Now and Forever (97 page)

The room fell silent. In unison the three of them turned toward the door to find Abigail standing there.

She looked curiously at Emilie and then at Dakota. "You're both the same!"

"Go back to your room, Abby." Dakota couldn't control the fear in her voice.

Emilie turned toward Dakota, eyes blazing with curiosity. "
Dakota?
"

The vibes between the two women were almost painful. Dakota felt as if she'd been hooked up to an IV drip and they were shooting straight adrenaline into her veins.

"'Tis a family name," she managed to say.

Abigail sidled up to Emilie and, to Dakota's horror, that dreamy expression was on her face again. "One day I'm going to—"

"Abby," Dakota said, fear rising. "Go upstairs!"

"Just like you and Dakota did when you came here from the future."

"Oh, my God!" Emilie met Dakota's eyes as the child's words faded away. "You, too?"

Dakota nodded. She had a sudden, fleeting vision of a dinner table many years in the future and of families linked together through time. It vanished as quickly as it had come and she realized Patrick was staring at her.
I'm so sorry. I didn't want you to find out this way.

"Explain, madam," he said, his voice tight. "I have heard much but understand little."

Abigail grabbed the sleeve of his jacket. "They rode in the big red ball, papa. They came from very far away where people fly like birds with silver wings."

Emilie ruffled Abigail's bangs with the easy grace of a woman comfortable with children. "ESP?"

Dakota nodded again. She couldn't find her voice.

"Beggin' your pardon, sir." Cook poked her head into the room. "Supper be ready in two shakes."

"Shepherd's pie?" Abigail asked, forgetting about silver birds for the moment.

"And a fine Indian pudding if you have the appetite, missy." If Cook was curious about what was going on in there, she gave no sign.

"I have to find Lucy!" Abigail cried and raced from the room with Cook close behind.

The tension in the room made Dakota's nerves jangle like bad jazz. There was so much she wanted to ask Emilie, so much Emilie probably wanted to ask her, but all she cared about was Patrick.

"We have to talk," she said to him.

He inclined his head but did not speak.

Emilie looked from one to the other, then rose to her feet and smoothed her skirts. "That shepherd's pie sounded wonderful. Would you mind if I supped with Abigail? I have not eaten since last night at the Inn."

Patrick turned away from her, while Dakota managed a weak smile.

"We'll talk later," Emilie whispered, then left the room.

Patrick waited until the woman's footsteps faded away.

"What is it you wish to talk about?" he asked Dakota, although he knew the answer. Last night he had given her his heart. Today she would give it back to him, torn asunder.

"I think you'd better sit down for this."

"I will stand."

"Trust me, Patrick." She pulled one of the chairs closer. "You'll be glad you listened to me."

#

He was the kind of man who gave orders, not obeyed them. Still, there was something about her tone of voice that made him bow to her wishes. She paced back and forth in front of the fire. Her cheeks were flushed with color.

Do not leave me, madam,
he thought,
for I cannot live this life without you in it.

Dakota stopped dead in her tracks. "What did you say?"

"I did not say a word, madam." Had she managed to hear the thoughts inside his heart? "'Tis obvious you wish to deliver news of an unpleasant nature. It would benefit us both if you did so with no further delay."

"What's happened to you?" she demanded. "Did I imagine last night? I must have, because I seem to be the only one in the room who remembers what happened between us."

"I remember, madam," he said, his voice deadly calm. "I am reminded of it each time you speak of returning home. What we shared was a thing apart."

Dakota waited for him to say more, to declare his undying love, his eternal devotion, his unbridled passion, but he refused to cooperate. She sighed loudly.

"You're not going to make this easy on me, are you?"

"Nay, madam, I am not."

She sighed again.

"Louder, madam," he said dryly. "They have not heard you yet in London."

"Do you remember asking me where I came from?"

"Many times." He leaned back in the chair and rested his left leg on his right knee. His boots gleamed in the candlelight. "And I remember that your answer varied according to the story you chose to tell."

"There was a reason for that. I didn't think you would believe the truth."

He said nothing.

"I
am
from New Jersey, but not the New Jersey you know."

"I have not traveled south of Trenton, but have been told it is not unlike Franklin Ridge and the environs."

"That's not exactly what I mean."
Just do it, Wylie. He's not going to believe you no matter how nicely you phrase things.
"Damn it, Patrick, I'm from the future."

His jaw didn't sag open. His eyes didn't pop. He didn't leap to his feet and shout, "Hallelujah!" The louse didn't do anything at all except continue to look at her impassively.

"Did you hear me, Patrick?" she demanded. "I'm from the future."

"I heard you clearly, madam." He brushed a speck of dust from the fine leather of his boot. "And from what distant world is it you come?"

"From 1993."

"The dawn of the twenty-first century?"

"Actually, we call it the new millennium."

"And how did you find your way to this time?"

"Remember that bright red ball that flew over the treetops?"

"The one in which you rode with Andrew McVie and his woman."

"Her name is Shannon and yes, that's the one."

"You are saying you rode through the clouds from the future."

"I guess that's exactly what I'm saying." Even if it did sound like the biggest whopper ever told.

"And you are saying that Andrew McVie sailed with you from the future?"

"Exactly!" Finally they were getting somewhere. "You were wondering where he's been all this time and that's the answer."

Patrick leaped to his feet, toppling the chair with a crash. "You try my patience to the breaking point with these tales. Do you mark me for a fool who would believe such nonsense?"

"You're a smart man, Patrick. You know what I'm telling you is true."

"I know no such thing, madam, for what you tell me lies beyond the laws of nature and man."

But he was starting to believe her. She could see it in his eyes.

"Think about it. Andrew disappeared without a trace over three years ago. No one heard a word from him, no one saw him, no one buried him. And now here I am and suddenly everyone is talking about him. Doesn't it all make sense?"

"Such things are not possible. A man lives and dies within his own time. It can be no other way."

"That's what I thought, too, until it happened to me." She grabbed his sleeve and forced him to stop pacing and look at her. "You know I'm not like anybody else you've ever seen. My hair is too short." She lifted her skirts to the ankle, revealing her running shoes. "I
know
you wonder about these shoes." She let her skirts drop. "I don't think or speak or act like anyone you know."

"You are an individual with individual taste."

"I'm weird."

"Your words, madam, not mine."

"Remember the shirt I was wearing when I arrived, the one with Jurassic Park written across my breasts? When did you ever see anything like that? Come on, Patrick, tell me!"

He was staring at her with eyes wide. "In truth, I have never heard a woman speak such words in my life."

"Jurassic Park?"

"Breasts."

She started to laugh. "There you go. Doesn't that tell you something?"

"You are plainspoken to a fault. That does not mean what you tell me is true."

She let out a shriek of frustration. "Wake up and smell the coffee, Devane! I'm from the future and that's all there is to it."

"Have you proof of your claim?"

"Shannon and Andrew could prove my claim."

"Shannon Whitney—she is from the future too?"

"She and Andrew met and fell in love in my time."

His brow furrowed. "And she chose to leave her own world to live in his?"

"She loves him, Patrick, and he was needed here."

"Do you love him as well, madam? Is that why you left your home?"

"I had no choice."

"They took you against your will?"

She described what had happened that last morning, the sensation of fading away into nothingness until the only thing anchoring her in the mortal world was the basket of the hot-air balloon. "You think I'm crazy, don't you? You don't believe one word I'm saying."

His silence told her she was right.

"Isn't this ridiculous? I've spent the past two days wondering how I was going to hide the truth from you and now that I'm baring my soul, you don't believe me." A wild laugh erupted. "Abby believes me! She knows it's true."

"Abigail also said she saw birds with silver wings."

Dakota grabbed him by the front of his waistcoat. His tension rippled through her skin. "She's right, Devane! Those birds with silver wings are called airplanes and they can fly hundreds of people anywhere in the world they want to go. China! Africa! Paris! And you can get there in just a few hours."

He pulled away from her. Anger and fear formed a shield around his heart that even she couldn't penetrate. "Madness! All of it. I will hear no more."

If only she had a newspaper or a photograph or a driver's license—anything to show him that what she said was true. She considered the gun, but in his frame of mind Patrick would probably chalk it up to one of Ben Franklin's inventions.

An idea popped into her head. A crazy idea. Ludicrous and embarrassing.

And it just might work.

"Damn it, Devane, take a look at this!" She gathered up her outer skirt, her underskirts, her petticoat, then found the waistband of her panties. The manufacturer's label was still there. "Read this."

Patrick stared at the sight before him. Dakota Wylie's skirts frothed about her head in a profusion of yellow and lacy white. Her shapely, round legs were encased in pale stockings that, under other circumstances, would pique his curiosity. And covering her bottom was that most intriguing bit of fabric he'd seen previously that conformed to her lush body and left naught to his imagination.

"A tempting offer, madam, but one better extended in the privacy of my rooms."

She grasped a small tab of white fabric between her fingers and pulled. To his amazement the entire garment stretched like a lazy tabby after a long nap. "Just read it!"

"One hundred percent cotton," he said slowly.

"Keep going."

"Machine washable."

"There's more."

"Made in the U.S.A." Blood pounded in his ears. He felt as if his heart would burst through his chest. "What is the meaning of this? What do these letters represent?"

"U.S.A.," she said softly. "The United States of America."

Chapter Twenty

"Sweet Jesus!" He leaped back as her skirts settled back into place.

"You're going to win the war, Patrick," she said. "It won't be easy and it won't happen tomorrow, but you're going to win." She told him that the thirteen colonies would one day become fifty states, that the nation they were fighting to create would still thrive and grow more than two hundred years into the future.