Give Me Tonight

intuition, then hers was prompting her to ask some questions. He had some answers. She would stake her life on it.

'So you believe that things can happen that don't make any sense? Things that sound like they belong in a storybook?'

'Of course. I've seen a lotta miracles in my lifetime. Trouble is, most people don't see 'em for what they are.' Noticing the cynical twist of Ben's mouth, the older man smiled. 'That one, there,' he said, pointing to Ben, 'he's one of those. He'll try to explain away miracles if he can't figger 'em out.'

'But that doesn't mean miracles don't happen,' Addie said, and Diaz smiled at her.

'Well, y'see-'

He was interrupted by Ben's jeering laugh. 'Whatever it means, I know one thing. It doesn't do anyone any good to believe in hocus-pocus like miracles and little elves-'

'We're not talking about elves,' Addie said, irritated by his interruption. 'And if you want to talk about them with Mr. Diaz, come back later, but for now I'm having a private conversation with him, and if you're not going to leave, you can at least keep quiet.'

Ben grinned, standing up and dusting off the seat of his Levi's. Clearly he thought she was indulging in a flight of fancy, and he was far from interested in hearing about it. 'All right. I'll leave you two to discuss your hocus-pocus. I've got a guitar to restring.'

Addie watched him stride away, her gaze troubled, and then she sighed. 'I have a question. It sounds too silly to talk about with him listening. It's a question about time. '

'Time? That's somethin' I don't pretend to know much about, Miss Adeline.' He smiled. ''Cept it goes too fast, an' I sure do like to waste it.'

'I've been thinking about things that happen to people in the past and whether or not it would be possible to… well, to go back and change things.'

'That'd be a miracle, all right. A big one.'

'Do you think time could work that way?' She flushed as she realized how silly she must sound.

Diaz did not seem to be surprised by the question. 'Do you think it works that way, Miss Adeline?'

'I'm not sure. Time is just hours and minutes. That's how I've always thought of it. Now is now, and yesterday was yesterday, and there's no going back. That's how everyone thinks of it.'

'Not everyone.'

'But I'm beginning to think of it in a different way, as if it's a distance that could be traveled. As if there could be a road between now and yesterday. What do you think?'

His black eyes gleamed. 'Let me see if we can make sense outta this. We're all movin' forward through time right now. But if you c'n go forward, don't you think you c'n go backward too?'

'Yes. Yes, I do. Then you think someone could go back in time? You really think it could happen?'

'Yes, ma'am. That it could ain't a question t' me but then, I like to believe in such things.'

'So do I,' she said softly.

'Don't bet it happens a lot, though. Couldn't be many who deserve a second chance. '

'What do you mean, a second chance?'

'Well, that's all goin' back in time is, ain't it? A second chance. Why would someone get to go back for any other reason?'

'To change things other people did.'

Diaz shrugged. 'Maybe. But I think we each gotta worry 'bout our own business.' He paused and looked at her shiftily. 'Now, let's say someone could go back in time. Someone like you, maybe. Why would you be there to change anything, cept if it was to change somethin' y' once did?'

'But what if! went back to a time before I was ever born?'

Diaz tilted his head thoughtfully. 'Don't know if that could happen.'

'You don't think I could go back earlier than the time I was born? Then you're saying a person could only move around in her own lifetime?'

He smiled and shrugged. 'This is all gettin' too tangled up fer me.'

'Me too,' Addie said with a defeated sigh. Tiredly she stood up. 'But thank you. You've given me something to think about. Oh, and… please don't tell anyone what we were talking about. Especially not Ben.'

'No, Miss Adeline,' he said with a grave smile. Troubled, she turned and walked toward the corral. I don't believe anything he said was right. I know I don't belong in this time. I was born in I9I0. Adeline Warner was born first,' not me. Unless. .. unless I really am Adeline Warner.

Impossible. She shrank from the idea. It was crazy. But everything that had happened to her was crazy. Suddenly her heart was pounding roughly, pounding so hard her chest hurt.

She couldn't be Adeline Warner. What about Addie Peck? What about her life with Leah and the years she'd spent living in the house on the edge of Sunrise? Shivering, she thought about the two hours during the afternoon when Adeline Warner had disappeared.

'What happened that afternoon?' she whispered. 'What happened to her? Where did she go?'

Frightening thoughts flew through her mind. Maybe she went to the future. Maybe she lived twenty years in the space of that two hours and then came back here. Maybe Addie Peck had just been a misplaced Adeline Warner.

'No,' she gasped, and leaned against the gatepost of the corral, her head spinning. 'I don't have Adeline's memories. I have my own. I'm not her. I don't want to be her. Oh, God, why am I in her place?'

Addie wanted to cry, but no tears came to her eyes. She was dry and numb. She remembered the peaceful, orderly life she had led with Leah as her companion. It had been difficult and lonely, but she'd always been secure in the knowledge that each new day would be the same as the one before. Why had that been taken away from her? Why was she here in the place of a girl who'd been wild and temperamental, selfish and spoiled? That's not me, she thought desperately. I'm not Adeline.

A cold feeling swept over her, and she swayed against the wooden post. A picture emerged behind her eyes. It was an image of Sunrise, the sides of the unpaved main street lined with wagons and oldfashioned contraptions pulled by tough-bodied horses. Everything was slightly askew, like in a dream, but the details were startlingly clear. She could feel the wooden boards of the sidewalk under her feet, smell the dust stirred up by wagon wheels.

As she walked down the street, it seemed as if a stranger had taken over her body and was walking in her shoes. The town drunk, Charlie Kendricks, careened against the side of a storefront and paused to watch her pass by. She saw her hands flick her skirts to the side in a contemptuous gesture, as if she would be soiled by walking near him.

A breeze blew a trendril of hair across her face, and she stopped to pin it back, looking at her reflection in a small store window. Then the image of her face disappeared, although she could still see the street and buildings beyond. Startled, she raised her hand to the pane of glass, but it wasn't reflected back at her. Suddenly the brightness of the sun struck off the window, blinding her. Covering her eyes, she gave a cry of pain, but she couldn't hear her own voice. Heat surrounded her, burning with the intensity of a thousand suns, and she felt her body shriveling, dissolving, hurtling down into an endless well of time and space. She heard the sigh of an old woman's last breath… and a baby's cry.

Addie opened her eyes, and the vision disappeared. Breath-ing through flared nostrils, she tried to gather her wits, and clung to the gatepost for support. That was what had happened to Adeline Warner the day she disappeared.

'That was what happened to me,' she whispered. 'It was