In sleep, he looks younger and somewhat vulnerable. The ridiculously long sweep of his dark lashes curve on his high cheekbones, feminine in their thick lusciousness. But it is most assuredly the only feminine thing about him, she thinks dreamily, and rising up on one elbow, studies his sprawling, nude body.

They have spent all afternoon in bed and had finally fallen asleep exhausted. Now, just looking at Max makes her shiver with the rekindling of passion. These thoughts prompts her to run her small hand lightly over his broad shoulder and across his massive chest, her fingers taking on the literal glow of arousal.

It is incredibly sweet to have Max at her mercy, to let her hand roam over his taut flat stomach, to feel his hard warm body, and to linger over the strong muscles of his thighs.

Liz lowers her head and kisses him softly as not to awaken him. She simply wants to love him freely with her hands and mouth.

"Wench, behave yourself." Max's hand grabs her wrist and in seconds their positions are reversed. Liz is flat on her back and Max is looking down into her deep brown eyes. "You're insatiable," he chuckles. "I never would have imagined when I first took you to bed what a sleeping Tigress I was arousing.

"Tigress, huh?" She shivers in delight as his glittering dark eyes devour her naked body with a most sensuous knowing triumph.

"You have to know how much I love and adore you." Max's face and voice serious and intense.

She sighs as his hand trails across her body to cup one full, round breast. "And I you: all you have to do is touch me and I'm yours for the taking." She adds on a moan as he rolls one taut nipple between his thumb and finger, sending arrows of sensations through her ultra sensitive flesh.

Max chances a glance at the bedside clock. "Much as I would like to take you up on your offer. We can't. Look at the time." He brushes his mouth briefly over hers before sliding out of bed.

Her loving gaze roams over him and she gasps as he turns and smiles down at her, magnificent in his nudity. Contrary to what he has said, he cannot hide his body's readiness to take up her offer.

"Is it that shocking?" he says, his voice deep and tinged with laughter as he catches her wayward gaze. "My body might be weak but my mind is strong, and I know that if I don't get you home before curfew, your mother will have my head."

Liz lets her gaze slide back down the long, hard length of him. "Weak is hardly the word I would use from where I am," she jokes.

"Get up and join me in a shower." Max calls over his shoulder as he heads for the bathroom.

Liz sighs happily and turns on her stomach savoring the lingering scent of Max and love on the crumpled sheets. She hears the shower water running but is too stated and lazy to move.

Liz takes in a deep breath and stretches her body as she peeps out form under the covers to check the time. Max is right she needs to get up so that they can head home.

She rolls over and places her small hand on the vacant spot where Max had laid up until a few minutes ago. The memories course throught her body like a tidal wave and she smiles, her contentment evident in the golden afterglow of their lovemaking.

Liz can't help but think of their earlier discovery of the Native American tourquoise necklace worn by her ancestor Aisling and the subsequent Rock Art synbols found in the family Coat Of Arms also revealed with the aid of a magnifying glass.

"Urrg...I need to get up." She sits up in bed and smiles as she anticipates joining Max in the shower. She is poised outside the bathroom door when she gets a flash. There was a birthday party for her grandfather, held here at the lake-house. She didn't feel well so he had taken her into her parents room to lie down. He showed her a framed picture of her mother as a newlywed. She was wearing a tourquoise necklace.

Liz bypasses the bathroom and runs down the hall and slings open her parents' bedroom door in one fluid motion. To her dismay, the framed picture isn't on the desk where she had seen it all those years ago so she franticly searches the desk drawers until she finds it.

There, around the neck of a young, newly married Nancy Parker, is Aisling's necklace.

Liz stands in the middle of the room, frozen, not sure of what to do next. The walls seem to close in on her as the room begins to spin, oviously sucking out the air because she cannot breath.

As a little girl, this room represented comfort and protection when things went bump in the night. Standing here now, hugging a photograph to her breast and reliving memories of dreams and visions that she once shared with her mother on the very bed that she was conceived.

"Max!" She screams his name as she clumsily makes her way down the hall and, straight into his arms as he slings the bathroom door open upon hearing his name wrenched from her lips.

"Liz," Max grabs her by her shoulders and pulls her behind him as he checks the hallway for an intruder.

Assured that they are alone he turns to her and lifts her chin so that their eyes meet and hold. "What's wrong?"

She tries to speak, but no words will come.

"Liz, look at me." He shakes his head in confussion as she looks up at him, hurt revealed throught her eyes.

"She knows." Liz's voice is tinged with anger.

"She?" Max tilts his head and arches his brow waiting for Liz's elaboration.

"My mother, look." Liz thrusts the framed picture at Max and, points to the tell-tale necklace around Nancy Parker's neck. "That's why she didn't want my father to tell me the story of Gray Ghost. She was afraid that I would remember."

"Remember what?" Max's look of confusion is secondary to his one of concern.

"Max. I've had visions before, as a child. My mother knows about them." Her eyes are wide and her voice raspy as she clings to his strong arms for support.

When she rests her forehead against his chest and her knees begin to buckle beneath her, he scoops her up into his arms and carries her over to the recently abandoned bed.

Liz inhales deeply as Max gently lays her in the bed that they've shared all afternoon. The familiar feel of the bed and, the heady smell of love surrond her and she snaps back to reality.

She sits up and leans against the pillows stacked against the headboard and Max, still wet from his shower with only a towel around his waist, sits facing her, holding her hand.

"I had a flash Max. She knows." Liz's words are bitterly spat out.

Max is taken aback by her venomous reaction. "Liz I don't understand."

Liz takes a deep breath and exhales slowly. "We were so close then. I would awaken her in the middle of the night and we would whisper under the sheets as not to wake my dad."

Her mouth curves into a smile. "I would tell her about my dreams of a special place, with special people who were at war but had been happy long ago. Max, they were dreams of your planet."