Crystal Jake: The Complete EDEN Series Box Set (35 page)

Prologue

T
he girl behind the counter smiled at me and licked her lips. Shit. That was an invitation if ever I saw one. Sorry, honey, I’m married. Hey, I’m not just married, I’m in fucking love. I had the perfect life. A beautiful wife, two little terrors, a successful career. In fact, I was poised to dominate my industry.

The results of my research would soon be made public and I was going to be a star! Life was good.

‘Keep the change,’ I told her.

Her smile broadened and yet there was disappointment in her eyes.

I grinned and shrugged. ‘If I wasn’t already hooked I’d ask you out. You’re gorgeous.’

‘I’m not jealous,’ she said flirtatiously.

‘My wife is,’ I told her, and picked up the tray of drinks: cappuccino for me, latte for my wife, and two hot chocolates for my monsters. Suddenly I heard a man shout, ‘Fuck me!’ And though those two words had nothing to do with me, my body— No, not just my body,
every part
of me
knew
.

They concerned me.

I whirled around, jaw clenched, still clutching the paper tray of drinks—one cappuccino, one latte, and two hot chocolates—as if it was my last link to normality. For precious seconds I was so stunned, I froze. I could not believe what I was seeing. Then instinct older than life kicked in. The tray dropped from my hand—one cappuccino, one latte, and two hot chocolates—my last link with normality falling away from me forever. I began to race toward the burning car. My car. With my family trapped in it. I could see my babies screaming and banging on the car doors.

‘Get out, get out of the fucking car,’ I screamed as I ran.

I could see them pulling at the handles, their small spread palms banging desperately on the glass. I could even see their little mouths screaming for me.

‘Daddy, Daddy.’

It was shocking how frightened and white their little faces were. I could not see my wife. Where was she?

I was running so fast my legs felt as if they might buckle, but it was as if I was in slow motion. Time had slowed down. At that moment thoughts came into my head at sonic speed, but the disaster carried on in real time. Suddenly my wife lifted her head and I saw her. She was looking out through the window directly at me. I was twenty feet away when I saw everything clearly. I kept on running, but it was like being in a dream where your mother suddenly turns into an elephant.

You don’t go
What the fuck?

You just carry on as normal even though your mother has just turned into a green elephant. I just carried on running. I no longer looked at my children. My gaze was riveted by the sight of my wife. I was ten feet away when the car exploded. Boom! The force of it picked me up and threw me backwards. I flew in the air and landed hard on the tarmac. I did not feel the pain of the impact. I got onto my elbows and watched the fire consume my family and the thick, black smoke that poured from the wreckage.

There was no grief then. Not even horror. It was just shock. And the inability to comprehend. The loss, the carnage, the tragedy, the green elephant. People came to help me up. I was shaking uncontrollably. They thought I was cold so they wrapped me in blankets. They sent me in an ambulance to the hospital. I never spoke. The whole time I was trying to figure out the green elephant. Why? How? It confused me. It destroyed my life, past, present and future.

Two years later

London

Marlow Kane

It is the time you have wasted for your rose that makes your rose so important.

—
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry,
The Little Prince

‘L
ady Swanson is here for her appointment,’ Beryl said into the intercom. Even her voice was all at once professional and terribly impressed.

‘Send her in,’ I said and rose from my desk.

The door opened and a classically beautiful woman entered. Her skin was very pale and as flawless as porcelain. It contrasted greatly with her shoulder-length dark hair and intensely blue eyes. Her dress and long coat were in the same cream material; her shoes exactly matched the color of her skin. The overriding impression was of an impossibly wealthy and elegant woman. Women like her lived in movies and magazines. They did not walk into the consulting rooms of disgraced hypnotists.

‘Lady Swanson,’ I said.

‘Dr. Kane,’ she murmured.

I winced inwardly. ‘Just Marlow, please,’ I said and gestured toward the chair.

She came forward and sat. She crossed her legs. They were long and encased in the sheerest tights I had seen in my life. Yes, she was an incredibly polished and cultivated woman.

I smiled.

She smiled back nervously.

‘So, I believe you refused to tell Beryl your reason for coming to see me?’

‘That is correct.’

‘What can I do for you, Lady Swanson?’

‘It’s not for me. It’s for my daughter. Well, she’s my stepdaughter, but she is just like my own. I’ve raised her since she was two years old. She’s twenty now.’

I nodded and began to raise the estimation of her age upwards. She must have been at least forty, but she didn’t look a day over twenty-eight.

‘Her name is Olivia and she met with an accident about a year ago.’ Lady Swanson paused for breath. ‘She nearly died. She had extensive injuries and was in hospital for many months. When she recovered she had lost her memory. She can remember nothing. She can remember how to do
things
—cook, places—but she cannot remember her past.’

I nodded.

‘I was hoping hypnotherapy could help her remember her past.’ She leaned forward slightly, her lips parted. ‘Do you think you could…hypnotize her?’

I watched her and thought of the men in her life. How easy it must have been for such a beautiful woman to get anything she wanted from a man.

‘Lady Swanson, I’m not sure I am the right man for the job. Usually I treat people who want to lose weight, kick a bad habit, or who are afraid of spiders.’

‘I understand that, but do you think you could help her, though?’

‘To be honest, I’ve never had such a patient.’

‘Well, it’s worth a try then?’ she pressed hopefully.

‘But you have to bear in mind that not everybody can be hypnotized.’

She didn’t listen to that. Instead she broke into a smile. It was like the sun shining out from between a crack in a sky full of storm clouds. Yes, she was obviously one of those women who could whistle a chap off a tree, but… I was immune to it. For two years I had wandered around looking for even the smallest spark of the vibrant life that used to course through my veins. All I had ever found was ashes. Even now this beautiful, beautiful woman elicited nothing from me.

‘Oh that’s wonderful,’ she gushed softly. ‘You will take her on then?’

I felt almost as if she had subtly manipulated me. ‘I’ll try. No promises.’

‘I did some research on you and your work, and I am certain you are the best person for the job. If anybody can do it, you can.’

I froze at that.

Instantly her face lost some of its glowing enthusiasm. ‘I hope you don’t think I was snooping into your private affairs? I was only interested in your professional credentials…’

I smiled tightly: the personal stuff came up with the professional stuff. After the accident the two had become inextricably entwined. ‘Of course not. It is prudent to check out a practitioner before you go to see him.’

‘I just want what is best for my daughter. And you are that. Will you take on her case?’

‘Does your stepdaughter know you are here?’

She leaned back and looked out of the window. ‘
A butterfly wing is a miracle, made up of thousands of tiny, loosely attached pigmented scales that individually catch the light and together create a depth of color and iridescence unmatched elsewhere in nature. Our identities are like the butterfly wing, made up of thousands and thousands of tiny, loosely attached memories. Without them we lose our color and iridescence.
Olivia is like a child now. We make all the major decisions for her. The world is a frightening place for her.’

‘All right, Beryl will find an appointment for you.’

She smiled. A soft smile. And I had a vision. Her in bed with her shriveled husband. It was not only she who had done a quick Google search. It was not every day that Lady Swanson, of the Swanson dynasty, called my office for an appointment.

For a moment our eyes held and I saw something in hers. Interest. Desire. I let my eyes slide away.

‘Thank you… Marlow.’

‘Goodbye, Lady Swanson.’

‘Ivana, please.’

‘Goodbye, Ivana.’

I walked to the door, opened it, and let her out. As she passed me her perfume wafted into my nostrils. Expensive, faint, but still heady. From up close she was even more flawless. I closed the door and walked to my desk. I opened my drawer and taking out a bottle of Jack Daniel’s poured myself a huge measure. I knocked it back, swallowed, and closed my eyes. Fuck. Was it ever going to stop hurting? I walked to the window and watched Lady Swanson get into her chauffeur-driven Rolls-Royce Phantom. She stared straight ahead. It was almost as if it was only a dream that she had come into my office and sat in my chair.

The intercom buzzed. ‘Can I come in?’ Beryl asked.

I sighed. ‘Yes.’

The door opened even before I had taken my finger away from the button.

‘Well?’ she asked, wide-eyed. ‘That was a very short first session. What did she want?’

‘She wants me to treat her stepdaughter.’

Her eyes became huge. ‘What? She wants you to treat Lady Olivia?’

‘How did you know that?’

‘It was all over the papers. She met with an accident and lost her memory. You have your work cut out for you.’

‘Why do you say that?’

‘Lady Olivia is known in the tabloids as ‘Miss Secretive’. She has never ever given an interview and furiously guards her privacy. There are no pictures of her behaving badly. Ever.’ Beryl came deeper into the room and went to my computer. She typed in a few words and turned towards me, her face filled with gossipy excitement, said, ‘Here. This is what she looks like.’

I walked toward the computer screen.

It was not a very good picture. A long lens photo. Grainy. And not even in color. But my cock twitched and woke up from its deep sleep.

Coming Soon…

GOLD DIGGER

Georgia Le Carre

CHAPTER 1

‘W
hatever you do, don’t
ever
trust them. Not one of them,’ he whispered. His voice was so feeble I had to strain to catch it.

‘I won’t,’ I said, softly.

‘They are dangerous in a way you will never understand. Never let your guard down,’ he insisted.

‘I understand,’ I said, but all I wanted was for him to stop talking about them. These last precious minutes I didn’t want to waste on them.

He shook his head unhappily. ‘No, no, you don’t understand. You can never let your guard down for even an instant. Never.’

‘All right, I won’t.’

‘I will be a very sad spirit if you do.’

‘I won’t,’ I promised vehemently, and reached for his hand. The contrast between my hand and his couldn’t have been greater. Mine was smooth and soft and his was gnarled and full of green veins, the skin waxy and liver-spotted. The nails were the color of polished ivory. The hand of a seventy-year-old man. His fingers grasped fiercely at my hand. I lifted them to my lips and kissed them one by one, tenderly.

His eyes glowed briefly in his wasted, sunken face. ‘How I love you, my darling Tawny,’ he murmured.

‘I love you. I love you. I love you,’ I said.

‘Do your part and they cannot touch you.’

He sighed. ‘It’s nearly time.’

‘Don’t say that,’ I cried, even though I knew in my heart that he was right.

His eyes swung to the window. ‘Ah,’ he sighed softly. ‘You’ve come.’

My gaze chased his. The window he was looking at was closed, the heavy drapes pulled shut. Goose pimples crawled up my arms. ‘Don’t go yet. Please,’ I begged.

He dragged his gaze reluctantly from the window. His thin, pale lips rose at the edges as he drew in a rattling breath. ‘I’ve got to go, my darling. I’ve got to pay my dues. I haven’t been a good man.’

‘Just wait a while.’

‘You have your whole life ahead of you.’

He turned his unnaturally bright eyes away from me, looked straight ahead, and with a violent shudder, departed.

For a few seconds I simply stared at him. Appropriately, outside the October wind howled and dashed itself into the shutters. I knew the servants were waiting downstairs. Everyone was waiting for me to go down and tell them the news. Then I leaned forward and put my cheek on his still, bony chest. He smelled strongly of medicine. I closed my eyes tightly. Why did you have to go and die and leave me to the wolves?

In that moment I felt so close to him I wished that this time would not end. I wished I could lie on his chest, safe and closeted away from the cruel world. I heard the clock ticking. The flames in the fireplace crackled and spat. Somewhere a pipe creaked. I placed my chin on his chest and turned to look at him one last time. He appeared to be sleeping. Peaceful at any rate. I stroked the thin strands of white hair lying across his pinkish white scalp, and let my finger run down his prominent nose. It shocked me how quickly the tip of his nose had lost warmth. Soon all of him would be stone cold.

I wondered whom he had seen at the window. Who had come to take him to his reckoning. My sorrow was complete. I could put my fingertips into it and feel the edges. Smooth. Without corners. Without sharpness. It had no tears. I knew he was dying two hours before. Strange because it had seemed as if he had taken a turn for the better. He seemed stronger, his cheeks pink, his eyes brilliantly bright and when he smiled it appeared as if he was lit from within. He even looked so much stronger. I asked him what he wanted to eat.

‘Milk. I’ll have a glass of milk,’ he said decisively.

But after I called for milk and it was brought to him he smiled and refused it. ‘Isn’t this wonderful?’ he asked. ‘I feel so good.’

And at that moment I knew. Even so it was incomprehensible to me that he was really gone. I never wanted to believe it.

‘In the end you wanted to go, didn’t you?’

There was no answer.

‘It’s OK. I know you were tired. It was only me holding you back. You go on ahead. Find a place for me.’

He lay as still as a corpse. Oh God! I already missed him so much.

‘I understand you can’t talk. But you can hear me. When it is my turn I want you to come and get me. I’ll be expecting you to come in through the window. Go in peace now, my love. All will be well. They will never know the truth. I will never tell them. To the day you come back to collect me.’

And then I began to cry, not loud, ugly sobs, but a quiet weeping. I didn’t want the servants to hear. To come rushing in. Call the doctor waiting downstairs to come in and pronounce him dead. I knew what waited for me outside this room. Another hour…or two wouldn’t make a difference. This was my time. My final hours with my husband.

The time before I became the hated gold digger.