“We made it.” She lifted the snifter in a toast, then recklessly drained it. “It’s still there, all of it. Somehow, no matter how close we came to blowing everything, we survived. There’s a Philadelphia in the future, Hornblower, and that’s the most wonderful thing I can imagine.”

Still laughing, she spun in a circle. “All these years I’ve been studying the past, trying to understand human nature, and now I’ve had a glimpse of tomorrow. I don’t know how to thank you.”

Just looking at her left his stomach in a knot. Her cheeks were flushed with excitement. Her body was long and slim and wonderfully graceful as she moved. Wanting her was no longer an urge, it was an obsession.

He drew a long, careful breath. “Glad I could help.”

“I want to know everything, absolutely everything. How people live, how they feel. How they court and make love and marry. What games do the children play?” She leaned over to pour another inch of brandy in her glass. “Are hot dogs still the best bet at a baseball game? Are Mondays still the hardest day of the week?”

“You’ll have to make a list,” he told her. He wanted to keep her talking, moving, laughing. Watching her now, animated, bursting with enthusiasm and humor, was as arousing as being in her arms. “What I can’t answer, the computer can.”

“A list. Of course. I make terrific lists.” Her eyes glowed as she laughed at him. “I know there are more important things for me to ask. Nuclear disarmament, world peace, a cure for cancer and the common cold. But I want to know it all, from the inconsequential to the shattering.” Impatiently she pushed her hair back from her face. Her words couldn’t seem to keep up with her thoughts. “Every second I think of something new. Do people still have Sunday picnics? Have we beaten world hunger and homelessness? Do all men in your time kiss the way you do?”

The snifter paused halfway to his lips. Very slowly, very deliberately, he set it down. “I can’t answer that, because I’ve only practiced on women.”

“I don’t know where that came from.” She, too, set the snifter aside, then rubbed her suddenly damp palms on the thighs of her jeans. “I suppose I’m a bit wired.”

“Excuse me?”

“Nervous, excited. Confused.” She pushed her hands through her hair. “Oh, God, Caleb, you confuse me. Even before . . . before all this.”

“We’re even there, Libby.”