Now and Forever (56 page)

Or maybe the catalyst.

She stopped dead in her tracks as she considered the notion. A catalyst? It didn't make sense. She hadn't brought Andrew and Shannon together and she certainly would never do anything to keep them apart. Other than swoon every time she saw him, the only thing she'd done was dig up a dusty old history book that had turned Shannon into a crazy person.

Still, the feeling persisted that there was more to it than that. All her life she'd had the feeling she was meant for more than the mundane reality of everyday existence. Was it possible there was a grand adventure waiting for her, right around the corner?

Like maybe in the next hot air balloon that floats by.

"Yeah," she said as she climbed into her battered Mustang and started up the engine. "Right."

The only grand adventure in store for her was a trip to the unemployment office if she didn't get to the library before Dr. Forsythe.

 
#

"Three billion sold," Andrew read from the sign beneath McDonald's golden arches on Route 206 a few miles north of Princeton. He turned toward Shannon. "Three billion what?"

Shannon pulled into the parking lot. "Hamburgers."

Andrew looked at her with a blank expression on his face.

"Chopped beef that you form into patties and fry on a grill then serve on little round pieces of bread."

"To what purpose?"

"Your dining enjoyment." She laughed and got in line behind a Chevy Blazer loaded with little kids. "Did I forget to tell you about the pickles, lettuce, tomatoes, ketchup, and Secret Sauce?"

"Aye," he said. "You forgot."

A minute later she stopped in front of the menu board and a voice crackled through the speaker: "Welcome to McDonald's. Can I take your order, please?"

Andrew leaned across Shannon to take a closer look. "Is there a machine to replace each one of us?"

"Just about," said Shannon.

"Your order, please," repeated the speaker voice.

"Big Mac, chef's salad, large fries, and two iced teas."

"Drive up to window one."

"Real food will be found at window one?" Andrew asked.

Shannon grinned. "Classic American cuisine at its best."

"'Tis a most amazing thing."

No,
she thought a few minutes later as they sat together in the car and ate lunch.
The only amazing thing in this big wide world is that you're sitting here beside me.

"So what do you think?" she asked as he swallowed a bite of his first Big Mac.

He popped a fry into his mouth while he considered the question. "I think I should like another one."

"A junk food junkie," she said with a rueful grin. "Who would've thought it?"

"In my time the words
junk
and
food
did not correlate."

"They do in this time."

He looked at the burger with suspicion. "Mayhap I will reconsider. 'Tis not a good thing to eat junk."

"You're so literal-minded, Andrew. Junk food means quick food, fast food, anything that's not your regular sit-down dinner."

He attacked the burger again with gusto and she found herself shivering with delight. Last night he had brought that same exuberant appetite for pleasure to her bed. She had lived almost thirty years and never known her body was capable of such transcendent delight until Andrew McVie took her in his arms.

She had gone to her ex-husband a virgin, both emotionally and physically, and Bryant had taken that naivete and destroyed it. From the start she'd believed she wasn't good enough, pretty enough, sexy enough, to satisfy him and it had taken a very long time for her to understand that none of it was her fault.

She'd regained her self-respect but she'd never believed that sensuality would be part of her life. She told herself it was okay, that you couldn't miss what you'd never known, but there was a hollowness inside her heart that wouldn't go away.

Until last night.

She felt her cheeks redden and she looked away, a smile playing at the corners of her mouth. All it took was the thought of his strong hands stroking her inner thighs, the sound of his voice as he said her name over and over and over again to bring her once again to life.

So this was the secret, the force that made rational people into fools and fools into poets.

 
She glanced toward Andrew and found him watching her. The sunlight brought out the golden flecks in his hazel eyes and she thought she'd never seen a man more magnificent - or glimpsed a heart so true.

 
#

Andrew remembered Princeton as a small town situated in the midst of heavy woods and lush farmland. For the most part, to his amazement, it still was.

In truth the farmlands were diminished and the heavy woods were confined, but the character of the place was unchanged. Princeton was a small town blessed with intellectual and artistic energy, both of which were blended with a rural aspect that had survived the years.

When Shannon turned the car to the left and drove down Nassau Street, he found himself engulfed in memory of a time just a few weeks past - and many worlds away.

"A tavern once stood here." He pointed to the corner of Nassau and University Place. "'Twas a common meeting place for the spy ring."

"I hear your words," Shannon said, "but it's so hard to believe you're seeing Princeton from across two centuries."

"Emilie and Zane stood on that corner. It was there that she told me in her time women ruled countries and went to university and did all that men do, but I did not believe her." And now, with the truth in front of his eyes, he still ofttimes found it difficult to fathom. "She took great offense at my disbelief.

Shannon abruptly pulled the car off to the side and stopped.

"'Tis something wrong?"

"You loved her," she said flatly. "Didn't you?"

"Nay, Shannon, 'twas not love but infatuation."

"But you thought it was love at the time."

He would not deceive her, not even to make things between them go easier. She deserved better from him than that.
 
"Emilie was unlike any woman I had ever seen before. She spoke of wonders beyond knowing. 'Twas easy to mistake that for something more."

"And what about me? Would you have felt - are you with me because I am the first woman you met or because you want to be?"

"I am with you because there is nowhere else in this world or any other that I wish to be."

An odd look drifted across her face, a look he had never before seen. "What if you could go back to your own time?"

"That question is not relevant for the opportunity to do so does not exist."

"But what if," she persisted, resting her hand on his wrist. "Now that you've seen this world, what would you do? Would you go back?"

"I would stay with you," he said, feeling the truth of his words deep inside his heart. "Whatever the time or place." He leaned across the small barrier she called an arm rest and touched the soft skin of her cheek. He wished he could reach inside her head and banish all memory of the husband who had treated her so badly.

Mayhap then she could believe happiness was theirs for the taking.

 
#

Shannon parked the car in the U-Store lot then she and Andrew walked over to Nassau Hall. Except for Dakota's involvement with the Historical Society, she'd never given much thought to the wealth of history that surrounded them in central New Jersey. But when you were walking with a man who'd been around when the history was being made, you couldn't help but gain a new perspective on things.

Some of the houses on Alexander and University boasted plaques that commemorated their dates of construction.
1752. 1768. 1772.
Once Andrew placed his palm flat against the door knocker of a stately three-story house and said, "William Strawbridge was a terrible merchant but a true patriot. He passed along many a message at great risk to his own family."

Stockton and Witherspoon weren't streets to Andrew; they were people. Richard Stockton and his wife Annis who buried the family's silver - much as Andrew's friend Rebekah Blakelee had - to keep it safe from the marauding British soldiers. And John Witherspoon who came from Scotland to be president of the College of New Jersey, only to become the only man of God to sign the Declaration of Independence. People who had lived and breathed and fought in Andrew's own time. People who were remembered still.

As Andrew would be if he'd stayed in his own world.

No. She refused to think like that. She wasn't responsible for him climbing into a hot air balloon and taking off for the 20th century. He'd come here of his own free will and he was staying here for the same reason.

"We could drive over to Morven or Drumthwacket," she said as they started walking down University Place near the Princeton railroad station where commuters caught the shuttle known as the "dinky" that connected them to the main line. "I believe Morven was built before the war started."

"Nay," he said, "but there is one thing more I would like to before we leave this place."

"Anything," she said, summoning up a carefree smile that hid her guilty conscience.

"The Blakelee farm."

"I never heard of a Blakelee farm anywhere around here. Was it close by?"

"Aye," he said. "Naught but a short walk from the center of town."

"I doubt if it still exists, Andrew. You can see what's happened. Much of the farmland has been turned over to developers for housing."

"Your friend Dakota," he said. "Does she not work for an historical society?"

 
#

Dakota couldn't believe her eyes.

She'd just come back from a quick lunch at the pancake shop near the movie theatre when she saw Andrew McVie and a grim-faced Shannon walking toward the reference desk. McVie was dressed in jeans and a plain white cotton shirt that strained against his powerful shoulders. He still didn't do much for her, but she had to admit he looked wonderful today. Especially with that pony tail. She'd always been a sucker for men with pony tails and he looked exceptionally good with one.

Shannon, however, looked like she was about to jump out of her skin.

I know you don't want to be here,
Dakota thought, trying to send the vibes directly to her friend
, but can't you see what's happening?
 
Fate had the three of them all tied up together in one unwieldy package and there was nothing any of them could do to change that.

Wasn't this proof positive of that? Shannon would rather chew ground glass than visit the museum. And she certainly didn't want Dakota anywhere near Andrew.

But there they were, coming toward Dakota like a pair of intrepid bloodhounds in search of quarry. She looked from Shannon to Andrew then back again. No, she was certain Shannon hadn't told him about the history text hidden behind
Plutarch's Lives
, which meant they wanted something else - something Shannon obviously wasn't too thrilled about - but what?

"Hi," she said, leaning across the reference desk. "Fancy meeting you guys here."

"Good day, mis--Dakota." Andrew favored her with a pleasant smile. "You are looking well."

"And you have wonderful taste." She glanced down at her Mexican peasant blouse and grinned. "Fifty cents at the thrift shop in Somerville." She hadn't swooned yet. So far, so good.

"This isn't a social call," Shannon said, a warning look apparent in her eyes. "We need some information about a Revolutionary War-era farm outside of town."

"Then you've come to the right place," Dakota said easily. "Whose farm?"

"The name was Blakelee," said Andrew. "Josiah and Rebekah."

"We have records in the archives," Dakota said, "and a master list on microfiche." She spun her chair around and turned on the machine. "Let's see what I can find out." She mechanically flipped through the pages. "There was a Blakelee farm between here and Griggstown but, according to the records, it passed into the creditor's hands in 1778." She spun back around to face Andrew and Shannon. "Much of the property was sold in the 1950s to a land developer but part of it was reserved under the Green Acres provision."