thought reading.” She made a disparaging sound in her throat and looked down at the hands now clasped tightly in her lap. It was still a mystery to her why she could see one person’s thoughts and totally blank out on another’s, such as Tyrone’s.

The bleakness in her tone and on her lovely face got to him, even though he didn’t have a clue what she was talking about.

“I’m not much of an expert at anything, really.” She looked out at the moon-filled darkness for a long moment. “But I sensed enough to realize you weren’t telling me the truth. I got that much when you came to Delilah’s the other day.”

She’d turned to face him again, her voice accusatory. “And of course I knew Bernie had taken pictures of me before that. Cameras give off a particular energy.” She curled her hands into fists and smacked them down on her lap, making the green dress billow around her legs. “It makes me feel…angry, and hurt, and defensive.”

She gave him that look again. “I just detest being at the mercy of such primitive emotions. It doesn’t say much for my training, you know. I realize full well that anger is residual fear, but darn it all, knowing it with my head doesn’t stop me from feeling it. And really, all you had to do was ask.”

She held his gaze. “I’d have told you the entire truth if you’d only asked me, Adam. It’s sometimes expedient to withhold details that might hurt someone’s feelings, but as for out-and-out lying—” she sounded vehement again “—well, of course I’d never deliberately lie. Truth is freedom. We all learn that in the nursery. It’s a critical learning experience.”

It was one his particular nursery had skipped, then. Damn, he’d somehow lost complete control of this conversation again. He blew out a long breath and tried to regain ground. “You’re telling me we just should have walked up to you on the street and said, ‘Hello there, Ms. Smith, who are you and what are you doing here?’”

She ignored the sarcasm in his voice and nodded emphatically. “Yes. You just should have asked me. I’d have told you the truth. The last thing I want is for you to upset Delilah with some misguided conclusions about who I am and what I’m doing here. Violet Temple has done quite enough of that. My job is strictly a literary matter. I intend to tell Delilah all about myself and my purpose when the time is right.”

“Yeah, sure you will,” he jeered. “The fact is, there’s nothing about you that anybody should trust. You see, Sameh—” he injected the faintest hint of threat into his tone “—nothing about you adds up. Your ID is as phony as all those so-called references you supplied to Elite Personnel. There are no records anywhere—” he underlined the word “—of Sameh Smith before April of this year.” He waited a long moment and added in a deceptively soft tone, “So now, since you suggested it, I’m asking, lady. Who are you, where do you come from and exactly what are you doing working for Delilah McDonell?”

He was pretty sure he’d get some kind of phony run-around, but at least it might get her off the offensive for a while, and even provide a few clues he and Bernie could follow up on. He hoped.

She seemed to relax and settle deeper into the leather seat. “My name is Sameh Smith, at least until I earn my new one—we get to choose when we qualify as Adepts. I was born in the year 2470. I have three dec…I’m thirty years old.” Her deep, calm voice, with its rich undertones of sensuousness, rhymed it all off casually enough. “My tutors sent me back here to do a research paper on Delilah McDonell because she’s an important historical figure in our era.”

Adam laughed, a harsh bark of sound. “And I’m Luke Skywalker. Welcome to the twilight zone.”

She ignored him. “I grew up on an agrofarm in the Western parameter. My father was an analog scientist, and my mother ran the baby nursery. There was—” her voice faltered for an instant “—there was an accident when I was sixteen. My parents left the earth plane, and I went to live with my great-grandmother.”

Adam decided to humor her. If she wanted to play science fiction, what the hell. He’d seen a few sci-fi movies himself. “Why a great-grandmother? Why not just one of your ordinary garden variety first generation grandmas?”

“Because we’re matriarchal. And my mother’s mother chose to emigrate to Balille, back when we were colonizing the asteroids. She invited me to come to her there, but I didn’t want to leave Earth, and anyway, Great-Grandmother Kendra had always taken a special interest in me.”

Adam struggled to quell a sinking feeling in his gut. Sameh was so earnest about this bullshit. Maybe a dose of cold, hard reality would help snap her out of it. “She must have been pretty old and feeble by that time, this Kendra. To take on a sixteen-year-old kid when she was already a great-grandmother herself. Let’s see, on the average that would make her about—” he calculated quickly “—seventy, at the very least.”

Sameh smiled and nodded. “She was over ten decades, actually, but that’s very little. She’s an Adept. In theory she could have as many decades as she wanted. She’s only now in her prime at one hundred twenty years. See, our lifespans are much longer than yours are now, and of course the Adepts live even longer than average because of their emphasis on meditation and diet. We learned to arrest the aging process just after the millennium, and of course we don’t have most of the problems with disease you still have here in the nineties. We have illness, but we manage it differently.”

“That’s real handy.” All of a sudden he was fed up with all of it. He felt sick inside, because it had dawned on him during the past few minutes that he might be dealing with a real, honest-to-God loony here. She was seriously deranged, no doubt about it. Probably spent those missing years sitting in some library reading H. G. Wells.

And why did she have to be so damned gorgeous? Why did just listening to that smoky voice rhyming off all this wacky crap make his blood run hot? Humor her. He’d humor her. Sooner or later she’d run down and he’d figure out what he ought to do next about this whole mess.

“So what exactly do you do, Sameh? What, uh, what kind of career do you have? Back, uh, in the future?”

“I’m in awareness training where you learn levitation, telepathy, teleportation, stuff like that.”

Stuff like that. God, this was getting worse and worse. “And when the training’s over, what are your job prospects?” Besides once a year on Halloween.

“Oh, awareness is the first step toward becoming an Adept. Some Adepts are master healers, others devote themselves to research. It depends where your interests and talents lie. After awareness, we work as tutors for an undetermined period. The theory is that we teach what we most need to learn. Eventually I’ll counsel or teach, and of course go on studying. It’s a long process.” She was quiet for a moment, and then she gave a huge sigh. Her breasts rose and fell, and his blood heated.

“That’s if I ever learn the basic disciplines. I’m not exactly a top student.” She sounded dejected, and he wanted to take her in his arms and comfort her.

Comfort be damned. He just wanted to take her in his arms, and that wasn’t kosher, because she was one sick lady. He was trying to remember what he’d read about schizophrenia, and whether that might be the kind of mental illness she had. Did it make them worse if you humored them?

Was sex beneficial?

He couldn’t believe all the details she’d created for this fantasy world of hers. She seemed to have an explanation for almost everything. Almost. What would happen if he managed to trip her up?

“So tell me, Sameh, how exactly did you manage to get back here from the future? Is time travel as easy for you guys as going to San Diego for the weekend?”

She frowned. “It’s a fairly new development with us, and it certainly wasn’t as smooth as the tutors seemed to believe it would be, that’s for sure.” There was honest irritation in her tone now. “Those techies. They have everybody convinced the method’s foolproof, but there’re a lot of details they haven’t mastered yet, like the landing location.” She shook her head in disgust. “I ended up on a soundstage somewhere in Hollywood. They were filming a movie about dinosaurs, and the techies’ transmission method shut down the whole electrical system. I was in delta state for transport, of course, and when I came out of it, I was absolutely terrified. These huge animals were everywhere. I thought those technodolts had misfired me by thousands of years.”

Adam actually found himself laughing, and after a moment, she giggled, too.

“I guess it does have its funny aspects. The director fired the entire lighting crew, and it certainly wasn’t their fault.”

Adam studied her face in the moonlight. She absolutely believed what she was saying, he’d bet his last dollar on it. And for the first time, she’d said something that made at least a little sense. He knew they’d made a big-bucks mega-movie about dinosaurs a few months back. It wouldn’t be too hard to find out whether there’d been a major power outage on the set.

Hawkins, what in God’s name are you thinking? Are you actually starting to believe this poor kid?

Poor kid, hell. She was thirty, he reminded himself, well past the age of consent. She just looked like a kid because where she came from nobody aged fast.

He groaned aloud. The intoxicating scent of her perfume drifted over him, and her profile was clear and clean in the moonlight. The curves that tantalized him were outlined beneath the wispy dress. It had settled between her long legs and he could see the outline of slender thighs. Damn her for being so provocative, so beautiful. Damn him for wanting her in spite of everything—and everything, in this case, was totally mind-boggling.

She was studying him, head tilted a little to one side. “You don’t believe me.” Her voice was sad.

He didn’t deny it. It wouldn’t take a mind reader to figure out that he was forty-five degrees beyond skeptical. “I’ll have to give it some thought,” he finally said. “It’s a lot to absorb in a short time.”

She was still studying him when he reached over and drew her into his arms. Her skin felt like cool satin under his hands. Desire twisted in his gut, and he was barely aware of her resistance. He reached out a hand to cradle her head. Silk strands of hair twisted around his fingers, and he pulled her head gently back so he could kiss her. He had to kiss her.

His lips were on hers, tentative for only a second as he adjusted to the shape and feel of her full mouth. She tasted wonderful, she felt fragile and yet voluptuous in his arms.

“Adam, please…”

“Easy, baby, we’ll take it easy….”

“Adam, let me…”

“No, sweetheart, let me. Let me kiss you here, and here…” He was on fire. Need for her was burning within him. He stopped what she was about to say with a kiss that he didn’t even try to control. For one intoxicating instant, he felt her begin to melt in his embrace, and smug triumph filled him, along with a flashing, blinding heat. She was female, and he was an artist at this.

Between one breath and the next, the pain hit him.

He cried out and all but shoved her away, bending down and holding his lower body with his hands. It felt as if his testicles were being crushed in a vise. Icy-cold sweat sprang out all over his body, and he groaned aloud. It lasted an eternity that was only fifteen seconds on the dashboard clock. Gasping for breath, feeling weak and nauseous, he dared to straighten up, terrified in case the pain struck again. He took a chance on one deep breath, and then another. When nothing more happened, he slumped back in the leather seat and gave silent but fervent thanks that it was gone.

Sameh was sitting huddled against the door on her side of the car, her wide eyes riveted on him. Cohen had come to the end of the disc and started all over again, and Adam reached out with a trembling hand and pushed the Eject button.

Silence. The breakers swished onto the sand far below, and a breeze ruffled the fronds of a nearby palm.

“Sorry,” he finally managed to say. “I—I don’t know what hit me. It’s never happened before. I got this—this sudden pain…” His voice was strained, and he stopped talking and cleared his throat, careful not to bring on another attack. His mind was working with feverish speed, running through all the venereal diseases he’d ever heard of. Or maybe it was cancer? A tumor? He felt sick with dread.

“I think maybe we ought to go back to the city now.” He turned the key, and the engine roared to life. He backed and turned, some part of him trying to prepare for the next attack. When it comes, he told himself, take it like a man, Hawkins. Don’t show her how much it hurts. Maybe it would hold off until he got safely home.

Home, hell. He was heading for Emergency. He tried to remember which hospital was closest. There was no point fooling around with that portion of his anatomy. He’d find out the worst right away. He gunned the car down the road and onto the freeway.

“Adam?” Her voice was tentative, and he tried to smile at her, to reassure her. His face felt as stiff as cardboard.

“Adam, there’s nothing wrong with you. I just wanted you to let me go, but you were— Well, you wouldn’t listen.” She swallowed hard and then tilted her chin up at a defensive angle. An accusatory note came back into her husky tone. “You really ought to pay more attention to what the other person is saying, you know. Even in this time in history, I know sex is consensual, but you weren’t asking. So I used an energy bolt, just a small one, really. I aimed at your arms, but—” she lifted her hands, palms up, and shook her head “—I guess my aim’s not very good. Somehow it went crooked, and it hit—” She swallowed hard and shot him a sidelong glance. “Well, anyhow, don’t worry about it. It’s just a defensive technique all of us females learn. It’s harmless and there aren’t any lasting side effects.”

He was passing a semi. It took all his concentration to keep from hitting it. As soon as it was behind him, he turned to look at her. She met his gaze with those huge, innocent blue eyes—eyes so devoid of guile that for a moment, he totally believed her.

“Kissing you was good,” she said. “I liked it at first. You’re quite practiced at it, aren’t you? I tasted the tactile memory of many women on your lips.”

What the hell was he supposed to say to that? He muttered something that could have been acknowledgment as he took the exit for Hancock Park and Delilah’s house.

“I’m not, you know. Practiced at intimate physical communion. It isn’t something I’ve pursued in this incarnation. It made this assignment much easier, too, because I don’t think I’d have chosen to come if there was someone in my time I was bonded with. I wouldn’t have felt good about leaving him behind.” Her husky voice was just a trifle wistful.

So there wasn’t anyone special in her life. He didn’t question the feeling of utter satisfaction that knowledge gave him. He turned into the McDonell driveway. Sameh gave him her security card for the gate, and he drove through and stopped under the trees that shaded the drive in front of the house.

“You’re telling me that you can—” How the hell could he phrase this to her when “coldcock” was the term that best described what had happened to him? “You have the ability to zap me if I try anything you don’t want or like?”

Her head bobbed. “I’ve hardly ever used it, though. Which is likely why I miscalculated. Not enough practice.”

He nodded.

“I’m sorry about that, Adam. It’s not wise to cause pain in the reproductive area.”

Affirmative on that one, Ms. Sameh Smith.

“Can you do it at will?” Proceed with caution, Hawkins. He held up a hand. “Don’t, for God’s sake, use it on me again like you did. But maybe cut down the voltage, say, and aim at…” He considered. “Aim at my hand, way out here?”

But she shook her head. “The energy required is distinctive. It results from the emotion involved. I couldn’t counterfeit it. And besides, we’re taught never to use our abilities for demonstration. It lessens the overall field, and puts all Adepts at risk, you see.”

Adepts, fields. He sank back in his seat and closed his eyes. He felt utterly exhausted and confused. “Sameh, I don’t understand that stuff. I don’t begin to understand you. I don’t know who or what you are, and I don’t have a goddamned clue whether or not you have the powers you claim to have.” He opened his eyes and looked at her. “I only know you’re a lovely woman, a puzzle, and I want to go on seeing you.”

Where in damnation was all this coming from? If he had the sense God gave a goat, he’d cut and run, fast.

“Will you have dinner with me—” He’d forgotten tomorrow was Sunday. He always visited Myles on Sunday. “Monday, how about dinner on Monday?”

“That would be good. I accept.” She was smiling at him now, as if he’d said or done something particularly clever. She slid across the seat toward him, knocking him in the ribs with her elbow in the process.

She cupped his face with both her hands, and pressed her lips to his in an awkward, closed-mouth kiss that shook him to the marrow.

CHAPTER FIVE

“HAWK, COME TAKE A LOOK at this.” Bernie’s voice over the intercom had summoned Adam, and they were both now in Bernie’s office.

It was Monday morning, and Bernie’s eyes were riveted to the computer screen. An oversize mug of coffee rested precariously near the edge of the desk as his deft fingers accessed the daily occurrence log—crime reports from the Los Angeles Police Department.

“Look here. See the item about Mrs. Hammerstein. This is another one of those scams—it’s the third one that’s come up in two months. If we could convince these women to get Blue Knights to check on where their money’s going, things like this wouldn’t happen.”

“Things like what? For God’s sake, Bern, you know I can’t decipher that crap on the screen.” Adam knew he sounded grumpy and out of sorts. He was tired. For two nights now, when he ought to have been sleeping, he’d been lying awake thinking about Sameh Smith.

Both nights, in the darkest hours before the dawn, he’d allowed himself to consider the utterly impossible. Maybe she was telling the truth. Maybe she was from the future. Maybe she had supernatural powers and maybe she really could conjure up a bolt of some vile kind of energy and send it winging toward the part of his anatomy that was the most vulnerable. At 3:00 a.m. he was almost ready to believe her preposterous explanations for who and what she was.

Fortunately each new morning brought the return of his reason. But this morning had also brought the loss of his good nature, because he’d called a contact he had at Universal Studios first thing, and after some confusion, his friend had found out that yes, they’d had a major power outage when they were working on the dinosaur flick a few months back.

Besides that disquieting news, Adam had spent all Sunday afternoon and evening with Myles, and it had drained him. Myles Fontaine was the closest thing he’d ever had to a father. Myles had once been the wisest and strongest man Adam knew. To see him now, his body skeleton thin, his long-fingered hands moving aimlessly, his mind wandering in some gray world invisible to anyone but himself, was a wrenching agony for Adam.

Myles seldom knew him anymore, but Adam kept going to the nursing home on Sundays, kept on talking and talking to Myles, hoping against hope that some afternoon his friend and mentor would shake the cobwebs out of his elegant silver head and be himself again. Well, it sure hadn’t happened yesterday. Adam knew it probably was never going to happen, and it was a bitter knowledge, a knowledge he hadn’t yet come to terms with.

And all afternoon, as he carried on a one-sided dialogue with his old friend, a corner of his mind persisted in going over and over the whole complicated issue of Sameh Smith. He told himself time and again that if he had any sense, he’d hand the whole matter of Sameh straight back to Bernie, break his date with her for tonight, forget he’d ever laid eyes on her and get on with business as usual.

He knew he wasn’t going to do any of those things, though. In spite of everything, he wanted to see Sameh again. He had to see her as soon as possible. Some part of him was already counting the hours until dinnertime. For the first time in as long as he could remember, he was obsessed with a woman, and he didn’t like it one bit.

“One of the reasons you don’t like computers, Hawk, is that they’re not shaped like a woman,” Bernie was saying. “Another just could be that you haven’t heard a single word I’ve said in the past five minutes. You’ve been staring at that calendar on the wall, and it’s two months out of date.”

Adam stared at the computer screen again, feeling put upon. “All I can see on that thing are meaningless abbreviations, Bernie. These damn machines make me itch behind my ears. I’m allergic to them.”

Bernie, oblivious to his partner’s lack of enthusiasm, was scrolling through some complex filing system on the screen that made sense only to him. “Here we go. I knew I coded these to see if any kind of pattern might be developing. There’s none yet, but you never know.” He sent a minuscule arrow scooting across the screen, ignoring Adam’s sour muttering.

“Look here. There’s three of these things now. They all concern older women, wealthy women, who trusted some guy to make long-term investments for them. The investments looked legit, too. None of these broads were out-and-out stupid. There was extensive paperwork and the letterheads on all the forms were real. The women each received reams of confirmation and updates on their investments over a period of time. Two of the women died, and when their heirs went to collect on the investments, they found out they were phony. This last one, this Mrs. Hammerstein, is in a nursing home now. She’s confused and the daughter’s trying to straighten out her affairs and finds out she bought a document for twenty-five grand, and the insurance company it’s supposed to be with has no record of the transaction. Problem is, the cops can’t do much. None of these women can lay charges, and there’s no record of who they bought the documents from in the first place.”

Bernie turned back to his machine and ran a few more cross-checks. He shook his head. “Not much more, but it sure as hell smacks of a scam to me.” He turned away from the machine and tilted his chair back, squinting up at his partner. “So whaddya think, Hawk? Any ideas as to how we could use something like this to publicize Blue Knights, get to some of these women before they hand their bucks over to some con artist?”

Adam thought he needed a stiff belt of Scotch, even though it was only ten in the morning. “I’m with you. I think these ladies would’ve been smart to hire us before they turned bundles of cash over for investment purposes, but as for publicity, you’re on your own,” he growled.

Bernie reached for his coffee. “Maybe Janice can think of a few new advertising schemes. Television would be the way to go if we had the bucks. Maybe we could get one of the talk shows interested, go and be interviewed, mention Blue Knights a few times. Hell, we’d be snowed under with work.” He gestured at the other chair. “Have some coffee and sit down. You get on my nerves looming over me like that.”

Adam wanted nothing more than to go back to his own office, shut the door and disconnect the intercom and the phone. He sat instead. He knew his partner. Bernie had something on his mind besides advertising, and they might just as well get it over with.

“What I was wondering was, whaddya think about Sameh Smith now you know her a little better?” Bernie took a noisy gulp of coffee and wrinkled his nose. “Damn, this stuff’s cold.” He got up and dumped it and then poured himself more from the coffee machine set up in a corner of his office. “Personally, I’m a big fan of Sameh’s, Hawk. I haven’t seen Frances as relaxed and happy for months as she was Saturday night, and her and Sameh are gonna go shopping together this week. You know how long it’s been since Fran agreed to leave the kids with a sitter?”

Adam had some idea. He’d watched helplessly as Bernie and Frances struggled with the reality of Corey’s handicap. After the initial shock, Bernie seemed to adjust somewhat, accepting the situation, but Frances was another matter. At first she’d marched relentlessly from one specialist to another with her son, demanding a cure. When each gave her the same diagnosis, the same heartbreaking prognosis, she changed tactics.

For the past six months, she’d been searching out psychic healers, prayer groups, naturopaths, chiropractors, dragging Corey from one to another, spending large amounts of money on people who weren’t doing anything Bernie could see to earn it. Adam had to agree, because Corey showed no signs of improving in spite of esoteric diets, healing circles, crystals or psychic healing.

Adam understood all too well the need Frances had for hope. Didn’t he, himself, spend every Sunday praying for a miracle for Myles? But he knew, too, that Frances’s quest was as futile as his own.

Myles had Alzheimer’s.

Corey had cerebral palsy.

Neither Corey nor Myles’s diseases were about to succumb to a laying on of hands or an exorcism. In Adam’s opinion, miracles were a little scarcer than virgins in L.A.

Bernie was still praising Sameh. “And the kids. Did ya see how the kids loved her?” Bernie drank half his coffee in one long gulp and peered at Adam over the rim of the mug. “I still don’t know the whole score on Sameh Smith, but I know in my gut she’s clean, Hawk.” He laid the mug down and lifted his feet to the desktop. “So what’d you do when you two left our place Saturday night?” A frown creased his forehead. “You didn’t use that famous line of yours on her, did ya?”

Adam scowled at his friend. “What are you, her big brother now?”

To his astonishment, Bernie shrugged, and his cheeks and nose got red. He recrossed his feet and avoided Adam’s eyes. “In a way, yeah, I guess you could say something like that. I just don’t want to see her hurt, is all, and I know your track record with women.” Adam gave him a frigid stare, but Bernie stared right back. “You’re my friend, Hawk, but I’d never send you off alone with my sister if I had one. And that’s how Sameh feels, see? Like my sister.”

Adam rolled his eyes. “Give me a break here, Methot. You met the woman, what, three days ago? And now all of a sudden you’re playing the white knight?”

Bernie’s jaw jutted out. “I’m serious, Hawk. There’s this thing about Sameh, this innocence, y’know? Some fast-talking jerk is liable to come along and take advantage of her, what with that face and figure, and that sort of, sort of…” Bernie searched for a word. “Trust. She’s so damned trusting, somehow. It’s scary.” He raised his head and looked Adam straight in the eye. “You gonna keep on seeing her?”

Adam was. But he wasn’t going to tell Bernie that he was taking her to dinner in exactly—he glanced at his watch—seven hours and ten minutes, not after what his partner had just said about fast-talking jerks. “I’m going to continue the investigation, and in order to do that, I’ll be seeing her, yeah,” Adam temporized. “After all, she’s still under surveillance by this company, Bern. As far as I’m concerned, Violet Temple’s our client. We took a hefty down payment from her and agreed to investigate Smith. And there’s a hell of a pile of questions that still need answers.”

More now than even Bernie knew, and for some reason, Adam didn’t feel like revealing to his partner the depths of Sameh’s delusions. He’d have to eventually, of course. But this morning he just didn’t feel up to it.

Janice knocked on the door, came in and made her way over to the coffee machine. “Karen Williams is here to see you, Bernie. That creep she was married to is still stalking her. He followed her to the office and tried to stop her coming in. Karen’s crying her eyes out, so I gave her tissues and told her I’d bring her some of this acid you call coffee. She’s laid charges with the police, but there’s not much they can do unless he assaults her, and by then it’s too late. I think she wants you to arrange for a bodyguard for her. She’s waiting for you in the corner office.”

Janice gave Adam an appraising look. “You’re going to have to start controlling those raging hormones of yours, boss. You’re looking far more than your age this morning. Haven’t you ever heard that too much sex makes your eyes go funny? And yours are well on the way.” Coffee in hand, she turned and sauntered out.

Adam glowered at her back, and Bernie guffawed. When Adam turned a malevolent gaze on his partner, Bernie gave him an elaborate shrug. “You have to admit some of her lines are good,” he said, getting up to riffle through a pile of files on his desk before he turned back to Adam. “About Sameh. Far as I’m concerned, I vote we hand Temple back her money today and tell her to use it on a good shrink.” He stuffed the appropriate file under his arm and shot Adam a hopeful look. “Whaddya say, Hawk? Can’t we drop the whole thing?”

Adam pretended to consider it and shook his head. “Like I said, there’s still too many questions need answers. If you figure you’d rather not be involved, I’ll handle it myself.”

“I’m already involved, but I think you’re making a big mistake here, Hawk.”

Adam remembered last night’s wild conversation with Sameh. He remembered all too well the pain in his groin. He figured Bernie could be absolutely right about big mistakes, but he still wasn’t about to change his mind about seeing Sameh.

“PERHAPS THAT’S ENOUGH for this morning, Sameh.” Delilah slowly eased her body out of its vertical but upside-down position and rolled in one lithe movement to her feet, bending over to give her leotard a few tugs back into place on her slender form. She straightened and staggered, and Sameh moved quickly to take her arm.

“Oops, guess I got up too fast again.” Delilah took Sameh’s arm as she walked over to an armchair and collapsed into it. “Thanks, sweetie.” Delilah rested her head against the back of the chair and closed her eyes for a moment. “I’m a teensy bit dizzy, all right. That’s such a creative position I always forget that I should come out of it slowly.”

Delilah was in the habit of dictating paragraphs of her new book while she practiced her yoga headstand. She was a great believer in doing two things at the same time, if at all possible, and she believed the rush of blood to her brain made her writing flow better. It certainly didn’t do her complexion any harm—her skin looked as fresh and glowing as a girl’s.

“That was rather good, that bit about interpreting one’s dreams, don’t you think?” She opened wide the cornflower blue eyes that had been her trademark years before when she was Hollywood’s femme fatale. There were laugh lines at their corners now, a few creases around the lush mouth that had been kissed by many of the silver screen’s leading men, and a certain looseness to her jawline.

Still, Delilah’s face and figure were exceptional for a fifty-six-year-old woman in this era, Sameh mused. She was getting used to the fact that people aged so much faster here, but it had been a shock at first to see people her era would consider mere youngsters with wrinkles and white hair.

“I’ve kept a dream diary for years now. I’m sure you do as well, don’t you, Sameh?” Delilah was still beautiful, with the proud, slightly blurred facial lines and honest wrinkles of a woman who’d stubbornly refused cosmetic surgery in a city and an industry where youth and beauty were everything.

“I pay attention to my dreams, certainly.” Dream study was a required course in Sameh’s time. All awareness students had a simple device that clipped to their pillows, recorded their dreams and helped with their interpretation.

Delilah would be fascinated by that. Sameh decided that this was the right moment to begin telling her employer where she was really from and what she was doing in the twentieth century working as her secretary. She was trying to figure out how best to begin when Violet Temple knocked and then bustled into the room.

“Tyrone’s waiting for you in the dining room, Delilah. I’ll have lunch ready in fifteen minutes.” She spoke to Delilah as if Sameh wasn’t there.

Sameh felt the hairs on the back of her neck rise, and she erected an invisible shield around herself and moved a few feet away from the other woman’s field. From the first moment she’d met Violet, she’d known that the older woman disliked her. Actually it went further than dislike; Sameh knew that, given an opportunity, Violet would actually harm her. It was the first time she’d ever encountered that type of hatred, and worst of all, Sameh had no idea why Violet felt the way she did.

Delilah, too, was well aware of Violet’s antagonism. Sameh knew that Violet told lies about her to Delilah, that she’d done her best to make Delilah distrust her. When the other woman shot Sameh a nasty look before she hurried out again, Delilah shook her head and rolled her eyes at her employee’s rudeness. “We’ll just have to give her some time, Sameh. Violet’s still feeling a bit jealous because you and I hit it off so well. She’ll get over it, I’m sure. We’ll both just send her loving thoughts.”

Sameh had a lot of faith in love, but she didn’t think it was going to be the ticket in this particular case. She didn’t say so, though.

Delilah patted Sameh’s arm. “By the way, how did your dinner go Saturday night?” Sameh had of course told Delilah about Bernie and Adam’s visit. Delilah knew both men, and she’d been intrigued by Bernie’s invitation.

“It was a wonderful dinner. Bernie’s wife, Frances, is warm and interesting. She’s an artist—she paints very colorful, dramatic canvases.”

“Do they have children?” A shadow crossed Delilah’s eyes and was gone again. When Maggie died, Delilah’s fond dreams of grandchildren had perished as well. Delilah moved to a mirrored dressing table and swiftly began repairing her makeup as they talked. The large, sunny, multipurpose office had been designed by Delilah and contained yoga mats, portable computer, juice bar and the elaborate makeup table.

“Two kids, Kate and Corey.” Sameh described the children, going into detail about Corey’s condition.

Delilah’s hands became still and her eyes filled with tears. “Such a difficult little body to choose to live in,” she remarked softly.

Sameh nodded heartfelt agreement. More than ever before, she wished she had mastered the healing arts; if she had, she might be able to help Corey, perhaps even to cure him. She’d pondered the situation all day Sunday, wondering if there were ways in which she could help the little boy, worrying because she didn’t think she had the expertise or the courage to do much for him.

“And were there other guests?”

Sameh felt the heat rise to her face. “Only one. Bernie’s partner, Adam Hawkins.”

“Ahh.” Delilah gave Sameh a knowing look in the mirror. “I know Mr. Hawkins quite well. Handsome devil, isn’t he? Their company’s done some security work for me, and Adam Hawkins attracts women like honey draws flies.” She snapped her mascara shut and picked up an eyeliner pencil. “Is he the one who drove you home Saturday night in that flashy little red sports car?” Before Sameh could answer, Delilah whipped around and held up a restraining hand. “Sorry, my dear. Of course you don’t have to answer that.” She turned again to the mirror. “I’m not prying into your private life. It’s just that I was reading late and happened to glance out the window.”

Sameh grinned. In so many ways, Delilah reminded her of Great-Grandmother Kendra. Both of them were the most intelligent of women, and both were adorably clumsy when it came to snooping. “I kissed him good-night.” She’d already thought-read Delilah’s knowledge of that occurrence.

It was Delilah’s turn to grin, albeit a trifle shamefacedly. “I thought perhaps you might have. I’d have been sorely tempted to do the same in your shoes.”

“He’s invited me to dinner tonight.” Sameh had mixed feelings about keeping the appointment—no, date. They still called them dates in the nineties, she reminded herself. It was proving difficult to keep up with all the current terminology, despite the programming she’d had.

It was even more difficult to remain objective when she was with Adam Hawkins, despite his shocking lack of development in some areas. She remembered the gentle kiss she’d impetuously given him. It had stirred the strangest reactions in her. Even now, warmth rushed through her as she remembered the feel of her lips on his.

“A dinner date,” Delilah crowed. “What fun! Have you decided what to wear? Did he say where he was taking you?” She could shift in an instant from being a metaphysical expert to a woman with nothing but clothes on her mind. “If you need to borrow a dress, just say the word. I’m sure I’d have something that would look wonderful on you—in fact, I can see you in that little blue number I bought for that dismal party last month.”

“Thank you.” Delilah paid her a generous salary, but so far Sameh hadn’t had any need to shop for fancy clothing. “Perhaps it would be a good idea to borrow a dress.”

Delilah fluffed her gleaming copper hair and gave herself one last critical stare. “We’ll go try on possibilities right after luncheon.” She sprayed a cloud of her favorite scent over herself, wrapped a long lilac chiffon skirt around her yellow leotard, added a matching loose blouse, and headed for the door with Sameh following close behind.

“You need friends your own age, Sameh. I’m delighted you’ve met some.” She stopped, and Sameh bumped into her. Delilah grinned. She seemed to find Sameh’s clumsiness endearing. “Remember, Sameh, we attract people into our lives for very definite reasons. It’s usually because they represent something we need to learn.”

She started off again in the direction of the dining room, skirt billowing and floating around her still shapely legs. She paused again a moment later, hand on the stained-glass door. “Mr. Hawkins strikes me as a man who would give fascinating lessons.” She turned and winked at Sameh. “Enjoy, but just don’t get hurt in the process, will you? I’m very fond of you, my dear.” With that, she tilted her head back at an imperial angle and swept into the dining room, making an entrance worthy of Delilah McDonell, Oscar-winning actress, bestselling writer, lecturer extraordinaire and femme fatale.

Besides Sameh, she had an appreciative audience of only one. Tyrone Wallace sat at the head of the long oak table, and he rose to his feet when Delilah entered, taking her hand in his and then pressing his lips to her fingers in a courtly gesture.

His thick shock of well-cut white hair set off his deeply bronzed face with its aristocratic nose and deep-set dark eyes. He had a neatly trimmed mustache, and a habit of smoothing it down with his fingers, bringing deliberate attention to his full lips. His distinguished looks and perfect diction had won him minor roles in movies, usually as a bank manager, but Sameh was aware that his acting talent hadn’t matched his appearance. He hadn’t acted for some years—except with Delilah.

“Lilah, you look stunning, as usual,” he purred, holding out a chair so she could sit down and allowing his hand to trail across her shoulders and neck in a provocative gesture,

Delilah looked up at him with adoration plain on her face. Some years older than Tyrone, she made no secret of her devotion to him. Sameh knew he’d lived with Delilah for four years now, accepting the gifts she showered on him with magnanimous grace. Outsiders might think Tyrone dependent on Delilah, but Sameh understood all too well that it was the other way around.

She knew that Tyrone’s show of love for her employer was just that—show. She almost felt as if she should be the one offering Delilah romantic advice. She hoped at least that Tyrone wouldn’t break her employer’s heart.

Sameh sat in her accustomed place at the far side of the table, and Tyrone nodded to her as he took his seat again, his smile warm and his eyes cold. They’d come to an understanding the first week she’d worked for Delilah.

He’d put his hand on Sameh’s thigh at the dinner table one evening, stroking her under cover of the tablecloth. Already aware of Delilah’s blind devotion to Tyrone, Sameh couldn’t bring herself to create the scene Tyrone’s actions deserved. Instead she’d moved his hand, aimed a bolt that gave him a cramp in his leg and told him later that if he ever tried anything like that again, she’d be forced to tell Delilah.

Since then, he’d been carefully cordial to her when Delilah was present, but Sameh understood well that Tyrone’s massive ego made him think he was irresistible, and that because she’d rejected him, he despised her.

On the surface, Tyrone was a charming man—but in his colors Sameh had no trouble detecting a very different person from the one he chose to expose to the world. She only wished she could read more of his innermost thoughts, but her own negative feelings for the man seemed to block thought reading most of the time with him. She got enough bits and scraps, however, to make her avoid him whenever possible.

“Is Violet coming?” Delilah looked at her watch. “She was the one who said luncheon was ready.” Delilah viewed her employees as friends. She’d made it plain from the first day that she expected Sameh to share lunch with her and Tyrone and Violet on weekdays. Breakfast and dinner were often eaten at different times, in different places, but these luncheons were something of a ritual for Delilah, an attempt to create the family she didn’t have.

After the first few days, Sameh found herself wishing that she could just make herself a sandwich and eat it in the kitchen. The clouds of conflicting energies that swirled around the dining table each noon didn’t exactly make for easy digestion, and today was no exception.

“What have you been doing all morning, Ty?” Delilah gave him her full attention.

“I was looking at cars—there’s a new Cadillac out that’s a real beauty.” Tyrone buttered a bun and bit off half of it. “You really should take one out for a spin, Lilah. It’s a car that would suit you.”

Delilah laughed. “We already have four cars sitting in the garage, Ty. We can only use one at a time, and since I hate driving, that’s more than one for each of us.”

Tyrone nodded, his expression thoughtful. “I was thinking perhaps we should trade in the Lincoln.”

“The Lincoln? But it’s hardly six months old.” There was a faint note of exasperation in Delilah’s tone. “It seems so materialistic, so unnecessary, changing cars every few months this way.”

“You’re right, it’s a foolish idea. It’s a weakness in me, this passion for cars.” Tyrone put his bun down and sat back in his chair, fixing his gaze on a painting on the far wall. “I suppose it goes back to when I was a boy,” he mused. “My poor father never owned a car, did I ever tell you that, Lilah?” He gave a deprecating laugh. “He hardly had money to feed us, much less buy a car.”

Sameh knew he was lying. She had a vivid mental picture of Tyrone, growing up in a nice, middle-class neighborhood somewhere in Washington state. She studied him, not for the first time amazed and shocked at his ability to mislead Delilah.

“Being dirt poor’s tough. A person never really gets over it,” Violet said in her little-girl voice as she set a tray of sandwiches down and slid into her chair, giving Delilah an ingratiating smile and, as usual, ignoring Sameh.

Violet was at least telling the truth, Sameh concluded, getting an unexpected glimpse into a rush of ugly memories that flooded into the other woman’s mind. She’d been poor, all right. She’d also been abused, both physically and sexually. Sameh shuddered as snippets of the woman’s past unrolled before her inner eye. She could see Violet’s father, drinking away the family’s money, lashing out viciously at his wife and laughing as he hurt his daughter.

Childhoods like Violet’s should never happen—and wouldn’t a hundred years or so after the millenium, Sameh reminded herself. That didn’t erase what Violet had already endured, however. A wave of compassion rolled over Sameh, and she ventured a tentative smile in Violet’s direction, but the skinny woman’s eyes filled with burning animosity when she caught Sameh’s glance.

“Well, I guess I was lucky,” Delilah remarked. “We weren’t rich, but Mom and Dad were able to give me everything I needed and a lot that I just wanted. I’m afraid I was a spoiled child. How about you, Sameh? What was your childhood like?”

For a moment, Sameh let herself remember the peaceful agrofarm and the enchanted years of her childhood. By the time she was born, children were considered a rare and treasured gift, to be nurtured and loved without restraint by everyone. “I was most fortunate. I had a wonderful growing-up time,” she responded. There wasn’t any common ground to compare with the others, so she didn’t elaborate.

Violet sniffed. “Some are born with a silver spoon, and some are born to shine it,” she said with sanctimonious venom.

“That’s very true,” Tyrone added with a heartfelt sigh. “I remember wishing I had even a bicycle when I was a boy.”

By the time lunch was over, Delilah was urging Tyrone to buy the new Cadillac. It was a scene that had been repeated in various guises during the weeks Sameh had lived there. It hadn’t taken her long to realize that Delilah, successful and outwardly confident, was actually a lonely and insecure woman, emotionally dependent on Tyrone, who took full advantage of both Delilah’s generous nature and her healthy bank accounts.

For all her remarkable insights into the rest of humanity, Delilah was totally blind about herself and those she cared about. It was a character trait Sameh found both endearing and disturbing in her employer.

She saw Tyrone give Violet a stealthy wink when Delilah told him to buy the new car, and she felt sickened by their duplicity. She herself wouldn’t trust Violet or Tyrone as far as she could teleport them in a windstorm.

CHAPTER SIX

IT WAS EIGHT O’CLOCK in the evening. Adam and Sameh were strolling down Sunset Strip when Sameh paused before an eight-foot-tall poster of Marilyn Monroe, advertising a retrospective of her movies playing inside the theater.

“Who is this woman?”

“C’mon, Sameh. You’re putting me on, right?” Adam gave her a quizzical look. “Everybody in the world recognizes Marilyn, the goddess of sex.”

Sameh studied the poster. “Well, I don’t recognize her. I didn’t have time to review some parts of your pop culture in depth.” She tilted her head up to look into Monroe’s face. “She has sadness in her eyes. Do you know her, or do security for her?”

Adam had a sinking feeling in his gut. He’d actually started to think they’d get through an entire evening without her going bonkers on him again, but that was obviously too much to hope for. He sighed and did his best to retain some semblance of sanity in the conversation. “Marilyn Monroe is dead, Sameh. She’s been dead for years now. Lately she’s become a sort of cult figure and she seems to be even more popular now than when she was alive.”

Sameh nodded, and her mass of bright curls glimmered in the rainbow of neon lights lining the Strip. “That happens with us, too, that people become more popular after they die than when they’re alive. Not for sexual reasons, though. We have total equality. Women are no longer viewed as sex objects.”

Here it was again, this division she made between his world and this…this other place she considered hers. Damn, he’d been hoping none of this stuff would come up tonight, and it hadn’t, until now.

They’d just finished an enjoyable dinner at Luigi’s, one of his favorite restaurants. A small, unpretentious Italian place in Westwood, it served the best linguine around. Sameh had asked questions about his work, and maybe he’d gone on a bit too long about Blue Knights, now that he thought about it. But he’d tried to be amusing and she’d laughed a lot. She’d hardly spilled a thing.

He discovered he loved making her laugh. She had a contagious giggle that made everyone in their vicinity smile.

He’d ordered a bottle of good wine and feasted his eyes on her as they talked and ate. She’d gotten sauce on her full bottom lip, and all he could think of was how it would feel to lick it off. Two tiny drops of wine had dripped from the edge of her glass, landing just where her breasts swelled at the neck of her dress…two tiny intriguing red dots on a sea of golden skin. He’d thought about that skin extending all the way down, over full and luscious breasts, flat stomach…

He’d forced himself to look only at her face, her eyes. He’d forced himself to concentrate on whatever the hell they were saying. Damn but she was desirable.

She’d seemed to bring the California sunshine with her into the dim restaurant. He’d caught the hungry stares she attracted from other men, and sent back silent, lethal warnings of his own, one murderous glare usually enough to make them flush and look away.

He was amazed that she aroused such powerful jealousy in him. He couldn’t remember feeling so jealous over a woman in a long time—it was all too often the other way around. Even in a city noted for beautiful women, Sameh drew attention, especially wearing this simple blue thing she had on tonight. It bared her long, shapely legs and veed in the front to reveal that tantalizing glimpse of creamy cleavage. It drew tight around her rear when she walked. It was definitely Adam’s kind of dress, and the woman wearing it tantalized and intrigued him—when she wasn’t driving him batty, like now.

“How old were you when this Marilyn Monroe died, Adam?”

She wasn’t going to let up on it. “Six. No, seven.” He tucked her hand in his as they strolled, watching the tourists and the regulars. Without consciously thinking about it, he kept a careful eye out for the crazies who frequented this famous boulevard, making sure his body was between them and Sameh as they ambled past, muttering to themselves.

Sameh looked at each of them with intensity, frowning to herself, but she didn’t comment. A family went past—mother, father, two young children—and Sameh waved her hand at them. The kids grinned and waved back, and she said, “Delilah and the others were talking about their childhoods today at lunch. What was yours like, Adam?”

“Oh, the usual. Ordinary. Boarding schools, summer camp. Being a little kid is pretty boring.” His voice was rock steady, and the protective walls he’d erected years before were firmly in place.

She stumbled on the curb just then, and her misstep provided a welcome distraction, giving him an excuse to put his arm around her. He left it there as they walked, and she didn’t seem to object. He could feel the sweet swell of warm hip against his palm, undulating gracefully as they moved. He could smell her perfume, something light and flowery.

“Do you want to go somewhere for a drink, or maybe dancing?”

She shook her head. “My feet hurt.”

“Let’s head back to the car, then,” he suggested. “We can cruise through Hollywood if you like.”

She looked up at him and gave him the smile that made a weird place in his chest feel sore. “I’d like that very much.”

Once they were in the convertible, he drove slowly up Sunset toward Hollywood, along the famous boulevards. Dusk was falling, and the smog gave the city a muted, shadowy hue, like an old sepia-toned photograph. All the signs and marquees were coming alive in the twilight, flashing color over Sameh’s skin as they drove. His small sports car was almost lost in a sea of Porsches, Cadillacs and Lincolns, with the occasional pickup mixed in for comic relief.

“These shoes really hurt my feet,” she remarked, reaching down to remove the blue satin heels that were a perfect match for the dress. “Delilah insisted I wear them. I had to practice for a long time this afternoon before I could walk in them at all, but I’m still not very good at it. They hurt my toes and make my legs ache.” She picked up one of the shoes and studied it as if she’d never laid eyes on a high heel before. “I guess even shoes can be sex objects, right? They certainly aren’t designed for comfort, the way our sandals are.” She sighed and flexed her toes, their nails painted pink. Adam kept glancing over at her legs encased enticingly in sheer stockings.

There was a noticeable run in her panty hose, right from her left toe up to where her leg disappeared beneath the short blue skirt, but she didn’t seem aware of it or concerned. Damn, even the holes in this woman’s stockings made him horny.

He could sense her eyes on him, and at a red light he turned to smile at her. She didn’t smile back. She looked serious. “There’s something you should know about me, Adam.”

A million somethings. Like where she was really from, for instance, and how he could best entice her into bed with him without running the risk of permanent disability. “Let me guess. You don’t like wearing high heels?”

“Besides that.” Her tone was solemn.

He had a bad feeling they were heading back to la la land here. “Okay,” he said with a sigh, “I guess you’d better lay it on me.”

“Is that the same as telling you?” She was frowning.

He couldn’t help laughing. “Right.”

She laid a hand on his arm, and he could feel the warmth through his light sport coat. His peripheral vision was excellent, and he knew her blue eyes were riveted on his face.

“I know when you’re not being truthful with me, Adam. It’s a little like these flashing lights.” She pointed up at one they were passing that said Filthy McNasty’s, Bar Open, Dancing. On, off, on, off. “If what you’re saying is the truth, your light stays constant. But when you say something that’s not true, the light blinks like that one and I know you’re trying to deceive me.” She withdrew her hand and looked away from him. “I’ve known every time, and you’ve done it rather a lot.”

He thought that over for a minute, feeling uneasy. In the first place, what light was she talking about, for God’s sake? In the second place, if she was on the level, it sure as hell didn’t make him feel comfortable. “Give me an example,” he made the mistake of saying.

“A few minutes ago, when we were discussing childhoods? You said yours had been ordinary and boring. And I knew right away you weren’t being truthful at all with me.” She shrugged. “It’s your privilege not to reveal what you’d rather keep hidden, but I just thought you ought to know that I know right away when you do—lie to me, that is. And you should be aware of it. Otherwise it feels as if I’m taking unfair advantage of you.”

She was right about what he’d said, no denying it. He hadn’t been anywhere near truthful about his childhood. He never was, most of the time not even to himself, and he sure as hell had no intention of spilling his guts to her about it. So maybe she did have some sort of cockeyed ability to detect bullshit, which didn’t make him feel exactly comfortable.

Adam thought of the countless times over the years when he’d made up successful but blatant lies to extricate himself from delicate situations with women, and he all but groaned aloud. If this neon-light thing Sameh was talking about ever became known to other females, he and just about every other man he knew was dead in the water.

“So you always know when somebody’s lying?” He made a sharp right and took the route that led up to Griffith Park.

“Almost always. Sometimes a person isn’t aware himself that what he’s saying is false, so then of course I don’t know, either.”

He thought about that for several miles. “Was this something you were born with, this light thing?”

She shook her head. “Not entirely. I had a latent ability, at least that’s what the testing showed. If we have latent ability, we develop it, in awareness training.”

And here they were, right back to square one and loony-land. There wasn’t much point in trying to keep her on the straight and narrow path of logical and reasonable conversation, Adam could see that. And after Saturday night, he wasn’t about to try anything heavy in the romance line unless he was damned good and sure she was willing. He felt a sharp pang of regret over that.

So, if they weren’t going to make out, and she wasn’t going to discuss anything more normal, he had to make an effort to meet her on her own ground and be absolutely honest about it. His ingenuity would certainly be tested.

He pulled into a parking space near the observatory and shut off the engine. Millions of lights were blinking on in the city that stretched out beneath them. She undid the seat belt and shifted forward, her face reflecting her delight at the fairyland coming alive far below.

“What’s it like, where you come from, Sameh?” He was surprised to find that he was really curious to hear what she’d say. Apart from anything else, she was the most inventive woman he’d ever met. “Are there cities like L.A.? Are there restaurants like Luigi’s? Are there guys like Bernie and me?” She turned and looked at him—a long, speculative look. He met her gaze honestly. “You told me last night that if I wanted to know anything about you, I just ought to ask,” he reminded her. “So I’m asking.”

The drive in the convertible had tousled her hair even more than usual. It curled around her face and throat, soft and shining. He wanted to touch it, but he resisted.

“First of all, we have strict population control, so there aren’t nearly as many people on Terra in my time as there are now, which makes everything much simpler,” she began. “Our cities aren’t like this, either.” She gestured at the scene below. “They’re smaller, more manageable. It took us hundreds of years, but we’ve managed to cleanse the earth of the pollution and repair the damage our ancestors—your civilization—did to it. We recycle and use all waste products, and of course we no longer use animals as a source of food or clothing.”

“No prime rib, no burgers, no salami? No leather?”

“Animals are living things just as we are, Adam.”

He remembered that Sameh had stuck to vegetables each time he’d eaten with her. She hadn’t made an issue of being vegetarian, but obviously she felt strongly about it. Well, it was just one more oddity, rather insignificant when you considered the total sum of oddities that made up Sameh Smith.

“Sounds like a real Garden of Eden,” he said carefully, doing his best not to sound sarcastic. “No wars, no riots, no racial tension? Must be a relaxing way to live, although it doesn’t sound as if there’s much to get your juices going. What do you do for excitement?”

She laughed. “We’re still human. We still have plenty of tension between those who think differently. No wars, though. War was strictly outlawed by the Central Committee after the nuclear accident that almost ended all life on Terra. That happened just after the millennium. It signaled the real beginning of peace on earth, what we call the Four Hundred Years. But we still have our problems. For instance, there’s always a heated debate going on between the techies and the Adepts.”

That tickled him. “Mind versus machine, huh? Sounds just like our office. Bernie and his computers, me and my hunches.”

She laughed again, soft and low in her throat. “Exactly. Computers versus awareness.”

“Tell me about the people, Sameh. Are there still rich and poor, black and white, good and bad?”

She frowned, thinking it over. “It’s not as clear-cut as that anymore. We still have evolving societies and a few ethnic groups, but we have a lot more compassion for one another. Most of the problems in your society are fear based, caused by ignorance and lack of understanding. That’s why awareness training is so important in our time. It allows us to communicate mind to mind, and when that occurs, there won’t be as many misunderstandings.”

Adam thought about the lie detector that she said blinked when he was being less than honest. A thing like that would sure make high-level conferences between politicians interesting and a lot more productive, as well.

“What about men and women, Sameh? Still marriage, divorce, infidelity and all this stuff about eternal love?”

“But love is eternal, Adam.” She sounded shocked.

He smiled at the reprimand.

“We no longer marry, though, and so we don’t divorce. Infidelity reflects basic insecurity and a lack of self-esteem. We give our children unconditional love and try to help them become confident adults, which helps them form honest relationships and prevents many problems later on in life.”

“Nobody promises to love, honor and obey anymore?”

She smiled and shook her head. “I happen to know that ‘obey’ is hardly ever used even in your time. You’re teasing me again, Adam. As for making commitments, of course we still do. If two people desire it, they’re free to bond and share their lives. There are a variety of simple contracts they can agree on. But if they want to have children, it gets much more complicated. They have to submit to intensive examinations by the Fertility Commission before they can be made fertile. It’s not a fast or easy process. Our society is extremely cautious about granting a license to have a child. It’s one of the greatest privileges our society has.”

“Sounds like you guys have a foolproof method of birth control, then.”

“Everyone in our society is sterilized at birth. It’s a simple procedure, reversible, of course. It ensures that every child born is a gift, something we’ve had to earn. Children are valued highly.”

“Too bad we don’t have the same value system.” He realized he was accepting her fantasies as fact. But this was a great conversation and he didn’t want to spoil it. “So how about you, Sameh? You said you didn’t have a main squeeze out there anywhere. You figure you’ll ever do this bonding thing, or are you committed to a career as one of these Adepts, and a dull and boring life as a vestal virgin?”

She giggled. “You know that sexual communion has nothing whatsoever to do with a career, Adam. It’s simply a personal and private choice, a decision to share yourself with another and enjoy physical pleasures.”

Aptly put. She certainly had the right attitude. It was just her application that left something to be desired.

“And do you plan to do that in the near future?” He allowed his voice to deepen, coloring his words with shades of meaning. “Will you share yourself with another and enjoy physical pleasures, as you so quaintly put it?” Maybe he could get some sort of reading on what his chances might be.

She was playing with a lock of her hair, curling it around her forefinger. “I’m waiting. None of the men I’ve spent time with so far feels right to me. You see, Great-Grandmother Kendra has spent most of her current lifetime bonded to her mate, Evan. The years I spent with her illustrated what bonding can and should be. They’re still very much in love, after almost ten decades together. That’s what I want, that kind of relationship.”

He reached out a finger and stroked it down her cheek. Touching her was addictive. He tucked a few strands of her soft hair behind her ear and stretched his arm out to encircle her shoulders. “Then why not practice a little with me, until the real thing comes along?” His voice was husky, and he drew her ever so gently toward him, paying particular attention to any sign of resistance, ready to release her at any moment.

He’d be the soul of restraint this time, he vowed. For one thing, he didn’t want to take any chances on another scene like Saturday, but he had to get past her barriers, make her want him at least one-tenth as much as he wanted her. His hunger for her was urgent. He needed to make her his, to bind her to him in a way he understood. So much of her was a puzzle to him.

Gently, slowly, he folded her against his upper body, stroking her arms, slipping a hand under her hair so he could trace with one forefinger the vulnerable line of her neck and throat. “Sameh.” He had to clear his throat before he could continue. “I want to kiss you.” He slid his fingers to her throat and triumph filled him when his fingers felt the pulse there. It throbbed away beneath his touch, as rapid and full as his own. Her long, thick lashes lowered slowly, covering those enormous blue eyes, and a shaky sigh escaped from her throat.

She didn’t mind, then. She wasn’t going to zap him.

Exultant, he tipped her chin up. She wanted his kiss; she was as aroused as he was, her breathing fast and shallow, the silky skin beneath his touch flushed and hot. Well, maybe she was half as aroused as he was, he amended. The car’s divided seats were keeping their lower bodies apart, and maybe that was a good thing, considering the condition he was in—for now, anyway.

He lowered his lips, brushed them lightly across hers. It was the most restrained of kisses, just as he intended. She gave a tiny sigh, and her hands, flat against his chest, slid upward to his neck.

He kissed her again, still gently, but with more intensity this time. He opened his lips over hers, and hers parted a little. It took every ounce of control he possessed to keep it light. Her taste was exotic, like fruit and wine. Her breasts were unbearably soft, but their nipples pressed, hard and hot, against his thin cotton shirt. It was taking years off his life, this painful slow seduction.

He deepened the kiss, made it more intimate, probing her mouth with his tongue, stroking her arms and neck in light, feather strokes with his fingertips. She quivered beneath his touch, and he allowed his hand to cup her breast, the delicious heat and weight of it making his arousal dangerous, delicious, urgent.

He freed her mouth to nuzzle at her jawline, her neck, drawing in the sweet, unbearably sensual perfume of her skin, the taste of her body like nectar on his lips.

Another moment and he’d lose control…

“Adam, stop.” Her husky voice wasn’t at all steady.

His body burned with an urgency and hunger that bordered on mania. To release her, he drew on reserves he hadn’t known he possessed. It was small comfort to realize that she looked as shaken as he felt, hair tousled, lips swollen from his kisses, pulse drumming at the base of her throat. The hand still on his shoulder was trembling.

“Adam, this isn’t such a good idea.”

He groaned and tried to hold onto his temper. “Why in bloody hell not?”

Her voice was thick and sad. “I want to join with you, you know that. There’s this attraction between us—the feeling is so powerful it’s hard to resist.” She drew in a deep, shuddering breath. “But sexual union between us is just not possible.”

He gritted his teeth and counted to ten to get some semblance of control over his voice. “Why’s that?” he finally managed.

She moved farther away from him, trying to straighten the slim skirt of her dress. It had ridden up high on her thighs. He could see the tops of her stockings and the barest hint of pristine white panty, and the sight wasn’t helping him get his breath back at all.

“I’m just a visitor here. I’ll be returning to my own time when my research is finished,” she said. “I don’t view sexual union the way you do, and therefore it would cause problems for me to become involved with you.”

He ran a hand through his hair. “What the hell do you mean, you don’t view sex the way I do?”

She was quiet for so long he wondered if she was going to answer at all. Finally, in a sad, small voice, she said, “I sense that for you, union is a kind of elixir, a cure-all you use to keep yourself from the pain of emotional growth. It’s not a giving thing, but a taking.”

He was stunned. Her words seemed to penetrate to his very core, to a place that was vulnerable, that he hadn’t even known was there or thought to protect from her. His stomach clenched, and then his defense mechanisms asserted themselves and he became furious. “You ought to leave analysis to the shrinks, lady,” he snarled. “In fact, you need one pretty bad yourself to get you over this hang-up you’ve got about sex, among other things.”

He reached for the key and started the car with a roar. “And while you’re there you might also mention this whole fantasy world you’ve built up around yourself. I’m sure that’ll fascinate the hell out of any head doctor. Do up your seat belt, we’re leaving.”

He drove her home far too fast, making her gasp at his reckless maneuvering through and around traffic. He knew he was behaving like a total jerk, but he couldn’t seem to stop himself. Her words kept running through his head, and each time they did, his stomach reacted as if he’d eaten bad clams.

When they were once again in the front driveway of Delilah’s house, he left the engine running and the driver’s-side door open as he went around to let her out. He maintained an icy silence. She fumbled with her seat belt, finally unhooked it, and slid out of the low car. He averted his eyes, even now all too aware of those long, beautiful legs.

She stood looking up at him. “I’d like us to be friends, Adam, if you ever decide to get over being angry with me for telling you the truth,” she said in a dignified voice. Then she turned and ran for the door, and he stood staring after her until he heard it close behind her.

He was half a mile away, stopped at a red light and still cursing when he spotted her blue shoes, abandoned on the floor of the car. He stared at them, and a vision of the lovely woman who’d been wearing them flashed into his mind as clearly as if she still sat in the passenger seat, tugging them off and telling him in that ingenuous way of hers how much her feet hurt.

Ingenuous. Truthful.

A car honked behind him, and he realized the light had changed. He drove off, but more slowly than before, anger giving way to puzzled despair. What Sameh accused him of had struck a nerve, and he probed it like a sore tooth. Part of his brain insisted with righteous anger that she was wrong, that his attitudes toward women and sex were both normal and healthy, that he was the most generous and painstaking of lovers.

Him, selfish? No bloody way. There were more women than he could even remember who could attest to the fact that a liaison with Adam Hawkins left them totally satisfied, begging for more. It was a matter of pride to him, being a thoughtful and considerate lover. Look at the way women had always reacted to him.

Physically, he’d developed early, and from the time he’d reached puberty, women had thrown themselves at him. Hell, he really liked women, he told himself. Thanks to a skilled instructor when he was very young, he knew his way around a female body; he was a connoisseur of what gave a woman pleasure.

He was a sensual man, and other women realized and appreciated it, so where did Sameh get off accusing him of taking, of using sex as—how had she phrased it?—as an emotional cure-all? She had absolutely no grounds to base that assumption on; they’d never even come close to making love. She was simply what teenage boys labeled a cocktease, he assured himself, pulling into the parking lot of Smitty’s, a pub near his house.

Like Bernie said, the smart thing to do was give old Violet her money back and make a point of never laying eyes on Sameh Smith again. L.A. was a big city—it shouldn’t be too hard to avoid her.

He put the top up, locked the car and walked into Smitty’s. The noise and smoke surrounded him like insulation. He’d have a few drinks and forget all about her. A table of young, nubile females snapped to attention as he sat down at the bar, and he allowed his eyes to rove over them. They giggled and flirted. Sure, Sameh was beautiful, but Los Angeles was overflowing with beautiful women. He ordered a double, and then another.

One of the women came over and asked him to dance. She was a dark-haired, exotic creature with lavish breasts that threatened to overflow her halter top. He looked at her for a long moment and then refused. He ordered another drink, instead.

One thing for sure, he was finished with Sameh. That drivel about wanting to be friends was ridiculous. He’d never had a woman as a friend, never even considered the idea. So why would he start with a screwed-up blonde who had a million hang-ups and some severe form of mental disorder?

He just wished to God he could get her out of his mind.

CHAPTER SEVEN

“SAMEH, I’M SO GLAD we did this today.” Frances smiled her wide smile and reached across to squeeze Sameh’s hand.

Delilah had gone off to San Diego with Tyrone early that morning, and Frances had picked Sameh up and driven them here to the shopping area in Larchmont Village, near the exclusive residential community where Delilah lived.

The two women had been exploring the tree-lined boulevards with their fashionable boutiques for several hours, trying on whatever struck their fancy. At Frances’s urging, Sameh had bought some snug name-brand jeans, several pairs of leggings and a cotton sweater in a deep violet shade, and now they were sitting in an outdoor café enjoying tea and pastries.

“You know, I feel as if I’ve had a week’s holiday instead of just a couple of hours away from the kids,” Frances said with a sigh. She shoved a stray tendril of red hair away from her forehead and brushed crumbs from her full denim skirt. “Corey’s therapy takes hours every day, and Kate gets jealous and needs more attention, and would you believe Bernie thinks he actually has to eat at regular intervals?”

Sameh returned Frances’s smile although she felt more like crying for her friend. Under the cheerful words she could see a seething purple cloud of fear and despair.

“I feel like a rat in a wheel sometimes,” Frances confessed. “As though there’s no time for just being me and having fun like this.”

Sameh nodded. “I get like that myself, going faster and faster, and I have only me to take care of. I can imagine how difficult it would be to have Kate and Corey and a house. And a husband.” For some reason, Adam’s face flashed in her mind’s eye. “It must be marvelous, but exhausting, as well.”

Frances rolled her eyes. “You got that right. But I’m also my own worst enemy.” She toyed with her cup. “Bernie’s always telling me to take an afternoon off and shop or paint or do something I want to do. I used to get a baby-sitter in one afternoon every week until Corey was born.” A familiar shadow passed over her mobile features. “Since we found out he was—” the words seemed to catch in her throat “—was handicapped, I stopped doing a lot of things.” Her soft gray eyes had a faraway expression.

“To tell the truth, I guess I lost interest in almost everything.” The words seemed to gain momentum, as if she’d been damming them up. “I’ve gradually stopped seeing all my friends with young children, because all their kids are so damned normal and healthy, and…and I can tell they don’t know what to say to me. About Corey. I feel as if it’s hard for them to have me around, like I’m an accusation or something.”

Frances traced a stain on the table with her finger, her fiery head bent. “And I can’t seem to paint anymore. The energy just isn’t there. Besides, there’ve been appointments with doctors practically every day, and listening to their verdicts about Corey leaves me too depressed to do anything except maybe laundry.” She laughed, glancing up at Sameh, but it was a sad sound.

“Believe me, when all you can do is laundry, that’s major depressed.” She looked up at Sameh again and blurted, “You work with Delilah McDonell. You understand all the New Age things she writes about. In her latest book, she had a whole section on spiritual healing and psychic surgery and things like that. I read it and it gave me hope, but in the past I’ve taken Corey to more so-called healers than I can even list, but so far nothing’s changed for him.”

The raw pain and longing in her eyes, the intensity in her voice, made Sameh ache inside.

“I can’t talk to Bernie about it. He figures they’re all quacks. He says I’m wasting my time and our money. It’s true I’ve spent more than we can afford, and I think he’s right about some of them. Sameh, be honest with me. Do you think that somewhere, somehow, I can find a cure for Corey this way?”

Sameh didn’t answer right away. She had to be extremely careful in what she said to Frances. When she did respond, her voice wasn’t quite steady. “I don’t know enough about the people Delilah writes about to be able to promise that any of them could cure Corey,” she acknowledged, wishing fervently she could offer to do it herself. She’d always wanted to heal, but never before had the desire been so overwhelming. She longed to help Corey, but she just didn’t have the training, or—

Face it, Sameh Smith. You’re a coward.

As for those who might be able to assist Corey, she knew there were authentic healers in the nineties, as there had been in every period of history, but she’d have to meet them to know whether or not they were legitimate. There were a lot of charlatans around. And the real ones might be in obscure corners of the world and almost impossible to find.

She thought about the healing classes she’d attended, remembering her own overwhelming fear of failing at the techniques she’d been taught, and she cursed her timidity. She’d been so petrified, she’d managed to botch most of her cases, but at least there were Adepts there to rectify the situation before she did any real damage.

Here, there was no one to clean up after her if she tried and failed. But Frances’s dire need tore at her soul. She had to do something to help her friend; she had to at least give Frances hope.

“There are some simple things I do know of, some healing exercises that you can do for him yourself,” she finally said, her voice hesitant.

Frances frowned and shook her head. “I really don’t think I’m psychic at all. I’m sure someone else—”

Sameh covered Frances’s hand with her own. “You’re wrong, Frances. Because you love Corey the way you do, your energy can be directed toward him in a powerful, positive way, the same energy you’re spending in searching for someone else to perform a miracle.”

She didn’t add that directing that energy into helping Corey instead of squandering it would also help mend the wound that Corey’s condition had created in Frances herself. Sameh tried to remember other parts of the healing theories, but she felt tongue-tied and inadequate about explaining even the ones she was most familiar with. She wasn’t a teacher yet, after all. But she could do the best she knew how, a small inner voice reminded her. And she wanted to help; she wanted to more than she’d ever wanted anything.

She silently begged the Higher Power for help as she outlined a few simple techniques designed to relax both Frances and her son. She described the meditative processes that would harness and direct the healing energy, and then came a small inspiration.

“I’ll help, too, if you like,” she offered. “First off, I’ll make a recording of that little song Corey enjoyed so much the other evening, and you can play it for him when you do the exercises.” She’d almost forgotten the instinctive sounds she’d used to calm the baby and help him relax. The technique was commonly used in the nurseries at the agrofarm to soothe children, but she kept forgetting that even the simplest devices in her time were still unknown in the nineties. “It will help loosen his muscles and you can play it for him as often as you like.”

The little song she’d hummed was actually a phenomonic, a series of vibrations that perfectly matched Corey’s individual energy system. Its purpose was to calm and soothe, but with subtle variations, it could have other uses. It had the capacity to activate energy patterns from past lives, from times when Corey had a healthy physical body. By activating cell memory, the body would gradually attempt to mimic that previous state of physical well-being. And wasn’t one of the first lessons Sameh had learned in the healing disciplines the magical, mystical power of the body to heal itself, given the opportunity?

She felt hopeful all of a sudden. “I’ll come over whenever it’s convenient for you and show you how the meditation exercises work,” she offered eagerly. “They’re best done when Corey’s sleeping because then his subconscious is most receptive to suggestion. And there are several other things we can do, as well, if you agree.”

Tears sparkled in Frances’s eyes. “Would you really do that for us? Oh, Sameh, I’d be forever grateful for your help. I’ve never seen Corey as relaxed and comfortable as he was the night you were over. Even the next day, he seemed better—Bernie remarked on it. How soon can we get started?”

“Whenever you like.”

Frances hesitated. “I feel as if I’m imposing on you, but where Corey’s concerned, I have no pride whatsoever. What about later today? You did say you were free all afternoon…” Without giving Sameh a chance to answer, she rushed on, “See, Bernie’s working tonight. They have that special security thing going on downtown at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. I could make us some pasta and a salad for supper….” She ran out of breath and slumped back in her chair. “Sorry. God, this is scary. I sound just like my mother. She’s a human bulldozer and she never gives anyone a chance to refuse anything. You’ve probably got a hot date—dinner, dancing, romance…”

Sameh shook her head. “Nope. I haven’t a thing planned.” Except a lonely evening spent avoiding malicious old Violet—and wondering if she might hear from Adam. “I’d love to spend it with you and the kids.”

Frances’s face lit up. “Great. Wonderful. You know, Sameh, what you’re saying about trying to help Corey myself?” Her expression was animated now. “It sounds right to me.” She reached over and took both Sameh’s hands in hers and squeezed them. “I’m excited about trying.”

Sameh smiled at her, delighted at the difference in energy she sensed in her friend. At that moment the waiter came and refilled their teapot with hot water, and when he left, Frances sat back in her chair and released a long breath. “Lord, I’ve just been thinking about how I’ve dumped on you today. I’m ashamed of myself. I didn’t intend to turn this into such a heavy scene.” She poured more tea for both of them. “Anyway, enough about me and my problems. Tell me what you’ve been doing with yourself, Sameh. Have you played tourist yet at all? Been on one of the Hollywood studio tours?”

When she learned Sameh hadn’t, Frances dug a piece of paper and a pen out of her bag. “I’ll make you a list of places you might like to visit, things you ought to see. I grew up here, so I’m a veritable gold mine of miscellaneous facts about the city. I only wish I had time to go with you. I love this area. Now, first of all, there’s the garment district—you’ve got to check that out.”

Half an hour passed as they talked. At last Frances glanced at her watch. “Yikes, look at the time! We’d better head back to the car.”

On the way they passed a lingerie store with a rack of delectable items hanging just inside the door. “Oh, look at that.” Frances stopped and held up a thigh-length concoction of black silk and midnight blue lace that they decided must be a nightshirt. “You think Bernie needs this for his birthday?” she asked.

“Definitely. When is his birthday?”

“Next February. I believe in shopping early.”

Frances bought the nightshirt, and Sameh explored a toy store next door. There were several things she wanted to play with herself, so she bought them for Kate and Corey, wondering if the time would ever come when she’d wear something as enticing as the silky nightshirt for someone she loved, or buy toys for her own babies. The nineties were influencing her value system, making her long for things she hadn’t realized she wanted.

Back in the car, Frances said, “I promised I’d drop by Blue Knights before I headed home. Bernie forgot some stuff he needs for tonight. You don’t mind, do you?”

Sameh’s stomach knotted. She did mind. The prospect of confronting Adam in his office wasn’t one she relished, but she couldn’t explain her reluctance to Frances without revealing more than she cared to about herself and Adam.

“That’s fine,” she agreed, thinking she’d wait in the car instead of going in. She hadn’t heard from Adam since he’d dumped her at Delilah’s on Monday evening, and this was Thursday. Sameh had gone over their final conversation time after time, and although she thought maybe she hadn’t been as tactful as she might have been, the fact was that he’d been downright rude and acted like a spoiled, immature child.

Still, she found herself wishing the evening had ended differently. There was a strange ache in her chest when she thought of him, and a new and piercing loneliness at the thought of not seeing him again. There was also a good dose of anger at his reaction to what she considered a healthy, constructive statement that happened to be the unvarnished truth.

Adam certainly didn’t take well to criticism, she mused. Heavens, what would he do if he ever had to sit through one of the Adepts’ evaluations?

The knot in her stomach tightened as they threaded their way through traffic. The tension got worse when Frances pulled into the small parking lot behind the modest two-story building that housed Blue Knights.

“Maybe I’ll just wait here in the car, Frances.”

Frances was retrieving a sheaf of papers from the back seat, and she stopped to give Sameh a puzzled stare. “Don’t be crazy. It’s boiling out here and you’ll get heatstroke. Besides, Bernie will never forgive me if you don’t come in and make admiring noises about his office. He’s real proud of it. You should have seen the dump they worked in before. And I want you to meet their secretary, Janice, a very neat lady. Come on, Sameh.”

Sameh had no choice. Feeling as though she were facing a primitive medical procedure, she got out and promptly tripped hard on one of the two steps leading up to the door. She landed on her hands before her knees hit the concrete, but her right hand lost a lot of skin in the process. It burned and started to bleed.

Blood didn’t bother her too much unless it was her own. Then it made her feel faint. Bruises were one thing—she was used to bruises—but her precious bright red blood was quite another.

No one was in the attractive reception area when they stumbled through the door marked Blue Knights. Frances led the way down a carpeted corridor. “There’s a bathroom back here. I know there’s a first-aid kit, so we can clean off that hand and put a bandage on it. You’ve really wrecked it good.” She sounded cheerful, and Sameh hated her for it. Didn’t Frances realize she was in pain?

A door opened on Sameh’s right, and she all but walked into Adam. He caught her by the shoulders in a reflexive move. “Sameh, what the—”

Sameh stepped back in a hurry, out of his arms, but her hand throbbed, and she felt shaken and a bit dizzy. She staggered and he slid a supportive arm around her.

“Adam, Sameh fell going up the stairs, she’s hurt her hand. We need some antiseptic and a bandage,” Frances informed him.

He frowned and inspected Sameh’s hands, gently uncurling the one she’d injured. Blood was seeping from the raw scrapes, and a fair amount of grit was imbedded in her flesh. Sameh whimpered. Even looking at it made her sick to her stomach.

“C’mon in here. This needs to be cleaned off.” Putting his arm around her again, Adam led the way into a bathroom and began rummaging in a cupboard. Sameh sat down on the closed toilet seat, still feeling light-headed, unsure whether it was a result of the fall or of having Adam now practically kneeling at her feet with a first-aid kit and a washcloth.

Whatever the cause, it wasn’t an unpleasant sensation at all. He smelled of after-shave, like ferns in a moist, woodsy place, with an undertone of musky male animal. His thick dark hair looked soft and rumpled. He’d taken off his jacket, and the sleeves of his blue striped shirt were rolled up to just below his forearms. He had nice wrists, strong, long-fingered hands. When he leaned toward her, the muscles in his shoulders strained against the shirt and her heart gave a crazy thump.

“Give me your hand,” he ordered. Sameh hesitated and then held it out.

Frances had been watching the whole scene. “Well, people,” she announced, “now that everything’s under control, I’m off to Bernie’s office to see what he and Janice are up to.”

Neither Sameh nor Adam paid any attention.

“Ouch, owww, that hurts!” Sameh shrieked. Adam was using the washcloth and some awful sort of antiseptic, dabbing at the dirt in her cuts.

“Be brave,” Adam murmured. She’d never been the least bit brave about things like this. She jerked her hand away and gave him a filthy look. “You want a bullet to bite while I amputate?” He glanced up at her with one eyebrow raised and a trace of humor in his green eyes.

She glared at him. “This isn’t the least bit funny, Adam Hawkins. Don’t be so rough—those cuts are very painful.”

“Sameh, I’m trying my best not to hurt you.”

“Well, you are hurting me, so try harder.” She sounded cranky and didn’t care.

He said something under his breath that she didn’t quite catch and took a firmer grip on her hand before he went back to what he’d been doing. He thoroughly cleaned each cut before he smoothed on a cooling gel and efficiently wrapped her palm in gauze, holding it firm with adhesive.

Sameh squawked and moaned and complained during the whole procedure, forgetting, just as she always did, to take a deep breath and go to meditative level where the pain wouldn’t be able to penetrate.

By the time he finished she was sorry for herself and furious with him. She snatched her hand away the moment he loosened his grip. If she could have gotten up and stomped away, she would have, but his large body was blocking the door. She was suddenly aware of how small the room was.

After a moment, he got to his feet. She could sense him looking down at her, but she wouldn’t meet his gaze. She stared at her bandaged hand, instead, resting it on her white walking shorts. She had a big ketchup stain just above the cuff on her left knee. She moved her hand to cover it. There was also dirt and blood where she’d wiped her hand down her side, but there was nothing she could do to hide that.

“Sameh, we need to talk.”

She shook her head, still feeling mutinous. “There’s nothing to talk about, Adam.”

He reached down and pulled her to her feet. “Damn it all, there is so. Look, I want to apologize for the other night. I acted like an ass, and I’m sorry.”

He sounded as if he were doing her a favor rather than apologizing, the arrogant— She stole a glance at him from under her eyelashes. There were beads of sweat on his forehead. The office was air-conditioned, so it couldn’t be that warm in the bathroom. She picked up the waves of acute nervousness that radiated from him, but his anxiety didn’t show on his face or in the way he held his body. He certainly was an expert at hiding his true feelings.

“If you still want to be friends, I’m game to give it a try.”

He sounded as if he didn’t give a damn one way or the other. She didn’t look fully at him this time. She studied his aura, instead, and she could see that he was telling the whole unvarnished truth for once.

“I intend to go on seeing you, Sameh.” There was both threat and warning in his words, but she could see they were really a plea. He was a proud man, and this was nearly killing him.

A rush of pure feminine satisfaction went through her. The self-assured Adam Hawkins was apologizing to her.

“I’d run like hell if he said that to me,” a feminine voice drawled from behind him.

Adam turned around, his eyes and voice like dry ice. “Janice, this doesn’t concern you in the slightest.”

“I know, but it’s fascinating all the same.” The plump young woman with startling yellow hair and the briefest mini Sameh had ever seen gave Adam a maddening smile and held out a beringed hand to Sameh. “Hi, I’m Janice Monk, resident slave.” Her smile was wide and genuine, and humor danced in her brown eyes.

Sameh maneuvered past Adam and clasped Janice’s hand in her uninjured one, immediately sensing that she’d known this woman many times before, in many lifetimes. It was a comforting feeling, like coming home after a long journey. “I’m Sameh Smith. Hello, I’m glad to meet you.” She almost added “again,” but stopped herself in time.

“Frances said you half killed yourself on those stupid stairs. How about a cup of our coffee to really finish the job? Or herbal tea? I always keep a stash of herbal tea in my drawer.”

Sameh smiled for the first time in half an hour. “I’d like tea. Thank you.”

“Then follow me.”

Sameh was about to do so when Adam took a firm grip on her upper arm. “Hold it just one damned minute. We’re having a private conversation here, and we’re not finished.”

Janice paused and then gave a shrug. “I guess you won’t want me hearing any of this, right, boss?”

“Right.”

Janice winked at Sameh. “Fine, be a spoilsport. I’ll be in the reception area, Sameh, whenever you’re finished.”

Adam waited until Janice had gone. “Now are we or are we not going to be friends?” He ground the words out from between clenched teeth, and Sameh knew that he was considering giving her a good shake as he said them.

She was nervous, but she lifted her eyebrows in the quizzical, cool way she’d learned from him. “Of course we can be friends, Adam. That’s exactly what I’ve been suggesting all along.” She sensed the sigh of relief he was doing his best not to release. His fingers loosened their stranglehold on her arm, sliding down to her wrist. “On one condition,” she added.

He tensed again, and now there was a threatening glint in his eyes. “You’d better lay it on me, but I’m warning you, I don’t have a lot of patience left. Don’t push me on this, Sameh.”

“I’m not pushing, for heaven’s sake.” She still felt short-tempered because her hand hurt. “I’m simply making things clear between us,” she said in a haughty tone that would have earned her a dressing down from Kendra. Well, Great-Grandmother wasn’t here, was she?

Just then, Sameh picked up what Adam was thinking, and she gasped. She was going to set him straight before those particular thoughts had a chance to go any further. They were a perfect example of the condition she was going to insist upon.

“Being friends is not just the first step toward something…more intimate, Adam. Being friends is all there is for us. It’s all there ever can be. Friendship, and perfect honesty.”

Something hot and dangerous flared in his eyes. “Perfect honesty, huh? Well, that’s what you’ll get from me about this whole mess.” His words were clipped. His voice dropped until it was almost a growl. “I can’t promise that I’ll stop wanting to strip off every scrap of your clothes and take you to bed and make love to you until neither of us can stand up anymore.”

Sameh closed her eyes. Damn it to Pluto, did he have to use words that drew such graphic pictures in her mind?

“To pretend I don’t want you sexually would be the biggest, fattest lie I’ve ever told,” he snarled. “So I won’t do it. Because I do want you, and nothing’s going to change that. Nothing. I intend to go on wanting you every single moment, and somewhere, sometime, you’re going to want me back. I know it, Sameh. You’re fooling yourself if you believe any different. Do you understand me?”

A shiver ran down her spine at the images his words evoked, and Sameh’s throat grew tight and dry. She understood, all right. He was being honest, just as she’d asked him to be. He’d backed her into a corner, he’d used her own methods against her, he’d—She gulped.

If she didn’t know better, she’d almost think that Adam Hawkins, a primitive man from the nineties, had just outwitted her.

CHAPTER EIGHT

SAMEH FLUSHED, swallowing hard, and a small, satisfied smile pulled at Adam’s mouth when he saw her reaction. “I promise you I won’t ever do anything you don’t want me to do, Sameh,” he said in a soft, velvety tone.

Now why wasn’t that reassuring? Sameh wondered. There was danger here, but she couldn’t put her finger on a solution at the moment. She cleared her throat. “That sounds, that sounds…I guess that’s fine.”

He nodded, and now satisfaction was plain on his rugged features.

“Okay, that’s settled, then. I’m working tonight, but I’ll pick you up tomorrow for dinner. About six?”

She shook her head, and his eyes narrowed. He looked ready to do battle all over again. “I don’t want to go out for dinner if I have to dress up and wear those high-heeled shoes again. I can’t find them, anyway. I’ve lost them, and they belonged to Delilah.”

He blinked, and then relaxed and grinned. “Wear whatever’s comfortable. We’ll go somewhere casual. And I’ve got your shoes. You left them in my car. I’ll bring them along tomorrow night.”

She gave him a small smile. “Casual sounds good. And afterward maybe we could see a movie?” An idea was forming.

“Sure.” He seemed prepared to be obliging. “I’m not sure what’s on, but I’ll check.”

She needed to fill the time they spent together with places to go and things to do. They had to keep busy. That way, he’d have less chance to take her in his arms and kiss her senseless. She remembered the list Frances had made of Los Angeles’s tourist attractions, and a smile came and went. Whenever things began to get out of hand with him, she’d just suggest something from the list. She beamed up at him, relieved at this simple solution. It felt so good to be around him again.

“I’m glad we’re going to be friends, Adam. Now if you don’t mind, I’m going to go and have something to drink with Janice. See you tomorrow at six.”

He watched her as she made her way down the hall. Before she rounded the corner into the reception area, she turned and waggled her bandaged hand at him and sent him one of those incredible high-voltage smiles.

He waited until she was gone, shook his head and went back into his office, slumping into his chair and massaging his forehead with his fingers. Relief washed through him. Sameh was back in his life, and he was so relieved and grateful it was almost pathetic. After several days of absolute hell, something was going right for him again.

He shuddered, remembering in detail what his week had been like. It had started bright and early Tuesday morning when Violet Temple had stormed into his office, too incensed to remember to speak in her little-girl voice.

“I want my money back,” she’d snarled, stabbing a long, skinny finger in the direction of Adam’s nose. “I hired you people to do an investigation. I gave you a very generous deposit for it, and all you’ve done is take that—that creature out to dinner.” Her droopy eyes were bloodshot, with deep, purplish bags sagging underneath them, and the finger pointing at him trembled. Adam wondered whether sweet Violet wasn’t hitting the bottle a bit too hard.

It took one to know one. His own eyes were red, and his head felt as if it had grown too large for his skin and was about to split like an overripe mango. Hangovers were painful. He should have remembered that before he stopped at Smitty’s. And even with more liquor than blood in his veins, he hadn’t been able to sleep long. At four that morning, he’d awakened thinking of Sameh, and he’d finally given up on sleep and tried a hot shower and a pot of coffee.

Neither had helped one damned bit. He’d arrived at the office feeling and looking like the walking dead, only to be greeted by a grinning Janice with Violet close on her heels. He wanted nothing more than to physically remove the old harridan from his office. Instead he did his best to keep his features impassive.

“Good morning, Violet.” He sat down and tipped his chair back in an attempt to appear calm and reasonable. “I take it you’re not happy with the job we’ve been doing for you.”

She snorted and slammed a fist down on his desk, toppling his photo of Myles. “I should sue you for misrepresentation. Instead of investigating that bitch like you promised, you’ve been taking her out on dates. I overheard her talking to Delilah. She was borrowing a dress to wear out to dinner with you. I saw you driving in last night to pick her up, bold as brass, holding the car door open for that slut.”

Rage exploded in him. For an instant, he wanted to murder Violet Temple. Her hostility toward Sameh triggered something primeval in him, a deep-seated need to protect that he couldn’t begin to understand. He struggled to control his voice and his emotions. “The way in which we operate isn’t any of your affair, Violet. We’ve done an extensive investigation of Ms. Smith, and the fact is we’ve found nothing whatsoever to suggest any wrongdoing or any malice toward Delilah or anyone else.” It was the truth. “She’s a remarkably honest and moral young woman.”

God knows he could attest to that.

“Honest and moral,” she mimicked in a nasty voice. “Aren’t there rules about having sex with a person you’re supposed to be investigating?”

His hands clenched into fists and it was all he could do to keep from hitting her. He stood up and buzzed for Janice, pinning Violet with a look that at least kept her from saying another word. “Ms. Temple isn’t satisfied with the work we’ve done for her,” he said when Janice appeared at the door. “Please make out a check for her entire deposit, plus interest, and bring it to me to sign.”

Violet huffed and tossed her head. “I’ll make certain you people don’t ever get any more security work from Delilah, you can bet your bottom dollar on that,” she snapped, heading for the door. “And you can bet I’m going to hire someone who can keep his fly done up to find out what’s really going on with your dear little Sameh Smith.”

Adam wasn’t conscious of having moved until he was between Violet and the door. He blocked it with his body, towering over her. She took several hasty steps back into the room, cowed by his barely concealed ferocity.

His voice was quiet and deadly. “You’ve heard of slander, haven’t you, Violet? I figure there’s grounds for a charge here, unless you back off fast. If I hear of one more unfounded accusation against Sameh Smith, I assure you this firm will take action against you on her behalf.”

Violet’s jowls quivered, and her mouth opened and shut several times before any words came out. “Don’t you—how dare you threaten me?”

The tight smile he gave her looked more like a snarl. “No threat, Violet. I never make threats.” He waited a long moment. “Just promises,” he added, his voice almost a whisper.

She’d scuttled out the door then, breathing as if she were about to have a stroke.

He’d found Bernie and told him what he’d done. Bernie, of course, was overjoyed. “Glad you’ve come to your senses,” he said with a wide grin, giving Adam a hearty thump on the shoulder.

But Adam knew he hadn’t come to his senses at all. If anything, he’d lost them, and Sameh was to blame. He thought of her constantly. Time after time, he went over everything he knew about her in endless detail, trying to analyze and make sense of the things she’d said.

Was she really a mental case? Or… He never managed to get past that or, because the alternative—believing Sameh was everything she claimed to be—was unthinkable.

And the whole time his logic wrestled with the question of who Sameh was and where she came from, the fact that he’d acted like a total bastard the last time he was with her gnawed at his conscience. In the small hours of the night, he’d examined his relationships with women and squirmed, unable to deny that there might be some truth to what Sameh had said—that he used sex to avoid a lot of other things in his life. He’d tried to remember one single woman, except his mother, with whom he’d had a meaningful relationship that excluded sex, and failed.

He told himself he was furious with Sameh for bringing out emotions and feelings he’d spent a lifetime concealing. He tried to convince himself he was well rid of her, but even as he did so, he knew he was lying to himself all over again.

From the first moment he’d set eyes on Bernie’s photos of her, he’d wanted her in his arms, in his bed, and that resolve hadn’t changed one bit, except to grow even stronger as he got to know her.

He’d never known failure with a woman he desired. It bothered him more than he could bear to admit that he was failing with Sameh. Her appearance here in the office today had seemed like a reprieve. It had taken every ounce of self-control he possessed not to try to seduce her on the floor of the bathroom.

Like he’d told her, he was willing to go along with whatever conditions she imposed if that’s what it took to go on seeing her. She wanted to be friends, they’d be friends, he told himself with grim determination.

Anyway, he’d read somewhere that friends ended up in bed together with amazing regularity.

“IT’S NICE THAT you’re growing up, boss,” Janice said, smacking a file he’d asked for down on his desk the morning after Sameh and Frances had visited the office.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” He and the rest of the security force at Blue Knights had worked half the night providing security for some of Hollywood’s most visible stars, always a hair-raising endeavor. Adam had only had three hours’ sleep at best, but for some reason he felt good this morning—too good to let even Janice’s barbed remarks get under his skin.

She gave him a dazzling smile. “Well, you seem to have given up Barbie dolls for real women, if Sameh’s any indication. She’s a breath of fresh air after the bimbos you usually attract. She’s vegetarian, you know.”

“I guessed.”

“Well, I am, too.”

He hadn’t guessed. He’d never really had many actual conversations with Janice. He’d been trying to figure out where to take Sameh for dinner that night. “Where do you vegetarian types eat, anyhow?”

Janice gave him a rundown on every health food restaurant in California. “Sameh’s going to be good for you, Adam. If you cut flesh out of your diet, you’ll stop being so aggressive. Did you know that?”

He looked at her in mock amazement. “Me, aggressive?”

“Yup, you, aggressive.” She gave him one of her looks, but there wasn’t as much punch to it as usual. “Y’know, I’ve been thinking of resigning. Sameh picked up on it when we were talking, God knows how. We’re both secretaries at the moment, and we were discussing how it’s not very satisfying as a long-term career choice.”

Adam gaped at her. Janice, resign? This was serious. This could be a calamity. Janice was the reason the office ran as well as it did. She had more organizational skills in her little finger than he and Bernie had put together and she knew more than either of them about the files. Alarm bells jangled as he ran through a mental list of things that might induce her to stay, starting off with more money, but before he could start begging, she added, “Sameh came up with a neat idea.”

Adam knew a little about Sameh’s ideas. He just hoped to God it didn’t have anything to do with witchcraft or sorcery.

“She asked why I didn’t get my investigator’s license. She said I’d be good at it, and y’know, I think she’s right. In spite of all this equality stuff, it just never occurred to me that I could be a partner in the business instead of a secretary.”

It hadn’t occurred to Adam, either, and he’d bet it had never crossed Bernie’s mind. It was a disturbing concept, Janice as a partner, but it was also a relief to know that she wasn’t going to walk out on them.

“Guess I was too close to the problem, huh, boss? Anyhow, I’m going to register for some classes at night school. Criminology, sociology, psychology, that sort of thing. I’m really grateful to Sameh for coming up with this.”

Sociology. Psychology. Adam hadn’t taken any such courses, and he knew damn well Bernie hadn’t. Maybe they’d better register for a couple themselves, or their future female partner would outsmart both of them.

FRIDAY NIGHT, HE TOOK Sameh to I Love Juicy, a vegetarian restaurant on Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. Janice had recommended it highly it seemed she ate there often.

Sameh’s hand was better. She’d replaced his bandage with a wide yellow one. She wore snug jeans that affected his blood pressure, and a soft purple top that turned her eyes sapphire and skimmed her breasts like a promise. The food was unfamiliar, but once he got through the puzzle of ordering, it tasted all right. God alone knew what was in it, though.

Sameh chattered on about Kate and Corey, about the book that Delilah was writing and about a boy she’d met while jogging that morning. “His name’s Troy, he’s only fourteen,” she confided over dessert—huge slabs of apple pie. Here at least Adam was on familiar food ground. “He was going through garbage cans, looking for something to eat.” Her blue eyes were troubled. “It’s a terrible thing for children to be that hungry,” she said.

Alarm bells jangled in Adam’s head as she described how she’d taken Troy back with her to Delilah’s house, sneaked him into the kitchen and fed him breakfast before Violet came in and caught them. Violet had had a fit, ordered Troy off the premises and given Sameh a tongue-lashing.

“Violet’s an unevolved soul. I’m afraid I told her so this time. Of course, I also went straight to Delilah and told her what I’d done, and she was more understanding.”

Adam had never dreamed there’d be a situation in which he sympathized with Violet. He put his fork down. “Sameh, I hate to say this, but Violet’s right this time. You have to be more careful. These kids aren’t always what they seem to be,” he began, and then stopped at the outraged look on Sameh’s face.

“He was a child, Adam. Children are the only hope for the future, and this boy doesn’t even have a home.”

He took a deep breath and started again. “What I mean is, a situation like that could be dangerous. Kids like Troy are often on drugs. He might not have had any qualms about pulling a knife on you, or walking off with Delilah’s stereo.”

She shook her head. “He wasn’t like that. He was just a hungry and confused little boy.”

He frowned at her. “You still shouldn’t have taken him home. There’s no way of telling whether he’s just a kid down on his luck or whether he’ll come back with a gang and trash the house.”

“Of course there is. I checked him out thoroughly.” Her chin tilted assertively. “I’m not a fool, Adam. Before I came, I was given intensive grounding in detecting and dealing with the violence and turbulence your society is undergoing. I wouldn’t put Delilah at risk in any way. Troy’s a good boy, and now I don’t even know where to find him. He ran off down the alley after Violet hollered at him.”

Thank God for small blessings, Adam thought as he paid the bill.

They went to a movie, a newly released romantic comedy in which the heroine’s mother happened to be psychic. Sameh loved it. Was he becoming paranoid, Adam wondered, or was he really being bombarded by elements straight out of the twilight zone?

When they came out of the theater, night had fallen, but the air was hot and dry. Adam took Sameh’s hand and they strolled down the neon-lit boulevard in search of somewhere to have a cool drink. They turned a corner, and Sameh bumped headlong into a woman wearing high-cut shorts, low-cut halter and five-inch heels. The small purse she was carrying slid across the sidewalk, flying open and scattering condoms, makeup and some small change in a wide arc. A prostitute. A thousand emotions skittered through Adam’s mind as she cursed at Sameh, crouching down to snatch up her belongings.

Sameh wrenched her hand from Adam’s grasp and knelt too, collecting lipsticks and condoms, clumsier than ever with her bandaged hand. “I’m so sorry. I’m accident prone,” she apologized in a contrite tone. “I was talking to Adam and didn’t even see you. There, I think we’ve got all of it,” she said, scooping the collection she held into the woman’s handbag. The two of them rose to their feet, the hooker giving Adam the once-over and staring at Sameh with a suspicious frown on her heavily made-up face. “We were just going to have a cold drink. Would you like one, too? It’s awfully hot tonight.”

Adam’s stomach contracted.

The woman licked her lips and grinned. “I get it,” she drawled. “You wanna party, right?”

“Get lost,” Adam snarled at her, tugging on Sameh’s hand.

Sameh ignored him. “No party, thank you,” she said to the woman. She was as polite as she might have been refusing a box of Girl Scout cookies. “I just thought maybe you were thirsty.”

The hooker was staring at Sameh.

“Let’s go, Sameh.” Adam had hold of Sameh’s arm now, and he tugged on it, trying to hurry her on down the street.

But Sameh slipped from his grasp again, walking back toward the other woman, reaching out and touching her arm, smiling into her eyes. “Maybe we’ll meet again sometime. I hope so,” she said in a soft voice. She took the woman’s hand and held it against her cheek for a long moment in a strange, intimate gesture.

When they walked away, Adam could feel the prostitute’s eyes boring into his back the whole way down the street. When he finally had them seated in a small café, Adam drank half his mugful of beer before he felt able to say anything coherent. “What the hell were you doing, buddying up to a hooker that way?” he finally managed to blurt out.

Sameh shrugged and sipped her lemonade. “She’s a person, a human being, another woman. I knocked into her. Why shouldn’t I be polite to her?”

Adam’s hands were trembling, and he clutched the glass so Sameh wouldn’t see. “Look, take my word for it, she’s not the type of woman you want as a personal friend, that’s why the hell not.”

Sameh frowned at him, tipping her head to the side and studying him with an intensity that unnerved him. It took an immense effort of will to meet her questioning gaze. As he’d learned to do long before, he slammed shut all the gates to his memories, to his past and, as always, took refuge in sexuality.

He reached across and ran a finger lightly down her cheek, allowing his thumb to slowly, sensually, trace the voluptuous curves of her mouth, filling his mind with the way it felt to cover those moist, full lips with his own. Her eyes widened, and for one intoxicating moment, he felt the sexual tension between them crackle and snap like a live electrical wire.

As if she’d been burned, Sameh jerked her head back. “Friends, Adam, remember?” There was warning in her voice, but there was also a slight tremor.

Reluctant now, he withdrew his hand. He gave her a lopsided, regretful smile and nodded. “Friends, Sameh.”

Just as he’d hoped it would be, the issue of the prostitute was forgotten.

SATURDAY HE TOOK HER to an amusement park and then out for dinner in Chinatown. And at the end of the day—a day in which he’d had more uncomplicated fun than he could ever remember having—he heard himself asking if she’d like to come with him on Sunday when he went to the nursing home for his weekly visit with Myles.

Myles was an old friend, he explained, wondering all of a sudden if he’d taken leave of his senses, asking her to come with him. It wasn’t as though he’d never introduced any of his women to Myles, he rationalized. Over the years, it was inevitable that one female or another might be on hand when his old friend stopped by.

Since Myles’s illness, though, Adam had always visited the rest home alone. But now he didn’t want to spend Sunday away from Sameh.

HE STARTED HAVING second thoughts Sunday afternoon, however, when they walked through the wide front doors of the comfortable, rather shabby building where Myles lived. Visiting an old man with Alzheimer’s wasn’t anyone’s idea of a fun way to spend a day. Sameh didn’t even know Myles. It was crazy, bringing her here, but it was too late now to turn back.

“Hi, Adam.” Vinnie Perkins, one of the nurses usually on duty when he came, smiled a greeting as they passed the reception area. She had dyed platinum hair, a road map of wrinkles and the kindest eyes in the world. Adam introduced Sameh, who was carrying the bouquet of flowers Adam brought every week.

“I’ll get you a vase for those. I just tossed out last week’s bouquet. They were finished yesterday.” Myles had always loved flowers, although he paid little attention to them these days.

“Thanks, Vinnie.” He extracted a single rose from the assortment and presented it to the nurse with a courtly bow. She took it and winked at Sameh.

“He could charm the birds out of the trees, this young man of yours,” she confided, her eyes twinkling. “Half my nursing staff’s in love with him, but they’re all ten years older than I am, so you shouldn’t lose any sleep over it, dear.” Vinnie’s hearty laugh brought smiles from the residents playing poker at a table in the corner of the cheerful room.

That air of relaxed friendliness and the eternal poker game in the lobby had convinced Adam that this particular facility was the one for Myles. He’d never regretted his decision; what the place lacked in elegance it more than made up for in comfort, and the staff was unfailingly kind.

“How’s he doing?” Adam asked the question every Sunday before he went up to Myles’s room.

Vinnie sobered and shook her head. “Not too well, I’m afraid. It’s been a bad week for him. He’s not eating again, poor dear.”

Adam cursed himself for bringing Sameh. On bad days, Myles could either be silent and catatonic, or insultingly vocal and inclined to violence. Either mode was hard for him to take, never mind dragging her into it. Taking Sameh’s hand, Adam led the way to the elevator, feeling his stomach sink as the first and second floors dinged past on the indicator.

Myles was on the third floor, the one reserved for those with advanced cognitive impairment. A security guard was on duty here, a middle-aged, portly man with a kind face. The patients on this floor tended to wander and needed constant supervision.

“Afternoon, Adam. Hot enough for ya?”

“How’s it going, Jim? That leg any better this week?”

Adam chatted with the guard for a while, again introducing Sameh and hiding the mounting anxiety that gnawed at his gut. At last there was nothing left to do but lead the way down the hall and knock on the familiar door. As he’d expected, there was no answer, so after a moment he opened it and led Sameh inside.

“Hello, Myles. I’ve brought someone to meet you.”

Silence. It was going to be one of the days that Myles didn’t recognize him, Adam realized. Such days came with increasing frequency as the disease progressed.

The large room was painted a cheerful lemon yellow, and Adam had hung Myles’s favorite pictures on the walls. The wide window overlooked the flower beds and caught the morning sun. Books, magazines and a large collection of videos were stacked on an antique wooden desk, and a complex entertainment unit almost covered one whole wall.

The tall, emaciated figure slouched in the worn leather armchair seemed oblivious to both the pleasant surroundings and the fact that Sameh and Adam had arrived. He was dressed in cotton slacks and a sweatshirt. His pale blue eyes, misty and unfocused, darted from one thing to the next, never settling on any object for more than an instant. He was flipping through a magazine, his long fingers trembling as they restlessly turned the pages.

“What you reading there, Myles?” Adam made his way over to his friend. The magazine Myles held was upside down, and Adam’s heart sank. He’d made a grave mistake bringing Sameh here.

Adam cleared his throat and tried to make the best of it. “Myles, I’d like you to meet a friend, Sameh Smith. Sameh, Myles Fontaine.”

There was no indication that Myles had even heard him make the introduction, but Sameh reached out and clasped one of the restless hands in hers. With her other hand, she gently cradled Myles’s sunken cheek. “I’m very glad to meet you, Myles Fontaine,” she said in her soothing, musical voice. “Adam has told me you’re a special friend of his.”

Myles’s gaze darted away as she crouched down to his level, and he began to rock back and forth in an agitated manner. Adam moved closer, worried that Myles might lash out at Sameh unknowingly, as he’d done many times over the past few months, hitting with a strength that belied his fragile appearance.

“Sameh, it might be better to…” Adam’s voice trailed off as Sameh released Myles’s hand and began to make a curious motion with her cupped palms a few inches away from Myles’s head, as if she were scooping the air down and away from his skull. She did this several times and then moved her hands slowly up and down, palms out, all around his head.

Myles became absolutely still. His hands relaxed in his lap and the magazine fell to the floor. Slowly, inch by inch, he raised his head and looked, really looked, at Adam. Recognition shone in the eyes that a moment before had been filled with confusion. A sweet smile curved his mouth.

“Hawk, my boy. How are you? It’s good to see you. I’ve missed you. Where’ve you been?”

CHAPTER NINE

THERE WAS BOTH COHERENCE and genuine pleasure in Myles’s weak voice, and for a moment, Adam couldn’t answer him. He was dumbfounded at the dramatic change in Myles’s condition. In all the months he’d been coming here, he’d never seen the older man go from a state of such utter disorientation to absolute awareness in a matter of seconds, even though the nurses had told him it was possible with this particular disease.

“And who’s this lovely creature?”

Adam looked at Sameh. Her eyes sparkled and she was smiling her wide smile. He introduced her all over again, and she grasped the trembling hand that Myles extended. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Fontaine.”

“The pleasure’s all mine.” His head dipped in a courteous little bow, and he held her hand much longer than necessary. “Please call me Myles, and then I’ll feel free to call you Sameh.”

Damned if the old fox wasn’t being outright flirtatious.

Adam felt like letting loose with a whoop of pure happiness, but he subdued the urge. His dearest friend was back from somewhere far away, and the pure joy of it damn near brought tears to his eyes.

For the next hour they talked, and Adam had to forcibly remind himself that the creeping darkness might steal over Myles’s mind again at any time. He had to guard against too much hope. To let himself believe this sudden respite was anything but temporary would be devastating when the disease reasserted its hold on his friend, and he understood all too well that it would.

But a quarter hour became a half, half a whole, and still the miracle held.

Myles asked Adam to locate an old photo album in the drawer of his desk, and he and Sameh were now sitting close together on the sofa, poring over the snapshots. Adam sat on a chair nearby, watching the elegant silver head bent so close to the gleaming golden one. A bond had formed between the old man and the young woman, and Adam couldn’t have been more pleased.

“How did you two meet?” Sameh tapped a finger on a snap of a very young Adam in military uniform, standing at attention in front of a parade ground, with Myles, also in uniform, beside him. “It looks as if you were both in the military.”

Myles nodded. “Indeed we were. I was an instructor at Robert E. Lee Military Academy near Richmond, Virginia. Adam was enrolled as a student. Despite the difference in our ages, we eventually became friends.”

Myles’s explanation left so much out. Adam remembered all too well the angry, incorrigible boy he’d been when he arrived at the academy. It had taken Myles almost a year to penetrate the shell Adam had constructed around himself. It was thanks to Myles that he hadn’t been expelled during that year; he’d run away several times, and Myles had bent rules and out-and-out lied to keep him enrolled. Adam had been booted out of numerous other expensive boarding schools before he got to the academy. And he knew that without Myles’s intervention, he’d have been drummed out of R.E.L. the first month he was there.

“How old were you when you attended this academy, Adam? You look so young in these pictures.” Sameh was looking over at him, interest alive in her beautiful face.

“Fifteen.”

She shook her head and frowned. “So very young to be away from your home. Where I come from, we’re still very much children at fifteen.” She turned the page and giggled at some new snapshot as Adam thought about her comment.

He’d been fifteen, but he wasn’t a child anymore when he was enrolled at R.E.L., and certainly not innocent. For one thing, he’d already had more instruction in how to make love to a woman than most men received in their entire lives. His mother’s best friend, Morgan, had seen to that the summer he turned fourteen.

His mouth twisted in an ironic grimace. Nowadays there’d be a song and dance about sexual abuse if it became known that a prostitute in her twenties gave a fourteen-year-old boy intricate and extensive lessons in lovemaking. Morgan had been thorough, no question about it. She’d paved the way for the years he’d spent seducing one woman after another. Sameh was the first woman he’d become friendly with before they’d gone to bed together.

He forced his attention back to the present.

“This was Adam’s graduation,” Myles was saying.

“What did you do after you graduated, Adam?” Again those intense blue eyes were trained on him.

“Vietnam,” he said shortly. “I was lucky. I only hit the tail end of the whole fiasco.”

“And then you came back here?”

He was about to agree when Myles interrupted. “No, he didn’t come home, not for several years. He stayed on in Southeast Asia, searching for prisoners of war.” The naked pride in the old man’s voice made Adam’s chest ache, although it also embarrassed him to have Myles brag about him to Sameh. “Hawk was something of a legend, rescuing men who’d given up all hope of freedom,” Myles related, and Adam’s face burned.

“Sameh’s not interested in all that ancient history, Myles,” he protested, his voice gruff. “Why don’t we go out for a walk, or—”

“Yes, I am so interested, Adam,” Sameh interjected, frowning at Adam and focusing her attention on Myles. “When did Adam come back to the United States? How did you two get together again?”

Damn. Adam got up and stalked over to the window. The two of them were talking about him as if he weren’t even in the room.

“He didn’t come back until after he nearly got himself killed over there,” Myles told her, and there was a tremor in his voice. “It was touch and go for a while. It took him almost a year to recover. I’d retired by that time—I’d never married, you see, and I was living here in L.A. I can tell you I was damned lonely. Hawk was good enough to come out and keep me company for a time.”

Adam shook his head in disbelief and rolled his eyes heavenward at that version of the story. The truth was that Myles had located the veterans’ hospital where Adam was a patient and had him transported out to his own house in the Valley. He’d hired the best rehab team he could find. He’d knocked out a wall and turned what had been his living room into a gym, filling it with the equipment Adam needed to regain the strength he was certain he’d lost forever.

Even all these years later, Adam shuddered at the memory.

It was humiliating to recall it now, but he’d sure as hell lost his guts at that stage. Worn down with pain and the dismal surroundings at the V.A. hospital in which he’d felt trapped, he was ready to give up and settle for a six-foot patch of earth until Myles got hold of him. The stubborn, wonderful old bugger had nagged and bullied and shamed him into taking the painful, tedious route back to living. Adam owed him more than he could ever say.

In a roundabout way, it was also through Myles that Blue Knights came to be. Through a friend of Myles’s, Adam had eventually met Bernie, who’d just quit his job as a detective on the LAPD.

Bernie was disillusioned and bitter over a case he’d been working for over a year, one his superiors had dropped because of political pressure. Bernie was newly married and needed to find another job fast. Opposites in many ways, the two men liked and complemented each other. They found they worked well together, and Blue Knights was born.

Myles had been friend and mentor to him, the nearest thing Adam had ever had to a father. The thought of losing him again to the creeping horror that stole his wits away and made him a caricature of himself made tears sting behind Adam’s eyes, and he suddenly had to turn away from Sameh and Myles until he got control of himself.

News of Myles’s amazing remission had quickly spread, and the nurses had been discreetly checking in all afternoon, as delighted and astonished with their patient’s sudden improvement as Adam was.

The afternoon shadows lengthened, and a nurse wheeled in a cart with dinner. There were servings for Adam and Sameh, as well, and Sameh set up the small table under the window, putting one of the roses in a water glass as a centerpiece, laughing at Adam’s good-natured teasing when she dropped the cutlery on the floor for the third time.

When the table was ready, Adam helped his friend over to the armchair he’d drawn up, but it was obvious that the older man’s strength was fading with shocking rapidity. Exhausted, Myles made a pretense of eating at first, but finally his head lolled and he lurched forward, falling asleep long before the simple meal was finished. Adam called an orderly to help prepare Myles for bed, and when the cheerful young man arrived, Adam and Sameh said a reluctant good-night.

“You come visit again soon, my dear,” Myles whispered tiredly as Sameh bent to press a kiss on his cheek. “You can even bring this reprobate along if you want,” he added, making an unsuccessful effort to clasp Adam’s hand in his own. His faded blue eyes met Adam’s, and a slow tear traced its way down his wrinkled cheek. “Goodbye, my boy,” he murmured. There was a finality to the farewell that sent shivers down Adam’s spine.

Vinnie met them in the lobby, her broad face wreathed in smiles. “Now wasn’t that something?” she crowed. “He’s been going downhill all week long. I’d never have imagined in a million years that he’d come out of it like this. Goes to show you miracles can happen. This old town isn’t called the City of Angels for nothing.”

Adam took Sameh’s hand in his as they left the building, but he didn’t speak even after they were in the car and back on the freeway. In his mind, he was going over and over the afternoon’s events, and he still could hardly believe what had occurred.

“I like your friend very much,” Sameh commented. “He’s an old soul, a most unusual person.”

Adam was remembering something. “Sameh, what was that thing you did with your hands when we first got there today? Around Myles’s head?”

“Oh, that. I was smoothing him, trying to fix the breaks in his energy field.” She turned to look at Adam, and her voice was filled with sadness. “I couldn’t really mend it, you know. I could only patch it together for a short time. The electromagnetic currents that surround him are short-circuiting and growing increasingly weaker. What I did was only temporary. It worked for today, but the disease he has is escalating. I’m afraid by tomorrow morning he won’t even remember us being there. The field is so weak that what I did today won’t work again.” There was pain in her voice now. “I wish with all my heart that I was better at healing, Adam.”

The uncomfortable and all-too-familiar gut reaction to her flights of fancy rolled over him, but this time it lacked conviction. He’d seen Myles both before and after she’d made those strange motions with her hands. There’d been a dramatic—an unbelievable—change after Sameh did whatever it was she’d done.

Adam had heard rumors of people who were able to use their hands to cure illness; he’d even seen a tongue-in-cheek report about them on “20/20.” The investigative reporters were skeptical, although they hadn’t been able to totally discount some of the episodes. Some people really believed that such healers existed.

Frances did. She insisted they were effective, although she’d never been able to locate one with the ability to cure Corey.

Adam was almost ready to believe that Sameh had some kind of talent along those lines, although he didn’t begin to understand what it was or how it worked. He thought about how Corey had relaxed when she’d held him, and hadn’t Bernie said yesterday that Sameh was teaching Frances some meditation stuff that might be good for the baby? By her own admission, Sameh couldn’t completely cure either Corey or Myles, but she sure as hell had helped them both.

Today she’d given him back his friend, if only for an afternoon. A wave of gratitude and overwhelming tenderness washed over him. Never mind how she did it. The fact was that she managed to make people around her feel better. She was so damned…sweet. Caring. Generous.

Loving. She was the most loving woman he’d ever met, which was richly ironic, considering that he’d never even gotten close to undressing her, much less taking her to bed. He’d never been around a beautiful woman this long without taking her to bed. That in itself was a miracle of sorts.

He grimaced. What was he thinking—miracle? It was a colossal bloody disaster. He spent his days and nights in a perpetual state of arousal, like a teenager. He’d probably start getting zits and having wet dreams if his frustration lasted much longer.

He glanced over at her as he pulled to a stop at a red light. Since they’d left the nursing home, he’d been preoccupied, thinking about Myles. He realized now that Sameh was playing with the controls on the radio, flicking from one station to another. The station changed yet again as he looked at her, but she wasn’t touching the controls. The small buttons on the console were moving in and out as if by remote control.

A chill wriggled up his spine, and his hands clenched the wheel.

Sameh was relaxing against the seat, head back, eyes closed, humming a little tune under her breath, her hands folded primly in her lap. Her dark eyelashes, indecently long and lush, curled against her cheekbones. He loved the way her nose tilted up just the smallest bit.

A news broadcast began and she frowned. Suddenly he heard the voice of Leonard Cohen, singing about Suzanne and the river, and Sameh, eyes still closed, smiled a lazy, contented smile and hummed along. “This is the singer you like, isn’t it, Adam?” The set button depressed and released, locking Cohen in.

The light had changed, and cars behind him were honking. Adam stepped on the gas and the car lurched ahead. “Sameh.” He did his best to keep his voice level, to sound only casually interested. “Mind telling me how you do that?”

She opened her eyes and looked at him. “Do what?”

He nodded toward the radio. “Change stations without touching the controls.”

She looked surprised, and then she smiled, pleased with herself. “I didn’t realize I was doing it. Goodness, it’s just like the tutors said. It’s simple when I don’t try, isn’t it? It’s called telekinesis—all you do is visualize the object and see the changes occurring. But I’ve always gotten tense and nervous, and then it doesn’t work.”

“I see.” He nodded as if all this gibberish made perfect sense.

She’d taken her sandals off in the car, as she always did, and now she pulled one bare leg up and encircled it with her arms, resting her chin on her knee. Her skirt hiked up so that part of her thigh was exposed. Her skin was golden, sleek and soft and inviting. He longed to reach across, place his hand on that smooth, slender leg, slide it up under her skirt— His body reacted energetically, and the loose cotton pants he wore were suddenly constricting.

“You know, Adam, this assignment is proving much more difficult than I expected it to be.” Sameh’s voice was pensive.

He stole another glance at the expanse of thigh. Trying to stop himself from pulling the car over to the curb and climbing all over her was proving more difficult than he’d expected. He cleared his throat and tried to pay attention to traffic. “How so?”

“Well, I studied this era before I came, of course, but living in a primitive society is lots different than viewing it on simucam.” She sighed, and from the corner of his eye he saw her breasts rise and fall under the sleeveless silk top she wore.

Damn it, what was it about her? She was fully clothed and yet she had him hot and breathless with wanting her. This stuff about only being friends was just making him more determined by the second that he was going to win her over in the end.

“I was mentally prepared for—” she ticked the list off on her fingers “—for the AIDS epidemic, drug addiction, social unrest, homelessness, wars, environmental disasters and archaic diseases like Alzheimer’s.” She wound her arms around her legs again and let her chin drop.

“I wasn’t bothered by any of it, because I knew that within another couple of hundred years, mankind would overcome most of those problems with the inevitable marriage of metaphysics and technology.”

She was bright. Brilliant, even. In the time they’d spent together, he’d come to admire her intelligence, the way her mind worked within the boundaries of the fantasy world she’d created. Now there was a first for him; it wasn’t ordinarily a woman’s mind that got him hot and bothered.

She dropped her leg to the floor and turned to face him, shifting a little to get comfortable within the confines of the seat belt and unfortunately tugging her skirt down until it wrapped around her legs like a shroud.

“But when I got here to the nineties, the whole project became personal.” She frowned, and her blue eyes clouded. “I wasn’t really prepared for how emotionally involved I’d get with everything and everyone. In my time, emotions are far more controlled than they are here.”

That sounded like a barrel of laughs, all right. He could just envision two people having sex in a controlled manner. It gave new meaning to the expression “no sweat.”

“Being here makes me feel emotionally…” She struggled for the right word. “Emotionally primal.”

“Sounds like fun.” The look he gave her must have been far too lusty, because now she scowled at him and shook her head.

“Honestly, Adam, you have to try not to interpret everything in a sexual way. This is a serious conversation.”

“Sex can be perfectly serious, if that’s how two people want it,” he teased, but when she didn’t smile, he sighed and tried for serious. “What’s so bad about feeling emotionally primal, anyhow?”

“It’s wasteful. In my time, we channel emotional energy into use for all the disciplines. It’s a valuable commodity. Here, most of it is squandered. Raw passion runs rampant here, and control becomes very difficult. It’s hard to maintain an impartial distance when I feel the way I do about Corey. And Myles. And Delilah.” She shuddered. “Or Violet.”

He noticed that, good or bad, she’d left him off the list, and in some cockeyed way, it hurt him. “Well, if it gets too tough, I guess you can always go back, can’t you?” He sounded flip, and he regretted the words the moment they were out of his mouth. Fantasy or not, he didn’t want her going anywhere, or even considering it. And it was wrong of him to encourage her delusions.

She was giving him that look that seemed to lay his entire brain open for study. “I have to go back eventually, Adam. I have no choice in the matter. My stay here is temporary.”

Damn it all, why couldn’t he keep his big mouth shut?

“When do you figure you’ll be going?” Just so he knew what the hell was going on in that complicated mind of hers.

She frowned, shrugging her shoulders. “It’s hard to say. Not for some time yet. I have a great deal left to do. For instance, I haven’t begun to chronicle all the details I need for Delilah’s biography.”

“But you’re not going anywhere tonight for sure?” He forced a lightness into his tone. She shook her head, and he was rewarded with a smile. God, he was becoming addicted to her smile. Face it, he was addicted to Sameh.

“Not tonight. For sure.”

“Great, so you’ve got the evening free.” He’d been driving toward the beach with a half-formed idea in mind. “Y’know, you’ve never seen where I live. I’m renting this cottage on the beach—you can see the ocean, the sunset, miles of sand. It’s not far from here. Want to have a look?” His cleaning service had been in on Friday, so the place was as good as it was ever going to get. He could probably find time to make the bed and pick up the undershorts he’d dropped on the bathroom floor.

She was hesitant. “I’m not sure it’s a very good idea, us being alone together at your house.”

Before she could refuse outright, he sweetened the pot. “We can pick up some pizza and a couple of videos. C’mon, Sameh, we’re grown-ups. We can manage civilized, can’t we?” God, she was right about him. He was a liar. “It’s a clear night,” he went on. “We can watch the moon come up over the water, eat vegetable pizza, watch movies.” He knew she adored both pizza and movies.

He also knew he had a bottle of wine, and if they were alone for a couple of hours, relaxed and easy, who knew what might happen? He shot her an anxious look, hoping she hadn’t picked up on the all-too-friendly things he was fantasizing about.

It seemed she hadn’t. She was considering. “I’d like that,” she said at last. “There’s an old movie I remember hearing about, one I’d very much like to see. It was considered a classic for centuries.”

He hated highbrow movies, but what the hell. “What’s the title?”

“It’s called E.T.”

God help him, he might have guessed.

“THIS IS A WONDERFUL place to live, Adam. How did you ever find it?” It was late, and they were munching leftover pizza and finishing off the bottle of wine he’d opened earlier.

They’d had a good time together in spite of the fact he hadn’t even kissed her. They’d drunk wine and talked about Myles. They’d watched E.T., and Sameh had cried. They’d danced together to some of his old, slow music, and they’d laughed at a television comic. He’d told her stories about his job, ridiculous things that happened to him as a celebrity guard, and she’d giggled and then choked on a mouthful of pizza. He’d had to rub her back.

Sameh had wandered outside. She was standing on the wide deck that stretched across the front of the cottage, where hours before she’d admired his sweeping view of the beach and the Pacific Ocean. It was dark now, but the moon was shining on the water.

Adam was admiring Sameh. She’d relaxed once she realized he wasn’t going to toss her over his shoulder and head for the bedroom, and she was barefoot. She’d pulled her silky top out of the waistband of her skirt, and it was all wrinkled. The breeze was ruffling her gleaming hair, turning her curls into a riotous mass around her face and neck.

He looked past her now, out to the horizon where the sun had set hours before. Together they’d watched it sink out of sight. She’d agreed with him that L.A.’s smog made for spectacular sunsets, with streams of purple and green and gold streaking the sky.

He thought all of a sudden how much he liked this place, although he hadn’t spent nearly enough time enjoying it. It was fun seeing it tonight through Sameh’s appreciative eyes. He remembered she’d asked him a question just now, about how he’d found the house.

“Renting this was one of the perks of doing celebrity security,” he said. “It’s owned by an actor who was a client of ours. He got a job in London in a television series two years ago, and he didn’t want to leave the place empty. He figured, with justification, that it would likely get broken into and wrecked, so he was happy to rent it to me for a pittance, considering what real estate costs along this stretch of beach.”

She was having trouble balancing her pizza and her wine, so he dragged two deck chairs over to her. “Sit down.” She did, spilling a little wine in the process. She wouldn’t be Sameh if she didn’t spill a little, he thought with a surge of tenderness.

“What will you do when the owner comes back, Adam?”

“Move, I guess. Find somewhere else to rent.” He hadn’t given it that much thought.

“Won’t you miss this place when that happens?”

He shook his head. “Not much. I’ve never stayed in one place for long, so I never get too attached to it.”

She was still staring out at the silvery ocean. She took another bite of pizza, chewed and swallowed. “Myles said you came to the military academy when you were fifteen. Did you have problems at home with your family? Is that why you were sent to a place like that at such a young age?”

In some strange fashion, he’d grown accustomed to telling Sameh the truth, and now, for the first time in his entire life, Adam did the unthinkable. For no reason he could fathom, and before he could stop himself, he told her the truth about his origins, as well.

“My mother, Gina, was a hooker,” he heard himself saying. “A New York prostitute. Beautiful, expensive, very high class, but a hooker’s a hooker. She died while I was at the academy. I was seventeen at the time. It was a relief in a way, because I was petrified the other guys would find out who and what she was.”

Once the damning words were out, he couldn’t believe he’d said them. His heart began to pound, hammering against his rib cage, and his mouth went dry. Something like fear swept over him.

What kind of spell had this woman at his side cast over him? She’d demanded the truth, and like an utter fool, he’d supplied it.

CHAPTER TEN

ADAM WAITED FOR SAMEH to react. He waited for the shock, the disgust, the morbid curiosity he’d always known would be the response if he ever told the truth about Gina.

Instead, Sameh crossed her legs at the ankle and went on munching pizza as if what he’d said wasn’t at all out of the ordinary. “So that’s why you were angry when I spoke to that prostitute on the street.” Her voice was sympathetic, but also matter-of-fact. It was too dark to see her expression. “What about your father, Adam? Where was he?”

His throat was tight. He wished to God he’d never gotten into this. “I never knew who my father was—I don’t think Gina even knew for sure. She named me Hawkins, but for all I know, she drew the name out of a hat. Her name was Buxton.” He remembered asking her, when he was small, about his name being different from hers. She’d told him she named him after her mother’s family, and maybe she had. Adam had never tried to find any relatives.

“She sent me to the academy as a last resort, because I’d found out what she did for a living the summer I was fourteen, and for a whole year after that I ran away from every expensive private school she put me in.”

“How did you find out?”

He laughed, a mirthless sound. What the hell was he thinking of, spilling his guts to her this way? But now that he’d started, he couldn’t seem to stop. “One of her friends told me, a woman named Morgan. I didn’t live with Gina much while I was growing up—she kept me in boarding schools and with foster families most of the time. I used to stay with her during the summer holidays.” He remembered dreaming of those few magic weeks with his mother.

“Y’know, when I was really young, I thought Gina was a princess, because she lived in a lavish apartment in a tall building in New York that seemed like a castle to me, and during the month I spent with her, she’d buy me stuff, take me wherever I wanted to go. I figured she had to be a princess.” He snorted. “Dumb kid, huh?”

Sameh reached out and took his hand in hers, but she didn’t say anything. She just looked at him with an understanding sort of look and waited for him to go on.

“Anyhow, the summer I was fourteen, she got sick while I was with her. She was rushed to the hospital, and I was left by myself in her apartment. She had an operation, probably a hysterectomy. She was in hospital for three weeks. I was pretty scared, and she asked this friend of hers, this Morgan, to come by her apartment and see if I was making out okay.”

He wished he still smoked. He needed a cigarette right this minute. “I was a big kid for my age. I was six-two already, pretty skinny, though. Morgan was a high-class call girl, like Gina, and I guess it was some kind of kick for her, initiating a boy into the mysteries of sex.”

“She was physically intimate with you?”

Any other time he’d have been amused at Sameh’s choice of words. He’d always used a much coarser description for what Morgan had taught him. “I was both fascinated and horrified by what we did together. Within a couple of days, I was hooked on sex, but I was also disgusted with myself and, most of all, with her. She was supposed to be my mother’s buddy, see, and I just knew that Gina had no idea what her friend was really like. Also, we were screwing in my mother’s apartment. My guilt and misplaced morality finally got the better of me, and I told Morgan I didn’t want her coming around anymore. God, I was a dumb little fool. I added, like some kind of sanctimonious prig, that I didn’t want her around my mother, either.”

Even after all these years, he was amazed to find that remembering that scene still had the power to make his stomach churn. “She killed herself laughing, and that’s when she told me all about Gina.”

“Oh, Adam. That must have been horrible for you.” Sameh tightened her hold on his hand, rubbing her thumb across the back of it in silent support. “For her, as well. Your mother, I mean. Her life must have been very difficult.”

“Yeah, maybe it was.” He’d never really gotten around to feeling sorry for Gina, and he didn’t now. “She chose her life, the way anybody chooses what they do for a living,” he said in a harsh tone. “She could have gotten out if she’d really wanted to.”

“Maybe she couldn’t. Perhaps there were things you didn’t know about her life and why she chose to do what she did. We seldom really know much about the private lives of our parents, but it sounds as if your mother must have loved you a great deal to have gone to such lengths to protect you, to make sure you didn’t know about her.”

Adam didn’t reply. He was wishing he could get out of this conversation.

“When did she die, your mother?”

“When I was seventeen. I was at the academy.” He remembered Myles coming to get him out of the gym that morning. He remembered the muscles in the arm Myles had wrapped around his shoulders, and the clean, freshly pressed smell of his uniform. “She was murdered. They never found out who did it.” His first reaction had been guilty relief. Now no one would ever know. None of his friends would ever find out who and what his mother had been.

The murder was reported in the New York newspapers, of course, but no one at the academy connected the murder of a New York call girl named Gina Buxton with Adam Hawkins, the star quarterback who led the football team to victory that fall.

Myles knew, of course. Adam had never asked when or how the older man had found out about Gina’s profession. It was something they’d never discussed, even though Myles had tried, during the months that followed Gina’s death, to talk to Adam about his mother. Gina had left a trust fund to pay for Adam’s education, and Myles had administered it. Adam had persisted in his refusal to discuss her, and after a few abortive attempts, Myles had given up.

“So tell me, are there prostitutes where you come from, Sam?” he asked, hoping to make this discussion less personal, to diffuse the torrent of confused emotions that engulfed him when he thought of his mother.

She shook her head. “We’ve outgrown the mind-set that made prostitution viable, and we’ve improved the social situations that caused it. I think I told you our society is matriarchal. Women have power, and so the sexual exploitation of women is no longer possible.” She was silent for a few moments. “But that doesn’t mean I don’t sympathize with your mother, Adam. I once had a lifetime as a prostitute,” she said in a matter-of-fact way. “It’s one of the few past lifetimes I was able to review through retrocognition.” She shuddered. “It ended badly, as badly as your mother’s did, and I didn’t make much progress that time around.”

She’d explained her belief in reincarnation, so he had some vague idea of what she was talking about, even though he didn’t for an instant believe any of it. “You just making that up to make me feel better, Sameh?”

“I wouldn’t do that, Adam.” She waited for a moment, but when he didn’t respond she went on, “You’re still mad at her, aren’t you? It took me a long time to get over being furious with my mother, too, you know,” she said. “When she died, I was sixteen, and I hated her for leaving me.”

He laughed, a harsh, angry sound. “Forget the drugstore psychology, Sameh. I came to terms with my feelings about Gina long ago. I’ve seen enough of the world to know that people choose lots of different ways to live their lives.” He stood up. His muscles ached as if he’d been in a knockdown, drag-out brawl. He wanted as never before to take her to bed, to lose himself in the oblivion of sexual release. “Let’s go inside, Sameh. It’s getting cool out here.”

She shook her head. “I should go. Will you drive me home now, please?”

So much for bad intentions. “Sure thing. I’ll just get my keys.” He felt a mixture of relief and remorse and a peculiar certainty that once again she’d managed to read his mind and find in it all the things he’d tried his best to keep hidden.

TWO WEEKS LATER, Sameh was jogging along her usual route just past 6:00 a.m. on a morning that, despite the early hour, promised to be a scorcher.

August in Los Angeles was a good argument for climate control, she reflected. When had the techies perfected climate control, anyhow? She knew it was well after the millennium, but the exact date escaped her. There’d been horrific opposition to the idea from the Green Alliance, she remembered.

“Morning. How’s it going? Hot enough for you?” A tall young man she passed almost every day came running toward her and stopped. His eyes, filled with longing and lust, skimmed down her pink shorts and singlet and back up again to her face. He’d used at least a dozen innovative approaches, asking her to join him for everything from a bagel to a premiere of a movie he said was directed by a friend of a friend.

Sameh admired his tenacity, but she wished he’d stop trying. She had no desire to go anywhere with him, and she’d told him so with her usual candor, but he seemed to consider her a challenge.

She smiled and put on a burst of speed, and to her relief he didn’t turn and try to join her this time. She sighed as she turned a corner and started past a park.

The men in this century were proving to be a bigger problem than she’d anticipated. She slowed her pace a bit and corrected herself. It wasn’t men in general who were proving to be a problem, it was one man in particular.

Adam had stuck to the promise he’d made to be her friend—at least he’d stuck to it technically. He hadn’t made any obvious advances to her during the past couple of weeks. But he was diabolically clever at making sure she was physically aware of him every second they were together. He brushed against her, he touched her hair, he held her hand, he slung a companionable arm around her shoulders as they walked, until every nerve ending in her body was aroused.

The Sunday night two weeks before when he’d lured her over to his house with the promise of pizza and videos was a perfect example. He’d poured wine, turned on soft music, dimmed the lights and asked her to dance with him as the moon rose over the Pacific—but he hadn’t made one single solitary attempt to even kiss her.

Which, of course, was exactly the way she wanted it, she told herself, cutting past the children’s playground to a path offering some shade. Adam was being a perfect gentleman, and wasn’t that what she wanted from him?

He’d looked at her with that absorbed, intense green gaze that told her in more than words exactly what he wanted to be doing with her, and she’d dropped, spilled, broken, tripped over everything in sight and completely bungled whatever it was she was doing all evening long. She’d stepped all over his feet when they danced, far too aware of his muscular arms holding her a few enticing inches away from his body. She’d dropped pizza down the front of her silk shirt and then knocked a plate flying.

Adam wanted her, and he made sure it showed, but he stuck to the letter of their agreement that they would only be friends. She paused at a water fountain to take a few long gulps before she ran again, her mind still on Adam. Who would have believed that having him want her could be so seductive? She understood now all too well how he’d become as arrogant as he was about his sex appeal. It was getting harder and harder to be around him without succumbing to his wordless campaign.

“Sameh. Sameh, hey, Sameh, stop.” An arm suddenly snaked out and grabbed her, almost pulling her off balance. It took her only a moment to recognize the thin figure in the tattered cutoffs. It was Troy, the young street boy she’d brought home weeks ago, the boy Violet had chased away.

Sameh had worried about him, watched for him every morning. Relief at seeing him again rushed over her, and she reached out and took his grubby hand in hers, twining her fingers through his. He looked even thinner than he had when she’d last seen him, and she noticed an ugly bruise on the side of his face. He wore round, rimless glasses, and the nosepiece was taped together. He kept shoving at the glasses with one finger.

“Troy, I’m so happy to see you again. How are you? Where have you been?”

“Around.” His eyes flitted past her, and he tensed as a figure appeared farther down the path, relaxing only when he realized it was just an old man leading a small dog on a leash. In an urgent voice he said, “Sameh, you got any money on ya?”

“Very little.” She dug into the inside pocket of her running shorts and produced the four quarters that Adam insisted she always carry when she went jogging—enough to make phone calls in case of an emergency. “Only this.” She held the coins out on her palm.

Troy’s thin shoulders sagged and he jabbed at his glasses again. Under the smudged lenses she could see dark circles under his eyes. “Jeez, a lousy buck. It’s not enough. My buddy’s sick. I need money to get him some stuff.”

Sameh remembered Adam’s warnings. Was Troy talking about drugs? She studied him, trying to decipher the truths that lay behind the anxiety swirling around him in a murky cloud. He was hiding something, was frightened and desperate, but she couldn’t sense any menace in the boy. Instead she detected an appeal for help and the pervasive feeling of hopelessness that had so bothered her the first time she’d met him.

“Where is your friend? What’s his name?”

“Cougar. He’s over there, behind those buildings. We’re, like, kinda camped out over there.” Troy gestured toward the park’s concrete-block washrooms a few hundred feet away.

“Take me to him and maybe I can help.”

“Promise you won’t call the cops? Cougar’s major scared of cops.”

“I promise.”

He set off at a trot, and Sameh followed close behind. There was a depression in the ground just behind the buildings where shrubs and a few trees grew. Troy shouldered his way through the foliage to where an emaciated figure with a shaven head lay huddled on the ground, partially covered with a jean jacket. He looked even younger than Troy, who’d told Sameh he was fourteen.

Sameh knelt beside the boy, appalled at the foul smell that came from the youngster’s body. She touched his cheek with her hand. He was running a high fever. He opened his eyes and looked up at her, his eyes bloodshot and sunken in his skull. His breathing was fast and shallow, and he was shivering. “I need a drink,” he croaked.

“I’ll get him some more water.” Troy pulled a small backpack out of the bushes, rummaged inside until he’d found a plastic cup, and headed off to the washrooms.

“It’s awful cold.” Cougar curled his body into an even tighter ball and closed his eyes. It was obvious he was too miserable to care who Sameh was or what she was doing there.

The park was quiet at this hour, and Sameh could hear the birds heralding the morning. This boy was sick. She tried to recall the exact pattern of healing the Hospice Adepts had used in the rare cases of fever she’d been allowed to observe. They’d worked from the head. She moved around until she was kneeling at the top of Cougar’s head, and she cupped her hands in the particular fashion she remembered them using, trying hard to draw energy through the boy’s body.

Time passed, but nothing happened. Her hands began to tremble, and all the old feelings of inadequacy and failure came back to haunt her. Feeling dejected and the worst kind of bungling idiot, she lowered her hands and slumped back onto her haunches. It was no use. She couldn’t manage the technique here any more than she’d been able to do in her own time.

“I got you some cold water, Coug. Wake up.” In slow motion, trying not to spill, Troy knelt beside Cougar, balancing the brimming cup. With painful effort, Cougar rolled onto his back, and with Sameh’s help, struggled to a sitting position so he could drink. He rested his back against Troy’s legs, tremors shuddering through his body.

“Throat’s awful sore,” he said in a gravelly voice. He took a few tiny sips and grimaced as he tried to swallow. After a few attempts, he handed Troy the cup and shook his head. “Can’t,” he said in a weak voice.

Sameh got to her feet and stood over him. He looked small and infinitely sad, huddled there on the ground, and she was suddenly furious all over again at a society that would treat its children in this heartless manner.

Troy was looking at her, and she could see the desperation in his eyes. “I don’t know what to do, Sameh. I tried to get him into a shelter. I tried a couple, but they wouldn’t take him. They’re scared what he’s got is contagious and then the whole place would get sick. I barely got him here—he’s pretty heavy to carry.”

Sameh nodded, not really listening as much as feeling Troy’s despair. But he had something else as well. Troy had a great deal of energy. Maybe she could harness some of it to help.

“Let’s try something, Troy. Give me your hands.”

He hesitated and then placed his dirty palms on her outstretched fingers. She closed her hands around his and moved until the two of them stood palm to palm, with Cougar’s slouched form between their legs.

“I want you to think of somewhere you’d like to be right now, Troy. A place where you’d be safe and warm, a place where nothing can harm you.”

He gave her a wary glance. “Like where? I dunno any place like that.”

Her heart contracted with pity as she realized the enormity of her mistake. How could he know anything of safety and warmth? Tears smarted in her eyes, and she had to pause a moment before she could continue.

“Imagine a beach then, on a desert island far away from here.” She made her voice compelling, searching for the soul note, the phenomonic, that would resonate inside him. “You’re the only person there, Troy.” Her voice was rhythmic now, luring him into the fantasy. “There are all kinds of fresh fruit and fish to eat, the sun’s wonderfully warm and the water’s great for surfing. You’re lying on that beach, half-asleep. Warm, safe, full of food, happy.”

His eyelids relaxed and a wistful half smile tilted his mouth. She had the sound right. Now, if she could just utilize his energy in conjunction with her own…. She visualized a shining bubble encircling the three of them, and suddenly it was there, all around them.

Success surprised her so much it made her jump and almost lose her concentration, but she managed to recover in time to retain the glowing sphere of raw, healing energy. Cougar moaned, and she turned the bubble green, a deep emerald green, the universal color of healing.

Time stood still. Heat spilled from her palms to Troy’s and back to her again in a circuit that encompassed their bodies and surrounded Cougar. She turned the bubble a warm, pulsing orange, and she visualized Cougar free of fever, his body healed.

The sound of voices interrupted. The park attendants were beginning their day’s work, and one of them came through the underbrush toward Sameh and the boys. He shoved his duck-billed cap to the back of his head and stared at them. “What’s going on here? These kids bothering you, lady?”

Slowly, reluctant to let it go, Sameh released the spell. She turned a dazzling smile on the attendant. “These boys are my friends. We’re just visiting.”

“Yeah, huh? Well.” He gave Sameh a suspicious look and turned his attention to the boys. “I thought I told you two hooligans you weren’t to hang around back here no more. You listen up and get movin’ or I’ll call the cops. This is a decent park, for decent folk. Don’t need no trash hangin’ out ’round here, scarin’ people off.” He shot them all a malevolent look before he turned and walked away.

Cougar was no longer slumping against Troy’s legs. He was sitting up on his own, reaching for the cup of water Troy had set down in the grass earlier. He downed the entire contents in one long, thirsty draft and struggled to his knees, then to his feet. He staggered a little and had to grab Troy’s arm for support.

“Hey, man, I feel a lot better.” He tried for a grin, and Sameh could see that two of his front teeth were missing. He wasn’t as tall as Troy, and his thinness was alarming. His eyes were no longer glazed and bloodshot, and she could see now that they were deep, soft brown, singularly attractive eyes in an acne-pitted face.

Troy wasn’t paying any attention to Cougar. Instead he was gaping at Sameh, his expression a mixture of awe and fear and suspicion. “What…what the hell are you, lady, some kind of witch?” A tremor ran through him, and he gulped. “I never felt anything like that before. I mean, like I been on some heavy trips, but never nothing like that. What did you do to us?”

Cougar looked from one to the other. “Hey, Troy, my man, I’m better, dint ya hear me?” He stumbled and had to sit down on the grass. “Whew, I’m still sorta weak, though. We got any money for some food, Troy? I’m runnin’ on empty, man.”

“Troy.” Sameh reached out and touched his face with the palm of her hand, smiling at him. “It’s just a sort of trick, a healing trick I learned. Don’t be frightened. Almost anyone could learn it. It’s—” she struggled for the proper slang “—it’s no big deal, okay? And Cougar’s better. Isn’t that all that really matters?” The warmth and reassuring energy of her hand calmed Troy. He looked at Cougar, and a smile slowly spread across his face.

“Hey, man. We gonna eat, or what?” Cougar persisted.

Sameh had been trying to figure out what to do. There was no guarantee that Cougar’s fever was gone for good—she’d never tried this exact technique before, and her healing abilities were questionable at best. She couldn’t just run off and leave them here hungry, with no money, no shelter. She didn’t dare take them home to Delilah’s; the older woman was still asleep, and anyway, Delilah hadn’t been herself the past few weeks. She’d been short-tempered and distracted, snapping at everyone and then apologizing.

Violet was up, of course. The moment Sameh brought these kids in the house, Violet would call the police and have the boys taken away. No, taking them home with her was out of the question, and she had the feeling that if she left them here and ran home to get money, they’d be gone by the time she returned. There was only one other solution.

“I’m calling a friend of mine, and we’re taking you both out for a huge breakfast,” she promised. She spotted a phone booth not far away. “Stay right here and I’ll get my friend to come pick us up in his car.”

“She callin’ the cops on us?” Sameh heard Cougar’s frightened whisper as she loped off toward the phone.

“Nope,” Troy said in a positive tone. “She’s weird like I never saw before in my life, but she won’t call no cops on us, I’m sure of that. She’s okay.”

THE PHONE RANG at seven-fifteen. Adam had just stepped out of the shower. He cursed under his breath, rubbed his hair with a towel and then wrapped it around his waist and made his way to the bedroom. Water dripped in a puddle at his feet as he lifted the receiver and said a terse hello.

“Sameh?” He tensed, listened, then frowned. “I thought I told you these kids could be dangerous. Where the hell are you?” He listened again. “Okay, just stay put. I’ll be there as soon as I can.” He slammed the phone down, dried himself off and then dressed as fast as he could.

She was in some park, for God’s sake, alone with a couple of young punks who might or might not be high on who knew what. She’d said one of them wasn’t feeling well. She wanted—he shook his head, unable to believe he’d heard right—she wanted him to come and take the three of them out for breakfast. She had no money with her but she’d pay him back, she’d promised in that husky, earnest voice that made him think of bedrooms and lascivious things.

Pay him back. Goddamn it, money wasn’t the issue here at all. Sanity, rational behavior—that was the issue. She was driving him berserk. What in blazes was he going to do with this woman? She was constantly getting him into situations he didn’t want to be in, and he went right on letting her.

Hell, nobody in his right mind would want to take two street kids out to breakfast at seven-fifteen on a Tuesday morning. Nobody but Sameh. And there was still a big question mark about the state of her mind, as far as he was concerned.

He stuffed his keys and his wallet into his pants pocket, ran a brush through his wet hair, rubbed his unshaven jaw and headed out the door.

THEY WERE ALL SITTING on a park bench, just where she’d said they’d be. The boys were clutching small backpacks. One of them was shaved bald and had a ring in his nose, and the other one, the one with broken glasses, had tattoos and a head of dark hair that stood out from his head as if he’d suffered a severe electrical shock.

Sameh smiled and waved. She was wearing abbreviated pink running shorts and a matching singlet, with a white headband holding back her mass of golden curls. She looked only slightly older than the two skinny kids she was with. She was a damn sight prettier, though, but at the moment that didn’t make him feel any better about the situation.

He pulled the car over to the curb. Before he could get out, Sameh came trotting over, all long tanned legs and delectable curves. God, if she was his, he’d never let her out on the streets in that getup. The boys followed at a slower pace.

“Are you sure he’s not a cop, Sameh?” The kid with all the hair gave Adam a suspicious stare through his smudged lenses, and the other boy, the one with the nose ring, looked poised to run.

“He’s not a policeman, I assure you,” Sameh told them. “He’s my friend and he’s just going to take us all out for breakfast, aren’t you, Adam?”

She flashed that brilliant smile. Damn it, why couldn’t he resist Sameh’s smiles? “I’m just going to take you all out for breakfast,” he parroted. His sarcasm was lost on Sameh, but it registered on the boys. They took several wary steps back, so he added in an exasperated tone, “Would you all get in this damned car? I’m not a cop and I haven’t the slightest interest in busting either of you—I’ve got better things to do with my time. I haven’t had a cup of coffee yet this morning, and if you don’t climb in right now, I’m driving away by myself to find one. Got it?”

For some peculiar reason, his irritability reassured them. They opened the door and squeezed into the small back seat.

“Thank you for coming, Adam.” Sameh flashed him a look that might have made up for the whole thing if only the boys weren’t there, or even if they were cleaner. His silver gray upholstery was going to take a severe beating.

“Cool car,” Troy said after Sameh had made introductions. “You must be like major rich, mister, driving a number like this.”

“I’m gonna expire if I don’t get somethin’ to eat soon,” Cougar moaned.

“Where to?” Adam raised a questioning brow at Sameh.

“There’s a pancake house not far from here,” she suggested. “Would that do?”

Affirmatives erupted from the back seat.

The hostess at the restaurant didn’t turn a hair at the sight of Adam, unshaven, Sameh in jogging gear, and the two scruffy-looking, tattooed teens. Thank God for Hollywood, Adam thought. She probably figured they were extras from some movie set.

He noticed several burly men who might have been truck drivers ogle Sameh as she passed. Adam was behind her, and the look he gave them made their heads whip back to their breakfast plates as if they were on springs.

A wide-bottomed hostess conducted them to a large booth. A waitress soon appeared, poured coffee, slammed down menus, rhymed off specials and left them to consider choices.

“Pancakes, eggs and bacon,” both boys recited. They looked at Adam and added tentatively, “Toast? Cereal?” It was obvious they were testing him, finding out how far his largess extended.

Adam nodded and asked for large glasses of juice, home fries and doubles on the pancakes, as well. He was remembering all of a sudden how hungry a teenage boy could get and wondering with an uncomfortable feeling in his own gut how long it had been since these two had had full stomachs.

While they waited for their orders, Troy and Cougar went to the washroom, taking their grubby packs with them. Adam took advantage of their absence to ask Sameh exactly how and where she’d met them. She told him, and then added, “Cougar was terribly sick. He’s feeling better just now—I used healing energy—but I’m not sure it’ll last.”

The kid didn’t look healthy, but Adam figured Sameh must be exaggerating the sick part of the story. Cougar looked as healthy as Troy, which wasn’t saying much.

Sameh was looking at him with a pleading expression on her face that was starting to make him nervous. “They don’t have anywhere to stay, Adam.” Sameh’s brow furrowed with anxiety. “They’ve been sleeping in that park, and the attendant came along while I was there and told them they had to leave.” She was outraged. “I thought parks were public property.”

He didn’t answer, waiting for whatever catastrophic idea she was going to propose next. It wasn’t long in coming. She looked at him from under her lashes, and against his better judgment, he felt himself melting.

“Adam, I was wondering if maybe you could let them sleep at your house for a couple of days?”

He almost choked on a mouthful of coffee. “You want me to—to take those two home? To my place?” He couldn’t believe he’d heard her right.

“Please, Adam? You do have that extra bedroom.”

Why couldn’t she beg him that way for all the things he ached to do to her instead of for something as preposterous as this?

“Cougar needs to eat and sleep and be able to relax in order to really get over whatever infection he had. I can’t take them home with me—Violet would be…” Sameh paused and then added in what Adam figured was the understatement of the century, “Violet would be upset. I thought of asking Frances and Bernie, but I don’t want to take any chances that Corey or Kate might pick up the infection Cougar had.”

She saw the expression on Adam’s face and hurriedly explained, “Not that I think he’s at all infectious, Adam. Not now. I just don’t want to take the slightest chance, you understand. And I’ve checked on both of them. They’re not on drugs.” She sounded definite.

This was more than he could swallow. “C’mon, Sameh. I told you I know about kids like this. Those two have done drugs, I guarantee it. They’re probably just coming off some trip right now.”

She looked a little guilty and countered in a small voice, “Maybe in the past they might have, but they’re not on drugs at the moment. I think they might have taken drugs at some point—there’s a slight disruption in their auras—but right now they’re uncontaminated.”

Uncontaminated. Well, whoopee, he’d be sure to mark one down for the good guys.

He just wished to God she didn’t look so appealing. He just wished she had more on than those ridiculous shorts. And he didn’t think she was wearing a bra under the flimsy nylon top. “I can’t turn those two loose alone in my house, Sameh. Surely you can understand that.” He could tell right off the bat that she couldn’t understand. Damn. Why had he ever taken up with such an exasperating woman?

“Well, we can’t just walk away and leave them after they’ve eaten, can we, Adam?”

That was pretty much what he had been hoping to do, but considering the expression of horror on her face, he decided perhaps he’d better revert to plan B. Whatever the hell that was. He thought fast. “Look, I know of shelters where these kids can stay, pretty decent places. I’ll try to locate something for them later.” She didn’t look convinced, but there wasn’t time to say any more because the boys came back just then.

They looked marginally cleaner than before; they’d scrubbed their hands and faces, and Troy had slicked down his wild black hair with water, but both of them still smelled less than pleasant. The air-conditioning helped, but didn’t entirely take away their stale, sweaty odor.

They’d barely slid back into the booth when the food arrived, and Adam couldn’t help but feel upset when he saw the almost frantic way they attacked it. He’d been through plenty of things as a boy, but he’d never been this hungry. Even when he’d run away from one of the schools he was enrolled in, he’d always had enough money to feed himself and rent a place to sleep at night.

The dismal reality of Troy’s and Cougar’s lives—of the life of any of the street kids in L.A.—wasn’t one Adam had dwelled upon. He’d seen these kids around on the streets, he’d even had a close and uncomfortable look at their world during an investigation he and Bernie had once conducted, but after that unpleasant job was over, he’d turned a blind eye to the entire problem of homeless youths. After all, what could he do about it? The problem was enormous, and he had his own life to live.

Now he felt as if his nose was being rubbed in his own indifference, and it wasn’t a pleasant sensation.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

THE FRANTIC SPEED with which the boys shoveled in their first order of food slowed somewhat when the second batch arrived at the table. Troy was forking up his syrup-soaked pancakes with a more relaxed rhythm by the time Cougar laid his fork down, his face whiter than his napkin, and scrambled out of the booth and bolted for the washroom.

“Jeez, he’s sick again.” Troy dropped his fork and started to follow his friend, but Adam put a hand on his shoulder.

“Stay here and finish eating. I’ll go check on him.”

Troy stayed at the table, but he dropped his utensils onto his half-finished food and his shoulders slumped. After a few minutes of silence, he said, “I thought he was all over it. I thought you fixed him.” There was both worry and accusation in his voice and in his eyes when he looked across at Sameh.

She felt a total failure. She reached across to touch his hand, knocking over the container of maple syrup in the process. She piled paper napkins on top of the spreading pool. “I did the best I could to help Cougar, but I’m not very good at healing, Troy,” she said. “I try, but a lot of the time what I do doesn’t work.”

He thought that over and then shrugged. “Yeah, well, I guess it’s not your fault he’s sick, anyways.” It was evident from his tone that he’d learned not to expect anything from adults.

Not her fault, Sameh thought, but her responsibility. “Isn’t there anyone to take care of Cougar? Where are his parents, his relatives?”

He shrugged. “His dad’s dead. His stepfather hated him—he used to beat him up real bad, and his mother didn’t care. They moved away and Cougar doesn’t even know where they went. He gets real low sometimes—he even tried to hang himself once.” His young voice took on a hard edge. “Anyhow, it’s not your problem. We’ll manage okay. We’re tough, Cougar and me.”

Sameh could sense the insecurity and fear that surrounded him, and the intensity of it made her shudder.

When Adam and Cougar finally returned to the table, it was all too evident that Cougar was having a severe recurrence of fever. His face was flushed and his entire body trembled violently. He was unsteady on his feet, and Adam had to support him. “We’d better get this kid to a doctor.” Adam paid the bill, and he and Troy supported Cougar between them as they made their way to the car.

Sameh made a quick call to Delilah, explaining what was happening. Sameh had the feeling that Delilah hardly listened to what she was saying. “Take the rest of the day off,” she said in a distracted tone. “I have an appointment, so I won’t be working on the book today, anyway.” Frowning, Sameh replaced the receiver. Delilah wasn’t her usual self.

She hurried out to the car. Cougar was slumped across Troy’s lap in the back seat. “If we go to Emergency, it’s going to take hours,” Adam growled, glancing at his watch. “There’s a doctor in the building next to Blue Knights we could try. I did some work for his, uh…” He glanced at Sameh and she sensed his uneasiness. “For his nurse.”

Adam seemed to be reconsidering the idea of using the doctor, but finally he looked at his watch again and made an exasperated noise in his throat. “I’ve got a meeting I have to attend in less than an hour, Bernie’s out on a job, and there isn’t time to take this kid anywhere else.” He nosed his way into traffic and headed for Blue Knights. Unfortunately the motion made Cougar sick all over again. He stuck his head out the window and vomited down the side of the car.

Adam pulled into the parking lot behind Blue Knights with a screech of tires. “You and Troy go wait in my office. I’ll take care of Cougar,” he ordered, half lifting Cougar out of the car.

“I’m going with Cougar.” Troy was adamant.

“I’ll come along, too.” Sameh ignored Adam’s objections and followed the others. It was rather like a parade.

As soon as they trailed into the doctor’s office, Sameh knew that the voluptuous blond nurse seated behind the desk had had much more than a business relationship with Adam. Her pretty face flushed bright pink when she first saw him, and her brown eyes widened with pleasure. Her lavish breasts heaved beneath the pristine white uniform.

“Hello, Joyce.” Adam’s voice sounded strained.

“Adam, honey, I’ve tried to call you so many times. Where’ve you been, lover?” Her voice was liquid honey. Smiling a knowing smile, moistening her full lips with the tip of her tongue, she got to her feet a second before she caught sight of Sameh, half-hidden behind the others. Her gaze slid slowly from Sameh’s jogging shoes up to her headband. She looked at Adam, and something in his expression must have alerted her. “Are you together?” There was still a glimmer of hope in her eyes, but when Adam confirmed that they were, and introduced Sameh and the boys, her face became stiff.

For some perverse reason she didn’t understand, Sameh moved to stand beside Adam. She even put a proprietary hand on his arm.

“What seems to be the problem?” Joyce’s welcoming manner had disappeared. She ignored Cougar, slumped in one of the orange plastic chairs, choosing instead to glare at Sameh, obviously hoping against hope that she was terminally ill.

The doctor had just arrived and wasn’t busy yet, so within half an hour, he took Cougar into his office and examined him. His prescription was bed rest, plenty of fluids and a course of high-potency vitamins.

While Adam paid the doctor’s bill and went to buy the vitamins at a nearby drugstore, Sameh and Troy helped Cougar up the steps and into Blue Knights’ offices. “You didn’t say this Hawkins dude was, like, some private detective,” Troy hissed at Sameh when he saw the sign on the door. “That’s almost the same as a cop, y’know. Cougar’s not gonna want to stay here.”

Sameh was losing patience. “Cougar’s too sick to care, Troy, and he’s got to stay somewhere. Now stop complaining and help me get him into the office. It looks as if he might be getting sick to his stomach again.” Janice came hurrying over when they barged in the door, and Sameh explained as best she could what was going on. Janice, completely unperturbed by the boys’ grungy appearance, Sameh’s running gear or the horrified stares of several over-dressed women waiting in the reception area, immediately got Cougar settled on the couch. She made him stretch out full length, and she covered him with an overcoat Adam had forgotten in the closet. Two clients got up and moved as far away as possible, which wasn’t far—the reception area wasn’t large.

Janice gave Troy a ten-dollar bill from her purse and sent him out to get fruit juice. “Get the pure kind, with no sugar,” she ordered. “And buy an extra bottle of vitamin C, as well. This kid needs all the help he can get.”

Sameh helped settle Cougar, filling Janice in on how she’d met Troy in the first place, but the whole time she talked, a part of her was trying to make sense of the intense and puzzling emotions she’d experienced when she realized that Adam and the nurse, Joyce, had been lovers.

It had felt as if a hand were squeezing her heart so she couldn’t breathe. She’d actually experienced intense rage, directed toward the nurse, and an infantile desire to stake some sort of claim to Adam. For an instant, she’d even wanted to use a bolt of energy to wipe the simpering smile off the other woman’s face—a woman she didn’t even know, for Jupiter’s sake, and one she had no reason in the world to dislike.

Slowly it dawned on her that she was jealous.

Jealousy was an emotion she was totally unfamiliar with, and one that she found profoundly disturbing. Her brain and her training told her that jealousy was a neurotic response, signaling dependency and insecurity and a host of other immature emotions that she, as a student Adept, should have overcome and outgrown long before.

But what her brain said and what her heart felt were poles apart.

ADAM HURRIED BACK to the office, aware that he was still unshaven and already late for his nine o’clock meeting with Mrs. St. James and her middle-aged daughter. The mother wanted Blue Knights to investigate the man who wanted to marry her daughter, just in case he wasn’t quite what he appeared to be. They were important clients; Mrs. St. James was from one of Los Angeles’s oldest and richest families. A good word from her would result in lucrative referrals.

Troy was just going in the door when Adam arrived. The boy had a grocery bag in one arm and his tattered backpack in the other. The air-conditioning wasn’t doing well at wafting away the pungent odor both boys gave off. It had obviously hit the fastidious nostrils of the silk-clad women now tapping their elegant sandals with visible impatience. They held lace-edged handkerchiefs to their noses, and they sat as far as they could get from Cougar, who was stretched out on the couch and making soft moaning noises.

Troy plopped down into a seat right beside Mrs. St. James. The glare she shot Adam told him she was on the verge of vacating the premises and taking her daughter with her. Hoping to contain the damage, Adam gave them both what he hoped looked like a welcoming smile. “Good morning, ladies. I’m Adam Hawkins. I spoke to you on the phone.”

He turned to Janice. She and Sameh were bending over Cougar, trying to get several tablets down his throat. He was making ominous gagging sounds. “Janice, would you take Mrs. St. James and—” what the hell was the daughter’s name? “—and her daughter into my office and get them some coffee?”

The women rose quickly to their feet, obviously relieved to be moving anywhere away from the reception area, and Adam tried for the smile again. It felt more like a grimace. “I’ll be along in just a few moments. Thank you for being so patient,” he said, waiting for Janice to move. “Janice?” There was steel in his tone.

Janice got up with obvious reluctance, her miniskirt revealing amazing portions of her bottom. Troy swallowed and averted his eyes. Mrs. St. James raised her eyebrows and sniffed. “On top of everything else, this poor kid’s got a doozy of a stomachache,” Janice announced loudly, giving Adam an accusing look. “I wouldn’t be surprised but what he gets a major case of diarrhea.” Mrs. St. James and daughter sidled toward the door as if this new horror was about to happen right under their refined noses.

Janice was impervious to their discomfort. “Sameh told me what you fed them for breakfast. It’s a wonder both these kids aren’t dead, eating all that heavy food when they’re practically starved. You oughta know better than that, boss.” Without waiting for a response from him, she marched off down the hall, herding the two women ahead of her like a pair of geese.

“Delilah said I could take the day off, Adam. I can stay with the boys.” Sameh was giving him a hopeful, expectant look. It didn’t take a health-care expert to figure out that the couch of Blue Knights’ reception area wasn’t the ideal spot for Cougar to recuperate, and Adam had no time to phone all over the city and find a shelter willing to take Cougar and Troy in right away.

He could rent them a motel room. He imagined the kind of sleazebag place that would even consider two kids like these and rejected the idea. He reviewed his options and found there weren’t many. There was, in fact, just one. He could let them stay at his place, as Sameh had suggested.

Just before he caved in, he gave serious thought to walking out the front door and heading for the nearest bar. The only thing that stopped him was the fact that it was still only ten-fifteen in the morning, and he was pretty sure the bars in the neighborhood didn’t open that early.

“All right, damn it, my place it is. Just until I can figure something else out.” He raked a hand through his hair. “I’ll call a cab.” He took two steps that put him nose-to-nose with Troy and said in a soft voice, “I’m trusting you and Cougar with my house.” My sound system, my water bed, my surfboard, my microwave. My woman. With every ounce of menace he could inject into his tone, he said, “Don’t let me down, will you, Troy?”

“No, sir. Thanks, sir.” Troy all but saluted.

“Oh, thank you, Adam.” Sameh’s eyes were shining. “This is so generous of you. You’re such a nice man.”

Nice, hell. He was a total idiot, Adam fumed, his temper barely under control. But then she skipped over to him, reached up and linked her hands behind his head and drew his face down to hers. She planted a moist kiss right on his lips, her mouth sweet and warm and delicious, and every single one of his reservations fell in a shattered heap at his feet.

God, he’d sign the damn lease on his house over to a street gang if only she thanked him this way every time he was nice.

IT WASN’T EASY TO GET the boys into any sort of shelter. Adam, Janice and Sameh all worked on the problem, making dozens of calls during the next few days, putting their names on countless lists, talking to one sympathetic social worker after another—all without results. The fact was, the number of shelters for street kids was woefully inadequate. The ones that existed were overcrowded, short of staff and seriously underfunded.

A full week passed and they were still living with Adam. Cougar made a miraculous recovery within the first twenty-four hours; just as Janice had suspected, his illness was probably more a combination of malnutrition and an overloaded stomach than an infection.

By the end of the first five days, Adam’s patience was stretched to the limit. As houseguests, the two left a great deal to be desired. Adam drew up a strict list of rules governing cleanliness, laundry and housekeeping chores, but the boys had little or no experience with even the rudiments of family living.

They tried. With well-meant zeal, they ruined four of his printed cotton shirts and three sets of Levi’s by pouring most of a bottle of bleach into the washing machine. They set fire to the stove by trying to broil an entire pound of bacon two inches from the element. The whole house and all Adam’s expensive suits smelled of smoke, and the white ceilings needed to be repainted. As if that wasn’t enough, Adam’s neighbors on either side complained about the music that played full volume from the moment Adam left for work until five minutes before he arrived home in the evening.

He finally wangled them jobs painting an old wreck of a sailboat for a lawyer to whom both he and Bernie had steered business in the past.

They’d been with him fourteen endless days the afternoon he phoned home to announce that a place had been found for both of them at a rehab center they’d visited with Sameh—a place they’d said they’d like to stay.

They could move in the following afternoon, and Adam was all too willing to help them pack and drive them there. Bernie had pulled in favors from friends he’d made as a detective on the LAPD to get the boys accepted at Phoenix Ranch. It was one of the area’s few long-term facilities, acclaimed as the best around, with programs for job training and life skills, and a staff trained to deal with the special problems of street kids.

Cougar sounded ecstatic on the phone, and Adam heard Troy giving a war whoop in the background. But when Adam arrived home a short time later, the house was empty, the boys’ backpacks and all their belongings gone. A quick search showed that Adam’s portable radio-CD player was also missing, along with the contents of his liquor cabinet and a small, elaborately carved knife in a sheath that he’d brought back from Bangkok.

That was all, however. His gold cuff links, his camera, his coin collection and other items of value were untouched. The boys had even washed their breakfast dishes and stacked them carefully in the drainer, the way Adam had taught them.

Adam’s fury and his steady stream of curses gave way to a feeling of utter dejection. He flung himself onto the sofa, stained from the wet bathing suits the boys had left there overnight, and against his will snippets of conversations he’d had with them came back in vivid detail.

They’d asked if, as a detective, he’d ever shot anyone. He’d said no, and Troy remarked casually, “A girl we know got shot. She kept back money from her pimp. She was, like, giving it to her boyfriend for drugs? We saw him do it. Her brains flew everywhere.”

Adam had gone into the bedroom to awaken them the first morning, and found Cougar sleeping on the floor in a tangle of blankets. “The bed’s too soft,” Cougar had grumbled. “Usually I sleep under parked cars and things.”

He’d replaced Troy’s broken glasses with a new set, and later that week he’d bought them each several new sets of clothes—jeans and T-shirts, jackets, socks, underwear, running shoes. They’d eyed the garments with suspicion, afraid to touch them. “What’s with you, man? You gotta want somethin’ major from us. Nobody does somethin’ like this fer nothin’, not for guys like us.”

Troy added in wistful voice, “Except maybe that Sameh. She’s one special lady. She’s your woman, huh, Adam?”

“Yeah, she’s my woman.” It had felt good to say it, even if it wasn’t true.

“I bet if she had kids, she’d hardly ever hit them much at all,” Cougar remarked.

SAMEH CAME WITH HIM that evening, and the next, and the next, to search for the boys. Troy had described for Adam some of the places where he and Cougar “hung out,” and Adam drove slowly through the downtown streets of L.A., watching for them.

Some of the areas he drove through were far too dangerous to even stop in, but wherever possible he parked and he and Sameh walked the streets, asking the young people they met if anyone knew where Cougar and Troy might be. Some of the youngsters they talked to stared at them with resentment and suspicion, refusing to answer their questions, but others seemed willing to talk. They insisted, however, that they hadn’t seen either Cougar or Troy recently.

“If you do, tell them I’m not mad at them. Tell them to call me collect and I’ll come and get them,” Adam repeated over and over. The amazing thing was, he meant every word.

He didn’t tell Sameh that, sick with apprehension, he’d also checked all the hospitals and morgues, as well. Thankfully no young boys matched the descriptions Adam provided.

The third evening, he was driving slowly down a dilapidated side street at dusk, when a car shot past him, swerving as it careered around a corner and disappeared. As he rounded the corner behind it, Adam and Sameh saw a child crouched over a small dog at the side of the road, halfway down the block. Obviously the speeding car had struck the animal and not bothered to stop.

Adam pulled over to the curb, and he and Sameh hurried over to the little girl. She looked about ten, and she was crying so hard she could hardly talk. “…car…hit…Tinker.” She gulped and swiped at her nose with a dirty fist. “Is…he…gonna die?”

The dog was making a terrible noise, agonized cries of extreme pain, and when Adam knelt beside the animal to take a closer look, he knew at once there wasn’t any hope. The little dog was twisted and broken. The sooner the end came, the better.

Sameh touched the child’s dark curly hair and then laid her hand on the dog’s blood-caked fur. She gave Adam an imploring look. “Could you take—” She turned to the child. “What’s your name, love?”

“Mar-Marlene,” the girl gulped.

“Do you live near here?”

The girl nodded. “Right over there.” She pointed to a ramshackle blue house with a wire fence directly across the street.

“Adam, please take Marlene home so she can get her mother or father to come help with her dog. I’ll stay here with Tinker until you get back.”

The child hesitated, crying harder than ever. Sameh smiled at her, a reassuring smile. “I’ll stay right beside Tinker till you come back, I promise,” she said again. “This is my friend Adam. He’ll walk you home.”

It was a good tactic, Adam realized. There was no point in the child seeing the animal draw its last painful breaths, but even though it was a residential neighborhood of sorts, it was rough, and he didn’t like to leave Sameh alone here for even five minutes. But neither did he want to send her into a strange house alone.

“Please, Adam?” Sameh’s voice was filled with both urgency and entreaty.

With Marlene’s hand in his, he headed for the blue house.

THE MOMENT THEY WERE GONE, Sameh closed her eyes and concentrated on drawing energy into her hands. When she felt the familiar tingle, she used a cupping motion over the small dog to ease its pain and begin to repair its injuries. She had to work quickly, because she could see the animal’s life force beginning to fade.

Animals are easy to heal, she remembered her instructor saying. Animals don’t have the same resistance humans have. They understand unconditional love, and they accept what we do for them without qualification or expectation.

Sameh felt quite confident, because the only consistent success she’d ever experienced as a healer was in the practice sessions she’d had with sick animals. For some reason, her insecurities disappeared when her patients weren’t human.

The healing energy flowed effortlessly from her palms. Tinker lay still and silent now, his liquid brown eyes fixed on Sameh.

MARLENE’S MOTHER WAS very pregnant. Adam, worried that she’d fall, took her arm as she hurried down the rickety steps at the front of the house.

“How many times I told you not to step foot outa this house without your big brother, child? Coulda been you that car hit, never mind Tinker.” Her shrill voice was harsh, but she hugged her sobbing daughter to her side as they hurried across the deserted street to Sameh.

It was growing dark, and though it was hard to see clearly, Adam realized that Sameh had lifted the little dog into her lap and was stroking its head. She looked up as they neared, and smiled at them.

At that moment, Marlene broke away from her mother’s grasp and let out a delighted shriek. “Tinker, you’re better!” She bent to catch the small animal as it launched itself out of Sameh’s lap and into Marlene’s arms. “Tinker, good dog, good dog. Look, Momma, he’s not hurt at all.”

“Looks like he ain’t hardly got a scratch, praise the Lord. You come along home now, and let this be a lesson to you,” Marlene’s mother was saying.

There were copious bloodstains on the dog’s fur, and on Sameh’s jeans and shirt, but if the animal had any serious injuries, they didn’t show. Tinker wiggled his ridiculous stump of a tail and gave a short, sharp bark, standing on his hind legs to lick Marlene’s face.

Adam couldn’t move. He stood on the sidewalk, gaping at the dog. He knew he hadn’t been mistaken about the severity of the injuries the animal had sustained. He’d seen the broken bones, the twisted body. The dog had been all but dead.

Slowly, with an ominous feeling in his gut, he turned his head and looked at Sameh.

CHAPTER TWELVE

SAMEH WAS ON HER FEET NOW, dusting off her jeans and smiling at Marlene as the girl picked up the little animal and cradled it in her arms.

“Thank you folks for stopping,” the mother said. “I guess it musta looked lots worse than it really was, thank God. Good night to you now.” She took Marlene’s arm and waddled back across the street.

Adam moved over to Sameh and took hold of her upper arms. He stared at her as if he’d never seen her before. Who was she, what strange powers did she have? Where had she learned them?

When he’d gained control of his voice, he said, “What in bloody blue blazes did you do to that dog, Sameh? It was all but dead. I figured it’d be gone by the time we got back. It looked to me as if its back was broken.”

She looked up at him, radiant. “I just helped him heal himself. Wasn’t it great that it worked, Adam? I used to do it sometimes on the agrofarm with animals, and even with plants.”

Adam’s hands were trembling. He wanted to ask her a million questions, he wanted some simple, logical explanations for— He had to swallow hard against the tightness in his throat. Was healing a little dog classed as a miracle?

With a ragged, wordless exclamation, he drew her into his arms, needing the reassurance of her body, warm and soft against him. He needed the earthiness of Sameh to remind him that she was only a woman, only flesh and blood, a flawed and beautiful and human female person.

Not an angel, or a devil, or a witch.

A woman. A woman he didn’t begin to understand, but one whom he wanted more intensely than he’d ever imagined it was possible to want.

She gave a huge sigh. “I try so hard to use the same techniques on people, Adam, but it just never works the way it’s supposed to.” She sounded tired, forlorn all of a sudden, the euphoria gone from her voice, her body slumping, heavy in his arms, her head resting on his chest. “I’m always petrified when I try to use it on people, scared that it isn’t going to work or that I’ll make the problem worse instead of better. Or even that it’ll work for a little while, like it did with Cougar, and then they’ll get sick again and feel worse off than ever because I gave them false hope.” She shuddered. “That’s truly terrible.”

After a moment, she made a sad sound meant to be a laugh. “And of course when I get scared, then I can’t do it at all. Nothing works right.”

She wound her arms around his neck, pressing herself tightly against him. He was keenly aware of her breasts pressing against his chest, her long thighs molded to him. His body reacted the way it always did to her nearness—with a jolt of intense and painful desire. But he knew that for Sameh, the embrace wasn’t sexual; he was aware that she needed only the simple security of his arms right now.

He held her gently and cradled her head with a hand threaded through her silky curls, aware of the vulnerability of her soft neck under his fingers, and both the lean strength and softness of her warm body.

“I’ve tried all day to use clairvoyance to find out where Cougar and Troy might be, but I can’t see them, Adam.” She sounded frustrated, frantic, angry with herself, all her doubts exposed for him to see. “I should be able to locate them—I have the techniques, but I just don’t have the talent. And what’s the use of knowing how if I can’t make them work?”

Her voice broke in a sob and he felt her hot tears soaking into his thin shirt. He patted her back, at a loss how to comfort her.

She cried for a while and then drew in a shaky breath and wailed, “I’m such a failure, Adam.” She sniffed, and sniffed again. “I’m horribly worried about Cougar and Troy. And I finally had an opportunity today to tell Delilah about my research, about why I’m working for her and the importance of what she’s doing for future generations. It was almost as if she didn’t really hear me, or care. Or maybe she just didn’t believe me, which is even worse. There’s such a cloud of confusion around her I can’t see exactly what’s the matter with her. I only know it has something to do with Tyrone. She won’t talk to me about it, and Violet’s being as hateful as ever. There’s something out-and-out evil about that Violet. I can’t find a single thing about that woman to like, even though, as Kendra would say, she’s just a person like me with problems she’s having trouble working through.”

She sniffled again. “My nose is running. I need a tissue. I never ever have a tissue when I need one. And I have to go to the bathroom. I need a shower, too. I’m filthy, my hands are all sticky from blood, and I smell like dog.”

He hid the relieved smile that her rush of rebellious misery inspired. This was just Sameh, clumsy, lovely, madcap Sameh, tired and sad and worried about everyone, disorganized as hell, beautiful enough to make a man forget his own name. Exhausted, troubled, she was turning to him for support.

God, he wanted to protect her. He wanted to shelter her, keep her safe from her own insecurities, act as a buffer between her and a world that would exploit her innocence and trust.

“Let’s get back to the car,” he said in a gruff voice. “We’ll get out of this neighborhood and find a gas station where you can use the washroom and clean up a bit.” She nodded agreement, swiping at her runny nose with the back of her hand. He slid an arm around her waist, encouraging her to lean on him, adjusting his stride to hers and keeping a wary eye on the darkening streets as they made their way back to the car. He’d had enough excitement for one evening without having to fight off a mugger into the bargain.

When he was once again on familiar ground, he pulled into a service station. Sameh hurried to the rest room. When she got back into the car, Adam started the engine and then paused and looked over at her before he pulled into traffic. It wasn’t all that late, nine-forty on the dashboard clock. “Want something to eat? Or do you want me to take you back to Delilah’s?”

She frowned and shook her head. In a small, tentative voice, she said, “Could we maybe go to your house for a while, Adam?”

He must have looked as astounded as he felt. “Sure,” he managed. “Great. I’d like that.”

She seemed to feel the need to explain. “It’s lonely at Delilah’s. I stay in my room to avoid Violet. I usually work on my notes and research, but tonight I really don’t feel like being alone.” She gave him a troubled look, her forehead puckered with anxiety. “You don’t mind if I come over, just for an hour or so? I should get to bed early—I promised I’d baby-sit Corey and Kate tomorrow night. It’s Frances and Bernie’s anniversary.”

“Come for a year if you want,” he teased, wanting to make her smile. Or better yet, come for a lifetime. The thought flitted through his head, and like a hammer blow, it struck him that he meant it.

He’d never before dreamed of asking a woman to stay with him for any length of time. He’d always been greedy to bed them and then eager to have them get up and go home. He’d often devised elaborate schemes to drive them away and never once missed them when his strategies worked.

In the soft glow of the streetlights, he looked at Sameh, trying to decipher what it was that was different about her from the other women he’d known—besides her refusal to make love with him and her bizarre talent for helping strays and bringing half-dead dogs back to life.

She’d scrubbed her face clean and brushed her hair in the washroom. Her clothes were still grimy, her bare feet in their strappy sandals were downright filthy, and yet she was beautiful, not in the pampered, carefully made-up fashion of the countless women who’d shared his passion over the years, but in a guileless, straightforward way.

It wasn’t just her looks that attracted him, however. It was something else, something he couldn’t quite put his finger on just yet. He’d figure it out in time. For now, there was the simple pleasure of having her with him for another few hours.

Adam reached across to take her hand in his. He gave it a comforting squeeze and rested their linked hands on his jean-covered thigh, humming under his breath and steering with easy assurance in the direction of home.

NOW THAT SHE’D SET the stage, Sameh was nervous. The decision to physically join with Adam had started to take form a long while before now, on a day when she was copying down Delilah’s dictation for a chapter in her new book.

The chapter dealt with time, with living fully and even recklessly in each moment of time without wasting energy in fearful wondering about what was to come. As always, Delilah was drawing from her own rich experiences to illustrate her beliefs. Her willingness to share intimate aspects of her own fascinating life was a large part of the success of her books, and she was describing in detail for her readers a tempestuous love affair she’d had some years before, a love affair with a fascinating diplomat, which had ended with him returning to his wife and children in Russia.

She’d winked at Sameh during one of her vivid descriptions of sexual passion and remarked, “It’s a lucky thing Tyrone never reads any of my books, huh?” She thought for a moment and added with a rueful twist of her mouth, “Or maybe it’s a shame he doesn’t. Maybe a good dose of jealousy would do him good once in a while.”

Sameh hadn’t commented. The relationship between Delilah and Tyrone troubled her, but it wasn’t her role to lecture her employer. After a quiet moment or two, Delilah had sighed and then gone on dictating. “I never regretted that love,” she’d said in a slow, certain voice, “even though it came near to destroying me. As I grow older, I find the only real regrets I have are for the things I didn’t do along the way.”

Her words stuck in Sameh’s brain, and late that night she finally admitted to herself that she understood exactly what Delilah meant. When the time came to return to her own era, would she regret not having explored the physical desire that sparked between her and Adam like electricity?

In her attempts at retrocognition, she’d managed to examine two of her past lives in detail, and she knew that sexual excess had played a major part in the wasting of those lives. In one, she’d been professionally promiscuous. She’d been absolutely zealous about physical joining, and some of the sexual details still made her blush when she recalled them.

So maybe that was why she’d gone overboard in this life in her desire to progress spiritually and avoid such excesses—or could it be that a man hadn’t come along till now to tempt her the way Adam did?

In her own age, because of the extended life spans, there was none of the urgency she sensed here—the feeling that one’s life went all too quickly and one should snatch at happiness when it presented itself. Her own era was more relaxed, she decided. But it wasn’t half as exciting, half as vital as the nineties were. And the longer she stayed here, the more she found herself absorbing the customs and the attitudes, reacting to the tumultuous emotions that swept over her.

And the longer she was around Adam, the more she found herself wanting him. She ached and burned at his casual touches, and during the long nights she fantasized about having him make physical love to her.

Ironically, for the past several weeks he’d stuck with dogged determination to the boundaries she’d drawn for their relationship, while she’d begun to wonder, feeling unreasonably exasperated with him, if he was ever going to really kiss her again. Her damned fantasies were all too vivid because of those wretched retrocognitive memories.

Tonight, all her defenses were down. She was emotionally battered by the disappearance of Troy and Cougar, physically tired from evenings spent searching for them, drained from the effort necessary to revive Tinker, and more than anything she longed for the comfort of Adam’s arms, the sensual oblivion that she knew would come with his lovemaking.

Tonight was the right time to turn fantasy into reality…if only she could get Adam to stop acting like such a perfect gentleman.

THE BEACH HOUSE WAS DARK when they pulled into the driveway, and it was only then that Adam realized how much he’d been hoping for lights, for loud music, for the chaos that would have signalled the return of Troy and Cougar. He was grateful for Sameh’s warm hand, clasped tightly in his, as he climbed the steps and opened the door to an empty house.

The night was windy, the nearby ocean restless. Adam had left windows open, and the small house was cool and welcoming after the heat of the day. He walked over to the desk and turned on a small lamp, and when he looked back at her, Sameh was still standing where he’d left her, just inside the door. She’d slipped off her sandals and was looking down at her feet and frowning.

“I’m dirty, Adam. Do you think I could have a shower?”

“Sure. I’ll find you clean towels.” He hurried down the hall to check on the state of the bathroom, aware that she was padding along close behind him.

The bathroom wasn’t too bad, considering. He stuffed several dirty towels and some underwear into the hamper, used a washcloth to wipe out the sink, and then rummaged through the cupboard for towels, thrusting them at her and making a hasty exit.

Back in the kitchen, he heard the shower start. His graphic mental picture of her standing naked in his shower was delightful, but not very comfortable. It was tough to have her in his bathroom, in his shower. He went to the liquor cabinet, intending to have a quick drink of Scotch to bolster his good intentions, and then remembered it was empty. Feeling sorry for himself, he thought that the damn kids could have at least left him one half-empty bottle for emergencies.

Muttering under his breath, he went into the kitchen and filled the kettle. Maybe Sameh would want tea. He opened the cupboard door and started a rambling search for anything that resembled a tea bag.

The shower stopped after what seemed a long time, and he heard the bathroom door open, then the patter of light footsteps. He turned around. She was standing in the doorway, wrapped in his navy blue towel. Her hair was wet and rumpled, her skin was rosy and a great deal of it was bare, except for the strategic areas the towel almost covered.

Heat flooded over him. He wasn’t used to celibacy, and the past few weeks had put a strain on his self-control. “Are you trying to drive me stark, raving nuts, Sameh?” His voice was harsh, and it took immense effort to stop himself from crossing the area that separated them.

She shook her head, and drops of water flew from her hair and shimmered in the light. “No, Adam.” She met his eyes with her forthright blue gaze. “I’m trying to show you that I’ve changed my mind.” The pink color on her cheekbones intensified. “I’ve decided I want to physically join with you after all.”

At first he wasn’t sure he’d heard her correctly. It took an instant for her words to register, another instant for the towel she dropped to slide in slow motion down her body and hit the floor. Then she was naked for him, and he drank in the sight of the long, supple curves of her body, the lush fullness of her breasts with their pink, rosy-tipped nipples, her narrow waist and taut hips with their nest of golden curls at the notch of her thighs.

He moved toward her slowly, devouring her with his eyes. Her skin was soft and vulnerable when he slid his arms around her rib cage, and a shy smile flitted across her mouth. “I’ve surprised you, Adam.”

She had the most marvelous gift for understatement.

“Sameh,” he breathed, holding her against him, arching her delicious nakedness into the aching hardness of his body. “God, Sameh, you’re beautiful.”

Go slow, he counseled himself despite the sweet, intense pleasure pulsing through his loins. One hand on the back of her head, he tilted it up, and her lips were parted for him by the time his mouth claimed hers. His tongue explored her, and he felt her body quiver as the kiss deepened.

He drew back a little, drunk with sensation, and began nuzzling her jaw, exploring her ears with his tongue, cupping her breasts with his hands. Fierce joy surged in him as he felt her lower body press, and press again, against his erection. He allowed himself to taste her breasts, groaning as the tender nipples hardened and peaked between his lips.

“Put your arms around my neck,” he demanded, his voice thick. She did, and he slid an arm down, his hand cupping and exploring the curves of her bottom and then sliding down to her knees so he could scoop her up and carry her into his bedroom. She gave an exclamation of surprise when he lifted her, and then a small, delighted giggle.

“Don’t fall,” she whispered.

It was dark in the bedroom. He lowered her onto his bed and switched on the small bedside lamp. She lay just as he’d placed her, on her back with her arms spread slightly to either side, her body naked and breathtaking in the warm light. Her legs were slightly parted, one knee raised, and he could see where the tender pink flesh began beneath the golden bush of hair. She was smooth and warm and glorious, relaxed in her nudity, and he was on fire, the hunger he felt for her bordering on savagery. His breathing wasn’t steady, and he knew he was dangerously close to losing all control.

“Adam? I can tell by your colors how much you want me.” Her deep, husky voice resonated in every pore of his body as he shed his clothes, clumsy with the need to hurry. Her eyes were blue stars, shining in the soft light, watching his every move, approving of him as he tossed away socks, shirt, pants, and finally briefs, until at last he sank onto the dark spread, covering her body with his, propping himself on his elbows so as not to crush her, leaning forward and claiming her mouth in a drugging kiss that unleashed a wild and terrible hunger.

Go slow, the practiced lover in him cautioned as his body surged against her softness, dangerously near completion before the act had properly begun. Go slow, make it last, make it good for her.

But for once, technique was forgotten. There was only Sameh and the overwhelming need he felt to brand her as his woman in this most primitive of dances.

SAMEH WAS UNPREPARED for the surge of desire that coiled in her lower belly as she watched him undress. He was a breathtaking male animal, lean and strong and powerful, his chest matted with thick dark hair. She was even less prepared for the delightful heat of his body, the sensual shock of his naked flesh against her own and the primal fierceness of his embrace.

She raised her arms and stroked his shoulders, running her hands over his muscles, glorying in the steely strength under the warm skin. She caressed his sides and tangled her fingers in the thick mat of dark, curling hair that covered his broad chest. She let her hands travel down the length of his back and learn the shape of his narrow, hard buttocks, and exalted in the tremors that rippled through him at her slightest touch. This was a different kind of power.

He groaned and bent his head again, devouring her with his kiss, drawing her into his wildness until her entire body responded, breasts aching, pelvis arching up instinctively to rub against the hardness of his erection. Heat and need spiraled inside her.

He abandoned her mouth and instead closed his lips around her nipple, drawing it into his mouth with a persistent, gentle suction that aroused a frantic craving low in her belly. His hand slid down to touch her wet core, circling and rubbing until she became frantic with desire.

“Sameh.” His voice was raspy and rough. “Sweetheart, open your legs for me. Let me inside you.” It was less entreaty than desperate command, and she obeyed, wrapping her legs around his hips. She whimpered as he entered her. “Am I hurting you?” He paused, and she could feel his entire body tremble with the effort it took him to stop.

She shook her head, unable to put what she was experiencing into spoken words. Instead she reached out with her mind and found his, showing him her pleasure, embracing and caressing him mentally with the same unabashed and total intimacy her body offered him, turning the very essence of her reality free to meld with his soul.

At last she found the center of his passion, and she added her own to the inferno, and it was impossible to tell what portion of the rapture that exploded through them was hers and which was his.

NOTHING COULD HAVE prepared him for the sensations she created in his mind or in his body. The numberless, faceless women Adam had made love to over the years might never have existed, the slate now wiped clean of acts that were only profane echoes of the ecstasy he shared with Sameh.

He couldn’t get enough of her. She grew sleepy after a while, and he turned off the bedside light and shifted her under the bedclothes, sliding the sheet up over her shoulders, her body still cradled in his arms.

Throughout the long night, he held her close, dipping in and out of sleep, loath to waste a single moment in oblivion. Again and again he grew hard and woke her, whispering the sweet and raunchy phrases of lovemaking, teaching her what her body was capable of, finding out what things delighted her, learning as never before the full extent of what was possible between man and woman.

Toward morning he fell into a deep and dreamless sleep.

He woke at seven, reaching out for Sameh and finding himself alone in the bed. A sound from the kitchen told him where she was, and he got up and pulled on a pair of jeans. She’d already showered, and she was wrapped in his white terry robe, her face shiny and feet bare, crouching in front of the open fridge and swiping with a paper towel at an egg she’d dropped on the floor. A trace of smoke and the acrid smell of burned toast still hung in the air, although she’d opened both windows and the sliding door to the deck. Water dripped off the counter and onto the floor beside the coffeemaker, and steam was pouring out of the top.

She looked up at him. Her cheeks flamed when she met his eyes. She stood up and dumped the towel and the eggshell into the sink, and in the process banged her elbow on the open door of the fridge. She rubbed at it absently, and the smile she gave him was shy. “Good morning, Adam. I’m making you breakfast. I’m afraid the toaster stuck down, but I think I’ve fixed it. How exactly do you work that coffee machine? I think there’s something wrong with it—the water spilled all over the counter.”

He looked at her as she wrecked his kitchen with the very best of intentions, and like a fist in the gut, the realization hit him. He was in love with her. He’d been in love with her for some time already without recognizing it. It hadn’t dawned on him because in his entire adult life he’d never thought of a woman in terms of love.

He’d had countless arguments with Bernie on the subject, insisting that love was simply a euphemism for sex. But he’d fallen in love with Sameh before sex, without sex, when she was intent on being just his friend, long before she’d changed her mind.

And now that last night had happened, he wanted her here, in his house, in his bed, not just for a day, or a year, or ten years. He wanted her for always. For the first time in his entire life, the concept of marriage made perfect sense to him.

“Would you like a glass of juice, Adam?” Before he could answer, a pitcher of orange juice sitting on the table tipped to the side and filled a glass that had floated effortlessly off the shelf and over to the table. It then sailed across the kitchen toward him without spilling a drop, and in a reflex action he reached out and grabbed it. Sameh hadn’t moved.

She grinned at his openmouthed astonishment and gave him an exaggerated wink. “I’m not good at coffee and toast, but I can do orange juice pretty well. This morning, anyway.”

He recognized her action as a playful gesture, but it hit him with all the ferocious impact of a runaway freight train. Here he was thinking marriage with a woman who couldn’t make toast but could use her mind in ways he didn’t begin to comprehend. If she was to be believed—and he realized he was coming closer to believing her every single minute he was around her—she’d been born hundreds of years after he must inevitably have died.

She insisted she had to return to her own time. She’d told him that marriage wasn’t part of her vocabulary. Out of all the hundreds of women he might have chosen to love, it was a real joke he had to choose the one woman who was absolutely unattainable.

The trouble was, he didn’t find it even remotely amusing.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

“BERNIE, WHEN YOU WERE with the LAPD, did you ever use psychics to help with murder investigations?”

Adam had dropped Sameh off at Delilah’s half an hour before. On the drive to the office, he’d tried to apply some rational thinking to the whole issue of Sameh and the abilities she had. He needed to figure out whether there were other people who could do what she did. For all he knew, her talents weren’t so strange after all. And if that were so, maybe his earlier ideas about her delusions as to where she was from and where she was heading back to were right.

It would be such a relief to know that she was just a little wacky. A person with mental problems could be helped these days. He’d get the best shrinks in the business for her, he’d… Damn it to hell, he didn’t know what to do.

The trouble was, he no longer really believed his own rationale about Sameh’s mental instability, and he found that trying to be objective about her was hopeless. He needed help with this whole mess, and the only person he trusted enough to talk to about it was Bernie.

As usual, when Adam walked into his partner’s office, Bernie was focused on his computer screen. Adam could tell by his distracted tone of voice that he wasn’t really listening. “Bern? I said, did you ever—”

“Yeah, I heard. Psychics, you were asking about? Yeah, there was one guy we called in on a homicide. San Diego PD used him a couple of times, too. Mezzner, I think his name was. Weird dude.” Bernie sat back in his chair, eyes still on the screen. “Say, Hawk, remember those women I told you about, the old ones who got duped on investment schemes? I’ve been watching the daily occurrence log, and I think maybe two more cases have surfaced. If I’m right, that makes five now, and if five old ladies have given some lowlife their money thinking he’s investing it for them, there’s no telling how many more are out there. I’m tellin’ you, Hawk, this investment thing is well organized. I talked to a guy I used to know, a detective from fraud. He’s interested but so far he’s got zilch to go on. I still say it’s too bad we can’t—”

Adam walked over and pulled the plug on Bernie’s computer.

“Jeez, Hawk, what the hell are you doing? I could lose a whole file that way….” He scowled at Adam and then really looked at him. In a much quieter tone, he said, “Okay, so what’s going down?”

“I need to talk to you.”

Bernie swung his feet up onto the desk and reached for the ever-present coffee mug. “So talk. I’m listening.”

“It’s about Sameh.”

Bernie nodded. “I kinda figured. You’re in over your head on this one, and you want me to put in a good word for you, right?”

“I don’t remember needing you to do my talking for me, Bern.”

“I don’t remember you being this touchy about a lady before.” Bernie dropped his bantering tone. “You serious about her, Hawk?”

Adam swallowed. “Deadly.”

Bernie whistled. “I take back everything I ever said about you having dubious taste in women. Sameh’s the best.”

“Yeah, I know it,” Adam agreed. “There’s a couple of problems, though.” He took a deep breath, and starting from the beginning, he told Bernie the whole story, detailing the list of things he’d watched her do that in the retelling sounded bizarre. He even scrapped his pride and described the bolt that had hit him in the balls the first time he tried to make a serious pass.

Bernie, God rot his hide, grinned all over his face at that one.

Before Adam was even half-finished, though, he started to wonder if Bernie would suggest he take a mental health leave of absence. He knew for sure that if the shoe was on the other foot, he’d be concerned about his partner’s sanity.

When he finally finished, Bernie didn’t say anything for a long time. He swirled his cold coffee around in the mug, sighed deeply and then said, “I’m inclined to believe her, Hawk. About where she came from and all that.”

Cold fear settled in Adam’s stomach. “You’re putting me on.”

Bernie shook his head. “I know it sounds crazy. Fran and I have talked it over, and there’s something about Sameh that isn’t like anything we’ve ever come across before. She’s helping Corey, you know. Or rather, she’s teaching Fran how to help him. It could be the therapy kicking in, but I don’t think so. It’s only been happening since Sameh came into the picture.”

Bernie’s whole face reflected his feelings. “God, Hawk, it’s good to see. Corey’s slowly losing some of the stiffness in his legs—they’re not scissored as badly, and he can reach for toys now and hold onto them. It’s like a miracle. But what I’m most grateful for is the difference in Fran. She’s happy again. She’s even started painting, and it’s entirely due to Sameh.” His voice grew gentle, tender, as it always did when he talked about Frances. “So I guess hearing about this other stuff doesn’t really surprise me all that much.”

He gave Adam a level look. “It shouldn’t surprise you, either. Remember the investigation we did on her, how there was no trace anywhere of her existing before April of this year? You know as well as I do that every single person in the Western world leaves a paper trail of some kind. I’ve never, in all my years as a cop or as an investigator, come across someone without a past. Except Sameh.”

Adam hadn’t, either, but he was grasping at straws. He had to. There was too much at stake here. “But this guy you told me about, this Mezzner, he could do things that were pretty peculiar, too, right? So maybe Sameh’s just a person who has exceptional psychic powers. Maybe that’s enough to make her more than a little strange, make her think maybe she’s from another time and place.” He thought about the orange juice floating toward him through the air that morning and shuddered. “God knows, it would drive me bonkers in one hell of a hurry, being able to do things like that.”

Bernie shook his head. “She’s not like Mezzner at all. She’s not like anybody. She’s unique.”

Adam closed his eyes and massaged his brow. He was getting a headache. Maybe both of them had lived too long in a city where make-believe was the major industry.

Bernie brought his feet to the floor and stood up, jamming his hands into his pockets, his forehead creased in a frown. “There’s something about Sameh, a sense that you get when you’re with her, a feeling in your chest that your’re dealing with an exceptional human being. It’s nothing you could take to court. But what you’ve just told me, about her coming here from a different time, makes one hell of a lot of sense. It explains all the things you and I couldn’t figure out about her right from the beginning.”

“C’mon, Bern.” Adam felt desperate. “We’re talking time travel here, damn it. You know as well as I do that there’s no such thing.”

Bernie gave him a pitying look. “What do you figure my grandfather would have said if somebody tried to explain computers to him?”

Bernie’s intercom buzzed, and Janice’s voice said, “Playtime’s over, boys. Ms. Roberts is here to see Adam, and an insurance adjustor named Howard Wart—can I possibly have heard that right?—is on line two for Bernie.”

The partners looked at one another.

“So how long you figure she’s here for, Hawk?”

Adam shook his head. “God knows.”

“Any chance you can talk her into staying?”

“I intend to try.” There was steely determination in Adam’s voice. “I intend to succeed.”

“Well, I’ve never known a woman yet who could say no to you, Hawk.” Bernie meant to be encouraging, but Adam already knew that Sameh was the exception to any rule that might exist on that score. “She’s baby-sitting for us tonight, so you could maybe drop over and start convincing her your intentions are honorable,” Bernie suggested with a wink.

Adam made an attempt at a grin. “I’m way ahead of you. I thought I’d come and give her a hand putting the kids to bed. And by the way, happy anniversary, partner.” He clapped Bernie on the shoulder. “You’re a lucky man, married to the woman you love.” He hadn’t really understood how truly lucky Bernie was until today.

“Thanks, Hawk. Let me know if there’s anything I can do.”

“Yeah, Bern.” For the life of him, Adam couldn’t think of one single thing anyone could do in this case. On second thought, maybe one. “A prayer or two might be good, if you’ve got any talents along those lines,” he suggested. He wasn’t joking at all.

Bernie nodded, as if the request was perfectly normal. “Sure. They know me up there. Ever since Corey.”

DELILAH STARED into the bathroom mirror and wondered if perhaps she was having some sort of emotional breakdown. The magazines were full of articles about women in menopause. Maybe this depression she was struggling with was simply a result of her age.

Over the past weeks, Delilah had begun to fear that Tyrone’s interest in her was slipping away, that the love he’d insisted was eternal might be all too temporary, and it was making her crazy.

When she was young, she’d have asserted that a fifty-six-year-old woman made herself look ridiculous and vulnerable by falling so hopelessly in love with a younger man. But when she was young, it was inconceivable that she’d ever really be fifty-six. Tyrone was forty-nine, seven years her junior. Until now, Delilah’s heart had insisted that age was irrelevant between two people who loved each other.

But Tyrone had just left for Las Vegas, and he hadn’t even bothered to ask Delilah if she wanted to go along. He’d made the excuse that he knew she had to stay home and work.

He’d made several similar trips without her in the past six weeks, and she was miserable because of it. She was far too wise, however, to allow any hint of her real feelings to show as she kissed him goodbye. She was still a wonderful actress.

“I’ll call when I can,” he promised, climbing into the shiny blue Cadillac she’d encouraged him to buy a short time ago. Violet was at the wheel; she’d offered to drive him to the airport.

Delilah was fairly certain he wouldn’t call. He hadn’t bothered to phone her the other times he’d been gone.

“Have fun, darling.” Waving and smiling, she watched the sleek car pull away, and the knot in her chest drew tighter, almost choking her. Feeling bone tired and miserable, she turned and walked back into the house and into the nearest bathroom to repair the damage that the tears trickling down her cheeks were doing to her makeup.

She knew that Sameh was waiting for her in the office, and Delilah really did have to work hard today. The deadline on her new book had come and gone, and she wasn’t anywhere near finished. They’d given her an extension, of course, but it bothered her to have to ask for one. Till now, she’d prided herself on always being professional and prompt with her editors.

The problem was, she couldn’t concentrate on her work the way she needed to. Little things kept bothering her, like the phone call she’d had from Mary Margaret Baker several days before. Mary Margaret wasn’t a friend, really. She was more of an acquaintance, which had made it all the more shocking when she’d been almost rude to Delilah, upset over some investment she’d made through Tyrone. Of course he’d handled the whole thing as soon as Delilah told him about the call, but it was upsetting all the same.

She kept thinking about Tyrone. She’d meditated, tried to tell herself that she had no proof of anything amiss between them, that she was being paranoid. All she had to go on was this strong, sick feeling that something in her life was deteriorating. And she’d had dreams warning her that a traumatic event was on the horizon.

Delilah was a woman who’d long ago learned to trust in feelings and dreams, but now she was trying her best to ignore the warnings. With an expert hand, she repaired her makeup and made her way into the office.

Sameh was seated at the computer, working on revisions Delilah had made in the past several chapters. She looked up when Delilah came into the room. Her smile was dazzling. “Hello, Delilah. Isn’t it a lovely morning?”

Delilah looked at her and made an effort to smile back, but it was difficult. She’d always considered her employees as friends. She’d always trusted the people she hired, but lately this, too, was becoming more and more difficult.

The problems had begun early in the spring, when Loretta had died and she’d hired Sameh to take her place. Violet, who’d been Delilah’s good right hand for six years, had developed an instant and intense dislike for the younger woman.

At first, Delilah had put Violet’s animosity down to a touch of jealousy. Sameh was like a breath of fresh air in the household, and Delilah hadn’t tried to hide her affection and respect for her young secretary. They shared an interest in New Age thinking, and Sameh’s insights had impressed Delilah. All summer long, she’d assured herself that things would work out between her housekeeper and her secretary, given time.

But things hadn’t. From the very beginning, Violet had insisted that there was something sinister about Sameh, that she wasn’t what she seemed to be, that she was flirting with Tyrone when Delilah wasn’t around, an accusation Delilah considered both mean and absurd. She’d laughed it off the first few times Violet had mentioned it, and eventually she’d forbidden Violet to ever say such a thing again. Lately, however, drowning in her insecurities during the black night hours when she couldn’t sleep, Delilah had begun to wonder if perhaps Violet had been close to the truth after all.

Sameh had told Delilah an incredible story about coming to work for her because Delilah would have a major effect on future generations, about Sameh herself being from that future time and coming back here because of Delilah. It was a flattering idea. Every writer dreamed that what she wrote would be immortal. But to a woman racked by insecurities, beginning to feel old, afraid that her last opportunity for happiness was disappearing, it also sounded too good to be true.

Sameh was beautiful, charming…young. She attracted men effortlessly. Delilah had watched in amusement as first her pool man and then her gardener, one young, one well into middle age, found flimsy excuses to seek Sameh out whenever they were around.

Adam Hawkins, too, seemed to have fallen hard for Sameh, and Adam had a well-known reputation for being unattainable. Wasn’t it ridiculous, Delilah told herself in absolute fevers of jealousy, to think that Tyrone alone was immune to Sameh’s beauty?

In the light of day, Delilah hated herself for her suspicions. But each time she passed a mirror and caught sight of her aging face, she was reminded again of the inevitable contrast between her and her youthful secretary.

It made her bad-tempered. She hated herself for being petty and mean, for losing sight of all the spiritual truths she emphasized in her books. She must keep in mind that the body was simply an envelope that everyone had to leave behind at some point, that spiritual growth was the only wealth that one could take away from the world.

The fact was, the more insecure she became about Tyrone, the less comfort she found in those beliefs. She wanted to be loved now, and in the years that were left of her life. She wanted this one man to be blind to her wrinkles and loosening flesh—or else, impossible as it seemed, to love her because of them.

Sameh’s beautiful, deep voice interrupted her thoughts. “Delilah, if you have a few moments, there are some things I need to talk about with you.”

Delilah knew Sameh hadn’t come home the night before. She’d undoubtedly spent the night in Adam Hawkins’s arms—while Delilah lay awake, listening to Tyrone’s snores, longing to awaken him and too afraid he’d reject her if she did. How long had it been since she and Tyrone had last made love? Delilah wondered.

“I’d like to confide in you, Delilah, and ask your advice, if you don’t mind?”

Delilah looked at Sameh, noticing the tiny bruise on her throat, the flush on her cheeks that could have come from a man’s unshaven face rubbing there, the unmistakable bloom of youth and love that glowed in her eyes, her smile, her unlined skin. Anguish and a terrible jealousy washed over her in a tide of bitterness and fear.

Tyrone was the last man she’d ever love. She’d wanted to grow old with him, to share with him the twilight years of her life. She couldn’t bear to hear the details of Sameh’s young and passionate romance. “I’m behind on this book, you know that,” she snapped. “I really don’t have the time or patience to indulge in idle chitchat with you.”

Sameh looked stricken, like a child who’d been slapped for no reason at all. Her eyes grew wide and darkened with unshed tears. She gulped and then turned to the computer.

Feeling like the worst sort of bitch, utterly miserable and yet unable to behave any other way, Delilah began to dictate in a hard, raspy voice she barely recognized as her own.

SAMEH DESCRIBED the painful scene to Adam that evening. They were sitting in the Methots’ kitchen. The floor and all the surfaces were littered with toys, and the children’s supper dishes were scattered over the table and the counters. Corey and Kate had been fed, bathed, played with, sung to, read to, given glasses of water and bottles of juice, kissed, hugged, rocked and thoroughly enjoyed by both Sameh and Adam. Now they were finally asleep.

“Tyrone deliberately uses Delilah’s generosity. He manipulated her into buying the car he wanted, and when he left, Delilah’s eyes were red. I knew she’d been crying….”

Adam had called in the afternoon to say that he was coming over to Bernie’s to help her baby-sit, and this was the first chance Sameh had had to say more to him than things like please dry Kate off while I diaper Corey. But just being with him, being able to share the love they both felt for these children, had filled her with contentment.

“I’m certain Delilah wanted to go with him, you know, but he didn’t ask her. And somehow I don’t even think he was going to Las Vegas. He’s hiding something and I can’t see what it is. I never can with Tyrone, or Violet, either.”

Adam, on the other hand, wasn’t hiding a thing. When their eyes met, Sameh knew that the memories of their lovemaking the previous night were every bit as vivid for him as they were for her, and she felt suddenly shy. His green eyes glittered when they looked at her, and she knew the desire he felt for her was even stronger than before.

She’d wondered all day what it would be like to face him. She’d gone over and over the night they’d spent together, trying to come to terms with a part of herself that she hadn’t known existed until she met Adam, a wild and untamed side of her that seemed foreign to her everyday self, and yet totally right and proper in Adam’s arms.

“Delilah is very much in love with Tyrone. She wants a close relationship with him….”

Sameh wanted that, too, but was it the same for Adam? Had the passion they’d shared been unique for him, the way it had been for Sameh? She’d sensed that, at some point the night before, Adam had crossed a barrier with her that was new for him too, that he’d held nothing back, either with his mind or with his body. He’d given himself totally, as she had. She sensed, as well, that his mistrust of her was gone, that for the first time since they’d met, he accepted her for who and what she really was—a visitor to his time and place. That new trust promised a closeness that hadn’t been possible before now.

Why, then, when they were alone and there was finally time to really talk with him, was she chattering on about Delilah and Tyrone instead of discussing this splendid thing that was happening between them? Why wasn’t she telling him that she’d fallen in love with him—a completely different situation than loving her fellow humans in the way the disciplines instructed. Distracted, she got up and took some of the dishes over to the sink, bringing the dishrag back to wipe the table.

She couldn’t bring up the important things because she was afraid, she realized. She was frightened of the magnitude of her feelings for him. She had to go back soon, and she didn’t want to face the inevitable ending of their relationship, didn’t even want to contemplate it. Agitated, she began to pick up the toys and stack them on the shelves in the corner and in the toybox.

God help her, more than anything she wanted to stay here in the nineties, live with this man, lie in his arms every night, have a child with him, even grow old long before she would ever age in her own environment, if it meant growing old with him. She wanted to share life and death and rebirth and everything that was or ever would be with Adam Hawkins.

She craved all those things with an intensity she’d seldom felt before. And she knew every single thing she craved was impossible, so she jabbered on and on, wanting to postpone the declaration she could clearly see forming in his mind, the declaration and the question she knew she’d have to refuse.

“In my time, mind contact makes everything so much easier between two people. Each can see clearly, instantly, what the other truly feels about issues.” Here she was talking about her world, when it was his that beckoned her with a power she knew she’d have to withstand, even though it tore her heart in pieces. “I suppose it could seem boring, such intimate contact, but in truth it’s very comforting.”

Adam sat, arms folded across his chest, green eyes narrowed on her, and listened with that silent intentness that had so intimidated her when she’d first met him. Now, his silence didn’t bother her at all. She knew that behind that intimidating silence was the man she loved.

“Delilah reminds me sometimes of Great-Grandmother Kendra, you know,” she babbled. “Both of them seem so strong, and yet they both are emotionally dependent on the person they love.” Her own words haunted her, because for the first time, she fully understood the extent of a woman’s love for her man. “I miss Great-Grandmother. I miss the peace of our era. The turbulence, the constant unrest of your nineties is disturbing. I get homesick.”

Without him, that peace was meaningless, but she couldn’t tell him so. She had to keep talking, keep her mind distracted, search for something about her own era that made going back seem even a tiny bit worthwhile.

She refilled the teacups, teleporting them to the table as she wiped up the water she’d sloshed on the counter. Not a single drop of tea spilled as the cups floated across the room, but Sameh didn’t even notice.

“And more than ever, Adam, I want to master the awareness techniques. Being here has taught me how invaluable those disciplines are for personal advancement.” That, at least, was true. She wished to God she’d learned the techniques before she’d come on this research trip. Then there might have been a chance she could’ve persuaded the tutors to let her stay.

She could sense that he was going to interrupt at any minute, that he was going to demand she stay with him. She didn’t want to chance it because she wasn’t sure she’d have the courage to refuse him.

“I think my work with Delilah is nearing completion,” she said in a rush. “So I’ll be going home soon. I’m looking forward to it, although it’s been really interesting observing your culture,” she lied. It felt as if her heart was bleeding. Could a heart bleed from loving?

Going home soon.

Looking forward to it.

Sameh’s words echoed in Adam’s mind, cutting into him the way a dull, slow saw blade would cut into tender flesh, and he lashed out at her because he couldn’t bear the pain and the fear of losing her. “Let me get this straight. You’re telling me that everyone you’ve met here has been a sort of guinea pig to you, is that right, Sameh?” His tone was deceptively mild. He didn’t think he could stand to lose her, but he couldn’t think of a single way to hold her here, either, short of tying her up and locking her in his bedroom for the rest of their natural lives. Come to think of it, that idea had merit.

“I guess we’re really primitive compared to these—whaddya call them again? Oh yeah, these Adept types from your time.”

Her eyes widened and she shook her head no, but he didn’t give her a chance to say anything. Her world didn’t sound like a place he even wanted to visit, let alone live in. He belonged here. He wanted her to belong here as well, but the gap between them had never been more obvious than right now.

“And last night, I guess that was just another part of the whole experiment for you, huh?” He took refuge in anger and sarcasm, wanting to hurt her because of the way he was hurting. “Slumming, making out with the less evolved tribes, I guess you could say. Well, I guess it’s all part of this research thing, right? Were you assigned a paper on the sexual habits of the natives of the nineties?”

“Stop this, Adam. You know what you’re saying isn’t true.” Sameh’s face was ashen and her voice trembled.

“I don’t know any such thing. I don’t know a damned thing about truth, or about you, either, when it comes right down to it. Although what I really don’t get is, with all this advanced learning and these so-called superior powers of yours, how come you can’t do more to help little Corey in there?” He gestured to the room where the baby was sleeping. “Seems to me you could use those abilities of yours for something practical for once, instead of just raising dogs from the dead and making tea.”

Even as the words came out of his mouth, he knew he’d gone too far. He’d deliberately aimed for and hit the place deep inside her that was the most vulnerable.

The anguish on her face was more than he could bear. He was destroying everything he cared about. With a muffled curse at his own cruelty, Adam stood up, knocking over his chair and gathering her into his arms.

She resisted, tears rolling down her cheeks, eyes enormous and filled with betrayal.

“Let me go, Adam.” He couldn’t. He brought his mouth down to hers, trying in his agony to convey an apology in the fashion he best understood. He should have known she’d throw up a block.

The instant his lips touched hers, every muscle in his body went into spasm. Agony ricocheted through his nerve endings, and for several moments he was in danger of passing out. The world spun and turned dark as he fought to retain his balance, and even in the face of oblivion, he welcomed the pain. He deserved it for hurting her the way he’d done.

It lasted what seemed an eternity but in reality was only a matter of seconds. When the spasms stopped, his forehead and clothing were drenched with sweat, and he felt weak and nauseous.

“I’d like you to leave now, please.” Sameh was standing at the sink with her back to him, shoulders hunched forward and hands clasping her upper arms.

“Sameh…Sameh, I’m sorry.” He searched for words to make up for what he’d already said and couldn’t find any that were adequate.

She turned to face him, and the cold aloofness of her expression stopped anything else he might have been about to say. “I think you should leave, Adam. I trusted you. I loved you. I still love you, but whatever there was between us is broken.”

“Sameh, please don’t do this….”

She shook her head, and when he took a step toward her, she held up her hand in silent warning. “It’s best that you go now, Adam. It’s over.”

Finally, he left. He couldn’t figure out what else to do.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

ADAM DIDN’T REMEMBER driving home. He parked the car in his garage and sat in it for a long time before he got out and unlocked the door to the house. The message light on his machine was flashing, and he punched the button with savage impatience and a wild hope in his heart, praying it was Sameh.

The voice was female, but it wasn’t hers. It was tear choked, and he had to listen closely to hear the words.

“This is Vinnie Perkins, Adam. I’m calling to tell you that Myles died about an hour ago. I’ll be at the home if you want to come over and—” Her voice broke, and the tape was silent for several moments. “Sorry. If you want to come over and pick up his things, or just—” she struggled for control “—just say goodbye.”

The message had come in at eight-fifteen, an hour and a half earlier. A coldness that seemed to radiate from his heart spread through Adam as he tried to adjust to the idea of a world without his old friend. He’d known that Myles was getting weaker; the older man hadn’t recognized him again after the Sunday with Sameh. But that knowledge didn’t make the fact of his death any easier to accept.

At last he turned and went back out the door, methodically locking it behind him.

“I WENT IN TO GET HIM ready for bed, and he was gone,” Vinnie said when Adam arrived. “I fed him dinner about six, and he was the same as when you were here last, not making much sense or eating a whole lot, but quiet, and I didn’t think there was anything different about him. I’d have called you if I’d had any idea he was close to dying.” Her kind eyes overflowed, and she blew her nose hard into a tissue.

Adam patted her arm. “Where is he, Vinnie?”

“He’s still up in his room. I wanted to wait until you got here before…”

“Thanks.” It seemed important to say a final goodbye here and now to the man he’d loved. He headed over to the elevator.

On the third floor, tortured voices often called out from one or another of the rooms, but tonight everything was silent as Adam made his way along the corridor to Myles’s door.

The room was softly lit by a bedside lamp. The old man’s body was lying on the bed. Vinnie had closed his eyes, and his face looked remote and infinitely peaceful. One of his gnarled hands was on the sheet beside him and the other was curled on his chest.

Adam walked over and put his hand over Myles’s. He looked down at the face of the man who’d given him so much and asked so little in return. Fighting the aching wound in his chest that made his eyes burn with unshed tears, Adam bent and pressed his lips to Myles’s forehead.

“Goodbye, old friend,” he whispered. For the second time in the space of a few hours, he couldn’t find the proper words to express what he was feeling.

He hoped that wherever he was, Myles understood, anyway.

DOWNSTAIRS, VINNIE was waiting. “Come into the lounge and have a cup of coffee,” she urged, but Adam shook his head.

“Thanks, Vinnie, but I need to be alone.”

She nodded her understanding. “There are some papers for you to sign. Myles arranged everything in great detail when he first arrived, so there isn’t much for you to do. Before you go, though, I want to give you a box he had me keep in our safe for him. When he first came here, he gave it to me and told me that you were to have it. He used to remind me of it whenever he was coherent. It was very important to him that you receive it.”

Hours later, when the moon had disappeared and morning was only a whisper away, Adam took the green steel box Vinnie had given him and used the key to turn the lock. It was full of letters, forty or fifty of them, divided into neat piles and held in place with elastic bands. Adam reached down to pick up one of the bundles and froze when he saw the faded handwriting on the letter at the top of the pile.

It was bold and slanted and feminine.

At summer camps, at boarding schools, all during his childhood, he’d received letters, three or four a week, in this same hand. Adam knew it as well as he knew his own, because it belonged to his mother.

Years before, he’d burned every letter Gina had ever sent him. Seeing her handwriting again was like having a ghost—an unwelcome ghost—walk into the room.

Gina. Why would Gina have written to Myles?

About Adam, probably. She’d likely written to find out how Adam was doing. He’d stopped answering her letters by the time he attended the academy.

He slipped the top envelope out of the elastic band and unfolded the brittle paper.

“Dearest,” it began.

Adam’s heart hammered. He skimmed the letter and let it slip from his fingers. He felt as if he’d been hit by a truck.

It was a love letter, reminiscing about a weekend Gina and Myles had spent together. Hands trembling, Adam checked the date on the envelope. It had been written only days before Gina was murdered.

He flipped through the other envelopes. Every single one was from his mother, addressed to Myles, arranged in what Adam’s stunned brain finally figured out was the order in which they’d arrived. Myles had always been compulsively neat.

Still shaky, he found the bottom one and opened it. He studied the date, calculating in his mind. It must have been written when he was about fourteen, a few months before he’d been enrolled at the academy. With a feeling of foreboding he read the letter.

My dear Myles,

Forgive me for presuming on our past relationship, but you did say if I ever needed help, I could ask you, and I’m afraid that time has come. I’ve spoken to you over the years of my son, Adam. He’s fourteen now, such a fine, handsome boy, but what I’ve been so afraid of has happened. He’s found out about my profession, Myles, and of course he’s angry and hurt. I blame myself for not being brave enough to be honest with him from the beginning, but I always remembered what you said once about boys wanting their mothers to be virgins. I’ve been a coward with my son, and now I’m paying.

“I’ve spoken to you over the years…”

Adam skimmed the rest of the letter, that one phrase echoing in his mind as he read further, skipping from one line to the next.

“Take him under your wing…”

“Needs a strong, trustworthy man in his life…”

“Promise me you’ll never reveal our relationship. It would seem the final betrayal to him, should he ever find out that you and I…”

He dropped the letter back in the box. He was sweating and shaking, and he felt as if he was going to vomit. It was obvious that Myles and Gina had known one another long before Adam entered the academy. It was also obvious they’d known one another sexually over a period of years.

An enormous sense of betrayal rose in him, bitter as bile.

He’d believed—no, goddamn it, he’d known—that Myles’s friendship for him was his and his alone. He’d never dreamed that Gina had had anything to do with Myles’s affection or with the older man’s persistent efforts to make friends with the rebellious, angry young boy he’d been. Now he realized that Gina was the real reason Myles had taken a special interest in him.

His mother had played a far greater role in his life than he’d ever imagined, and the knowledge was galling to him. It felt as if a monstrous trick had been played on him, one which he’d never even suspected.

He got to his feet, spilling the letters onto the floor. His body was stiff and sore. He had to get out of the house, away from the steel box and the truths it contained.

He was still wearing the pants and shirt he’d put on hours earlier when he’d dressed with such care to spend the evening with Sameh. He ripped them off, tugged on jogging shorts and singlet, and tied his running shoes with numb fingers. Feeling as if something ugly was about to explode inside him, he burst out of the house and started running the moment his feet hit the sand.

It was barely dawn, and the beach was still deserted, except for the birds and one old beachcomber. Adam pounded through the sand, on and on, welcoming the pain in his lungs and the heaviness in his legs that eventually forced him to slow down. Sweat dripped from his forehead and into his eyes. Blinking, he swiped at it with his hand, allowing his body to fall into a slower rhythm.

For the first few miles, the running itself occupied his mind. He concentrated on keeping his pace steady, his breathing even, his arms moving rhythmically. But the time came when even running wasn’t enough to stop the thoughts from forming in his brain.

Against his will, he realized that in turning him over to Myles, Gina was caring for him the best way she could. She knew how her son felt about her, she knew how he despised her, and she did the only thing she could: she turned him over to someone she must have implicitly trusted.

She knew, too, that Adam would come to respect Myles. With painful clarity, Adam remembered the ugly words he’d used to graphically illustrate the total lack of respect he felt for Gina. The more exhausted his body became, the more vivid grew the memories of his mother. He remembered that she’d never once tried to defend herself against his rage.

God help him, he’d almost struck her once, the day he confronted her, the day he’d all but begged her to deny the ugly things Morgan had told him. Instead, in a calm voice, Gina had admitted it was all true, and in that moment of awful acknowledgment, he’d wanted to lash out at her.

She must have loved you a great deal, Sameh had once said.

For the first time in his adult life, Adam realized the truth.

Gina had loved him, loved him enough to set him free, to steer him to the one person who would care about him. Myles had cared. He’d illustrated it countless times over the years, and it really didn’t matter whether that caring had originated with Gina or not. What Adam had shared with Myles was a relationship both had cherished.

The sun was beginning to come up and other early-morning joggers plodded past him. Adam was miles from home, walking now, his strength exhausted. Just ahead he saw a wooden pier, and he made his way to the end of it and sat down, legs hanging over the edge of the planks, the rising sun warm on his back.

He looked out at the ocean, salmon colored in the dawn light, and like a long dammed-up torrent, his love for his mother flooded through him, a love he’d denied all his adult life. It was agonizing to think of her, to remember the mother who’d loved him so very much.

He cursed the stupid young boy he’d been, cringing at how much he must have hurt her. Even after her death, he’d denied her, never allowing himself to mourn for her. Now as he sat on the pier, the tears came at last, an outpouring of grief inside him that began to cleanse old wounds, deeply buried but still unhealed.

It was hard to cry. It was something he hadn’t done since boyhood. He cursed as the tears streamed down his face, struggling with shame and embarrassment, glancing around to make certain no one was watching. He fought to control himself, gritting his teeth and trying to stop the flow, but his emotions seemed to have a will of their own, and at last he was forced to allow the sorrow freedom.

When it was over, he stripped off his singlet and used it to blow his nose and mop his wet face. He dropped it into a garbage can near the pier and crouched at the edge of the waves to slosh saltwater over his head and stinging face. Bare chested, feeling drained and light-headed, he slowly made his way back to the house.

He called Janice and told her that Myles was dead and that he was taking a few days off, then disconnected and unplugged both telephones before she could say how sorry she was or put Bernie on the line.

Before Sameh, Adam would have found a woman, a willing but faceless someone to lie with, and used sex as he always had to obliterate the raw, agonizing emotions that swelled within him like the ocean tides. Because of his love for her, Sameh had made that escape impossible. Because of the years he’d spent pretending he didn’t need anyone, he was unable now to go to the woman he loved and ask for forgiveness.

He drove to the nearest store and picked up several bottles of whiskey and then went home, poured himself the first drink, and settled in to read his mother’s letters and do penance for the omissions in his life. He thought of Sameh, and of Myles, and of Gina, and the three were all part of one enormous loss that gaped like a black hole inside him.

Time passed, a day, a night, and Adam found that no matter how much liquor he poured into himself, he couldn’t get drunk. The Scotch burned his stomach, but oblivion eluded him. It even seemed for a while on the second day that his mind grew clearer, the memories sharper and more painful than ever. He finally finished reading the letters, and he slept a little in the afternoon, waking with a start when he heard banging on the door.

He let the racket go on a long time before he finally got up and stumbled over to unlock the door. He was surprised to find it was dusk.

“Hawk, why the hell can’t you answer your damned phone? I’ve been trying to reach you for two bloody days.” Bernie gave him a long, appraising look and his voice gentled. “Sorry about Myles, partner.”

Adam stood looking at him, not saying anything, barring the door with his body.

“Let me in. I need to talk to you. I know you’re in a bad way, how you felt about Myles, but something’s happened that I need your help with. Sameh—”

Adam’s hand closed like a vise around Bernie’s arm. “What’s happened to Sameh?”

“Nothing. Not to Sameh. Jeez, Hawk, let go—you’re crushing the bone to a pulp. It’s not Sameh, it’s Delilah. It seems Tyrone and the dragon lady, Violet Temple, have taken a powder, and Delilah’s gone ballistic. Sameh phoned this afternoon. Delilah won’t hear of calling the cops. She wants you and me to track them down.”

“Come in.” Adam stepped back to let Bernie inside.

Gina’s letters were scattered everywhere. Adam carefully picked them up and folded them into their envelopes, piling them back into the box, taking his time about it and trying to collect his wits.

Bernie watched without comment.

“You want a drink?” Adam motioned to the open bottle on the coffee table.

Bernie shook his head. “I gotta drive home. You got any coffee?”

“I’ll make some.” Adam went into the kitchen and Bernie followed. As he made the coffee, Adam tried to make sense of what Bernie had told him. The only thing that had really registered at first was the fact that Sameh was all right, and the relief he felt was overwhelming.

“You said Tyrone and Violet took off? Together?” He must have heard wrong. Who the hell would want to go anywhere with Violet Temple?

“Looks that way to me. All their personal stuff’s missing. Violet was supposed to be going to the airport to pick up Tyrone—he was in Vegas for a couple of days—but she never came back. Delilah got frantic and called the hospitals and the police, but of course they can’t do anything until somebody’s been missing for twenty-four hours. So then she had Sameh call Blue Knights, and I started checking. I don’t think Tyrone ever was in Vegas—his name doesn’t turn up on any of the flight logs.”

Bernie leaned forward, the excitement of the chase sparkling in his eyes. “And get this, Hawk. Delilah’s made a bunch of long-term investments through Tyrone—mutual funds, life annuities, all big-name companies: California Life, Utah Fire and Casualty, Lone Star Securities. That ring a bell with you?”

Adam whistled. “Investment fraud.”

“Right on. Janice called their offices today and surprise, surprise, they all say there’s no record of any such transactions. A real professional job by the sound of it. Looks to me like old Tyrone’s used forged documents from big life insurance companies, had copies made of their stationery, printed out statements every month, and the whole time he’s squirreled Delilah’s bucks away in his own personal bank account. And now he’s flown the coop with a ton of Delilah’s money.”

“Delilah told you all that?” Adam took two mugs from the stack of unwashed dishes in the sink and rinsed them under the tap.

“Not entirely. I had Sameh check out some stuff in Delilah’s personal accounts. With Delilah’s permission, of course. The old girl’s hysterical, says she doesn’t care about the money. The reason she wants us to find Tyrone is because she’s recommended these investments to quite a few of her friends over the past couple of years and some of them stand to lose a lot of money.”

“Delilah’s no fool. Didn’t she suspect anything?”

Bernie shook his head. “Not till a few weeks ago. A woman phoned Delilah, said she needed the money she’d invested with Tyrone and she’d tried to call the company but they’d never heard of her. She was pretty upset. When Delilah told Tyrone about it, he got in a flap. Delilah checked back a few days later, and the money had somehow miraculously appeared in the old girl’s bank account—a direct deposit.”

“Tyrone got scared.”

“Right. Remember the files I was interested in, the ones on those older women who got swindled by some smooth-talking investment broker?”

Adam nodded, filling the mugs with coffee and handing one to Bernie. “Same M.O.?”

“Thanks.” Bernie took a long gulp. “Same M.O., all right. Same problem with prosecuting, too. Delilah doesn’t want to go through court proceedings. She won’t even talk to the police about Wallace. She’s too ashamed.”

Adam nodded. “The publicity would be tough on her, no question. She’s got reporters who think she’s batty, anyhow, because of the stuff she writes about. They’d have a field day with this.”

“She wants us to keep this whole thing quiet,” Bernie confirmed. “She wants us to find Tyrone and try to get the money back from the women he’s duped. In the meantime, she says she’ll put money into an account to cover their losses, just in case we don’t find lover boy. She’s a decent lady, Delilah.”

The smell of the coffee was making Adam’s stomach churn. He took a gulp and shuddered as the hot liquid hit his stomach, but at least his brain was starting to work. “The part of this I don’t get is Violet Temple,” he said. “Assuming you’re right and Wallace has done a number on Delilah, why the hell would he want to cut Violet in on the deal?”

Bernie looked smug. “I’ve got a hunch it might just be the other way around, Hawk. See, I think it was Temple who was the brains behind this whole thing all along.”

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

ADAM TOOK ANOTHER HIT of caffeine and considered what Bernie had just said. “You think Violet Temple put Tyrone up to this investment scam?” Maybe the coffee was going to help his stomach after all.

Bernie shrugged. “It’s just a hunch, like I said. See, I never figured Tyrone for being a heavyweight in the brain department, did you?”

“Nope.” Adam shook his head. “I figure old Ty got along mainly on good looks and charm. A real smoothy.”

Bernie agreed. “Well, somebody’s got to be masterminding this fraud thing, somebody with more smarts that I ever gave Tyrone credit for. And Violet’s a dark horse. I thought just for the hell of it we’d do a background check on her tomorrow, see what turns up.”

“Good idea.”

Silence fell. Bernie cleared his throat. He was obviously uncomfortable but determined to say what else he had on his mind. “Sameh’d been crying when we got home the other night.”

Adam didn’t reply. When he thought of Sameh crying because of the things he’d said to her, it felt as if a giant hand was squeezing his chest.

“I take it things didn’t work out the way you’d hoped they would between the two of you.”

His jaw clenched, Adam shook his head.

“I talked to her today, and she’s pretty upset. Over this thing with Delilah, of course, but I figure she’s also plenty messed up over you. I told her about Myles dying, and she started crying and asked where you were. I had to say I didn’t know.” He pointed at the trailing cord on the phone. “You might consider hooking in to the world again, Hawk. She’s probably trying to call you.”

Adam ignored the suggestion. Instead he got to his feet, picked up the empty mugs and dumped them into the sink, giving Bernie the silent treatment and hoping to God he’d leave.

His friend didn’t recognize a brush-off, however. “I sure hate seeing her brokenhearted over you, y’know. You’re sure you gave it your best shot, huh?”

Adam shot him a filthy look, and when it didn’t faze Bernie at all, he gave up the pretense of toughness and sagged into a chair. “She won’t call. I ended it in the worst possible way. I was a real jerk, Bern. I was scared to lose her, and so I made it happen sooner than it needed to. I said things I shouldn’t have said, things I knew would hurt her.” He thought about the letters. “I guess I’m an expert from way back at doing that.”

“So go tell her you’re sorry, take her some flowers.”

Adam shook his head. “It’s too late for us. Maybe it was always too late. She’s going back where she came from, but I’m staying here. I get crazy every time I think of her leaving. I couldn’t promise if I saw her I’d be any different than I was the other night. It’s better we end it now.”

Bernie shook his head and looked disgusted. “I hate like hell seeing two of my favorite people screw up like this. But I guess you know what you’re doin’, Hawk.” He gave Adam a narrow-eyed look, then said, “You do, right? Know what you’re doing?” When Adam didn’t answer, Bernie gave a deep sigh, looked at his watch and got to his feet. “Fran’s keeping my dinner hot. I gotta run.” He hesitated, hand on the door. “When is the funeral for Myles?”

“No funeral. Just a memorial service early tomorrow morning at the rest home. Myles hated funerals. He left strict instructions for cremation, no ceremony.” The small smile on Adam’s face was genuine. “Don’t you remember him telling us one night when we were all drinking that he didn’t want his friends getting together for him when he couldn’t have a drink with them?”

Bernie smiled, too. “Yeah, I remember. He was a great guy. I’ll be there in the morning. What time?” Adam told him, and at last Bernie opened the door and stepped outside. “You’re comin’ in tomorrow, right, Hawk? After the memorial? I need you to give me a hand on this Temple thing. Janice is helping but there’s not a hell of a lot to go on.”

“Yeah, I’m coming in.” Going to work was about the last thing he felt like doing, but it wasn’t fair to expect Bernie to carry the whole work load.

Bernie thumped Adam’s arm with his fist. “Hang in there, partner. See you in the morning. With all of our fine minds working on this case, I figure we can haul Tyrone and Violet in by tomorrow afternoon, max.”

BERNIE’S HUNCH ABOUT Violet was dead right, but his optimism about finding her and Wallace wasn’t. By the following afternoon, Blue Knights had a new perspective on Violet Temple, but they were no closer to finding her.

Bernie and Adam were sitting in Bernie’s office, each of them with scraps of paper containing the various bits of information they’d spent the day chasing down. Janice had one hip resting on the computer table, listening. The information they’d unearthed was sketchy, but it told them enough.

On the computer, Bernie had found out that the woman they knew as Violet Temple had been born Beverly Grasmick, in Detroit. She’d married Steve Zowalski, a smalltime criminal who’d been convicted of investment fraud twenty years before. Steve had died in prison, and Beverly had then changed her name to Violet Temple and moved to Los Angeles. From there on, they had to use their imaginations, to fill in the gaps between what they did and didn’t know.

“She was probably involved in all Steve’s scams,” Adam surmised. “For all we know, she was the brains behind them. I’m surprised she didn’t get arrested along with him.”

“Maybe she got scared and decided to go straight for a while after he went to jail. Who knows?” Bernie said. “She had lots of smarts, for sure. She cooked up a whole new identity for herself when she came out here, got references, the whole ball of wax, and eventually she landed a job with Delilah as a bookkeeper.”

Janice nodded. “I think she probably made friends with Loretta, Delilah’s secretary, the one who died last spring? I’ll bet she got Loretta to recommend her to Delilah.”

“And as we know, Delilah didn’t bother checking much on the people she hired. She didn’t check Sameh’s references.” Bernie shot a quick glance at Adam.

“I think Violet made Delilah dependent on her,” Janice went on. “Sounds as if she took over the cooking, the driving. It seems she was pretty much in control of the household. It must have started eating at Violet, the fact that Delilah had so much money, while Violet was doing all that work and only getting wages.”

Bernie took over the story. “So when Tyrone came on the scene, she was ready to try for the brass ring. She musta seen all the possibilities in old Tyrone, and she sure as hell sensed that he wasn’t any too honest.”

Adam glanced down at his notebook. “I found out Tyrone was licensed as a broker years ago, before he tried to break into the movies. I suspect Violet talked him into getting his license renewed.”

“And from there on,” Bernie continued, “it was probably easy to talk him into the whole scam. I figure Violet did all the paperwork, made up the phony statements and stuff, while Tyrone used his charm on the ladies. Delilah knew tons of people. It wasn’t hard to find easy marks besides her.”

Janice nodded. “Then when Delilah hired Sameh, Violet got scared she and Tyrone would be found out, which was why Violet put you on Sameh’s trail in the first place, right?”

“Right,” Bernie confirmed. “Brilliant. We’re all bloody brilliant.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “So where the hell do we go from here? We’ve checked airports, car rentals, trains, even the bus lines. There’s not a trace of either of them.”

FOURTEEN DAYS PASSED. Sameh knew that Blue Knights was putting all its considerable resources behind efforts to locate Tyrone Wallace and Violet Temple, but the two seemed to have vanished into thin air.

And Adam might just as well have gone with them, Sameh reflected. Her stomach recoiled as she carefully spread diet mayo on whole wheat bread and made a sandwich of tomatoes, avocados and cucumbers. She’d felt sick to her stomach ever since the last fight with Adam. She hadn’t seen or heard from him since the night they’d quarreled, but not one full hour had gone by in which she hadn’t thought of him and reviewed in endless detail that last fateful meeting.

She cut the sandwich into tiny triangles and put them on a pretty plate. She was making lunch for Delilah, which was pretty much a wasted effort, because her employer wasn’t eating enough these days to keep a bird alive.

Not that she was herself. Sameh didn’t feel much like eating, either. Besides her concern for Delilah, a tight, hard lump seemed lodged in her chest, a lump that had to do with Adam and the hurtful accusations he’d hurled at her. She understood that he’d been angry and afraid, that he’d lashed out at her as a result of his own frustration, but that understanding didn’t make her heart feel any better.

He’d wanted to hurt her, and he had. He’d seemed determined to sever the connection between them, and he’d succeeded. He’d forced her to take action, to end their relationship, and she’d done what he wanted. She hadn’t seen him since and she was grateful, she told herself. She didn’t think she could handle being in his presence.

But oh, Jupiter, she missed him.

Bernie was the one who phoned and came to the house to go through Tyrone’s and Violet’s rooms in search of any clue to their whereabouts. Tyrone and Violet. Sameh shook her head and poured lemonade into an ice-filled glass.

There, too, she’d been a wretched failure, and she felt disgusted at her own ineptitude. A competent Adept would have been able to thought-read well enough to figure out what was going on with Tyrone and Violet, but all she’d picked up were emotions that any beginning student could sense. She’d felt threatened by them. Besides, she really hadn’t had any training in detecting criminal intentions.

She wiped her wet hands on the hem of her loose shirt and arranged everything on a tray. She’d teleport it to the top of the stairs and then carry it into Delilah’s bedroom, she decided with a sigh. It was ironic how easy teleportation had become since she’d quit worrying or even caring about whether it worked or not.

The heavens knew she had more important things to think about these days than whether or not she could move things from place to place, but she had learned to be careful about teleporting when Stella, the maid, was around. The portly woman had had hysterics last week when Sameh absently moved a heavy couch for her so she could vacuum behind it.

Stella was vacuuming just now in the dining room and the door was shut, so the coast was clear. Without effort, Sameh moved the loaded tray to the top of the stairs. Feeling weary and drained, she retrieved the tray at the top, still thinking and worrying about Delilah. In fact, she’d gone way beyond worrying, she decided as she balanced the tray on one knee and knocked at Delilah’s bedroom door.

Delilah refused to come out of her room these days, and it seemed as though something vital in her had withered and died. She’d canceled all her seminars and abandoned work on her book. She’d refused to speak to anyone after the initial meetings with Bernie, and she spent her days in bed with all the blinds drawn. Her shining cap of coppery hair was dull, and broad streaks of gray were already showing at the roots.

Sameh was very familiar with the connection between mental and physical health. She knew that if Delilah wanted to die, she well might do so. A cold shiver ran down her spine. The thought was terrifying. Sameh just couldn’t allow that to happen.

Quite apart from her own affection for Delilah, losing her at this stage would change the entire course of history; it would set the New Age movement back who knew how long, and above all, it would be such a colossal waste of energy and love and talent.

Delilah was a unique soul.

Sameh had tried repeatedly to tell her employer these things, emphasizing the importance of the role Delilah was playing in the development of the New Age, trying to make her see the larger picture instead of focusing on Tyrone and Violet and their betrayal. It was hopeless, and Sameh understood only too clearly why her efforts didn’t work with Delilah. Reason didn’t work at all on her own confused feelings for Adam, so why should they work with anyone else? Love and reason were opposing forces, she concluded sadly.

“Delilah?” The tray tipped to one side now as she knocked again on the door. “Delilah?” Some of the lemonade spilled, soaking the napkin. At least it hadn’t wet the sandwiches yet. “Delilah? I’ve made you lunch. May I come in?”

When there was still no answer, Sameh struggled with the doorknob. The door was locked from the inside, and suddenly a horrible feeling swept over her, a creeping black cloud that seemed to sift under the door like smoke. There was something very wrong in there, and it was imperative that she get the door open.

Dumping the tray onto the floor with a resounding crash, she closed her eyes and concentrated on the locking mechanism. Panic and fear made the task more difficult, and it took her several minutes to calm herself enough to try again. Even then, five full minutes passed before she heard the snick of the lock. Frantic now, she turned the knob, and the door swung open.

Stella had heard the dishes break when the tray dropped, and she came puffing up the stairs. “What’s goin’ on? What’s the matter up here?” Her round face reflected the fear Sameh was feeling.

The room was dim and the air smelled stale. Sameh’s heart convulsed inside her chest, and terror half choked her as she caught sight of Delilah, sprawled on the pillow-strewn bed, her face stark white against the peach-colored silk sheets. Her eyes were half-open, rolled back in her head so only the whites showed. Her frail body was limp, and Sameh didn’t think she was breathing.

“Oh, she’s dead, she’s dead, oh my Lord,” Stella screamed.

At least six vials of pills were scattered across the satin duvet that covered Delilah. Most of the vials were empty. The brightly lit aura that normally surrounded Delilah was barely discernible. “Go call 911,” Sameh gasped, and Stella ran from the room.

Sameh stared at the still figure on the bed. Delilah would die before help arrived if she didn’t do something. Only once, long ago, Kendra had told her the techniques for spirit recall.

You can’t, Sameh Smith. You’ve never even mastered the basic disciplines. You’re far from being an Adept. Who do you think you are to even contemplate…

There was no one else. She had to try.

She drew in a deep breath and used every ounce of energy in her own body to strengthen Delilah’s aura and with her will sustain the almost invisible life force that might still linger in the older woman. She put her mouth on Delilah’s and she breathed…in…out…in…out. With her mind she searched for the tenuous threads of individuality that hovered over the still form and called them back. And in another corner of her mind, she prayed hard, and at last the emergency team responded to Stella’s frantic call.

The ambulance attendants allowed her to ride with Delilah on the way to Emergency, but after they’d rushed the older woman away and banished Sameh to a waiting room, she was less certain than ever that Delilah would live. Fighting back the fear and hopelessness that weighed her down, Sameh tried to figure out a course of action.

Closing her eyes, she resorted to meditation, and by the time a haggard young doctor touched her shoulder an interminable amount of time later and told her that he thought Delilah would survive, she had the beginnings of an answer. The time had come to take positive steps. She was going to use the contingency techniques she’d been taught before she left home in an all-out effort to contact her tutors. When—she didn’t allow herself to think if—when she managed that, she’d ask them for advice and practical suggestions about what should be done.

The effort it was going to take to explain the all-too-human problems Delilah was experiencing to tutors who’d grown beyond sexual desire and emotions like jealousy, fear, anger and betrayal was daunting, but she really had no choice. The fact that she was enduring every single one of those primitive emotions herself over Adam wasn’t exactly helpful, either. It certainly wasn’t professional. It wouldn’t even be private once she made contact. Whoever received her telepathic message would know all her innermost feelings, because communicating mind to mind allowed for no secrets.

It was going to be hard, having to expose her soul. But there wasn’t a thing she could do about it if she wanted to help Delilah.

WHEN SAMEH’S TELEPATHIC message reached the year 2500, Gamma was the one who received it, and he immediately called an emergency meeting with Alpha and Beta. Over tea, he outlined the situation, feeling a little bit smug about being the one in touch with Sameh. The females usually outmaneuvered as well as outnumbered him, so this was no small coup.

“She’s done well on this trip,” he told them, his pride in Sameh obvious. “Delilah McDonell is going to survive that disturbing suicide attempt that succeeded in the alternate reality the computers found when I was studying the era, but she wouldn’t have if Sameh hadn’t been there.”

They all nodded and sipped their tea.

“The girl actually used techniques she’d only heard about in her rescue attempt. And I gather she’s made gigantic strides in most of the disciplines. She’s much more confident than she was when she left.” He was beaming with pride, a golden light shimmering around him. “Her natural abilities seem to have blossomed on this trip.”

Beta knew him well. “However?” she prompted. “I clearly see a however in all this, so get on with it, Gamma, or we’ll be here into the next century.”

“However,” he continued, grinning at Beta’s good-natured impudence, “we have a slight problem. Sameh’s convinced that Delilah might try suicide again. She’s very much at the mercy of her emotions just now. It has to do with the collapse of an unfortunate liaison that was barely mentioned on the history roms.” He shook his head at the slipshod reporting. “It goes to show how much of what really occurs becomes lost when historians make judgment calls on what or what not to include. This Wallace person, although important to Delilah, seems to be an unevolved soul. In fact, in his nineties incarnation, he sounds like a total jerk.” This term hadn’t been in use for centuries. Sameh had used it to describe Wallace, and Gamma found it very satisfying. Sameh would be a mindmine of information about slang usage when she returned.

“Total jerk?” Alpha looked puzzled and Beta shook her head and rolled her eyes. Gamma cleared his throat and continued.

“Our problem is that Sameh’s due to come back soon, and Delilah isn’t in a good mental state at all. Even the use of psychic surgery for emotional upheaval wasn’t discovered until the early two thousands, you remember, and aura manipulation came even later than that, so Delilah will have to rely on their primitive psychiatry to help her over this trauma.” Gamma frowned at the thought and the other two shook their heads.

“The two people she was closest to have betrayed her, and she’s lost sight of her true purpose in her present lifetime, which, as we know, was to stimulate the world into full acceptance of the New Age.” It was a daunting problem, and they were all silent. Blue mist filled the room as they considered it from all angles.

“Sounds as if the poor woman needs a holiday,” Alpha finally remarked.

Beta snapped her fingers. A rainbow of sparks shot from her aura. “That’s it,” she crowed. “Brilliant, dear Alpha. We’ll bring Delilah here for a holiday. Sameh can travel with her, to ease the shock. Don’t you think that’s a splendid idea, Gamma?”

Gamma thought it over. It wasn’t a bad concept at all. Many of the nineties populace would be far too unevolved to accept a holiday like this one, but Delilah was an exception. Once she snapped out of her depression—and a few good shots of positive energy from the tutors would probably take care of that—she would begin to appreciate the value of the work she was doing back there, because she’d be able to see the end result.

“Well, Gamma?” The other two were giving him the amused looks they always did when he wandered off this way.

“I agree,” he said emphatically. “And we ought to do it quickly, before Delilah gets a chance to try any more destructive behavior. What do you think, Alpha?”

Alpha thought it was the perfect solution—after all, it had almost been her idea in the first place. “Can the techies manage to transport two instead of one, though? You know how clumsy they can be.”

“They’re constantly looking for new challenges,” Beta remarked. “This should occupy them at least for an afternoon. I’ll get a probable schedule from them, and then you’ll contact Sameh and have her standing by for immediate conveyance, right, Gamma?”

Right. It was good. It was all but done. He couldn’t wait to meet the McDonell woman in person. What a stroke of luck for a researcher.

As for Sameh, he’d get in touch with Kendra, and together they’d figure out how best to help her with this Adam Hawkins complication. The fact that the child was so much in love and lust with an old comrade of his, an early and therefore rather savage incarnation of a dear friend he’d shared many lifetimes with, was private and privileged information, and there was no real need to go into details about it with the other tutors. He and Kendra would have to do some deep meditating on how best to solve the problem of Adam Hawkins.

He was inordinately fond of Sameh. He’d been delighted that his former self, in the body of one Bernie Methot, had been around to extend a protective and friendly hand to her back there in the nineties. He felt grateful to old Bernie for his help, and of course he and Kendra would somehow try to repay the favor.

WHEN THE TIME CAME to leave, Sameh found she couldn’t go without saying goodbye to Adam.

The message from Gamma had arrived late in the evening. She and Delilah would be leaving at dawn the next morning; it was the time of day when the barriers were the least formidable. Delilah was asleep in her room, heavily sedated. The private night nurse was with her, and would stay until dawn.

Sameh had finished writing her difficult goodbye letters, to Frances and Bernie, to Corey and Kate, even though they wouldn’t understand, to Troy and Cougar, even though they might not ever receive them, and to Janice.

She tore up three to Adam before she made up her mind. Her heart beating as though it might explode, Sameh phoned for a cab and was soon on her way to the beach house.

On the route to the freeway, the taxi wound through the streets of the city she’d explored with him, the city he loved. All the way out to the beach, she kept wondering if she was making a terrible mistake by going to him. What if he had a woman with him? The idea made her both nauseous and infuriated, but it was certainly possible. She tried, with her inner eye, to see if he was alone, but as so often happened with Adam, her psychic abilities had deserted her.

What if he was alone and still didn’t want anything to do with her? She’d zapped him pretty good the last time she was with him. She planned a formal little goodbye speech that wouldn’t require much of an answer. She wouldn’t go into the house; she just wanted to see him for a moment, she told herself, to carry one last memory of him back to where she was going. Where he wouldn’t be.

What if he wasn’t even home? What if… The cab pulled up outside Adam’s house. A light was on inside. Apprehension made her drop the driver’s fare three times before it finally landed in his outstretched hand. Jupiter, she was nervous. “Would you wait, please?” Her legs trembled so much that she could hardly climb the few steps up to the door. She stumbled at the top and barely regained her balance by grabbing at the doorknob.

She wasn’t sure if Adam heard the noise she made or if he simply opened the door to go out, but suddenly his tall frame filled the opening, the light behind him blinding her to the expression on his face. “Sameh?” His tone resounded with disbelief. “Sameh, what the hell are you doing here?”

“I came to—” She was going to tell him she was leaving in the morning, and say a formal goodbye, but the words wouldn’t come. Instead she looked up at him, and the truth slipped out. “I came to tell you that I love you, Adam Hawkins,” she said, and the words filled her with the most intense pleasure.

“Sameh.” A low groan escaped from his throat, and then his arms were around her and he was lifting her off her feet. She started to say more, to explain why she’d come, but he bent his head and his lips covered hers, smothering her words with a frantic kiss that went on and on, until finally a horn honked behind them. The cabdriver stuck his head out and hollered, “Hey, lady, I hate to interrupt, but are you sure you still want me to wait?” Sameh looked at him, dazed and disoriented. Adam gave him an impatient, dismissive wave and then drew her into the house and shut the door.

“Adam, I—”

“Don’t talk. For God’s sake, don’t talk.” He held her tightly against him and put two fingers across her lips. She could smell his skin, taste its slight saltiness on her lips. She could feel his strong arms trembling as they enfolded her. “Don’t say a single word, Sameh. It’s only when we talk that things get out of whack.” His head dipped, and he claimed her lips again, his kiss hungry and intense.

“Sameh. My darling, beautiful Sameh.” His lips were pressed against her ear. “I love you, you know that. I’m an idiot for hurting you. I’m sorry.”

She nodded against his jaw. She knew. She knew too that she should tell him right now that she was leaving, but she couldn’t bring herself to do it. “Adam?”

He was nuzzling her neck, pressing kisses against the hollow of her throat, whispering his love in broken phrases, holding her as if he never intended to let her out of his embrace again. It broke her heart. Time was slipping away; all the precious moments she had left with him were speeding past.

“Adam, take me to your bed. Please.” With her body, with her soul, with the complex language of physical love that they’d taught each other so well, she would say goodbye.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

ADAM STIRRED just before dawn, still drugged by the warm and delicious aftermath of passion, and in his sleep he reached out to hold Sameh, the way he’d been holding her all night.

She was gone. The pillow beside him was cold. Alarmed, he came fully awake and staggered out of bed to see if she was in the bathroom or the kitchen. The light over the stove was on. A note stood propped against the toaster, and the moment he saw it, he knew.

I have to leave now, Adam. I’m sorry. I hate to go, but there’s too much I haven’t learned yet, and Delilah is coming with me. I’ve explained it all to Bernie in a letter. I’d like Blue Knights to close up her house and care for it until she gets back. If I don’t see you again in this lifetime, know that I love you, and love is eternal.

Yours, for always,
Sameh.

The paper was tearstained.

She’d tried to make him some coffee before she left. The machine was still making gurgling sounds. Grounds were spilled in the sink and the filter wasn’t in properly. Water was dripping out the bottom and trickling slowly down to form a growing puddle on the tile at his feet.

He picked up the note and crumpled it savagely in his fist and threw it hard against the wall, wanting to smash something, to destroy something, because the unbearable pain inside felt as if it was about to destroy him.

TWO MONTHS PASSED. Adam went to work because he couldn’t figure out what else to do to fill the daylight hours, or how to vent the confused mixture of anger and loneliness churning inside him.

Janice and Bernie at first tried to sympathize with him about Sameh, but when he consistently met their stumbling efforts with stony silence, they finally gave up.

Bernie and Frances invited him over repeatedly. He refused, polite and remote. He couldn’t bear to see Corey and Kate, and remember a lovely, clumsy woman singing them lullabies.

Janice asked him for advice on the courses she was taking in criminology. He answered only her direct questions and volunteered nothing more.

The first couple of weeks, he’d gone home and methodically drunk his way into oblivion, but the next morning’s hangover, combined with overwhelming feelings of hopelessness and loss, became more than he could bear, and finally he gave up on liquor.

He tried women next. He phoned a redhead he knew, an obliging, lush widow who liked to cook candlelight dinners and serve sex for dessert. He drank her expensive Scotch and ate his way through beef Wellington and Caesar salad. Sipping cognac as she led the way to her bedroom, he did his best not to think of Sameh. The redhead was naked except for a triangle of thong panty and a filmy bra when he realized he didn’t have an erection, and he wasn’t going to have one anytime soon. He felt as if he was betraying Sameh and everything she’d taught him by even being there, and shame scorched him. He mumbled a string of feeble excuses, pulled on his pants and hurried away.

He didn’t try women again. Instead he joined a gym. He drove to it after work and spent two solid hours training with mindless determination. He drove home, still in his gym gear, and ran along the beach until he was finally exhausted enough to stop, grab a bite and then sleep a few hours.

He’d just arrived back from one of those marathon runs on a stormy Wednesday evening a few weeks before Christmas when the phone rang. He avoided calls now, allowing his machine to pick up and ignoring requests to call back. He listened dispassionately, toweling off sweat as the machine recorded yet another message.

“Adam Hawkins, this is Detective Mike Lopez, San Diego Police Department, Juvenile Division. We have two boys in detention here who insist they know you. Their names are Troy Cavanaugh and Victor Gascon, better known as Cougar. Call me at 555-4600. I’ll be here till ten tonight.”

Troy and Cougar, obviously in trouble. Well, they were on their own. He had no intention of ever getting mixed up with those two delinquents again. He’d taken them in because of Sameh, he reminded himself. He and Bernie had both gone out on a limb to get them into a decent place, and they’d done their vanishing act, leaving him with a whole lot of explaining to do. To hell with them.

Adam went into the bathroom, pulled off his shorts and shirt and stood under the shower spray a long time. He fought against memories, but they flickered through his mind unbidden.

Myles, driving all night to pick him up the third time he’d run away from the academy.

Sameh, exhausted and sweaty, asking him to try just one more street, one more hangout, one more alley, in case the boys were there.

Myles, standing beside Adam’s wheelchair at the veterans’ hospital, telling him he was taking him home.

A letter in Sameh’s handwriting, sent to the office and addressed to Troy and Cougar.

Cursing, Adam roughly dried himself, pulled on sweat-pants, picked up the phone and stabbed in the numbers. “Detective Lopez, this is Adam Hawkins.”

IT TOOK AN HOUR and a half to reach downtown San Diego, another twenty minutes to locate the juvenile detention center where the boys were being held.

“They were picked up for shoplifting, boosting candy bars and bread out of a convenience store,” Lopez told Adam. “If you pay the fine and take responsibility for them, I think the owner’ll waive charges. They didn’t have any weapons or drugs on them, and they’re not members of any gang that we know of. Not yet, anyway,” he added with a tired sigh. “It’s only a matter of time before they get recruited, though, and then they’re headed for big trouble.”

Adam had to visit a bank machine, hand over a substantial amount of cash, and slash his signature across innumerable forms promising God alone knew what before Troy and Cougar were at last released into his custody. They were filthy, their clothing ragged, and they were trying to hide how really frightened they were behind a thin veneer of bravado, but the look in their eyes and their trembling gave them away.

The first thing Troy said after Adam loaded them into the car was “So, man, where’s Sameh? Why didn’t she come with you?”

The blatant need in the boy’s voice struck a raw nerve. Adam didn’t answer. He couldn’t bring himself to talk about Sameh to anyone. He rolled the windows down—the two of them smelled disgusting—and he turned on the car radio and let music fill the silence, all the while telling himself how furious he was at them for putting him through this, how furious he was at himself for letting them do it.

“Are you gonna take us home, Adam? To your house again, I mean.” Cougar’s voice cracked and he cleared his throat. “I mean, like, your portable stereo and all the CDs got stolen, man, and we sold all that booze we took. I lost that knife of yours—we were getting chased by the cops one night and we jumped a fence and it fell outa my pocket. Man, you gotta be nuts to take us home with you again, right?”

“You got it, in spades,” Adam snarled. He deftly negotiated the late-night traffic and took the most likely route to the freeway. “I’m a goddamn certifiable lunatic to have anything to do with you two again. There’s just one thing I want to know, and after that the both of you shut up and stay shut up till we get back.” He spaced the words out. “Why—did—you—run—away? What the hell were you running away from, for God’s sake? You had jobs, a place to stay, the chance at some training. Why did you run?”

Neither boy seemed to have an answer. After a long, charged silence, Troy sighed and leaned forward from the back seat, resting his arms near Adam’s shoulder. “Like, it was just too good, man. We just got scared, ’cause it was way too good.”

Adam thought of Sameh, of the night he’d been so afraid of her leaving him he’d said things he knew would drive her away, and he knew what Troy was talking about. He had to force himself not to think of her. The boys’ presence made it marginally easier. “You guys hungry?”

“We’re starving.”

He pulled off at the next exit and headed for a fast-food outlet.

MORE MONTHS PASSED. Cougar and Troy stayed with Adam during the long interval it took to get them reaccepted at Phoenix Ranch, and during the time they were with him, he found he was finally able to talk about Sameh.

The letter she’d written them had promised he’d explain all about her, and in a halting monologue, waiting for their hoots of derision, he related exactly what she’d told him about herself, where she’d come from and returned to, and why. He found they accepted what he said without a second of doubt.

They asked a lot of questions, intelligent questions that he sometimes had trouble answering, and in their way, they mourned her leaving just as he did, but they didn’t disbelieve any part of her story. Adam remembered his own disbelief and was ashamed.

“You loved her, huh?”

Adam nodded. “I still do. I always will.”

“Well, maybe she’ll come back,” Troy said.

Adam shook his head, but Cougar nodded. “Sure she will. She done it once, she can do it again,” he stated with the perfect faith of the young.

After that, they came to trust him enough to talk about what their lives had been like on the street.

With a casualness that sickened him, they discussed the incest and physical abuse they’d endured before they finally ran from the parents who were supposed to love and protect them. They told stories of their friends on the street, children who chose street prostitution over sexual abuse at home, who became involved with drugs and pimps and murder. They talked about young people who banded together in street families. It was clear to Adam that these “families” of abused, lost children were trying to care for one another with far too few resources to help them.

He thought of his own mother often, and, not for the first time, wondered what influences had made her choose a life of prostitution. He searched his early memories for any mention Gina might have made of her family, of a mother or a father. As far as he could remember, she’d never once mentioned any relative, and he wondered why. What nightmares had she concealed behind the beautiful face, the loving smile she’d always had for him? He wished that she’d lived, because now he knew that they could have been friends as well as mother and son.

And always, day and night, Sameh’s memory stayed with him. Her face was stamped on his inner eye with indelible detail, her voice echoed in his ears, and the remembered sound of her irrepressible giggle brought a sad smile to his lips.

“The hope for the future lies with the children,” she’d repeated so often.

After Troy and Cougar had been safely settled at Phoenix Ranch, Adam found himself cruising the streets of downtown L.A., watching the street kids and wondering what future there could possibly be for them. A few more months passed before he took action.

Celebrity security had made him familiar with many of Hollywood’s influential people. Wrestling with his own distaste for publicity, he began to use his contacts in efforts to raise money for shelters, counselors and training programs that would get more kids like Troy and Cougar off the street. Janice soon became involved; she was the one who named the organization the Samaritan Foundation.

WITHOUT ANY CONSCIOUS effort, an internal clock in Adam’s head kept track of how many days, how many months, and finally, as the seasons came and went and came again, how many years had passed since Sameh had gone away. It was October, and the total was two years, three weeks, four days.

It was Saturday, and he had a benefit to attend that evening. Blue Knights was doing security for a fund-raising dinner. Some of Hollywood’s most famous stars would be there, and a healthy portion of the money raised would go to the Samaritan Foundation. Adam planned to make a short speech on behalf of the foundation, outlining what they’d accomplished in the past few months. Bernie had begun kidding him about needing Blue Knights bodyguards himself, he was becoming so well-known. Adam still hated doing anything of a public nature, but he’d gradually become more at ease in his role as spokesperson for the organization.

He’d shopped for groceries that morning, changed the sheets, washed a couple of loads of clothes, picked up his tux from the cleaners and bought a birthday present for Troy’s sixteenth birthday. He got him a mountain bike, something that Troy had been hinting at for weeks. Adam had promised him a car at the end of the semester if his marks stayed as high as they’d been all year. Both boys already knew how to drive; Adam had taught them himself, getting his first gray hairs in the process.

He liked to get the chores out of the way so that Sunday was clear to spend with Cougar and Troy. He’d bought a sailboat a few months ago, and the three of them were learning how to sail. The boys had filled a huge, empty space in his life, all too often with hair-raising emergencies, but also with laughter and energy and youthful exuberance.

And love. How the hell had he come to love a couple of gawky teens so much, anyhow?

At noon, he made himself a thick ham and cheese sandwich, generously smearing on mayo and mustard, the way he liked it. He took it and a beer out to the deck, looking through the haze to watch the waves licking the shore. A man and woman stood locked together at the edge of the water, his arms crossed on her back, hers twined around his neck. They weren’t kissing, but they looked as if they either just had been or would begin at any moment.

Adam watched for a moment, a nostalgic ache in his throat as he remembered how it had felt to hold Sameh that way. Would it ever go away, this soul-deep, endless longing for her?

He bit into his sandwich and took a slug of beer. It amazed him sometimes to realize he’d been as celibate as a monk since she’d left. It was getting tougher as the months passed, though. He was, after all, not a monk, and he supposed that as time went by, sooner or later he’d find some pretty lady or other who made interesting conversation and make an effort to get to know her. So far, it hadn’t happened.

Not even close. Women still came on to him, the way they always had, but he’d grown adroit at letting them know he wasn’t interested. Now why that should be a challenge to some women, he really had no idea, but it often seemed to work that way. He grinned ruefully and shook his head as he took another slug of beer, thinking of the one particular situation which was getting more and more difficult for him to sidestep.

Bonnie French was one of Hollywood’s new crop of stars, a sensual and intelligent woman, aggressive as hell about her career and, Adam was finding out, aggressive as hell about the men she chose to sleep with. He’d met her through Samaritans. Bonnie had adopted the foundation as her pet charity, which made for wonderful publicity for her and benefited the street kids. Unfortunately she seemed to have decided Adam should show his gratitude for the money she raised by ministering to her in bed.

Up to now, he’d neatly deflected Bonnie’s advances without insulting her—God knew the foundation needed the visibility she provided—but it was getting tougher all the time for him to gracefully slide out of her grasp. The woman was like an octopus or, as Bernie said, maybe more like a barracuda. He glanced at his watch. She was going to be at tonight’s benefit. He’d have to make sure she didn’t get him alone.

He was finishing the last bite of sandwich when the phone rang. It was Bernie. “Everything in place for tonight, Hawk?”

“I called Janice and she’s got everything under control.” Janice was now a full partner in Blue Knights. She was a good investigator—hell, she was better than good, she was exceptional. She kept Bernie and Adam on their toes. The only investigation she hadn’t gotten to first base with was the disappearance of Tyrone Wallace and Violet Temple, but neither had Adam and Bernie. Those two had disappeared without a trace.

“Fran blew the bank account on a new dress for this one, Hawk. Her mother’s gonna baby-sit.”

“Tell the kids hi from me.”

“Will do. See ya about six.”

SAMEH RUBBED HER HIP as she headed for the pay phone.

Before she’d left this time, she’d put the four quarters she’d taken back with her two years before inside her sandal to use for calls when she got here. She leaned against the side of the phone booth, hopping a little as she retrieved them.

She’d probably have a gigantic bruise on her bottom for weeks, the way the techies had landed her this time. For a newly qualified but clumsy Adept, landing in a heap on the sidewalk outside Giorgio’s on Rodeo Drive was demoralizing.

Her simple tunic wasn’t exactly haute couture, and the elegant woman she’d knocked into had screamed and made a terrible fuss, even though Sameh had apologized profusely as soon as she’d come out of delta and realized what had happened.

Passersby gave them both a wide berth for the hectic few moments it took to untangle herself and get to her feet. The woman hadn’t even said thank-you when Sameh teleported all her parcels back into the elegant shopping bag she carried. “Disgusting,” she’d hissed, instead. “Drunk in broad daylight, here of all places. Where are the police when you need them?”

You’d think the techies would get better at landings. Maybe by the time Delilah arrived next year, they’d have learned to do a better job.

Sameh dropped the quarter twice before she finally managed to reach Fran and Bernie’s number and her heart did a mad, skipping dance when Bernie answered. “It’s Sameh” was all she had to say. She gave them her exact location, and within a few ecstatic moments, her friends were on their way to pick her up.

She plopped down on a bench at a bus stop to wait, and she thought about Adam and wondered for the zillionth time what his reaction would be when he found out she was back here in the nineties. She’d spent untold hours before the trip trying to figure out if she should call Adam first when she got here, but shyness and insecurity had stopped her.

She knew he wasn’t married to someone else, she knew he still thought of her, she knew—oh, she knew all sorts of delightful and secret things about Adam. Kendra and Gamma had insisted on checking him out, a rather thorough and invasive mind, body and reincarnational check that was probably as illegal here in the nineties as it was in 2502.

The thought of Kendra and how far away she was brought a lump of homesickness to Sameh’s throat and tears to her eyes. It had been harder than she’d imagined it would be, leaving her great-grandmother, even though Kendra had promised she’d come for a visit when—Sameh’s face flushed. When Sameh got pregnant with her first daughter, Kendra would come. Sameh’s obligatory sterility had been reversed a few days before in a landmark decision by the Fertility Commission, even though they hadn’t interrogated Adam beforehand as they always did with prospective fathers.

Kendra and Gamma had produced all the data they’d collected on Adam, and the commission had accepted it in lieu of a personal interview. Sameh’s case had been the first of its kind, and the romantic aspects had won over even the phlegmatic hearts of the twenty-four female commission members.

She was the first Adept to ever apply for and receive permission to emigrate to the past on a permanent basis. The official reason, of course, was that she was coming back to continue her work with Delilah, to help that lady accelerate the spread of information and awareness in order to facilitate the progress toward the New Age. The Fertility Commission suspected, though, that the main reason she was returning was because she’d fallen in love with an old-fashioned man, and they were right.

Of course, Sameh also planned to teach anyone who wanted to learn all the disciplines she herself had now mastered, like telekinesis, hypnosis and teleportation. And, most important of all, healing. It was the discipline she was most proud of attaining, the one that had been the hardest for her to master, and was now the dearest to her heart. With Gamma’s help, she’d spent the past months researching cerebral palsy, and Kendra had helped her learn the exact techniques she’d use to heal Corey.

She couldn’t wait.

“Sameh, Sameh, is it really you?” The sound of Fran’s jubilant voice brought Sameh to her feet. Bernie had parked illegally in the bus zone, and he and Fran were breathlessly racing toward her. A moment later, engulfed in their arms, their happy tears mingling with her own, Sameh felt all traces of her homesickness disappeared.

She’d come home.

All she needed to make her happiness complete was the man she loved.

HE WAS BACKED FLAT against the green concrete wall of a dressing room backstage. Bonnie’s lavish breasts were all but erupting from the top of her silvery dress, and they were pressed so tightly against his chest he could feel her nipples right through the fabric of his tux.

“You’re sooo strong, Adam. So sexy.” Bonnie French was doing her best to undress him. Her nimble fingers kept tugging at his zipper.

“We’d better get back out front. Aren’t you introducing one of the entertainers, that country singer—” Adam’s breath caught sharply as her other hand cupped him. He groaned, which encouraged her. He finally managed to grab both of her wrists in his hands and he held on for dear life.

Where the hell was his own security company when he needed it? Janice had assured him that every inch of this place was covered by Blue Knights, so where was the muscle—his well-paid muscle, at that—who were supposed to be working backstage?

Bonnie writhed against him. “There’s lots of time, baby.” Her voice was husky, her skin flushed. “I’m a quick study. There’s a couch right over there—wouldn’t we be more comfortable lying down?” She stood on tiptoe and pressed her full lips to his, pushing her tongue between his teeth, demonstrating graphically what she wanted from him.

He could taste lip gloss and booze. He tried to break off the kiss without insulting her, but there was a narrow line there, one he wasn’t sure how to negotiate with her tongue stuck halfway down his throat.

Damn. If she kept this up much longer, he was going to have to tell the lady where to go, and then Samaritan would be looking for another sponsor. On the other hand, months of abstinence were taking their toll, and in spite of himself he could feel his body beginning to respond to the bundle of eager, perfumed, writhing femininity now tugging her skirt up and undulating her shapely hips against his crotch.

He closed his eyes and tried to think of Sameh.

BERNIE AND FRANCES WERE on their way to the benefit when they picked Sameh up at the bus stop. Because of their detour to collect her, they all arrived after the event had already begun.

Bernie had somehow wangled her a seat at the back, and Sameh sat in the darkened theater, tears streaming down her cheeks as she watched and listened as Adam accepted a check and then made a short speech about street kids, a plea so heartfelt and powerful she could see the auras of those around her vibrating in empathy.

She was overwhelmed by the way he looked in his tuxedo. The stark contrast of formal black and white played up his tanned skin, the ruggedness of his features. Most of all, she was aware of the total honesty he projected. Adam had learned to speak and feel from the center of his soul, and she rejoiced.

Love and pride and eagerness to be with him burst inside her like the sudden blooming of a flower. She got up to follow him when the clapping faded and he disappeared backstage. It took her a while to convince the burly guard in the outer hallway to let her follow him up the stairs.

The maze of corridors and dressing rooms up there was confusing, and Sameh had to stop and concentrate now and then, in order to visualize Adam and the route he’d taken, before she arrived at the closed door of the right room. For some reason the door was locked from the inside, but locks were easy.

She shut her eyes and opened the lock.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

“SAMEH?”

Adam’s voice sounded smothered, and no wonder. He seemed to be wearing a voluptuous woman with short-cropped ebony hair and a tight silver dress. The dress was hoisted up past her curvaceous thighs, which in turn were pressed against a part of Adam that Sameh considered her exclusive territory. She turned her head, gave Sameh an insolent stare, and in a cultured voice said, “How did you get in? This happens to be a private party, dear.”

Sameh hadn’t felt such a rush of primitive anger since the last time she’d been in the twentieth century. Without a moment’s hesitation, she used the mental abilities she’d perfected, although perhaps not in the precise manner her tutors had intended.

The woman peeled off Adam as easily as a piece of lint. She floated above the ground, wailing and flailing her arms, and Sameh stepped out of the way as she sailed past her and out the open door. She picked up speed as she traveled down the hall and landed with a satisfying thump and a most uncultured grunt on the uncarpeted floor.

Sameh stuck her head out the door in time to see this latest exercise in teleportation scramble to her feet, shrieking as if all the demons in hell were after her, and make a mad dash for the stairs. Then she moved back into the room, slammed the door shut and locked it.

She turned, in slow motion, to look at Adam.

For a long heartbeat, he stood propped against the wall, unmoving, and stared at her. Then he straightened and came toward her. He made a sound deep in his throat, and at last she was in his arms again.

He held her locked tightly against him with one arm, while with the other hand he stroked her hair, ran his fingers over her face and glided a thumb across her lips. He let his hand slide down her shoulders, tracing her waist, the swell of her hips, as if he thought she was smoke and might disappear at his touch, but he encountered only solid, warm flesh, and at last he let out the breath he’d been holding.

“It’s you. My God, Sameh. Your hair’s longer, but it’s really you.” He put his hands on her waist then and held her away from him, abrupt and a little rough. He stared down into her face, a frown creasing his forehead. “So how long are you here for this time, Sameh Smith?” His voice had become harsh and cold.

She looked up into his green eyes. She was planning to tease him just a little, because of the woman, but when she saw the anguish on his face, the pain in his colors, the very real fear in his eyes, she just couldn’t do it.

“Only for the rest of this lifetime,” she said as casually as she could manage.

He went still, and then with a groan he pulled her into his arms again, crushing her against him until breathing was difficult. Had he become stronger since she last saw him, or had she forgotten how muscular he was? She really didn’t mind being squeezed breathless. It felt better than anything she had experienced since the last time she’d been in his arms.

“You’re going to marry me, then. Damn it all, Sameh. Will you marry me this time?”

There was that same impatience, the same vexation in his gruff tone that she remembered so well. She pretended to think it over. She tipped her head to the side, frowned and considered the question, then shook her head a little against his chest. “Marriage? I don’t know. It’s such an archaic custom, Adam.”

His large body grew still. She saw the temper building by the rosy sparks shooting from his aura, and she had to hide her grin against his chest.

“Listen, Sameh, don’t give me any damned song-and-dance routine right now about our so-called customs, all right? Can’t you, for once, say a simple yes without a lecture about how superior your civilization is?”

“But it’s not an easy question,” she countered, wondering how far she dared go with this before he exploded. On the other hand, the black-haired woman was very attractive, and he hadn’t been fighting for his honor quite as hard as he might have done. “Marriage involves the concepts of equality and trust and mutual sharing, Adam. We really shouldn’t have to have a ceremony to validate those doctrines, should we?”

She tilted her head just enough to look up into his face and decided maybe she’d gone far enough when she saw his expression. “Of course,” she added as if the idea had just struck her, “if we were going to have children, then I might change my mind.” She thought-read the next question before he could articulate it. “And since I had my birth sterilization reversed before I came back this time, you should be aware that babies are a very real possibility.”

It was too soon to tell him just how many babies Kendra had foreseen when she studied their probable reality. The idea of such a large family might be too much for him to adjust to on such short notice. But the state of his lower body, pressed against her, told her he wasn’t considering diapers and applesauce at all at this point. He was obsessed with the procreative process.

His lips found hers, tasting, exploring. His hand moved, cupped her breast, slid around and down and urged her hips closer still to his hard heat. “I’m all for having babies, Sameh,” he murmured against her lips.

She shivered and kissed him back, tasting his essence, her tongue as reckless as his, letting his touch heal the emptiness she’d lived with for so long. She loved this man. She’d left her homeland and Kendra and all that was familiar and dear to her to come back to him.

The kiss deepened.

From far away came a long burst of applause, music, and then voices and the sound of feet hurrying past in the corridor. Someone tried the door. “Hey, all my clothes are in there! Open up.”

Adam ignored it all. He went right on kissing her until at last, as unwilling to end it as he was, Sameh pulled away a little, aware of the increasing ruckus outside the door. She reached up and traced the new lines at the corners of his mouth, beside his eyes. Her beloved. Her good, honest man. They would age together.

“The ceremony’s over, Adam. Bernie and Frances will be looking for me. Bernie said they wouldn’t leave until he knew I was safe with you. And Janice is here—I want to tell her hello. And someone wants in here.”

“I asked you a question and you still haven’t answered me, Sameh. Damn it all, I love you, woman. Will you marry me? Will you live with me and have my children?”

A new, more officious knocking began at the door. “Security here. Open up in there.”

Adam scowled and cursed and then hollered in a savage tone, “Get the hell away from the door, you idiots. Where were you when I needed you, I’d like to know?”

Sameh giggled. She looked up at this irascible, primitive man who loved her and she had a vision.

For a moment, the corridors of time stood open and she saw herself with Adam, together for centuries past, joined for those still ahead, their entwined destinies like a rich mosaic, filled with promise, filled with loving and laughter and tears and pain, with children, and children’s children, before this moment and after it, on and on until the time of her birth in that far off century she’d left for love of him.

“Of course I’ll marry you, Adam.”

She saw eternity and truth. She saw the frailty and the power of human love, and it was good.

ISBN: 978-1-4268-8401-6

NOT QUITE AN ANGEL

Copyright © 1994 by Bobby Hutchinson.

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