“So am I. It’s time to end this, Sydney. Bear—come!”
By the time he’d hooked his fingers under Bear’s collar, I heard the distinct grumble of a Harley being started, followed by the typical, loud, straight-pipe
Rrrrip! Rrrrip! Rrrrip!
Then the angry sound of the rider tearing off down the road. Lane muttered all sorts of colorful expletives as he punched a number into the phone, but I was no longer paying attention because Sydney chose that very moment to get through to me. At first I thought it was the same voice I’d been hearing earlier, the one calling me, but I was now inside what amounted to a soundproof building. I listened closer. It sounded like the word “no,” but I couldn’t really tell. Then it came again, clearer the second time. That was definitely a “no,” or something sounding close. It was her all right, but why at this very moment?
Lane was talking to someone about Kojak, and… Max? Was
he
the reason she was finally trying to reach me? Father Gabe had described her as desperate, terrified. Furthermore, Kojak had shown up at the church while
she
was there… even if it was actually me. He’d followed Lane to this house, and he’d been writing something down out there. And by some coincidence I didn’t grasp, Sydney was calling “no” to me. Coincidence? Or the beginning of something else?
“NO!”
This time the single word came through loud and clear, almost as if I’d asked the question and she’d answered it. Maybe I’d somehow reached her with that little talk of mine, there on the hill behind Faith’s house. I whispered her name in return. “Sydney?”
“LEAVE! GET OUT! I WANT MY BODY BACK!”
Shit! Nothing about her had changed after all. If I ignored her, she’d scream even louder, but giving in to her now was almost as bad. The body she wanted back was living
my
life, damn it! Why hadn’t she made her move back when I’d first talked to her? Now I wasn’t all that ready to cooperate. Lane heard me.
“You say something?” he asked. His hand covered the phone.
I shook my head, turning away so he couldn’t see my face. Sydney was back to talking instead of shouting, but from somewhere distant, as if she had a pillow shoved in her face.
Oh, God!
I didn’t dare move or even breathe. One of the words was “Chen,” then “keep,” and finally “die.” Die? That one did it. I buckled on the spot, not caring that Bear was systematically goo-ing every inch of my face. Maybe he was the reason I didn’t really faint this time, but my legs had certainly gone on vacation. A moment or six later, Lane was wiping my face with yet another towel, a clean one, and Bear was obediently sitting in a corner. Maybe I’d fainted after all?
“Don’t worry,” Lane said. “The police said they can’t do anything until he makes a move, but I’m not going to let… hey… are you all right? You don’t look so good. Your hands are like ice.” He started rubbing them while I wrestled with my thoughts.
I could pretend I never heard her. Kojak was the one behind this. He’d provoked her just by showing up. Then again, maybe it had something to do with Shae and all the church stuff.
“I won’t let him hurt you. I’ll protect you.” Lane held my frigid hands between his own.
Protect me? Oh, God, who cares about protection? It seems I’m being given two choices, both impossibly bad. If I shut Sydney out, now that she’d made contact, I’ll be a monster. If I leave voluntarily, I’ll lose the only people who’ve ever cared if I lived or died. Leave voluntarily? What am I thinking? When have I ever had a choice? And why doesn’t Sydney understand that?
Sydney’s communication was a new piece to my puzzle, even if it was the exact opposite of anything I’d hoped from her. Somehow the puzzle now included Faith and Steven, Max, Father Gabe, Lane… and Shae. How many others were waiting in the wings to make their appearance? The cops? Max’s gang? It was my puzzle to solve, and on top of it all, God might yank me out of the picture at any second, assuming He was behind it all. Even
that
was a guess on my part.
Squeeze a little joy out of a miserable situation. Was that what Faith had said not that many days ago? Yeah, right!
Sydney had to be ecstatic, the way things were coming together. She’d won on some level, at least.
I’d promised Lane that I’d see this Dr. Chen the following day, but “Chen” was one of the words that Sydney had managed to get through to me during her tirade, along with “die.” Between those two words was stuff I couldn’t make out, but the gist of it completely unnerved me. That, on top of Kojak, gave me a full case of the heebie-jeebies. On top of it was Lane’s revelation that Dr. Chen was a specialist in lost memories and head trauma, exactly what I’d feared right from the very first time Faith had started in on the doctor bit. Chen was a psychiatrist! If anyone would know how to screw up a person’s brain,
he
would!
I was calmed by Lane’s physical contact more than his assurances that Kojak was not getting anywhere near me, but as soon as he suggested I use his bathroom to wash Bear’s slobber off my face I began to panic all over again. After all, the bathroom sink would be whole
feet
away from him, when inches would have been too far. In the end, he walked me there and waited outside the bathroom door.
I was careful to avoid Sydney in the mirror the whole time, concentrating on how good the warm, soapy water felt and deliberately turning away when I used the towel. One day! Twenty-four hours. That was all the time I had left before it… before everything might change, if that part about Chen agreeing to see me right away was true. Less than a day, if it was the very first thing in the morning. Another surge of panic hit me, along with adrenaline. This was
my
life, at least for this moment. I needed to squeeze a little joy.
Lane made a production of inspecting my face, peering at it this way and that.
“Well, do you still want to marry me, Lane, now that I have a clean face?”
“More than ever!” He took my face in his hands.
“Why? And don’t tell me it’s because you like girls with clean faces.”
He rested his forehead against mine. “When I first saw you, it was like you reached into my soul and woke me up, and now that I’m awake, I can’t… I won’t live another day without you. There will never be another girl for me. My heart will always, forever belong to you.”
“What if forever ends tomorrow?” I whispered. “What then?”
He pulled back a little to look at me, holding my shoulders. “Then we better enjoy it while we can because every second is precious. That’s the beauty of life, the very reason we can love so thoroughly, so completely. Deep down we know it isn’t meant to last.”
Sydney, you can damn well wait your turn!
I grabbed the back of his head and pulled his lips down to mine. Everything I was, everything I wanted to be, I poured into that kiss. My lips… my tongue… my stolen body. They spoke without words, willing him to feel the truth, forcing him to feel it, to feel
me.
He took far too long to respond—almost a half second!—before lifting me in a single, swift motion and holding my buns so I was straddling his waist. My legs, knowing exactly how to play their part, were already in place when he backed me up against the wall. I wriggled so he could inch his erection closer to me, closing my eyes while my body got acquainted with his exploring hands. The conversation had shifted to X-rated by the time he’d moved us to a massive four-poster bed, stopping twice on the way for further “clarification.” If I was hungry for him, he was ravenous for me. I drank in every kiss as though it was my first. Who cared about a crumbled wall? I had eternity to ponder the damn wall.
It was not a good time for buttons, his or mine.
Time stood still. Our souls were entwined until I could no longer distinguish where he began and I ended. Even when we were pressed together, flesh to flesh, I yearned to be closer. I needed all of him inside of me as far in as he could go. When he stiffened and started to moan, I arched my back and thrust my hips hard against his, over and over until an intense pleasure lifted me so high I could have thanked God face to face. In that one blissful second, I’d found a peace I’d never known. Bliss needed no memory; it belonged to the soul. Sydney? Let her cringe while she thought of Max, Max and her dangerous gang of druggies and everything they stood for. Let her compare
that
with whatever she was feeling now.
Lane flopped on his back, panting, a thin sheen of sweat covering his muscular body. He smiled and rolled over onto his side so he was facing me. “I didn’t know it was possible… to love like this. Wouldn’t you think someone would have at least warned a guy?”
I backed up against him, pulling his arms around me. “Promise me you’ll always remember the way we feel about each other right this second. Promise me… you won’t forget.”
He pulled me closer, nuzzling my hair. “If we were somehow separated, I could find you in any crowd, no matter how big.”
“How?”
“I’d close my eyes and follow the pull you have on me. I swear it would lead me right to you!”
“Know what
I’m
thinking? That I’ve never been happier than I am right this second.”
That I’ll never be this happy again.
“Good,” he said, rolling out of the bed and reaching into the discarded pile of clothes on his bedroom floor, “then I have something for you.” When he returned, he held a tiny, red velvet box. Kneeling, he flipped it open and there, nestled against shiny black satin, was a breath-taking diamond ring. I knew nothing about diamonds or settings, but the stone was half the width of my finger. It was beautiful, actually stunning, but it could never be mine. His next words confirmed it.
“Sydney Turner, will you marry me?”
“Shhh! Don’t say her name… especially not now.” I covered his mouth with my hand while I dealt with the sharp jab in my stomach.
He spoke through my fingers. “What? Who are you talking about?”
When I simply stared at the ring, he sighed. “I’m not following you. Who is ‘her’?”
Frick, frick, frick! How could he have gone and done such a thing, especially when he knew I was going through an emotional struggle with everything, even Shae? The ring box looked brand new, as if he might have bought it that very morning. Or maybe right after our hike, that kissing session on the mountain trail? Was he that impulsive? Was
that
what he’d been talking to Faith about? Had she guessed his intentions?
When I still didn’t answer, he took a long breath. “Okay, fine… then just explain to me why I can’t call you Sydney any more. It’s your name.”
I leaned over and cupped his face in my hands. “Tomorrow… I promise I’ll answer
all
your questions… right after my appointment with Dr. Chen.”
“All right, I’m going to hold you to that. Don’t think I won’t.” He looked somewhat pacified, which surprised me.
“I hope you do, Lane, and I’m being serious. You and Faith can fire away for as long as you like and absolutely no subject will be off limits.”
“Nothing?”
“Nothing! Even if your interrogation takes all day and even if I get so mad I want to back out of our agreement… but until then, let’s pretend that everything is perfect, that we’re just two ordinary people planning a wedding.” I slid off the bed onto his lap. “Can you do that for me? Will you do that for me?”
“The wedding part is easy,” he said, taking the ring out of the box and placing it on my finger. “It’s the ordinary people thing that has me stumbling. Have I told you how truly odd you are?” His expression was a mix of amusement and curiosity.
I kissed his cheek and held my hand up so we both could admire the ring. “Yeah, I think you’ve mentioned it once or twice.”
“But do you know what I’m thinking now?” he asked, kissing my neck.
“I can’t even imagine.”
“That I must be even odder than you, because I love it.”
I managed a smile. Sydney was going to get one helluva homecoming. If she was able to read my thoughts this minute, she already knew what that homecoming was going to be for her—a void. She’d be pushed onto a stage in the middle of the play without knowing her lines, or the script, or knowing what was expected of her. She’d inherit Lane, yes, but everything she’d been before my visit would be there to haunt her.
Including Max and his buddies.
* * *
The ring had belonged to his mother, and in turn to
her
mother. The velvet-covered box was new, bought after the tragedy that ended his mom’s life. As for the ring, it was a little big, but I’d only be wearing it for another seventeen hours and thirty-three minutes. No, make that thirty-two minutes! I turned the clock face-down and made love to Lane one last time before we left. If our previous session had been intense, this one threatened to melt us both.
This
was what I needed! This was to be my solace for as long as I could remember it. I needed to be a sponge, to soak up everything, his touch, his caresses, his cries and responses. Our music together! And then I’d protect my precious cache of soul food so that nothing could ever squeeze the sponge or rob its contents.