Author's webpage: http://www.apo.nmsu.edu/site/directory/mcmillan/stories.html

Notes: This story is for Sue and Duranee, who have certainly waited long enough. Thanks to them for their patience, and to Paulette for her beta-reading and excellent advice. This story doesn't occur at any particular time within the series, but for those who like everything in its place, this could be taken as being near the end of a low-angst version of third season.

"The Tale of the Body Thief" by Anne Rice is a really cool book -- the only one of the Vampire series that I really got into. It has some delightful homoeroticism right up there in the text -- not stuffed way down in the subtext. Alas, the homoerotic desire is unrequited (mostly), but it's still a good book.

THE BODY THIEF

Out of the darkness, a great flash. A deafening boom that smacked against the eardrums.

Shouts and running feet. Sharp cracks from small arms fire.

The patter of fat droplets as a new rainstorm arrived. A man lying in a pool of blood under a streetlight as others come to bend over him.

Dispassionately, I watched the scene in the ambulance. They had let the patient's partner ride along, mostly as another set of hands to keep pressure on wounds. That was a pity, I thought vaguely; the poor guy didn't deserve to witness this. There was really no doubt that the man on the gurney was dying.

Still his partner and the attendants worked frantically to keep him alive as I looked on. One of them was suctioning blood from the man's mouth while another cut away the last of the bloody clothes, shouting his discoveries and instructions to the others. The man had taken a shotgun blast; some of the pellets had hit his arms and face -- even one in his neck -- but most took him square in the chest. One of the attendants began hastily taping squares of plastic and foil over each bubbling wound.

The man on the gurney coughed and gasped and struggled weakly, spraying blood on his helpers. His partner crouched over him, holding his head and murmuring words that were lost in the bustle and horror of the scene.

Losing interest, I drifted away.

I stepped through the doorway and gazed around at the night-shrouded jungle. This place was familiar; I looked back to find that I had just left a temple, overgrown with vines and moss. The open door beckoned, but I turned and stepped down from the stone platform in front. The rich smells and varied sounds of the rainforest seduced my senses.

A low growl drew my attention. There was the panther, its tail lashing and its ears pinned back. It hissed and spat at something small running along the ground. I tried to focus, but it was hard to see. The creature seemed like some kind of rodent or weasel, undulating swiftly across the ground on short legs. It darted out of of the panther's reach and dashed right between my legs. I moved to block it, but I was too late. The thing scampered up the steps of the temple and ran into the blackness within.

The door swung shut behind it.

The boom of the stone slabs meeting seemed to ring through my bones, staggering me where I stood. The night went dark as if a cloud had covered the nonexistent moon, and the noisy insects fell silent one by one. I stumbled up the steps and clawed with my fingers at the edge of the door, but it was firmly shut.

Weakness crept through me like a fog, and I slumped to my knees. A warm-furred body pressed near, and a great head butted at my stomach. I tried to push the panther away, but he shoved me again, trying to raise me to my feet. The wind was rising.

At the panther's continued urgings, I forced myself to stand. The air was chill, the darkness growing deeper. I could smell snow on the wind as it stirred broad, delicate leaves that had never known true cold. My own skin shivered; I had to find shelter.

I stumbled through the darkness on barely-seen paths, with only the soft brush of the panther's tail to guide me. Other stone shapes loomed in the night, but none offered any entrance. Through ears that seemed stuffed with cotton, I heard a wolf's mournful howl, as incongruous as the soft flakes beginning to sift down on the jungle. Three times I lost my footing and sank to the ground, ready to give up, but each time the panther pushed at me until I got up again.

The fourth time I tripped, my knees found a ledge of stone under the snowy blanket. I could see and hear nothing now but the blowing needles of ice, and my hands and feet were numb. The blunt head shoved against the backs of my legs with new urgency. Wearily, I crawled across the stone toward the vague sense of a shelter from the wind. As the veil of snow cleared, I saw that we had come to another building -- more of a hut than a temple, but shelter nonetheless. The door was ajar, the interior devoid of movement or life. I dragged myself across the threshold and pushed the door closed before collapsing wearily on the floor.

Bright lights glared beyond my eyelids. Beeps and hisses sounded around me. A bored voice crackled from a distant speaker.

Hospital. It was only too familiar. But something was wrong -- everything seemed dull and blurred. I felt disconnected, off kilter.

My eyes were hot and crusty, reluctant to open. My lips, when I swept a dry tongue across them, were stiff and cracked. Other than that, I wasn't in too much discomfort. That was odd all by itself, but I couldn't quite think why. What was I doing in the hospital anyway? Nothing seemed to be broken; all I could feel was an incredible weakness. It required a monumental effort just to move my arms.

An alarm sounded as I tried to turn my head. Even that noise seemed muffled, as if I had earplugs in. I tried to raise a hand to check, but it was trapped beneath the covers.

If I waited, he would come to help me. He would know what was wrong with my ears and eyes. I couldn't quite remember his face, and his name escaped me just at the moment -- but I would know his voice when I heard it. He would arrive and solve whatever problem was keeping me wrapped in cotton, insulated from the world.

A door to my right swung open and I forced my head to turn, cracking open my eyes. It wasn't him -- just a nurse regarding me in surprise.

"Well, hello!" she said cheerily. "Welcome back, shrell."

I formed a word with my tongue and lips, but nothing came out.

"Just a moment, dearie," said the nurse. "Let me get you some water." She returned in less than a minute with a tiny cup and a straw. "Just a sip, now -- your stomach is a little out of practice, you know."

"W -- w . . . where," I managed. My voice sounded strange, weak and high-pitched.

"You're in the long-term care facility at Engelmann. Do you remember what happened?"

I struggled to focus. I remembered a flash in the darkness, and a deafening noise. "Shot?" I breathed.

"No, dearie, you were in a car accident. It's not surprising that you wouldn't remember, though. You had a nasty knock on the head."

Car accident? Her earlier words came back to me -- long-term? "How long?" I croaked.

"The accident was nearly two months ago. You've been in this wing for over four weeks now. You were in a coma."

I blinked at her, uncomprehending. It didn't make sense. Two months? That would at least explain why he wasn't here sitting with me, but the car accident didn't sound right at all.

"Now, I don't want you to worry, shrell. You're awake now, and that's a very good sign. You might be a little confused at first, but that's only to be expected. You give it time and I'm sure you'll do better. Right now I'd like to call in a doctor and have you answer a few simple questions." She slipped out the door.

I rolled my head back and forth in protest, the only movement I seemed to be able to make. Was I paralyzed? No -- my hands and feet moved, but the covers bound me so tightly I couldn't escape.

The nurse was back soon enough. She loosened the covers around me and slipped a stethoscope under my gown. The bell should have been colder, harder against my chest. Why was I so numb?

"No," I told her. "Not a car. Shotgun."

"Hush, dearie, I need to listen to your breathing." She was a big woman, looming over me. The bed was big too -- in fact, the whole room was designed on a very generous scale for a hospital room. Or was my sense of space distorted as well?

I managed to worm a hand out from under the covers. The nurse caught it and pressed large, warm fingers over my wrist. I stared at the hand she was gripping.

It was a delicate hand, the color of fine milk chocolate on the back and dusky pink across the palm.

"Not my hand," I mumbled, watching as the fingers curled at my command. I pulled the wrist free and reached up to my face. No wonder I couldn't speak properly -- I was wearing someone else's mouth! Short, wiry curls crinkled under my touch. "'Sizzn't my body!" I said in growing alarm.

The nurse was patting at my shoulder to calm me when a doctor entered. "Well, miss utterly!" he exclaimed. Why was everyone speaking gibberish? "I see you're awake."

"This isn't me," I told him, articulating carefully with my borrowed tongue. "I'm someone else. This isn't my body."

He blinked. "Do you know where you are, miss?"

"Engelmann. Buh 'sall wrong. I was shot, not in a car crash."

"Can you tell me your name?"

I stared at him. The name was right there, on the tip of my tongue, but it wouldn't quite come to me. "Eh . . . Ellis . . . this isn't me!" I tried to grab his lapel to pull him closer, so I could make it all clear. Instead, the unfamiliar hand at the end of a short arm caught the end of the stethoscope wrapped around his neck. The bell whacked against his temple as I pulled it free. "I'm not . . . 'snot my body!"

The doctor caught my hand and pinned it down easily. I still hadn't gotten the other free of the tight sheet holding it down -- or was it tied to the bed?

"Gina, get me 10 cc's of Thorazine," the doctor said in an artificially calm voice.

"No! No drugs!" my voice rose to a surprising screech.

"Thorazine, doctor?" the nurse asked for confirmation.

"Yes, dammit! We have to get her to calm down, but we don't want to send her back into the coma."

I tried to pull free, but I was so weak. I couldn't even lift my head. "Please," I mumbled. "No drugs. I have bad reactions."

The nurse brought a syringe, and the doctor released me to check it. The nurse caught my hand before I could do anything. She pushed my other sleeve up, and I could see the tube running into my left arm. The entire arm was thin, small, and light brown in color. It was taped to the bed; that was why I couldn't move it.

"No, no drugs." I barely had the strength to move as the doctor slipped the needle into a port on my IV. "Blair! Ask Blair! He knows." But even as the remembered name energized me, I could feel the drug taking effect.

I drifted in and out for a while, visions of temples and panthers mingling with occasional glimpses of bright lights and strange faces clustered around me. When I finally reached something like awareness, I found a nurse giving me a sponge bath.

There was another layer of distance between me and the world around me. My senses were dulled so that hardly anything felt real, and the part of my brain that worried about problems seemed to be asleep still. I remembered that I was stuck in a strange body, but I couldn't seem to make myself care about it.

The nurse -- not the same one as before -- smiled when she saw that my eyes were open. "Well, you're awake!" she said cheerily. "Too bad you didn't wake up an hour ago -- your mother was here to see you."

"M'motherz dead," I mumbled.

The nurse didn't answer, being busy wiping me down in a very embarrassing place.

"So how are you feeling, shrell?" she asked at last, tucking the covers around me once again.

"Tired," I complained. "Why's everyone call me that?" This new voice of mine was high-pitched, but too weak to be called shrill.

"That's your name, sweetie." She unhooked the chart from the bottom of the bed and lifted it up so I could see.

I mustered up enough energy to pull the chart closer and study it. Cherelle Sutterly, it said. Race: B. Sex: F. Age: 19. Head injury (MVA). There was more, too much to take in at one glance.

I shook my head weakly. "Not right," I said.

"I know you're confused, honey. But that's normal. Give it time. I'm sure your memory will come back. We'll have a doctor talk it over with you when you're feeling a little better."

I was still twisting my head back and forth as she left the room. Then the drugs caught up with me again, and I slept.

• * *

There was a phone on the table, several feet from the bed. I spent long minutes unwrapping the tape from my left arm. Then, with a huge effort, I rolled over and stretched; my cappuccino-colored hands barely reached. I pulled on the cord, and the wheeled table squeaked a little closer. The old-fashioned square phone seemed enormous, impossibly heavy. I could barely shift it with my weak, borrowed arms. Close enough, I decided, and tried to dial.

The phone rang six times. I frowned. Why hadn't the answering machine picked up? At last, a voice spoke blearily.

"Yeah?" The voice was slurred with sleep, but I didn't think it was anyone I knew.

I swallowed. "Um . . . Simon Banks, please." The words that came from my mouth were soft and timid. Did I really sound like that?

"Wrong number, lady." The dial tone returned unapologetically.

The receiver fell from my shaking hand. What if it was all a dream, all my imagination? What if this really was my own body? Perhaps there was no cop named Jim Ellison, no Simon Banks or Blair Sandburg . . .

Blair! He could help me, if anyone could. I fumbled for the fallen receiver and depressed the switch on the cradle. My dainty fingers poked uncertainly at the buttons. Everything seemed blurry and colorless, and my hands wouldn't obey me. Had I dialed that correctly?

On the second ring, I heard the sweet voice I was missing, but it was only a recording. "Hi, this is Jim and Blair's place. Leave a message and we'll call you back. Or if you're one of those people who hates answering machines, don't leave a message and we'll forgive you."

I waited for the beep. "Sandburg, it's . . ." I trailed off, unable to say it. What was I supposed to tell a machine anyway -- that Sandburg's best friend had gotten stuck in someone else's body? Or that he had never met me, the person who spoke with such a light soprano, but if he would come to my hospital room I had something important to tell him? What room was I in, anyway?

While I hesitated, the machine beeped again and hung up.

No, there was no message I could leave. I needed to speak to someone in person. But at least now I knew that I hadn't imagined Jim Ellison. He was a real person, and he lived with Blair, and I was supposed to be him -- not some teenaged black girl who had almost died in a car wreck.

So if Blair was real, Simon must be also. I had just mis-dialed the first time. I tried again. My eyelids were sagging, and my wasted arm seemed even heavier than it had just a minute ago, but I squinted at the phone stubbornly as I tried to dial.

The phone company gave me three annoying tones and told me that the number I had dialed was not a working number. I forced my small brown hand to press the switch down and try again. After hitting the last number I collapsed back against the pillows.

This time, the familiar bark came after the first ring. "Banks!"

I smiled. So he was real, too. That was good. I wondered how Simon would react when I told him . . .

"Hello? Is there someone there?"

Oh, right. I should say something. I pushed the leaden receiver up closer to my mouth. "Ssssszzzz . . . ."

I fell asleep and dreamed of shotguns.

I woke to the sound of weeping. A large woman was clutching my hand to her dark brown cheek. She dabbed at her eyes with a crumpled kleenex, but most of the tears had already run down to paint my hand with mascara.

I pulled away involuntarily, and the woman straightened.

"Cherelle?" she whispered. "Oh, Sherry, child, thank the Lord you're better."

I just stared, unable to think of anything to say. Oh shit was all that came to mind, and that would hardly be polite.

She sniffed hugely and swiped at her eyes again. "Now, honey, the doctor told me -- I know you're confused. But it's me. Your Mama. You remember me, don't you?"

I shook my head slowly. "I'm sorry."

"Oh, Sherry, don't be sorry. The Lord brought you back to us, that's a great gift. I'm not going to be complaining if we have to spend a while helping you get back your memory."

"Um," I said. "Look, Mrs. Sutterly --"

"Mama, child. You call me Mama."

I swallowed hard.

"Doctor says in a few days, after they've run all their tests and made sure you ain't going back into a coma, you can come home. All your brothers and sisters will be so glad to see you again! They've been praying every day since you was in that accident."

My eyebrows rose. Brothers and sisters? How big a family were we talking about here?

"And see, honey, here's Frank come to see you!"

A huge man, bigger than Simon, loomed over the bed. Was this one of those brothers the woman had mentioned?

Apparently not. Before I could move away, he planted a kiss right on my mouth. I twisted my head aside, feeling a tongue slither across my cheek.

"Sherry, Baby," he murmured in a rumbling bass. "I was so worried about you. I'm so sorry, so sorry, Baby. I never saw that truck coming. If only it woulda hit my side of the car, 'stead of yours. . ."

I shrank back into the pillow, appealing to the woman with my eyes. "Mrs. -- um, Mama?"

"Frank, step back and give the girl a minute," said Mrs. Sutterly briskly. "She don't remember anything."

"Oh, but you gotta remember me, Baby. You do, don't you? Say you do. Tell me you remember."

"No, uh . . . can't say that I do." Please, I was thinking, don't let Cherelle be married to this behemoth.

Mrs. Sutterly stepped forward, pushing Frank aside. "Honey, this is Frank Tooley. You and him were going to be married in the spring."

Not married yet, then, but almost as bad. I tried a weak smile, shaking my head. "I'm sorry, I just don't . . ."

"I know, child. Don't you worry about a thing. We'll take care of you, give you plenty of time to remember what you need. Now, the doctor's coming in to have a little conference with us -- you feel up to hearing what he has to say?"

"Sure. Whatever." Maybe having the doctor in the room would prevent Frank from making further advances.

Unfortunately, while Mrs. Sutterly -- Mama? -- was out of the room getting the doctor, I was alone with Frank. He held my hand and gazed at me earnestly. "Baby, I know you can remember. Just try to think, okay? We were in the car --"

"Really, I can't remember anything." I tried to reclaim my hand, but my weak borrowed muscles were no match for his meaty grip. "Look, I know you must be upset about this, but I can't pretend I know something that I don't, okay?"

"But Sherry, you and me are so good together! We belong to each other. I know you can feel that."

I watched apprehensively as he leaned closer. If he tried to stick his tongue in my mouth again, I swore I would bite it off. But before he could trap my head against the pillow, the door opened again.

My heart sank. It was the same doctor who had shot me full of thorazine. This was not very promising.

"Hello, Cherelle," he said cheerfully. "Remember me? I'm Dr. Williams. You were a little out of it the last time I saw you, but you're looking a lot better now."

I nodded sullenly, still trying to squirm my fingers out of Frank's grasp.

Dr. Williams' eyes darted quickly between Frank and me. "Excuse me sir, if I could just get in there --" He elbowed Frank delicately out of the way. It was very smoothly done; *ten points for the doc,* I thought. I could forgive the guy for the Thorazine if he'd just keep Frank out of my face.

The doctor quickly assessed my vital signs and asked me a few simple questions to establish my state of mind. Then he stood back a little, leafing through my chart.

"All right. Miss Sutterly, Mrs. Sutterly, Mr. -- O'Toole, is it?"

"Tooley," Frank growled.

"Ah, yes. I just wanted to make sure you all know the current situation and what we can predict -- and can't predict -- about Miss Sutterly's future recovery. The fact is that injuries to the brain, and the way every patient responds differently, are still pretty much a mystery to us. We can make guesses based on what we know about brain structure and the outcome of similar cases, but we're not always correct -- which you already know from the fact that a few days ago we thought Cherelle would probably never wake up. Now she is awake, and apparently all motor functions and most mental functions -- such as language -- are working just fine. The only major problem just now is the amnesia."

"I feel really weak," I put in.

"Yes. That's a normal result of the two months you've just spent in bed -- your muscles have begun to atrophy. Fortunately the process hasn't gone too far, and you should be able to recover your muscle tone within a few months. We'll want to do a more detailed assessment of your neuromotor skills, but so far we've seen no problems attributable to the head injury. That's pretty surprising in itself."

He pulled an X-Ray out of the file and held it up to the light. Frank and Mrs. Sutterly moved closer to see it, but it was at the wrong angle for me to make out any details. Reflexively, I tried to narrow my sight, but all that got me was a headache.

"As the two of you know -- but Miss Sutterly hasn't heard yet -- she suffered a depressed skull fracture in the region of the right temporal lobe, with associated concussion and intracranial bleeding involving a large portion of both hemispheres . . ."

I listened to the doctor's words with half my attention. It sounded like the poor girl was dead; I didn't blame them for thinking she would never wake up. But what did that have to do with why I was here, and how could it help me get out of this situation?

I remembered the flash, and the great blow that had struck me in the chest. If Cherelle Sutterly was a body with no mind left to inhabit it, was Jim Ellison a mind with no body? Was that how I had ended up like this?

"Cherelle?" Dr. Williams said, as if he had spoken several times already.

"Oh. Uh, sorry." I forced a smile.

"You seem a little distracted. Maybe we should continue this another time?"

"Huh? No, I was just thinking. Look, doc, could I talk to you?"

"Of course."

"Um." I glanced at Cherelle's hovering family. "Alone."

Mrs. Sutterly didn't like it, but she was ready to go along. Frank was ready for a fight. Dr. Williams handled them both smoothly out of the room, then came back and perched a hip on the edge of the bed, regarding me earnestly. "How can I help you, Cherelle?"

Maybe it was the drugs. Maybe it was the feeling of being completely isolated, worse than I could remember since Peru. Maybe it was the way Williams had picked up so quickly on the tension between me and Frank. Whatever it was, I thought I could trust the man.

"This isn't me," I said, waving at the papers scattered across the bed. "I'm not Cherelle Sutterly."

His face took on a closed, wary look. "Cherelle, I know you're confused and disoriented. Amnesia can be very troubling to a sense of self-identity --"

"No. I know who I am, and this isn't it. I'm not a teenaged girl, okay? I'm a man. A cop. I don't know how this happened, but there's been some mix-up . . ."

He blinked several times. "We can get you a mirror, Cherelle. The truth is that you are a young woman. There's no need for you to deny that or hide from it -- you're a very bright girl with excellent grades and a fine future --"

"No, you don't understand. I wasn't in a car accident. I was shot. This isn't my body. Somehow, I ended up in the wrong body. Don't you get it? I don't belong here."

He was silent for several minutes. "All right. Here's what we're going to do. I'll bring you a pad of paper and a pen. I'd like you to write down everything you remember about yourself -- about being a man. Write it all down, and I'll go over it with you later. But until then, could you do me a favor? Could you not discuss this with your mother?"

"Of course I'm not going to talk to her about it!" I hissed. "I'm not that insensitive!"

"Good, good. Thank you. That will help a lot. You just, uh -- put down all the facts you can remember, and we'll discuss it next time I see you, okay?"

"Great. Fine. Just . . . could you maybe keep Cherelle's family off my back for a while?"

He nodded slowly. "I'll tell them you're tired. Visiting hours are essentially at my discretion, so I'll just try to keep it limited."

Tired wasn't far from the truth -- I had no stamina left. Mrs. Sutterly and Frank came in for some tearful goodnights. A nurse brought me a pen and paper. I wrote my name across it: Jim Ellison, in shaky block print. Then I signed my name. It was my signature, more or less, but it looked like it was written by a forger with the DTs. No way it could pass muster from anyone who knew what my signature ought to look like. I let the paper drop from weary hands, and sleep caught up with me once more.

Once again I tried calling the loft and got the machine. I didn't even try to leave a message this time. I had to find Blair.

Maybe he was at the university. I tried to remember the number. He had moved out of that gloomy artifact storage room and gotten a proper office, but all I could recall was that it was speed dial three on my cell phone. It was dark outside, so I couldn't call the department office, and information didn't have all the university extensions. . .

Simon, then. I dialed the station's number with more confidence.

"Banks."

"Simon, thank god," I said fervently. "I need your help."

"Who is this?"

Oops. In such a short time, I had forgotten how different my voice sounded. "It's Jim. I'm --"

"Jim who?"

"Ellison!" My snarl didn't come out at all right; it sounded more like a piercing whine.

"Ellison -- what about him? Are you calling from the hospital? Do you realize we've been getting prank calls from one of your phones?"

I was silent, groping for words. "Yes, I'm at the hospital. I need you to come see me, so I can explain . . ."

"Explain what? Look, nurse, if you have a problem, tell it to the officer in front of Ellison's room. I'll be there in fifteen minutes."

"No, wait -- Simon!"

He was gone already. Gone to visit his detective, who was apparently in the hospital. Which hospital -- this one? Did that mean my body was still alive?

Maybe there was hope yet.

A knock on the door. A gray-bearded man stepped inside. "Hi there," he said in the same cheery tone that marked all hospital staff. "You have a minute?"

"Sure." I studied him as he walked in.

"I'm Dr. Broward," he told me. "Dr. Williams asked me to stop by and talk to you." He had all the arrogance of a doctor, but he wasn't wearing a stethoscope.

"Oh, did he," I grumbled. So much for trusting Williams. "Shrink, right?"

He gave the false smile of one who hates being stereotyped, but knows objecting would just make it worse. "Yes, I'm a staff psychiatrist here. Dr. Williams told me you had some interesting things to say."

"Dr. Williams thinks I'm completely crazy, and he doesn't know what to do about it," I paraphrased.

"Hmmm," Broward offered non-committally. "Would you like to tell me about what you said to Dr. Williams?"

I looked away, feeling an absurd sense of disappointment that Williams had betrayed me. But I didn't have time for that; I had to think of some explanation that would match what I had said to Williams without landing me in the loony bin.

"Look," I began weakly, "it's just confusing, okay? I don't remember anything about being Cherelle Sutterly. The name isn't familiar, I don't know the people who are claiming to be my family -- it just doesn't seem to fit, okay? I thought I remembered something else, closer to -- to how I feel. Something that seemed to make more sense, except it doesn't."

"Doesn't make sense how?"

I spread my hands, gesturing towards my body. "Well, obviously I'm not a man, right? Obviously I'm not a white policeman. So even if that seems to fit the way I feel on the inside, it must not be true."

"Hmmm," he said again, infuriatingly.

"Look, doc, I can tell the difference between reality and imagination, okay? I'm a little shook up, but what with the amnesia and the drugs, that's hardly suprising, right? Give me a little time and I'm sure I'll get it all straightened out."

"I see. What about the journal Dr. Williams asked you to start? Can I see that?"

Stupidly, I let my eyes drift towards the pad of paper sitting on the table. "I didn't write anything," I said. "I fell asleep. I've been sleeping most of the time anyway. Actually, I'm feeling kinda sleepy right now . . ."

He didn't take the hint, but reached instead for the pad. I winced as he studied the first page. "Jim Ellison. Did you write this?"

I shrugged. "It was something I thought I remembered. It just seems weird. I can't remember anything about Cherelle Sutterly or her -- my -- family, but I feel sure I know something about this Ellison person." I smiled weakly. "Maybe I read about him somewhere or something like that. I guess the brain is pretty complicated, huh?"

"Yes, that's certainly true. Listen, Cherelle, you shouldn't be afraid to talk about anything that you're feeling right now. Even if it does seem illogical. Letting us know what's going on with you will help us to help you better, okay?"

"Uh-huh," I said brightly, trying to sound as if I believed him. In my girlish soprano, it actually came across rather well. "Right now all I'm feeling is tired, though."

He sighed. "All right. I'll be back to talk to you later, Cherelle, is that okay with you?"

As if I could object. "That's fine," I said, still sweetly. Eyelids drooping, I watched as he took the top sheet of paper from the pad and carried it out of the room with him.

Clearly, I would have to be more careful whom I talked to. Confiding in Williams had just gotten me an interview with a shrink. Calling Simon hadn't helped much either, except to tell me that my own body apparently wasn't dead. That was good to know, but I doubted that Simon would be receptive to the idea that I was Jim Ellison.

It looked like I was on my own.

Knees wobbling, I clung to the edge of the doorway and stared down the hall. My immediate objective: get to the bathroom. Unfortunately, a patient who was in a coma for two months didn't rate a room with a private toilet. I did not want to experience even one more intimate encounter with a chilly bedpan. To think I had once believed those little plastic urinals were embarrassing! I'd give a lot to be able to use one of those just now.

My ultimate objective, of course, was getting my own body back. I just hadn't figured out all the mission parameters yet.

I staggered a few steps, supporting myself against the wall. They had disconnected my IV in the afternoon, after it was established that my stomach could handle liquids and soft foods. When I first crawled out of bed, I had been grateful I didn't have to drag a pole along with me. Now I was thinking that it might be nice to have something to lean on.

Four more steps, and I was able to sink down onto a padded bench for a few minutes. Halfway there; I could see the door of the bathroom just a dozen yards away. I gathered myself for another effort.

When I reached the bathroom at last, it turned out to be occupied. I concentrated on keeping my knees locked while the occupant finished. When the lady came out at last -- dragging an IV pole with her -- she had to catch me with a quick hand under my elbow the first time I took another step. I smiled thinly, too embarrassed to be properly grateful. Then at last I was on my own.

The toilet turned out to be only marginally less messy and embarrassing than a bedpan; the only real difference was that no one was there to witness my clumsiness. I closed my eyes and reminded myself that this was not really my body. And after all, I had had my hands in similar places before, hadn't I? The rationalization wasn't very comforting. I used a lot of paper.

When I bent over the sink to wash my hands, the reflection in the mirror startled me so badly I nearly fell down. It was such a young face, and so feminine. Wide brown eyes, delicately flared nostrils, and a lush mouth beneath a cap of tight curls. The hair was short -- probably shaved two months ago after Cherelle's accident. The high cheekbones were strong and elegant, but I wanted my own square jaw and receding hairline back.

I glanced down the rest of this strange body, but it was so disorienting I looked away quickly. An afterimage stayed with me of moderate-sized breasts and soft brown skin made loose by sudden illness. It wasn't an ugly body, but the contrast with the muscles I had spent years working into condition made me dizzy, almost nauseated.

On the trip back down the hall, I made it as far as the bench before my borrowed legs gave out entirely. They kept quivering and twitching as I slumped there, and I glared down at the thin, useless limbs. How could I begin to get my own body back if I couldn't even control this one? I needed help from somewhere, but the memory of Dr. Broward's skeptical eyebrow made me wary of speaking to anyone else.

Just then, a familiar voice made me jerk my head up. My heart thumped eagerly. Blair Sandburg was walking down the hall toward me, gesticulating broadly as he talked. I was so glad to see him and hear his voice that it took me several seconds to realize who he was talking to.

"Nonsense," my father replied to whatever Blair had said. "He'll get much better care at my house. I will hire someone to be with him 24 hours a day. Can you promise as much?"

"By the time he's released from the hospital, he's not going to need 24-hour care!" Blair expostulated. "I just think he'd be more comfortable at home with me."

"He doesn't even recognize you!"

I could see Blair wince as they drew closer to where I was sitting. "Well, he doesn't remember you either! The doctor said familiar surroundings would help --"

"That would be the house he grew up in," my father interrupted.

"He hasn't set foot in that house more than twice in the last fifteen years! He should be in his own home, with his own things."

I stared at them, blood pounding in my ears as I realized what they were talking about. Me! They were discussing me.

I raised a hand weakly as they passed by, and Blair stopped at once. He smiled down at me. "Are you okay?"

I moved my mouth, but nothing came out.

He wrapped my hand in his own warm one. It was strange, seeing him as larger than myself. "Do you need some help?"

"I, uh . . ." I licked lips that were suddenly dry.

My father stopped a little ways down the hallway and looked back. "Are you coming, or do you intend to flirt with every female between here and the ICU?"

A chill went down my spine. Suddenly Blair's friendly manner was no longer so comforting.

Sandburg frowned, looking torn. "You go ahead," he said at last. "They only allow one visitor at a time, anyway."

I squirmed my hand free. "No, go on," I murmured, hating my weak feminine voice more than ever. "I'm all right."

Blair just smiled and settled next to me on the bench as my father strode away. "It's okay, I wasn't really enjoying that discussion much anyway," he confessed in a whisper. "My name's Blair Sandburg, what's yours?"

"Um, J -- Ch -- Cherelle," I stammered. "Most people call me Sherry."

"Well, is there anything I can get for you, Sherry?" He pronounced the nickname with an emphasis on the second syllable.

I looked away, not wanting to see the familiar Sandburg woman-chasing expression directed at me. Even sitting down, he was surprisingly big. "No, I, uh -- I was just headed back to my room."

"Well, do you need a hand?"

"I'm fine, really."

"Great." He stood up. "I'll walk you there. Which room is yours?"

"Right down there," I admitted reluctantly, starting to lever myself upright.

He caught my arm neatly and offered support where it would be most helpful. "I'm here to visit a friend of mine," he explained, using conversation to smooth the awkwardness in typical Sandburg style. "But I don't get along so well with his family, and it's pretty frustrating." He started to lead me along the hallway.

My mind raced as I tried to figure out how to ask him for the details I needed. "So . . . your friend doesn't remember you?"

Blair was silent for a moment. "We're not sure. He's only been awake a few minutes since he was shot, and he can't talk right now. It could be amnesia, or just that he's too groggy and doped up to understand what's going on."

I placed my feet carefully. "He's in ICU?" I asked.

"Yeah, he took a shotgun blast to the chest. It was pretty bad."

Glancing at his face, I saw that it was stiff and pale. I couldn't hear his heartbeat or breathing, but I knew Blair well enough to recognize the hidden misery.

"Here we are!" he said brightly. "This is your room, right?" He bumped against the door frame as we passed in together.

"Yes . . ." I groped for the support of the bed. "I'm sorry about your friend," I offered.

Blair smiled sadly. "Well, he's alive, and that's the most important thing. For a while we thought he wouldn't make it, so I should be grateful for that at least, shouldn't I?"

Perched on the side of the bed, I stared at him. "Blair --"

Before I could even decide what I meant to tell him, a nurse bustled in. "Sherry, what were you doing out of bed?"

"I had to go to the bathroom," I said stubbornly.

"You're not supposed to be walking around on your own yet!" she scolded.

Blair ducked out of the nurse's way, gave me a little wave, and was gone before I could stop him.

"If I'm not supposed to be out of bed, why the hell did you take out the catheter?" I demanded.

"Now, there's no need for strong language, dearie. You'll be starting physical therapy tomorrow morning. For now --"

"I'm not using another bedpan," I growled. It still wasn't very effective with my new voice.

"We'll see if we can get you transferred to a room with a private toilet," said the nurse, "but until then you shouldn't be on your feet. Call a nurse if you need help. We can bring you a portable potty."

I grimaced. "How about a wheelchair?"

• * *

As I discovered a few hours later, a wheelchair wasn't much of an improvement for someone with arms as weak as mine. I could manage about four or five good solid pushes before my arms got too tired for more. But at least it was easier to stop for a rest and then get started again.

I had never been in Engelmann's new Long-Term Care wing, but I knew roughly where it was in relation to the rest of the hospital. I had to cross a walkway over the cafeteria courtyard to get to the main wing. Once there, I was intimately familiar with the route to Intensive Care.

Wheeling myself along the glass-walled overpass, I stopped to stare down at one of the tables. A familiar mop of curly hair was fanned out across an empty tray as Sandburg dozed at the table. How many hours had he spent here since the shooting?

I swallowed hard. Maybe I should have told him the truth. I was getting ready to, when the nurse came in. I was pretty sure I could get Blair to believe me. But would anyone else? Would I just be pulling Blair into trouble along with me, if I convinced him I was Jim Ellison?

First, I decided, I had to know more. The person everyone thought was Jim Ellison had been awake at least briefly since he was brought to the hospital. That meant my body wasn't just an empty shell; someone was in there. I needed to know who it was.

If it turned out to be Cherelle Sutterly, we might be able to work out this whole mess. If it was someone else, everything got much more complicated.

A few more bursts of exertion and a ride on the elevator brought me to the ICU. I knew better than to ask a nurse where Detective Ellison's room was; they would just call someone to take me back to the long- term care wing. It wasn't difficult to tell which bed to check, anyway, since there was a uniform sitting by the door.

I smiled weakly at the officer -- Sayers, wasn't it? -- and wheeled myself up to the window. The sight of my own body lying there gripped me with a strange fascination. There was a large dressing over half the face; had one of the pellets hit me there? More dressings covered most of the chest, neck, and upper arms. Tubes sucked at either side of the chest to keep the lungs inflated, and another tube ran down the throat, taped in place around the mouth. Monitors of every description surrounded my body and needles ran into each arm. For a brief moment, I was glad not to be in my own body just now.

Then the eyes opened and looked straight at me.

I couldn't tell if he knew who I was, but I recognized him right away. The eyes were the same blue I had seen in the mirror last time I shaved -- but the flat light in them belonged to Nathan Secrist, professional assassin.

Flashes of lost memory rushed in on me. The call coming in that Secrist had been sighted down by the docks. Driving swiftly through rain-slick streets, telling Sandburg to stay in the truck, searching around the empty warehouses.

The sound of a bolt pulling back as I spun to face the doorway. My gun lifting, my trigger finger tightening without conscious thought. A flash of light, a deafening roar . . .

Chill raindrops falling on my face, glittering like sparks beneath the streetlights.

Then his eyes closed, and memory released its hold on me.

"You okay, miss?" Sayers was asking.

I nodded, dry-mouthed. "I was looking for someone else," I managed, and wheeled myself back to the elevator.

Those blue eyes, even glazed with pain and drugs, had seemed to bore right into me. Had he guessed who I was? Could he hear my heart pounding even as I waited for the elevator to arrive?

So now I knew my mission parameters. While I worked to get my body back, I had to figure out some way to protect my friends and family from an assassin wearing Jim Ellison's face.

I had to find a way to protect Sandburg.

The foundation of every successful mission is good intelligence. I started on my homework by getting hold of a three-day old newspaper. The story was on page two: "Detective Injured in Deadly Shoot-Out."

Detective James J. Ellison, 1996 recipient of the Officer of the Year award, was in critical condition at Engelmann Hospital after receiving a shotgun blast to the head and chest. He had been pursuing Nathan Secrist, a notorious contract killer wanted in fifteen states, who was suspected of involvement in the shooting death last month of City Council member William Habecker. Habecker had been a controversial figure in city politics ever since he decided to vote against a popular resolution etc., etc.

Despite his near-fatal injuries, Ellison had managed to get a shot off, wounding Secrist enough to enable his colleague, Detective Brian Rafe, to track the killer three blocks and eventually bring him down.

"Good for you, Rafe," I murmured.

Secrist, arriving at the hospital only minutes after the ambulance carrying Det. Ellison, was declared dead upon arrival.

I frowned at that information. So Secrist was dead, was he? Or at least his body was gone. That would make it pretty hard to persuade him to give up the body he'd stolen from me, even if I had the faintest idea of how to make the transfer.

After I had read what the paper had to say, I tried to find out more about the condition of my body. When I called the ICU claiming to be a reporter, all the nurses could tell me was Ellison's basic condition -- "stable" the first time I called, and "serious" the next day. If I wanted to know more, I would have to get closer.

I was really starting to miss the ability to hear through walls.

There was no officer on duty when I snuck into the ICU this time -- an unexpected bonus. When one of the nurses caught me lurking around a short while later, I found out that the officer had only been posted because some strange phone calls had been made from the hospital. It was probably just some mix-up -- there was no real danger because the man who had shot the detective was dead.

Hospital security escorted me back to the long-term care wing and warned me that my wrist would be slapped if I went exploring in restricted areas again. I only overheard a little of the nurses' conversation before I was caught, but it was obvious that "Detective Ellison" would be in the hospital for at least a few weeks. That gave me some time to work in.

One of the most essential skills for an assassin -- or a detective, for that matter -- is to be able to get into his enemy's mind and predict his next move. That was what made Secrist so good at his job, and what made me a good detective even without the Sentinel thing on my side. Now I had to figure out how Secrist would react when he woke up to find himself in a strange body.

Since the same thing had just happened to me, I had some special insight into the problem.

The big difference for Secrist was that he would have more time to get his bearings. The body he was in -- my body -- was much sicker. He wouldn't be expected to talk the first few times he woke, and nobody would be surprised if he was a little disoriented when he did speak. He might have some trouble if he had to deal with Sentinel senses along with being in a strange body, but he would still have more time to adjust than I had. On top of that, he already knew who Detective Ellison was. All it would take would be for a nurse to call him by my name a few times, and Secrist would have a pretty fair idea of what was going on.

What would he do then? Play along, of course, until he got some of his strength back. He'd play up the disorientation angle, probably claim amnesia just as I was doing. When he got out of the hospital, that would be the critical period. Secrist would want to get his own life back, as much as possible, but he'd also be looking to take advantage of his position as an acclaimed hero in blue. I doubted he'd go so far as to try to take up my job at the station; more likely he'd exaggerate the seriousness of the injuries to make it seem impossible for him to return to the field anytime soon.

Of course, maybe the injuries to my body would make it impossible to return to the field. Ever. I couldn't afford to spend time worrying about that.

What worried me the most was that Secrist might try to eliminate anyone who was likely to guess that he wasn't really Jim Ellison. The amnesia angle could only work so long; eventually Blair or Simon or maybe even my father would realize something was just too far off. Secrist would want to strike before that time came. With his background, Secrist could probably manage to make murder look like an accident even while he was confined to a bed. He still had resources, and possibly accomplices, that we hadn't tracked down yet.

It was what I would do, in his position. Even in my situation, I had no idea how to deal with Mama Sutterly or the sullen Frank. If I were a little more unscrupulous, I might be thinking along Secrist's lines.

And what if Secrist did have the senses to go with the body he had taken from me? That would probably slow him down, at least until he could get a handle on using them. Sandburg would try to help him, of course, thinking he was me. Maybe I should tell Blair what had happened, get him to stay away from Secrist. It would be nice to have some help figuring this whole thing out -- nice to know I wasn't completely alone here.

But if Sandburg ever learned the truth, it would show all over his face. Even if he avoided Secrist altogether, his absence would be remarked on by everyone who visited. Secrist would have no trouble guessing that Blair knew, and he'd move his plans forward. I couldn't risk that.

I would have to run this mission alone.

The evening after the nurses caught me snooping around the ICU, Dr. Broward paid me another visit. This time I was ready for him.

"I figured it out!" I told him excitedly, making the most of my girlish voice. "I know why I thought I was Detective Ellison!"

"Oh?" he said slowly.

"It was a dream I had, just before I woke up here. I've been remembering bits and pieces of it . . . I dreamed I was Detective Ellison, and I was chasing a fugitive, and I got shot. The dream was so vivid, it seemed more real to me than being myself."

"But now you realize it was just a dream?"

"Yes, but not just a dream -- it was true! Look!" I showed him the newspaper. "This was what I saw -- it's all right there! I dreamed about the docks and the warehouse. I even remember having a partner with me, this Detective Rafe they talk about." I had carefully picked out which details to mention, and which points to get wrong. If Broward checked up on the story, he would find that I was talking more about the newspaper article than the real event.

"So you believe you dreamed about something that was really happening."

"Right. It was a vision. I'm sure God sent it to me. And right after the vision, I woke up from my coma! It has to be a sign. God wants me to do something, to help Detective Ellison somehow." I was betting that the religious talk would make Broward just as uncomfortable as it made me, and he would back off.

He gave me a stern look. "Is this why you've been placing calls to Ellison's captain?"

I tried for a repentant expression. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to alarm anyone with the phone calls. I was just trying to find out if my dream was true or not. Now that I know it was, I'll try not to bother Captain Banks. I'm sure the Lord will tell me soon how I'm supposed to help. Until then, I can wait."

"Hmm." Broward picked up the paper and glanced over the article I had marked with underlines at salient points.

He would be checking up on the story, I could feel it. And hopefully when he found the inaccuracies he would conclude that I had just latched onto the Ellison angle to explain an unusually powerful dream. If I played my cards right over the next few minutes, I could get Broward out of my hair for good.

"Do you mind if I tell Captain Banks what you just told me?" he asked.

I gritted my teeth. I would prefer not to be brought to Simon's attention at all -- at least not until I had a plan for dealing with Secrist -- but it was already too late for that. "Okay," I said. "Would you let him know I'm sorry for calling him so late at night? The drugs had me a little confused." I tried a pout on for size. It felt strange, though it was probably more believable with Cherelle's full lips than it would have been on my own face.

"I'm sure the captain will understand -- so long as there are no repeats of the phone calls. And no more sneaking off to the ICU, is that understood?"

Who the hell did he think he was, my father? Even if he had truly been speaking to a nineteen-year-old girl, it seemed rather patronizing. But I nodded dutifully, hiding my resentment behind a clenched jaw until Broward had left the room. Then I let loose with a stream of curses that would have done my old drill sergeants proud. A nurse passing by the door of my room stared in surprise until I glowered at her. But I had to do something to remind myself of who I was.

My physical therapy consisted mostly of time in the four-foot-deep heated pool, walking from one end to the other or swishing my palms through the water. I would have preferred to use the weights to build my strength more quickly, but after I had pushed my weakened muscles too hard in the first session, Alan, the head therapist, assigned me to the pool instead. He called it "self-limiting resistance training." The faster I moved, the more resistance there would be; if I got tired, I wouldn't move as quickly, and there would be no resistance -- so, no danger of tearing muscles.

Also no danger of getting strong any time soon, I thought sourly. Water aerobics was for little old ladies wearing skirted swimsuits and caps with flowers on them. I only planned to put up with this as long as I had to.

But until I was released from the hospital, I was sentenced to scissor kicks and breaststrokes -- and I was only allowed to do an hour at a time. At least the chlorine didn't burn my sinuses they way it would in my proper body.

Mama Sutterly had brought in a suit for me that turned out to be several sizes too large. That fit in with the family pictures she had also brought, in which Cherelle had a rather Rubenesque silhouette. Apparently two months of nourishment through tubes had done wonders for the girl's figure, if not her muscle tone. This body was almost skinny enough to star on TV.

So I got a new swimsuit, in a creamy white that definitely flattered Cherelle's complexion. The significance of that never really occurred to me until Sandburg came down to the therapy center.

I was sweeping two kickboards through the water -- together and apart, together and apart, gritting my teeth as I pushed them as fast as they would go. I probably had a horrible grimace on my face -- at least that was what Marie, the assistant PT, kept telling me. I looked up and there he was by the edge of the pool, staring right at me.

My legs gave out, and I barely caught myself on the kickboards before my head went under. "Sandburg!" I gasped. "What are you doing here?"

He grinned. "My name's Blair," he said patiently.

"Oh, right," I said. "I, um . . . I remembered your last name."

He nodded, still smiling. From the shadows under his eyes I had the feeling he hadn't smiled enough lately. "I'm looking for Alan Pappas?" He cocked his head at Marie, who was in the pool to spot for me.

"I think Alan's out to lunch right now," Marie said apologetically. "He had to take it late because he was working with a patient at noon. Can I help you with something?"

"Well, a friend of mine is here in the hospital and he's going to need some therapy before he gets out. It won't be for a couple of weeks yet, of course. But I was just hoping I could get an idea of what would be involved?"

"Oh. That's Alan's department, all right. He won't know for sure until he's seen your friend --"

"I understand that. I was just hoping for a general idea."

"Well, he should be back in half an hour or so. I can give him your message."

"Thanks, I'd appreciate it."

I power-walked through the breast-deep water until I reached the side where Blair was crouching. I leaned my elbows on the ledge, trying to draw his attention away from Marie. "So how is your friend doing?"

Blair sighed and pushed the hair back from his face. "They moved him to a private room yesterday --"

"That's good news!"

"-- And within a couple hours they diagnosed him with pneumonia and sent him back to the ICU."

"Oh. I'm . . . sorry to hear that," I said slowly. A stab of fear went through my heart. Pneumonia could kill, especially when it was associated with bullet wounds to the chest. Maybe I wouldn't have to worry about getting my body back after all. Maybe it wouldn't be there for me to get back.

"Are you okay, Sherry?" Blair asked quickly. He used that same strange pronunciation I had noticed before.

I forced a smile. "I guess I'm a little chilly. This water's warm, but . . ."

"You've been in here over 45 minutes," Marie pointed out. "Why don't you dry off and go lie in the other room. I'll be there in a few minutes to give you a rub."

Marie tucked a hand under my elbow for the steps out of the pool, though I could mostly bear my own weight by now. Blair was at my side immediately with one of the white towels from the rack by the wall. I leaned on him a little and waved toward the door, and he gallantly helped me into the other room.

"So how are you doing?" he asked. "You look a hundred percent better than the other day."

"I am better," I said. "Physically anyway. My memory's still gone, and it's been tough dealing with my family."

He nodded sympathetically. "Jim still doesn't remember me either. Or his father and brother, but for some reason he seems to get along better with them, even though they hardly had any contact in the last twenty years."

"I guess it's kind of the same for me." I took a breath for courage, then opened my brown eyes wide. "Really, I feel more comfortable with *you.* You didn't know me before, so you don't expect me to act a certain way. Does that make sense?"

"Yeah, I suppose it does," he said slowly. "Maybe that's what's going on with Jim, too. Do you need help with that?"

I was rubbing the towel awkwardly over my hair. The curls were so short that they hardly needed any special attention to dry within minutes, but I passed the towel to Sandburg at once. "I guess my arms still tire a little quickly," I admitted. *Don't overdo it,* I warned myself. The weak-and-helpless act was nearly enough to turn my stomach, even if it was more than half true -- or maybe because it was so near the truth.

Sandburg started to rub the towel gently over my head, considerately keeping my face free. "I knew a guy once," he told me, "who had a terrible heart attack. His brain was without oxygen for long enough that it was damaged -- but not too badly. He got out of the hospital and he could walk, talk, do everything he needed to do -- but his personality had changed. He was a much more peaceful person. He didn't like sports or violent movies anymore. And he had this friend who used to go to football games and action movies with him all the time. Suddenly they had nothing in common, and the friend didn't know what to do." Sandburg frowned, looking thoughtful.

"So how did they cope?" I asked at last.

"They didn't. It was basically the end of the friendship. But see, the man made new friends. He found out that some of his acquaintances, people he barely talked to before except when he had to -- he found out suddenly he had a lot more in common with them."

"But that's sad," I said. "That he lost his friend?"

"Yeah, well . . ." Blair shrugged. "It was me. I was the friend. See, he was one of my mom's boyfriends, so probably we would have drifted apart anyway, since my mom never stayed with a guy very long. I did feel bad about leaving him like that, hardly even writing him. But I bumped into him a few years ago and found out that he's actually a lot happier these days than he was before he nearly died. So it may hurt, at first, having to redefine all those relationships. But maybe all you need is time to settle into your new life."

I stared at him. His story spoke to me on so many levels I could hardly get it straight in my mind. Blair thought he was speaking to Cherelle the amnesiac, and he had just encouraged her with more sensitivity than I had ever known my young friend was capable of. But in fact, he was talking to me, the exile from my own body who might have to learn to do a lot of adapting if I couldn't get my life straightened out. And he was also talking to Jim Ellison, who had been Sandburg's roommate for over two years without ever learning this kind of stuff about him. At the same time, Blair had his own worries about losing a close friend, and I didn't dare say anything to reassure him.

So I just sat there staring open-mouthed at Sandburg, trying to figure it all out. He was beginning to turn pink around the ears when Marie breezed into the room. "Ready for that rubdown?" she asked.

Blair fumbled the towel and bent to pick it up from the floor. "I guess that's my cue," he said shyly. "Maybe I'll . . . see you around?"

"I'd like that," I told him. "And let me know how your friend is doing -- I'd really like to know."

He smiled and waved as he headed out the door. I turned and lay facedown on the little vinyl-covered bench while Marie rubbed my shoulders, and I thought hard.

I was the one inhabiting a strange body. So how come Sandburg suddenly seemed like a completely different person?

My homecoming to the bosom of the Sutterly family didn't go smoothly. Cherelle had four younger siblings, all with colorful names and all very skilled in the art of annoyance. The oldest, besides Cherelle, was twelve-year-old Jesrine. The girl was full of pre-teen confidence and didn't appreciate having her big sister move back home to usurp her authority. Then there were the twins aged six, Dareth and
Darnell. They were apparently not identical, but I couldn't tell the difference, since they were dressed alike. The boys were largely uninterested in anything but their sports games and arguing over who would get to be the Jaguars this time. The youngest was three-year-old Reanna, who clung to her mother's skirts and stared at me shyly. No father was in evidence, and I didn't ask.

The four kids plus Mama Sutterly inhabited a single-story three-bedroom house. I ended up sharing a room with Jesrine, who was annoyed because she had gotten used to having her own room since Cherelle went off to college. The boys were together in another room, and Reanna had a tiny bed in the corner of Mama's room. Most of the family took the crowding as a matter of course, but I hated it. There was no semblance of privacy.

Frank came by the day after I had settled in. Mama Sutterly was out at the grocery store with Jesrine, and I was supposedly babysitting. Frank sat next to me on the sagging living room couch -- still managing to tower over me even in a sitting position -- and explained earnestly why I had to be in love with him.

Well, I had no hesitation about being rude if that was what it took to get through to the guy. "Look," I told him bluntly. "You need to face the facts. *I don't remember you.* Chances are I never will. And frankly, the way you've been acting, I don't know what Ch -- what I ever saw in you in the first place."

He gaped at me. Apparently talk like that wasn't characteristic of Cherelle. "You . . . what? What did you say?"

"You're smothering me, Frank. You need to back off and let me figure this out on my own."

He still wasn't getting it. "Baby, how can you talk to me like that? After all we been through together?" He leaned closer, his fingers digging into my biceps.

Just then Dareth -- or Darnell, I wasn't sure -- came charging into the room, shrieking "Wallace has the ball! He dribbles it the length of the court -- he shoots --"

The undersized red-white-and-blue basketball bounced off the side of Frank's head. I had to stifle a laugh.

The other twin caught the ball before it could roll into the kitchen. "Jordan gets it on the rebound! He shoots -- he scores!"

The ball went into the little woven-wicker trashbasket, knocking it on its side.

Frank's face darkened, and he opened his mouth to yell.

"Boys! Pick up that trash," I said quickly before Frank could speak. "And I thought you were supposed to be playing quietly in your room?" I took the opportunity to pull out of Frank's grasp and put some distance between us.

"But Sherry --" Darnell whined. Or maybe it was Dareth.

"-- there's no basket in our room," the other boy finished.

"Then take the bag out of the trash, tie it up and take it out to the dumpster, and then you can use the trash basket. Only until Mama gets home, though. And while you're at it, you can empty the kitchen trash too."

Still complaining, the boys took out the trash.

"I think you should leave, Frank," I said firmly when we were alone again.

"Sherry, honey --"

"*No,*" I snapped. "Unless you can listen to reason, I don't want to see you again."

He blinked. "Can't I even visit you, babe?"

"Only when Mama's around. Right now I have enough to do watching the kids. I should go check on Reanna now."

The boys trooped back in to claim their wicker prize, and I more or less pushed Frank out the door. The baby, fortunately, was still napping. I sagged back onto the couch, my still-weak muscles trembling with exhaustion. I really wasn't cut out to be a big sister, much less a bride. When I checked my arm, the bruises from Frank's fingers were barely visible on my brown skin -- but I could feel every one.

The whole family went to church on Sunday morning. It was a Baptist church with a primarily African-American congregation -- one of the ones that had been threatened in the bombing campaign a couple years back. It couldn't possibly have been more different from the ornate, stiff-starched Catholic church my own family had attended before my mother left. This building was full of children and teenagers, all encouraged to make a joyful noise. Even the adults chimed in frequently during the service with "Amen!" and "Praise him!" at random intervals. The choir was about half as big as the congregation itself, and struck up a new song every five minutes. In his sermon, the minister talked about me -- or Cherelle -- as an example of God's miraculous works. After the service, I had to endure congratulations from what seemed like hundreds of well-wishers, many of them quite surprised when I didn't recognize them. It was a relief to get back to the cramped and crowded Sutterly home.

Jesrine, who shook me awake in the mornings, was the one to discover the blood spots in my bed after I had been there about a week. I stared at the stains in alarm, wondering what could be wrong with my borrowed body. I didn't guess the significance until Jesrine spoke up in disgust.

"Aw, Jeez, Sherry, can't you be a little more careful?"

"Huh?" I said blankly.

"Well, you should have known. You always get cramps the day before!"

"Oh. Oh!" I gulped. This aspect of it had never occurred to me. "I thought it was just my muscles aching from the physio." Actually, I had thought Mama's cooking was disagreeing with me, but I didn't say anything.

Jesrine gave a windy sigh and started to strip the sheets from the bed.

Something was trickling down my thigh. "Um, Jesrine?" I said tentatively. "Do you know what, um, I mean -- where's the stuff?"

I didn't even know what stuff to ask for, or what names women might use for the things between themselves. Jesrine stomped into the bathroom and showed me the stash of tampons in the back of the cupboard. "I better not be late for school because of cleaning up after you!" she snarled, handing me the little box. "And don't be spending too long in here, either. Other folks need the bathroom too, y'know."

I looked at the package doubtfully. Carolyn had always told me she hated tampons, but she was also incredibly choosy about which of those feminine napkin things she would use. Three times early in our marriage, she had sent me out to buy the pads for her, and three times I had brought back the wrong brand or the wrong sub-sub-species. Finally she had become resigned to doing that part of the shopping herself.

I followed the directions on the tampon packet and then spent the next five minutes scrubbing blood out from under my fingertips. The cramps were back again, low in my belly and back. It wasn't really like a pulled muscle, but not like a food reaction, either. The pain wasn't terribly severe, but the irregular way it would come and go made it hard to ignore.

The next few days were distinctly unpleasant. I must have gone through three rolls of toilet paper just by myself -- and I had thought I was using a lot with each bathroom visit before this! I discovered why Carolyn hated tampons, but my attempts to use pads instead just resulted in more spotted sheets. I needed the tampons anyway for my daily physical therapy sessions in the pool. As a man, I had never thought about such things as sharing a pool with
menstruating women, even when my Sentinel senses had informed me of the cycle of every woman in the PD. I tried not to think about it now that I had first-hand experience of just how messy it could be. At least I already knew the best methods for getting blood out of fabric, even if my lessons had been learned in a very different school.

I still couldn't understand women's urge to talk about the whole subject. It was even more embarrassing to experience than it was to hear about, and I had no wish to discuss it with anyone. Fortunately Jesrine, for all her worldly air, was not quite old enough to commiserate, and Mama Sutterly was giving me plenty of space.

Another week went by, and still I bided my time with the Sutterlys. I had my strategy all laid out, down to minute details and various contingencies, but I had made no move to implement it. I tried telling myself that I was waiting for the right moment, trying to gain a little more muscle tone -- waiting for the menstruation business to be over, at least! But I knew what it really was: the old pre-mission funk. I knew what I had to do, but I hadn't gotten up the nerve for it yet.

It wasn't as if this had never happened to me before, but in the army I always had commanders or subordinates whose expectations pulled me along until I was in the thick of things. This time no one knew what I was doing -- and if I was successful, that was how it would stay. There was no one around to whip up my morale and get me going.

Part of it was the hypnotic effect of worrying about what could go wrong. There were plenty of things I could mess up, even conceivably making the situation worse. I wasn't looking forward to finding out, for example, that maybe I *couldn't* switch bodies back. Or if I had to fall back on contingency and get help from Simon, I didn't want to think about his reaction to the mess I had ended up in.

But most of my fears revolved around what I had planned for Sandburg, assuming everything did go right. It just wasn't an easy thing to wrap my head around.

Sandburg was an attractive enough guy -- I could see that. It wasn't so much his looks, although I had always had a sneaking desire to run my hands through that mass of hair. It was more his manner with people, and how easy he was to get along with. I already knew how soothing he could be to an overloaded Sentinel; now I was finding out that he had a gift for reassuring a stranger exiled from his own body, even if Sandburg had no clue that was what he was doing. It also helped that he wasn't a big meaty hulk of a guy, even though he was several inches taller than my present form.

Attraction I could deal with. Flirting wasn't a problem -- I'd already tried that, and it was kind of fun. But every time I tried to prepare myself mentally for the possibility of actual sex, my brain just shut down. Maybe it didn't count as homosexuality while I was in this body -- maybe it wouldn't be a crime even if I did get turned on. But I would still be entered, possessed -- fucked, to put it plainly, and the idea didn't exactly mesh with my self-image.

I tried to talk myself into a more reasonable frame of mind. I told myself that it might not actually come down to sex. And if it did, I had already decided that this was the best way to go about it. I had to get close to Sandburg so that I could protect him, without making him suspect what was going on with Secrist. I had figured it all out -- now I just needed to go and do it.

In the end, it wasn't my own mental pep-talks that did the trick. Three things happened almost at once that spurred me into action.

Firstly, I called the hospital and found out that "Jim Ellison" would be released in a few days. With a little finessing and my newly-mastered innocent-little-girl voice, I learned that the wounded hero would be discharged into his father's care. That meant that at least he wouldn't be living in close proximity to Sandburg, the person most likely to figure out that Jim wasn't Jim. But I still didn't have much time left to work with.

Secondly, Frank got more persistent. After both Mama and I had asked him for the third time not to visit the house anymore, he came to church. The choir was just swinging into their second rousing hymn when Frank sidled into the pew and crowded up next to me, grinning eagerly.

Mama told him off after the service, scolding him for using the Lord's worship as a cover for him to pursue me. But Frank had made all the correct respectful noises to the minister, and after all, it was a public gathering. We couldn't legally order him to stay away.

The third thing was that Mama found out my secret. Or part of it, anyway.

We were in the kitchen late on Sunday night, after the kids had gone to bed. I was emptying the dish rack; Mama was taking the plates out of the cupboard as quickly as I put them away, setting the table in preparation for breakfast tomorrow. She put a hand on my arm and gestured to the table.

"Sit down, honey. We gotta talk."

I wiped my hands on a towel and sank into one of the hard-backed chairs. "Is something wrong?" I was thinking about money; Mama Sutterly only worked three days a week cleaning other people's houses, and I had seen the state the household accounts were in when I tried to balance the checkbook. I didn't want to think about what Cherelle's hospital bills must have done to the family finances.

"You ain't really Cherelle, are you?"

My face went hot and my heart began to pound. "What? I -- I don't know what you mean. You said -- in the hospital, they told me --"

"Hush, child. Don't be afraid, I ain't gonna bite. But I know my daughter, and you ain't her. You don't move like her and you don't talk like her."

"Well, I don't remember what I was like before --"

"You remember how to read and write, and you do math better than Sherry ever did, but you don't know the littlest things about bein' a woman. Now, how's amnesia gonna make you forget that?"

I gulped.

"Now, I talked to Dr. Broward at the hospital, and he told me how you said you'd been sent by the Lord to help someone --"

"Damn him!" I hissed.

Mama Sutterly puffed up like an outraged hen. "CherELLE SUTTerly! Or whoever you are -- it don't matter, but you will NOT use language like that in my home!"

I ducked my head. "I'm sorry, Mama. I was just . . . angry. That conversation with Dr. Broward was supposed to be private."

"Hmmph!" she snorted, settling down a little. "I suppose if he hadn't told me, you woulda kept quiet about it, huh?"

"I didn't want to upset you --"

"Never mind that. Is it true? Did the Lord send you?"

I studied the tabletop, guiltily trying to formulate an answer that wouldn't be a complete lie.

"Are you an angel?" she asked.

"No!" I yelped in surprise. "Of course not. I'm just -- just . . . I don't know how I got here, Mama, or who sent me or why. You're right, I'm not Cherelle. But I feel like . . . there's someone I have to help. I just know it."

"This detective you told the doctor about?"

I lifted my head. "Not him. I think it's the detective's partner, Blair Sandburg. I met him in the hospital, and I have this feeling he's in terrible danger. I just know it, Mama, and I have to help him."

She nodded slowly. "So why haven't you done anything about it?"

I blinked. "I wasn't sure how to start. Or what to tell you . . ."

She chuckled. "You've told me, dear. Sounds like now is a good time to get started." She stood up and patted my arm. "You get a good night's sleep, and tomorrow you find this Blair person. There ain't no use putting off what the Lord has called us to do."

I stared at her. "Doesn't it . . . bother you?"

Her face turned grave, and she sank back into her chair. "The Lord knows how much I would give to have my daughter back," she said slowly. "But it must be that it doesn't suit the Lord's purpose for Sherry to be here with us now. I spent two months in that hospital, honey, looking at my baby's face and praying she wasn't lost to me forever. All the doctors tried to tell me she was gone. But now -- now I've got you here. And it's something, which is a whole lot better than nothing. Maybe it's a chance to say goodbye to my baby, at the very least. Or could be, when you've done what you were sent to do, I'll get my Cherelle back. Until then . . . well. If the Lord wants to borrow her body while Sherry ain't using it, I won't be the one to deny him. No good can ever come of resistin' God's plan. You remember that, honey. Do what you've been called to do." She slapped my thigh lightly. "Now get yourself to bed, young lady, and don't tell me you ain't tired, 'cause I can see those bags under your eyes."

My eyes were stinging. I stood up and pressed a kiss to Mama Sutterly's smooth brown cheek. "Thank you, Mama," I whispered. "Thanks for understanding."

I hurried off to Jesrine's room, fighting unfamiliar tears all the way.

The Army gave me a comfortable pre-mission routine to fall back on, though it was a little different in this case. First, assemble your materials and prepare for the mission. I dug through Cherelle's closet for some nice clothes. There was a long skirt in a rich coppery-red color that would work if I belted it tight, and a lacy cream-colored blouse that had probably never fit her because it was just barely too big now. I was no big expert on women's fashions, but in the mirror the combination seemed to fall somewhere between artsy and folksy. It would catch Sandburg's eye.

I shaved the curly black hairs from my lower legs, eventually deciding to leave the upper legs alone. Legs seemed a bit easier to shave than a rugged jawline, but there was more territory and more room for mistakes -- and I still wasn't too coordinated in this new body.

I picked a rich dark lipstick out of Cherelle's stash and learned to apply it passably well after a few false starts. I considered eye makeup, but it seemed to present too many possibilities for disaster. I didn't want to ask Mama Sutterly for help, and I certainly wasn't going to appeal to Jesrine. Lipstick would be enough. Fortunately, Cherelle had an excellent complexion, and Sandburg was a big fan of the clean-faced look.

Once I was ready, I had to corner my prey without alerting him to the hunt. That took me a while. I knew all of Sandburg's usual hangouts, but it seemed he wasn't hanging out these days. Probably he was still spending a lot of time at the hospital, which only made my mission more urgent. Eventually, the best I could think of was to stake out his office.

The student union had large windows facing toward Hargrove Hall across an expanse of green and a fountain. If I sat at the corner table, I could see the lot where Sandburg usually parked. I set myself up with one of Cherelle's psychology textbooks, and waited.

I thought another day had been wasted until, just as the setting sun cast its rays across the quad, a familiar blue-and-white truck pulled into the lot. I spared a moment for outrage -- who the hell told him he could drive my truck? -- then snatched up my book and hurried outside.

I almost had to run to get there in time, but it worked out perfectly. I collided with him right at the base of the steps, and my book went tumbling down along with several fliers and the class schedule I had gathered for show. "Oh!" I gasped. "I'm sorry!" I started to collect the papers, sniffling and rubbing at my eyes.

"No, it was my fault, let me help --" he froze. "Sherry?"

"What? Oh, Blair! I'm sorry, I should have been watching where I was going." I sniffed again.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

I shrugged. "I just had a meeting with my academic advisor. He said I have to start all over again, since I can't remember anything. In fact, he said I should wait another semester and then take some placement tests and see if I even belong here at all."

"That's awful!" Blair exclaimed.

"He said I might need remedial work --" I went on pitifully, then ducked my head and went back to gathering papers.

"Here, let me carry that for you. Come inside with me," he said.

"What? Oh, no, I shouldn't take any more of your time."

"It's no bother. Come on, my office is right in here."

He led me to his office, made me sit in his chair, and put water on to boil for hot chocolate. "Now, let's look at this one piece at a time," he said firmly. "You know, waiting another semester might not be such a bad idea. That would let you start out in the fall, with everyone else. And as for the placement tests, I'm sure you'll do just fine . . ." He proceeded to talk me out of the dumps I would have been in, if I had really been Cherelle and hadn't made up the entire story about the advisor.

I had been undercover before, but this was more difficult. As a girl I was expected to be more emotional; the old Ellison poker-face wouldn't work here. And I was deceiving a friend when what I really wanted was to confide everything to him. I reminded myself firmly of what was at stake and tried to appear as if I'd been successfully cheered up.

Right on cue, my stomach growled. Not so surprising, since I'd had nothing all day but some vending-machine crackers with cheese. Sandburg met my eyes, and we both cracked up at once.

"I don't have any food here," he managed at last. "How about we go out for some dinner? My treat?"

I protested once, then let myself be talked into it. Sandburg was really pouring on the charm, just as I'd hoped.

I let Sandburg choose, and he picked dim sum -- of course. I had learned to hate Chinese food years ago, but I'd never told Sandburg that fact. The story was too long and complicated, and half of it was classified anyway. Actually, his enjoyment had brought back some of mine, and I was learning to appreciate the food again. It was always easy to keep Sandburg talking to cover my discomfort.

"So what are you studying?" he asked me.

"Oh. Well, I really don't remember," I said. "Not really. But apparently I was about to declare a major in psychology. That makes sense -- I know I'm interested in people and what makes them tick."

He leaned forward. "Have you considered anthropology?"

"Um. I don't know. You think it would be a good idea?"

That did it. Blair had a topic he could discuss for the next hour, easily. He told me all about the wonders of comparative cultural studies, throwing in a few anecdotes about interesting tribes while he was at it. By the time the check arrived, I was almost ready to drop everything and become an anthropologist. Cherelle would have been convinced in an instant.

"Actually," he told me, "Rainier's anthro department is unique in this country. Most people divide anthropology into several subfields -- cultural, physical, and historical anthropology. And different people, or different departments, will specialize in one or the other. But Rainier encourages a multi-disciplinary approach. It's really revolutionary. Take my thesis, for example --"

"What's it about?" I asked innocently.

He froze, just for an instant. "Um. Social subcultures in closed societies. Oh, look, fortune cookies!" He grabbed one and tossed me the other.

I looked at the confection in my hands. This was the part of American-Chinese restaurant culture that I hated the most. When I was in the Rangers I had been involved in a covert operation, giving supervision and backup to an operative tracking a suspected arms dealer. He had developed a way to exchange messages via fortune cookies, and I had ended up having dinner at a particular Chinese restaurant every night for a month. Then one day the message in my cookie said 'Tell your Colonel we don't like spies.' And the next morning my operative was found in several pieces. Since then, I had a definite distaste for fortune cookies.

"'Lose an old friend, find an old friend,'" Blair read. "That's weird. Shouldn't it be 'Find a new friend?' What's yours, Sherry?"

"Why do you say it like that?"

"Say what like what?"

"My name. SherRY." I imitated his pronunciation.

"Isn't that how it's supposed to be? It's French for 'dear one.'"

I blinked. I had been thinking of wines, but of course I'd never seen the nickname written out anywhere. "C H E R I?" I guessed. I had only taken a year of French in junior high before switching to Spanish -- mostly to outrage my father. Lower-class kids took Spanish, not Ellisons. My perfect grades hadn't appeased him a bit.

"With an E on the end. That makes it feminine," Sandburg told me with a sultry smile.

"Oh, right." Inwardly I reminded myself to leave off the E.

"So what about your fortune cookie?"

I forced myself to smile. "It says, 'Help! I'm a prisoner in a fortune cookie factory!'"

Blair snorted and grabbed the slip of paper from my hands. "'Tread carefully on the narrow path between danger and deception.' That's pretty grim."

"It's just a mass-produced platitude," I said with a shrug.

His eyebrows went up. "Now you sound like my mother."

I choked on my tea. Me, sound like Naomi?

Blair's eyes crinkled as he watched me laugh.

"Blair," I said quickly, before I could lose my nerve, "can I come home with you tonight?"

He looked surprised. *Whoops, too fast,* I thought

"I mean -- I just feel so comfortable with you!" I explained. "At home, with my mother and my brothers and sisters -- they remind me every time I speak or act differently than I used to. I keep trying to figure out who I'm supposed to be, instead of who I am. With you I don't need to worry about that."

"I don't know . . ." he said uncertainly.

"You look like you could use some company, too," I told him. I tried for sad puppy-dog eyes modeled after Blair's own, but I wasn't sure how it would look on Cherelle's face.

In any case, it seemed to do the trick. "Well, that's true . . ." he admitted. "Okay. Come on, let's go."

And there I was, letting a boy take me home on the first date. If it hadn't been so serious, I could have laughed. Or cried.

It was strange stepping into the loft; everything was so much bigger. I was getting used to being shorter than everyone else, and I had adapted to ceilings being so far above my head, but this was different. Even clambering up into the passenger seat of my truck hadn't been this much of a shock. I had lived in this loft for over six years now. I could find my way around the place blindfolded, even without Sentinel senses. Now, all the proportions were magnified and the place seemed huge, echoing with emptiness.

Then Blair stepped through the door behind me, and it was home again -- just a little more so. "Well, this is it!" he said breathlessly.

"It's nice. Very spacious." I looked for something to comment on. "Are those your weights?"

"No, they're Jim's. He uses them when he can't get to the gym."

I eyed the set of free weights greedily. "Do you think he would mind if I used them? I need to cut back on the PT, but I can't really afford a gym membership either."

Blair bit his lip. "Actually, he probably would mind. He's very touchy about anyone messing with his things. Or he was, before . . . I guess he probably won't remember exactly how he left them."

I struggled between a sense of outrage that Blair would let a casual acquaintance -- which was what I was in my Cherelle persona -- use my belongings, versus the feeling that they were my weights and he'd better not tell me not to touch them. "I can put all the settings back exactly the same way," I promised. "So . . ." What to talk about? "You share this place with --"

"With Jim, yeah. It's his place, actually. He let me have the spare room when I didn't have anywhere else to go, and, well . . . I guess he forgot to kick me out."

My lips twitched. Sandburg knew perfectly well that he had a home here as long as he was willing to stay.

Or perhaps he didn't know. "I'm not sure what will happen when Jim gets back. He's going to his Dad's place after he gets out of the hospital, but eventually he's going to want his own home."

"He still doesn't remember you?" I prompted.

He ran a hand through his hair, leaving it disordered. "No, he doesn't. And it's like he doesn't even want to know me. He's so cold! He's been having a lot of trouble with . . . and he won't let me help!"

It was smoothly done. If I hadn't been expecting the words "his senses," I might not have noticed the gap. Anyone who did catch the little bobble would probably have guessed that Jim was having some kind of masculine trouble, although that opened a whole new can of worms when Blair said he wanted to help.

Now he was pacing the living room floor, stabbing the air with his gestures. "I keep trying to tell Jim I can help him, but he won't listen. He lets the doctors give him all kinds of drugs even though I warned him about reactions. He zones out on the pain and won't let me help. He talks to his father instead."

Interesting. So, after more than two weeks, Secrist was still having trouble dealing with my Sentinel senses, eh? I filed that fact away and went to work calming Sandburg. "Hey, take it easy, Ch -- Blair. Here, sit down. Come on." I patted the couch until he settled next to me. "Now, you helped me earlier. So let's look at this one piece at a time, all right? Maybe Jim just needs some space so he can figure things out for himself. I'm sure it's nothing personal. Why don't you just leave him alone for a while -- let him deal with his father. He'll come around pretty soon, I bet."

"You think?" Blair looked doubtful.

"I'm sure of it. He didn't have a brain injury like me, did he? Well, then, his memory's bound to come back soon. And once it does he'll probably be sorry for pushing you away. But right now the best you can do is to back off and give him whatever time he needs." I was trying to persuade Sandburg to stay away from Secrist and at the same time prepare him for a miraculous 'recovery' when I finally got my body back.

"Maybe you're right," he admitted.

"Of course I'm right." I stood up. "Would you like some coffee or a beer or something?"

He blinked. "Isn't that supposed to be my line?"

"Oh. Right." I sat down again. "So do you have any beer?"

He laughed. "Coming right up." Then he paused. "Are you even twenty-one?"

I managed to keep my startlement from showing. I hadn't even thought of that. "Sure," I said casually, doing some hasty calculations. "I'm a junior -- well, I was a junior. Now I suppose I'm going to be a freshman again."

He handed me a bottle. "I thought you said you hadn't declared your major yet -- aren't you putting it off pretty late?"

I gulped at the bottle hastily. "I don't remember. I thought my advisor told me I hadn't declared yet -- but he said a lot of things today, and I didn't hear much after he told me I had to start over."

Blair nodded sympathetically, and I took another long swig. I really needed the artificial courage, and a bottle would probably pack twice the punch on Cherelle's smaller body. The stuff tasted horrible, though -- I wasn't sure why. It was my usual brand, and it wasn't as if my sense of taste was overdeveloped now. Perhaps Cherelle had simply never acquired a taste for beer -- could that affect me somehow?

I finished my bottle before Blair was halfway through his, and let him get me another.

The evening passed in haze of the best conversation I had ever known. Blair did most of the talking, which was fine with me. We discussed anthropology, sports (I kept forgetting to keep up the faulty-memory pretense, but Blair didn't seem to notice), and Jim. Blair went on at great length about Jim, what a great guy he was, how he was the best detective in the city -- maybe the state -- and what complicated cases they had worked on together. Even buzzed, Blair got the details right and always remembered to gloss over the Sentinel stuff. Sometimes he made the bad guys out to be bigger, tougher, or better shots than they really had been -- but that, I reasoned, was just embellishment. I listened to the stories with a warm glow of pride in my gut. Or maybe it was just the beer.

From there, it all happened very smoothly. First, we were sitting on the couch facing each other and arguing about the Jags' lineup for this season, then Blair had one arm slung behind my back while his other hand drew examples of Olmec architecture in the air, then we were giggling in each other's arms at the story of the freon smugglers on the ferry -- and then he was kissing me.

It wasn't like Frank's slimy kisses. Blair used mostly lip at first, his tongue only darting out for brief tantalizing brushes. He had the pacing right, varying from intense face-sucking to gentle lip-nibbles just as I got out of breath. And he tasted good. At least I thought he did -- I couldn't really get a good taste of him. I kept trying to dial my senses up, but it wouldn't work. At last, he stopped teasing me with his tongue and got down to some serious business. He tasted like beer, and Chinese, and wetrichBlair . . . and suddenly I couldn't breathe.

I was kissing a man.

I was kissing Sandburg.

I pushed him away and gasped for air.

"Are you okay? Cheri? What's wrong?"

I nodded. "I'm fine. Just . . . a little nervous, I guess."

His eyebrows rose into his hair, but his hands rubbed soothing circles on my shoulders. "Nervous, huh? I've been less scared than that dodging bullets from a semi-automatic." That, I knew, was going beyond embellishment right into obfuscation.

"Well, I've never done this before," I admitted unwisely.

"You what?!" His voice rose an octave.

"That I can remember, I mean," I amended.

He narrowed his eyes. "You're not a -- a virgin, are you?" He said the word not with disgust, but with a certain hypnotic terror.

"Of course not." I thought about Frank's pushiness. "I think." I thought about the tampons. "No, I'm certain I'm not. I've done this sort of thing before, it's just -- different now, that's all." And that was literally true; petting and frenching on the couch was old stuff to me, but making out with a man, as a woman, was something different entirely.

"Uh-huh," said Sandburg slowly. "Look, maybe we shouldn't do this tonight."

He was going to send me away. "No!" I couldn't mess this up -- not with Secrist getting out of the hospital tomorrow. "I want this. Really." Gathering my courage, I pressed closer to him. "And it'll be nice. Think about it -- my first time, as far as I can remember, but no pain."

I had only been with a virgin once, when I had only had a little experience myself. I had heard that it didn't have to be painful, but for her it was, and I was frightened away from virgins ever since. If anything like that was going through Sandburg's mind, I wanted to nip it in the bud.

"Come on," I purred into his neck. "Give me something worth remembering." I nibbled at the skin under his ear, and he shivered against me.

He smelled nice. It was only a faint echo of what I had picked up with Sentinel senses, but now it was easier to isolate one portion of his body at a time. His neck smelled sweet. His jaw was aftershave-sharp. I wanted to explore further down, so I undid the top button of his shirt and nuzzled into the opening.

*I'm making out with Sandburg* flashed through my mind again, but it carried only a fraction of the panic from the first time the thought had hit me. It was getting easier now. Next time it occurred to me, I would probably think it was cool.

He pulled me up for another kiss, and we locked lips for a few minutes. This time I used my own tongue to go in search of his taste, and it was delicious. When we parted for air, he gave me an adorable shy grin and bent down to explore my neck in turn. I tilted my chin back so he could reach the buttons of my blouse.

As he worked his way down my chest, my hands twined in his hair -- deep, silky, and luxurious. With small hands I could burrow even further into the strands, and they seemed to go on forever.

Then he slipped a hand inside my bra, squeezing gently and pinching the nipple between two fingers. I felt a sudden unexpected tightness between my legs, and I gasped.

Making love to a man -- I was adapting to that idea. But being turned on as a woman was just plain weird.

He paused and looked up at me, sensing my tension. I ran a tongue around dry lips and nodded to him. "Feels good," I gasped. "Keep going."

His left hand stayed on my breast, stroking it gently, while the other undid the rest of the buttons. Then he was brushing the blouse back off my shoulders and leaning forward to press butterfly-soft kisses along my collarbone.

I shivered. I was definitely turning on, but it was such a strange feeling -- so internal. The excitement seemed to climb right up into my belly and sit there quivering.

My bra straps were pushed down as easily as the blouse had disappeared. Now his hand had freer access to my right breast, and his gentle kisses were moving down in the direction of my other breast, a little tongue putting in an appearance now and then.

As soon as he suckled me, I turned into jello. I was weak and melting, but that shivering core of tension remained in my middle. His lips seemed to be pulling on a string that went right down through the center of me to that diffuse place of excitement.

As a man, I had never gotten much of a charge from having my nipples sucked. Oh, they were sensitive, all right -- especially after the Sentinel thing kicked in. But it was never in a sexual way. Now I was beginning to get the idea. If only a few men felt only a shadow of this when their tits were sucked, it must add quite a charge to their sex life.

He switched his mouth to my other breast, his thumb moving in sweet circles around the nipple he had just abandoned. The tightness was all through my belly now and spreading to the insides of my thighs. I barely noticed him unfastening the bra and tossing it aside. I was sprawled back against the couch, unable to do anything but enjoy. I still had a hand in his hair, the softness tickling my palm -- but I couldn't manage any sort of coherent motion. The muscles I had just spent two weeks working into a semblance of working strength had
suddenly given out.

Then he was heading down my stomach, his mouth seeking out spots that made me gasp. My left side seemed to be more sensitive than my right -- almost too sensitive. I squirmed as his beard stubble tickled me, and he ranged back toward less unstable terrain.

I was expecting him to undo my belt and skirt, but when he reached my navel he just flipped the skirt up and ducked underneath. I couldn't see what he was doing, but it felt like he just pushed the panties to one side. The feel of his ribs between my thighs ratcheted my tension up even further.

And then he touched me.

Warm, gentle fingers sweetly skimmed my flesh. At first he wasn't even touching the skin, just brushing over the hairs, sensitizing everything. Then he stroked ever so softly across the skin, finding the moisture and spreading it around. Gradually, he began to rub a little deeper into the flesh underneath, but always he kept to the outside, never venturing near the center.

I wasn't entirely sure of the geography. I had seen it and touched it on plenty of women, but it was hard matching mental images up with sensations. But I knew what he was doing when I felt fingers spread me open, and I clawed at the cushions in anticipation.

His mouth fastened on me, so warm over the moistness that had begun to cool in the air. He started with his tongue down low, and I knew where he was because I ached to be entered there. I moaned. Then he ran in a long slow sweep upward, and when he reached the top I yelled.

He was good -- oh, very good. I had done this for many women before, but I wasn't sure my technique could match up to his. He started with broad, deep, slow strokes of the tongue around the little bud, revving me up until my thighs and stomach trembled with the need for release. Then when I was completely warmed up, he found the very most sensitive spot, got the tip of his tongue right against it, and moved so swiftly and sharply that I was sobbing as my hips came up off the couch.

The pleasure and sensation were centered in one tiny space, but the climax happened all over. I felt it in my chest, where it seemed as if a hand was clutching my heart. I felt it in my thighs, clamped up against his body so tightly that I could feel him breathe. And I felt it roaring up through the center of me into my belly like a swift-burning fire.

I fell back panting against the couch, muscles exhausted. My pulse pounded in my ears; the loft swam slowly into focus around me.

He pulled his head out from under my skirt and shook the hair from his eyes. "Was that a first?" he asked cheerily, wiping moisture from his chin.

I gulped. "Far as I know."

"Good." He plopped down on the couch next to me. I glanced down at his crotch and wondered how he could move around so easily in jeans that tight. "That was round one. Shall we move to a cozier venue?"

"Huh?" My higher vocabulary functions had shut down for the time being.

His hand curved around one of my breasts, and he spoke more plainly. "I have everything we need in my bedroom. Why don't we go to bed?"

"Oh, uh, sounds good." My legs had gotten a workout, and they weren't sure about providing the power to stand or walk. I levered myself up on the arm of the couch and managed a few tottering steps towards the french doors.

Blair appeared in front of me. "You won't be needing that," he promised, and deftly unfastened my belt. The skirt and panties were left behind. Naked, I followed him into his room.

I should have gotten the idea by now, but I was surprised once again when I stepped in his room to find it less cramped than I remembered. When I sat on the edge of his bed, the futon seemed cozy -- just right for the two of us, as long as we stayed close to each other.

Blair was undoing his shirt. "Hold it," I said, just as he reached the bottom button.

"What?" He looked bewildered.

"It's my turn now. Come here."

When he was standing over me, he seemed huge. But my legs were still too rubbery to stand, so I patted the bed beside me. He sat facing me with one knee hitched up between us. I brushed the shirt back off his shoulders so I could see him.

I already knew his chest was hairy and masculine, but I had only gotten a few brief glimpses of it since that time I taped his ribs up. He seemed to have muscled up in the meantime; I wondered if he had been working out in secret.

I stretched out a hand to touch, when I was assailed by uncertainty. "I'm not sure what to do," I admitted.

"Do whatever you want, whatever feels right," he murmured.

*Riiight.* How many times had I said that to a woman, when what I really wanted to do was get my pants off and get down to business? But now here I was on the other side of the equation, and I wanted to draw it out. I wanted to explore.

I carded my fingers through the nest of hair across his chest. It curled wildly in every direction, resisting my attempts to tame it. I ran a hand over his shoulder and down his arm, feeling the heaviness of muscle just under his skin. When I was the bigger one, I had never noticed what a sturdy build Blair had: long torso, broad shoulders, short but powerful legs. I spread his fingers open and matched my palm to his, marveling at how much larger his hand was. I wasn't used to thinking of Blair as big.

But I really should think about getting down to business. I leaned in to kiss him, licking sweetly at his parted lips. I mouthed down along his neck and across his bobbing Adam's apple, feeling the stubble burn my nose and chin. I tongued a path along his collarbone.

He was leaning back, one hand braced on the bed behind him as he tilted his head back. He was breathing in shallow, panting gasps. Apparently he was having at least some fun, even with his pants still on.

I brushed a knuckle across one of the nubs peeking out, a smooth island amid a sea of curls. He arched up toward me.

"Do you like --"

"Yes!" he gasped.

*Okay.* His chest hairs tickled my nose as I bent and took the little nubbin in my mouth. Trying to recall what had felt so good just a few minutes ago, I swirled my tongue around it and suckled. He moaned and cupped the back of my head against him. I scraped my teeth gently across it, and he collapsed back on the bed. I had to scramble to get him back again. I felt incredibly powerful as he groaned and writhed beneath me.

I switched nipples after a few minutes; the first one was fat and red. With one hand I soothed the swollen bud, but soon my fingers began to stray downwards.

He would have to wear button-flies. I only managed to get the top button undone before he pushed me away and began to writhe frantically, kicking the jeans off as quickly as possible. Then he was nude in front of me, his cock arching up across his belly.

It looked big, of course; everything looked big to me these days. But it was objectively quite nice -- slender, straight, and well-proportioned. Just the head was rosy with blood, but I knew if I pumped it for a while the whole thing would go purple.

I touched it uncertainly. It was warm and silky-smooth, a familiar feeling. But in my small hand it seemed huge, and I had never felt that sensation against my palm without feeling the other side of it through my dick at the same time.

I glanced up at his face. He was staring at me with huge, pleading eyes, too patient to demand anything -- but the strain showed on his face.

I licked my lips, trying to work up a little spit in my dust-dry mouth. Some women really hated this part, I knew -- and any man who did it was an outcast, at least in the groups I hung out with. But I had to try; I had been in Sandburg's position too many times not to feel for his desperation now. I pulled his cock toward me and bent my head.

The skin was sweet-sour, hot against my lips. I couldn't get more than the head inside my mouth at first, so I stuck to sweeping my tongue around. I sought out the little spots that were most sensitive for me, not knowing if they would apply to him. Judging from his groans, the broad head of the glans seemed to be more tender in his case; for me it was always the underside. And the little slit on top -- I loved having someone tease that for me, when I was suitably
excited. I poked just the tip of my tongue into it and waited for Blair's reaction, but I almost missed it in my own response to the harsh taste. Just a tiny drop of fluid seemed to burn my tongue. I pulled back and smacked my lips uneasily.

His hands were on my head again -- not pulling, just suggesting. I worked up a little more spit and bent down again. This time I tried to see how much I could take in, twisting my head around to get the best angle. Even sucking him in until I almost gagged, I couldn't get further than halfway down the shaft. Maybe my mouth was just small, like the rest of this borrowed body. I kept trying for a few minutes, until I realized the hands on my head were tugging me the other way.

"Gotta get stuff . . ." he panted. He squirmed out from under me to pull a lovely little carved box out from under the bed. I had to look away to hide a smile; only Sandburg would store condoms in a cultural artifact!

He got the packet open and fumbled with the little disk. I reached out to help and he pulled away with a wince.

"Careful!" he yelped. "Hair."

I grimaced. Some bitch had managed to roll Sandburg's pubic hair up in a condom? No wonder he was a little gun-shy. "I know," I said reassuringly, and carefully pushed the curls aside before rolling the latex down.

He caught my hand, holding it still until I looked up at him.

"Are you okay with this? We don't have to go on."

Well, that was articulate of him. Magnanimous, too, since he had reached that purple stage. I stuffed my uncertainty away and nodded. "I'm fine."

"Do you want to be on top?"

I blinked. It might help me feel more in control, but it wouldn't change the act itself. And anyway . . . "My legs are still weak," I confessed.

"Okay." He pressed me back gently on the bed. "Anytime you need to stop, just say so."

I wanted to close my eyes, but he was holding them with a direct stare. He reached down and opened me; I was still slick from the deluxe treatment he'd given me earlier. Now he touched the center of me, and I felt that same excitement tighten through my stomach and buttocks.

He dipped a finger down lower, to the place where I ached with emptiness. I groaned as he pushed in, but a finger wasn't enough.

"Go on," I whispered. "Do it."

He moved into position and entered me in one smooth stroke. My eyes went wide as I felt myself filled and stretched. I wrapped my arms behind his shoulders, lifted my legs to twine behind his.

The books had it all wrong. They talked about a man "taking," "claiming," or "possessing" a woman. But I was the one who completely engulfed Blair, who took him in and consumed him. I was the one who pushed and pulled against him to make it work out as he moved helplessly in the face of his need.

He stopped at one point, his head buried against my neck, and I wondered if I could possibly have missed his orgasm. But he just raised his head and smiled at me. "How're you doing?" he asked.

"Good. It feels good," I told him.

"Hmm. Well, 'good' isn't good enough." He shifted around, leaning his weight on one elbow and reaching down with the other hand. His thumb insinuated itself cleverly between our bodies, and suddenly a spike of pleasure went straight up my spine. I gasped.

He grinned. "Can you lift your legs higher? Like behind my back?"

I wasn't sure, since every muscle was already exhausted, but I managed to get my ankles up behind his butt. This changed the angle of his entry, and he began to move in short, sharp thrusts. His hips slapped against the backs of my thighs, his thumb kept up its clever wiggling, and something indefinite was happening deep inside that was winding me up like a spring. I whimpered and gasped and dug my fingers into his shoulders.

"Blair . . ."

He was smiling broadly enough to split his face. "You like that, Cheri?" he murmured huskily. "You going to come for me? Going to come with me?"

"Yessss . . . more," I begged.

He thrust faster, pressed harder with his thumb. I ground my head back against the mattress. I could feel it rising inside me, just as it had before -- all through my chest and stomach, in my legs and arms where I held him.

"Blair . . . Blair, please."

"That's it, Cheri. Give it to me." He was breathing in swift pants. "Open your eyes. C-come on, look at me."

I forced my eyes open. His face was flushed, damp hairs sticking to his forehead -- he was beautiful.

"You ready? Almost there, Cheri. Ahhhlmost . . . there! Yes! Come with me!" His eyes were half-lidded as his hips juddered against me. I could feel his cock jerking, right down inside me.

It pushed me over the edge, and I cried out. "Oh god, Chief, it feels so g-good! Yes!"

We lay still for a minute afterwards, panting and grinning like idiots. My muscles felt like pudding. Blair rolled off me and got rid of the condom. When I realized he had stopped moving I turned my head in his direction. He was watching me with a strange, sober expression.

"Hey," I said. "That was great. I loved it."

He didn't move.

I held out a hand. "Come here. Come back to bed."

He lay down and I rolled to tuck my head in the crook of his shoulder and sling my arm across his chest. I couldn't see his face from where I was lying, but he still seemed disturbed by something.

"It was beautiful, Blair. A wonderful first time." I yawned against his chest. "Wore me out," I chuckled. And before I could find out what was bothering him, I fell asleep.

I couldn't have slept long, but I woke feeling refreshed and uncomplicatedly happy. I grinned stupidly at the ceiling for a few minutes, then turned to share my happiness with Sandburg.

He wasn't there.

Reflexively, I tried to extend my hearing to find him, but it stayed at the same muffled level. He wasn't doing anything that I could easily hear -- not puttering around in the kitchen or anything.

I slipped out from under the covers to look for him, and froze when I realized I was completely naked. I couldn't even remember where half my clothes had ended up. I found Blair's old threadbare flannel bathrobe hanging by the door and slipped it on. It reached past my knees and smelled of Blair.

It was dark when I stepped through the door. I could make out a glint of light off the polished surface of the table, but no details. Nothing moving. I stepped out carefully, conscious that my landmarks were further apart than they were supposed to be. There was a light switch on the kitchen island, if I could just find it -- there! The track lights over the stove came on.

I turned toward the living room and saw a shadowed figure on the couch. "Blair?" I moved towards him. "Is something wrong?"

He didn't move. "No, nothing's wrong," he said in muffled tones. He was fully dressed, leaning forward with his head in his hands.

"What's the matter, couldn't you sleep?" I had never thought of Sandburg as a post-coital-depression kind of guy. From what I'd always seen, he was more in the shit-eating-grin category. But maybe that didn't kick in until a few hours later.

He lifted his head slowly. "I had something to think about."

"Oh." Suddenly I wanted to strangle Secrist for hurting Blair's feelings, even though it was the best possible thing that could have happened. "Can I make you some tea or something?"

"Sure. Whatever," he said dully.

I got the kettle down from its cupboard, filled it with the filtered water from the fridge, and set it to boil. There were a couple of dishes in the sink, rinsed but not clean -- probably from breakfast today. I washed them quickly, throwing glances toward Blair's still form. I wished I knew what else I could do to make him feel better.

Just as the kettle started to rumble and pop, he got up and started sorting through his stash of teas. His movements were unnaturally slow as he lifted down a mug. I came up behind him and raised a hand to touch his shoulder or back the way I normally would -- then it struck me that I didn't have to limit myself to little pats. I could touch Blair as much as I wanted, and no one would call us perverted for it. I wrapped my arms around his waist and pressed my cheek between his shoulder blades. Heat ignited between our skins, warming me through.

"Pour some for me too, will you?" I breathed into his shirt.

He slammed the mug onto the counter, making me jump back. "You hate this stuff, Jim. Quit pretending already."

I stared at his back, unable to say anything. Protests of innocence died before they reached my lips.

Sandburg turned around and stared at me with the bitterest expression I had ever seen on his face. "Aren't you going to deny it?" he asked sourly, leaning back against the counter.

I shook my head weakly. "How -- how did you know?"

"You mean besides you calling me 'Chief' at the height of passion?"

*Oh, shit.*

"You called me 'Sandburg' in the hospital, but I didn't guess. Then at Rainier, you went for the truck before I told you -- in fact you went to the driver's side. You knew where the kettle was, you used the filtered water, you didn't have to search for the dishwashing liquid . . . even the fucking fortune cookies! I should have known!" He dashed a hand across his cheek and whirled away to pound his fist on the counter. "You knew everything you needed to seduce me, and you used it *all,* dammit!" He took a deep breath, but it escaped though his lips in jagged, angry bursts.

"Blair, no, it wasn't like that --" I began, lifting a hand toward him.

"What I don't understand is why," he said, his voice cracking. "You lied to me, you let me think you were this innocent girl -- why couldn't you just tell me the truth? You end up in a fucking different body and you didn't think it was important enough to mention! Did you think I wouldn't believe you?"

"Well, it is pretty hard to swallow," I pointed out.

"Not as hard as you lying your way into my bed!" he yelled, catching fire again. "What the hell was that about? What were you trying to accomplish -- humiliating me?"

"Blair, stop it," I said. "Just calm down. This isn't about you."

"Of course not! Just like everything else, it's all about you. Your problems, your lies, your secrets."

I grabbed his shoulders. "Listen to me, Sandburg!" If I'd been a foot taller and eighty pounds heavier, I would have shoved him against that counter hard enough to make him listen. "Just stop and think for a second. If I'm here, who the hell is in my body?"

He gaped at me. Obviously that hadn't occurred to him yet.

I gave him a little shove for emphasis before releasing him. "That's the real problem. That's what it's all about."

"It's -- who . . ."

"It's Secrist," I told him reluctantly. I didn't like him knowing, but I'd never get his trust back if I didn't tell him.

"Ohmygod. The guy who shot you? But he's dead."

"His body is dead. That means he's not going to want to give up the body he took from me."

His eyes were wide, showing white around the edges. "That's why he didn't know me. That's why he kept pushing me away! It wasn't you at all!"

"That's right. Since you know me better than anyone else, you were the one most likely to figure it out. He had to push you away."

Blair shoved a hand through his hair, eyes flicking back and forth as he put things together. "He wouldn't listen to me when I tried . . . Jim, he has your senses!"

I nodded grimly. "Apparently they're part of the package."

"This is not good, man. Someone else in your body . . . so, what, you have a plan to make him give it back?"

"I haven't gotten that far yet," I admitted. "I'm working on it. Right now I'm more concerned with protecting you and Simon and my father."

"Protecting? From what?"

"From Secrist. He's a stone-cold killer. If he even suspects you know he isn't me, he'll take you out like that." I snapped my fingers. "He can do it from a hospital bed, believe me.

"You mean that's why you lied to me? Why you -- what the hell was that, Jim?"

My face was burning. "I had to get close to you," I muttered. "I needed to stay here, stay with you, and keep you away from him -- without letting you know what was wrong. It was all I could think of."

He shook his head over and over. "I can't believe you, man. You are such a piece of work. Didn't it ever occur to you to just --" He broke off and walked away suddenly, muttering "Stupid, stupid, stupid," under his breath. I didn't know if that was supposed to refer to him or me.

The kettle was howling; I banged it down on a cold burner and wrenched savagely at the stove controls.

Sandburg went into his room and closed the door. I had always tried to respect his privacy, so I ended up wandering around the living room with his robe pulled close around me. Eventually I realized that my -- Cherelle's -- clothes were scattered all around the room. I stared down at them in dislike. I wasn't putting that skirt on again. Instead, I carried the clothes upstairs and folded them on a chair, then dug through my drawers until I found a pair of sweatpants that had shrunk after I washed them. They were still too long, so I rolled them up, then pulled on a T-shirt.

Sandburg's french doors slammed open suddenly. "Jim!"

I craned over the railing as he looked around the loft frantically. When he saw me, he came charging up the stairs. "Jim, you have to tell me --" He pulled up short.

"What?"

Sandburg lifted a hand to his mouth, not really hiding his twitching lips. A strangled snort escaped.

I looked down at myself. I suppose I did look like a little girl dressing in her father's clothes.

"Man, you really need to be wearing a bra," Blair managed in an unnaturally high voice.

He was right, actually; as much as I hated the things, I had found that going without a bra tended to chafe. And I was pretty sensitive right there at the moment. With a snarl, I pulled off the T-shirt and reached for the underwear I had left on the chair.

"Oh, uh, wow," Sandburg breathed. "Could you not do that right now, Jim?"

"Why not?" I growled. "You've already seen it all." I turned to face him, both hands going up behind my back to work the clasp. It did sort of push my chest out at him.

"Yeah, but --" He gulped and turned his back.

"What were you in such a hurry to tell me, Chief?" I asked as I struggled with the clasp.

"Oh. Actually, I wanted to ask you. That body you're wearing -- I take it that's Cherelle Sutterly, or were you lying about that too?"

"Sandburg, I didn't want to lie to you at all. Damn it!" I muttered, shaking my hands out as they went numb. "Yes, this is Cherelle Sutterly."

"So, uh, is she in there? With you?"

"No, it's just me. She was in a coma for two months before -- before I was shot. Brain trauma. The doctors didn't expect her to come back at all." I cursed again.

"What are you doing, man?" He peeked over his shoulder.

"I can't get these stupid hooks to catch," I complained.

"Well, don't do it behind your back, then!" He stomped over to me and grabbed the scrap of satin from my hands. Then he arranged it backwards on my chest, with the cups behind me and the clasp just above my belly button. "Fasten it there and then move it around and get your arms inside."

I did as he said, and it was easy. "Carolyn always did it behind her back," I said. So did every other woman I had ever watched dress.

"Women have years of practice doing it every day," Blair pointed out. "I guarantee you, when they start out as teenagers, they do it this way." He paused for a moment with his hand on my shoulder, then turned to the bed to grab the T-shirt. I hadn't noticed before in the soft light, but he was distinctly pink.

I caught his hand as he passed me the shirt. "Blair. What we did -- it wasn't just because I thought I had to."

He didn't pull away, but he wouldn't look at me either. "I thought, maybe if Cherelle was in there with you --"

"She had nothing to do with it, Chief. I'm pretty sure she's gone." I spoke gently, wondering if he could possibly have gotten attached to a person he had never truly met.

He took a deep breath and sat on the edge of my bed. "Okay. That answers one question. The next one is, how did you end up in her body? How did you leave yours in the first place?"

"I don't know." I pulled the T-shirt on. I hated to admit it, but I was more comfortable with the bra.

"Come on, man, you must know something!"

"Sandburg, I don't even remember the shooting very well, much less how all this happened." I gestured up and down my borrowed body. "All I know is I woke up in the hospital, and everything was different.

"It's important, Jim. How you got there is the key to getting you *back!*"

"I realize that, but I've tried to remember and it just isn't there! Isn't there something else we can try?"

He sighed. "Well, we could ask Secrist if he remem--"

"No. Absolutely not. We are not even hinting to Secrist that you know about the switch, or that I'm hanging around trying to figure out how to get my body back. In fact, it's better if you don't even see Secrist until we're ready to make our move. You got that?"

"Jim, it could be the only way --"

"Think of another."

He sighed, his eyes wandering the room as he searched for inspiration. His brow furrowed up. "Have you ever read The Tale of the Body Thief?"

"What?"

"Anne Rice. It's in her vampire series --"

"Chief, you know I don't go in for all those trendy novels."

"This one's different, man. The main character ends up in almost the same situation you're in. In fact, he's even stupider about it than you were -- well, sort of. At least he trusted his friends enough to tell them --"

"Sandburg, it wasn't a matter of trust . . . let's just drop it, okay? What about this book?"

"Well, it's been a while since I read it, but I think there's a scene . . . wait, I've got it in my room." He popped off the bed and bounded down the stairs. Even without Sentinel senses I could hear him rummaging in his room. I walked down to wait on the living room couch.

"Okay, here it is, man." He handed me a battered paperback. "This scene here. The vampire -- who's stuck in a mortal body -- and his friend are practicing switching bodies so they can get the vampire's body back from the guy who stole it."

I took the book, leaning a little closer to the lamp to read the scene. It was hard to concentrate, because Blair was staring at me. "What?" I snapped at last.

"Huh?" He looked completely innocent -- and utterly lovable.

"You're staring at me," I said, more gruff because I didn't know what to do about the attraction.

"You're . . . well, you."

"I thought you figured that out a while ago."

"Yeah, I picked up on some cues, but now . . . you're acting like yourself, like Jim. You even sound like yourself."

"This may come as a surprise to you, Chief, but I am capable of putting on an act