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this woman for years.
Years.
He’d kept his distance when she dated and then married Albert Ford, but he’d never stopped wanting her. If anything, the years and their continued friendship had made him want her more. Yet nowhere he was, about to talk her out of the kind of relationship he’d only ever dreamed of having.
    “Because I need you to help me change
Charles
’s future.”
    She forcefully pushed open the door and he followed her out into the warm night air. “But you’re Charles, and Charles is
you
,” she argued.
    Yes, he was Charles, but Charles wasn’t him. Charles hadn’t made the mistakes that he’d made. Charles hadn’t put an entire nation in jeopardy. Charles hadn’t been tainted by his connection to Wizard-9.
    “Here’s what I think we should do,” Chuck said to Maggie as they crossed the car-filled parking lot. “You take this dress and go home, and tomorrow night wear it over to Data Tech and …”
    Chuck had seen the car approaching the moment they exited the mall. He’d been watching it out of the corner of one eye, his wariness a habit that was impossible to break. The car was moving too fast, bouncing jarringly over the speed bumps. But it was the fact that the windows were tinted and the front passenger’s window—the side nearest them—was rolled slightly down that made the hair stand up on the back of his neck.
    He was reacting even before he saw the slightmovement at the window, even before his mind registered the fact that that was, indeed, the barrel of a gun being aimed at them.
    He caught Maggie around the waist, pulling her down between two cars, dragging her to cover as an assault rifle was fired from the open window of the car. Bullets slammed into the cars around them, breaking windows and tearing into the metal with a terrible screeching sound.
    And as quickly as it had started, it was over. The car was speeding away with a squeal of tires.
    The explosive racket of a weapon being fired at close range still rang in Chuck’s ears as he took one shaky breath and then another. He realized he had thrown himself on top of Maggie in a ludicrous attempt to shield her from the bullets with his body. He was probably crushing her, grinding her into the rough asphalt. But she didn’t move beneath him, didn’t protest, didn’t make a sound.
    A drowning wave of panic washed over him as he pushed himself off of her, terrified that the future was repeating itself.
Please God, don’t let her have been hit.…
    But Maggie moved then, throwing her arms around his neck and clinging tightly to him. She was alive. His relief nearly knocked him over, and as he sat up he pulled her with him, cradling her in hisarms. He ran his hands over her, reassuring himself that with the exception of a slightly skinned knee, she was all right.
    She seemed only to want to hold him tightly. He could feel her trembling, or maybe that was him, he wasn’t sure anymore. But then, God, she lifted her face, and just like that, he was kissing her. Kissing her as if the world were coming to an end.
    In some ways, it was.
    This
was what he should have wanted more than anything else in the world. Maggie, with all of her passion and joy and those smart-aleck comments that always made him smile. Maggie, with her million-watt grin, her husky laugh, and her sparkling eyes. Maggie, not just his best friend, but the keeper of his heart and soul—his lover, his only, his wife.
    If only he had fought as hard for her as he’d fought to develop his theories on time travel …
    But
what ifs
weren’t any use to him now. Chuck had come too far down his own path ever to turn back. But Charles, Charles still had a chance to choose heaven over hell.
    Only Chuck was finding out firsthand just how very hard it was to let go once he held heaven in his arms.
    Especially since heaven was responding to each kiss he gave her with a fierceness and intensity thatdamn near took his breath away. She wanted him as badly as he wanted