Remember Me (5 page)

She bit her lip and then closed her eyes. This nightmare was too horrible to comprehend.

“I'm so sorry,” she whispered, her voice thick with tears. “I don't know what to say to make this better.”

“For starters, you could tell me where you've been…what you've been doing.”

She shuddered. His voice was harsh. But there was an anger of her own that wouldn't let go. For some reason, she felt abandoned. This wasn't fair. She knew herself well enough to know that she would never have willingly walked out on Clay. And if someone had taken her away, even though she'd found a way to come back, it stood to reason that it might happen again.

“When I know, you'll know,” she snapped, turning her face toward the wall.

Her anger startled him. And it was in that moment that the first inkling of trust began to renew itself. What if she was telling the truth? He needed to talk to the detectives to keep this out of the media.

After the quake: Day four

Even unconscious and barely alive, Pharaoh Carn still managed to make headlines. Of the seven bodies they'd pulled out of the rubble on his estate, he was the only one to survive. But the whys and how of it had yet to be told. Pharaoh was unconscious and unable to explain.

Duke Needham, Pharaoh's second in command, had been out of the country when the earthquake hit, and it had taken him a frantic day of plane hopping to get back to L.A., only to find the mansion in ruins and searchers still pulling bodies from the debris.

By the time he'd located the place where Pharaoh was hospitalized, he'd wasted another day. After finding his boss unconscious, he began searching for Pharaoh's woman. It wasn't common knowledge to anyone outside Pharaoh's compound that the woman even existed, but the ones who knew also knew that he had spent the better part of two years trying to win over a woman who seemed to hate the sight of his face.

After several days of diligent searching, all Duke knew was that Pharaoh's woman was not in a morgue. Whether she'd survived and been taken to another hospital had yet to be learned. It wasn't as if they could give out her name and see if she happened to turn up. It would have been like offering a reward to have stolen property returned to the thief. He never considered the fact that the woman could have escaped unharmed. Not after seeing the mansion.

So Duke waited, knowing that the next move had to come from Pharaoh, only Pharaoh was in no shape to tell anyone what to do. It was all he could do to draw his next breath.

There would be time enough later to retrieve that which had been lost.

 

Within hours of her awakening, Frankie's physical health took a remarkable turn for the better. By the next morning, she was allowed to sit up on the side of the bed, and by afternoon, with the aid of Clay's arm, she was walking up and down the hall. The mutinous thrust of her chin coincided nicely with the jumble of curls around her face. She looked like an unruly child, angry from an unjust punishment.

“I want out of here,” she muttered. “I don't like being helpless.”

Clay sighed. This wasn't the first time she'd said it, and from the look on her face, it wouldn't be the last. But if he was honest with himself, he would have to admit that he wasn't so sure he wanted the same thing. Here, she was under the watchful eyes of her doctor and the nurses, as well as himself. When they went home, he would be on his own again. Truth be told, he was scared. How could he face a normal day ever again, wondering when he left each morning if she would be home when he returned?

“Your doctor says you need to stay one more night. Just be patient, Frankie. You'll be home soon.”

She headed toward a couple of chairs beneath a window overlooking the city, and sat down with a careful plop. She didn't know how to explain the urgency inside her, but it was there just the same.

From the moment she'd awakened in the hospital, she'd had an overwhelming urge to run. But why? And where? Clay was all that mattered to her. All that had ever mattered. And the little house they were renting from his folks was the first real home she could remember. She loved that house. She loved Clay. So why the panic?

“I know, but…”

She sighed, leaving her sentence undone, and looked down at her hands, frowning at the strange, dark red polish on her nails. The color was nothing she would ever have chosen. What else, she wondered, was different about her?

“Clay?”

“What?”

“Do I look different?”

“What do you mean?”

She frowned, blinking back angry tears. She hated this rootless feeling.

“I mean, physically. Am I fatter or thinner? Was my hair always this color? Do I have scars that didn't used to be there?”

Clay sat beside her and took her by the hand. She seemed so sincere. If only he dared believe.

“You're thinner, but not much. Your hair is shorter, but the color is the same.”

She watched his lips moving as he spoke the words, and even though she heard him, her mind was remembering the way his mouth felt on her body. She stared at his fingers as they threaded through hers, and she shuddered. His hands. She'd always loved his hands. Strong and tan, they were callused from his work, yet with a few skillful strokes, could turn her bones into mush.

Suddenly she realized that he was no longer talking. She flushed, wondering how long he'd been silent. She looked up. His eyes were dark with secrets and pain. Pain that she'd put there. And there was anger, too. She flinched, then looked away.

Clay watched the expressions changing across her face and knew to the moment when her thoughts ran to love. He'd seen that look on her face too many times before not to recognize it now. It hit him, then, how drastically their expectations of life had changed. She thought of making love, while his thoughts ran toward fear and distrust. And then she turned away, once more revealing the tattoo to his gaze. He spoke before he thought.

“The tattoo…what does it mean?”

Frankie looked at Clay as if he'd gone mad. “What tattoo?”

He traced the shape of it with his finger. “The one here, at the back of your neck.”

A shaft of panic dug deep in her belly as she pushed his hand away to feel her skin. Her skin became clammy, and her fingers started to shake. It was as if someone had just pointed out a spider crawling up her person.

“I can't feel anything,” she muttered, and wondered why she wanted to cry.

He took her finger and placed it directly on the gold ankh.

“There.”

Her eyes were dark and huge with shock. “What's it look like?”

Clay frowned. Fear wasn't the reaction he'd expected. Then he wondered exactly what he
had
expected.

“Like a cross with a loop on top. It's Egyptian, I think. It's called an ankh.”

“This is my mark. In the eyes of the world, you will always be mine.”
The words echoed in her head.

Frankie closed her eyes. “Don't touch me,” she whispered. “I'll never be yours.”

She slumped forward, passing out in Clay's arms.

T
he sun was weak but persistent as the nurse wheeled Frankie out of the hospital. When the cool air penetrated the thin sweater she was wearing, she shivered. It occurred to her then to wonder about her clothes. Had Clay given them away, believing her to be dead? Her lower lip trembled as she resisted the urge to cry. The familiarity of her world had been stripped away and she couldn't even remember being gone. My God, my God, how had this happened?

Sometimes she could feel something pushing at the edge of her consciousness, other times, her thoughts were a blur. She couldn't help but compare the emptiness she was feeling now to the emotions she'd suffered after her parents were killed. One day she'd had a mother and a father and a wonderful home. Within weeks, she had become a ward of the courts, living in an orphanage and crying in the dark for a mother who never came.

Now this.

The last thing she remembered was getting caught in the downpour and then coming home with a headache and crawling into bed. She'd woken up to a nightmare. Only this nightmare didn't fade, it was getting worse by the day. The emotional distance between her and Clay was as real as the air that she breathed, and it was scaring her to death. Clay was her rock. If he quit on her…

She shuddered. The consequences were impossible to consider.

“Cold, dear?” the nurse asked.

Frankie shrugged. It was easier to admit being chilled than to face how frightened she was.

“A little, I guess.”

The nurse pulled the wheelchair back a bit into an alcove out of the wind.

“There comes your husband now,” she said, pointing to a gray sedan.

Frankie didn't recognize the vehicle, but why should she? Her spirits plummeted even lower. In two years, a lot of things could change.

She watched as Clay parked and got out, her eyes narrowing as he came toward her. The first time she'd seen him, she'd been working in a restaurant. She'd looked up and caught him staring at her from across the room. Even then, she'd known they would be lovers. She sighed. Had she ever told him that?

Then she lifted her chin. The present was more than she could handle. There was no need dwelling on the past.

Silently, she continued to watch Clay's approach. He was so very much a man. Two years was a long time to be without a woman. Had he given up on her and found someone else? She moaned softly. The mere thought made her sick.

“Mrs. LeGrand, are you in pain?” the nurse asked quickly.

“I'm fine,” Frankie mumbled, blinking back tears. She had to be. She had no other choice.

And then Clay was beside her. She met his gaze, trying to read his thoughts. His expression was bland, almost polite. She wanted to scream.

“Your wife is getting chilled,” the nurse said, speaking to Clay as if Frankie was no longer present.

Clay's glance shifted to the stiff set of Frankie's shoulders.

“I'm sorry, honey, I didn't think,” he said, and quickly shed his own jacket.

As Frankie stood up to walk to the car, Clay put it on her, working her arms into the overlong sleeves and overlapping its breadth around her waist.

Her tears came closer to the surface. He'd called her honey. Did that mean he was beginning to forgive, or was it just a word that he'd used out of habit?

“Drive safely,” the nurse said as they bundled Frankie into the front seat of the car.

“Yes, ma'am,” Clay said.

Moments later, they were pulling away from the hospital. Clay managed a smile and a pat on her leg before he lapsed into silence. Frankie couldn't bring herself to pretend that all was well between them anymore. She should have been elated to be going home, but all she could feel was an overwhelming sense of panic. And there was a certainty within her that wouldn't go away. She might not remember the last two years of her life, but she remembered her love for her man. She would not have left Clay of her own free will. Ever. And yet he believed that she had. That knowledge fed anger. The anger fed hurt.

As Clay stopped at a red light, another reality hit Frankie with a jolt. Accepting that her disappearance had not been of own accord, what reassurance did she have that it would not happen again? All she could think was, God, what a mess.

“Clay?”

He answered absently, his gaze focused on the red light as he waited for it to turn green.

“Hmm?”

“I don't have a job anymore, do I?”

Clay looked startled. “Why, no, honey.” Then he added almost apologetically, “It's been two years.”

She thought of the library, then looked away. “I loved working there.” Her fingers curled into fists as the light turned and Clay accelerated through the intersection. “As soon as I'm better, I'll start looking for another job.”

He frowned. The idea of Frankie being out of his sight was frightening. “There's no hurry,” he said quickly.

“But we'll be needing the money. My salary always pays…I mean
paid,
the utilities. If I don't work, it'll put us in a bind.”

Clay hesitated, choosing his words carefully so as not to insult her. “Not really—at least, not anymore. I bought Dad out a while back. The company is doing good. There's no rush.”

She didn't know what to say. One of their dreams had already been realized and she'd had no part in its happening. Fear spiked. What else had he done in her absence?
Please God, just let him still love me.

A few minutes passed, and the silence inside the car was growing more uncomfortable by the moment. Finally, for lack of anything else to say, Frankie said, “I was wondering about my clothes.”

A muscle jerked in his jaw. “They're in the spare bedroom closet. Mom got them all out the other day and washed them.”

“All of them?”

He nodded.

“I didn't take anything with me?”

He hesitated, then shook his head.

The tone of Frankie's voice shifted sarcastically. “And you didn't think that was strange?”

He inhaled sharply, angered by the accusation in her question. “Don't go there, Francesca. You don't know what the hell you're talking about. Two years ago this month, I came home, expecting to see my wife, and instead I found blood in the bathroom and a broken coffee cup and spilled coffee on the kitchen floor. Within an hour, I was the prime suspect in your murder, so don't give me ‘strange.' Everything about it was strange.”

In the middle of his answer, Frankie started to shake. She could still hear his voice, but the words were fading. Something flashed across her memory.

Hands upon her mouth.

A sharp prick in the flesh of her upper arm.

Someone whispering her name.

She gasped and put her hands to her head as if trying to hold on to the images, but they disappeared as quickly as they had come. She groaned.

“What?” Clay asked.

“I don't know. Something just…” She shook her head. “It's gone now. I don't know if it was a memory or my imagination.”

Clay refused to be swayed by confusion and chose to ignore what she said.

“We're almost home,” he said. “You'll feel better after you rest.”

She flinched. His refusal to address her confusion was making her crazy.

“No, Clay, I won't,” she snapped. “I won't feel better until I understand what's going on. I've lost two years of my life, and the way I feel, I'm losing my husband, as well. A good nap isn't going to cure a damn thing.”

The color faded from his face. “You're not losing me,” he muttered.

“Feels like it to me.”

She looked at him for a long, silent moment—waiting for a more reassuring response, or, at the least, some sign of tenderness. It wasn't there. When he turned the corner and headed down their street, she looked away.

The tension between them lengthened. Moments later, he was parking in the driveway, and the business of getting her out of the car and into the house overtook the inquisition.

The house smelled damp, a holdover from the recent rains. Clay helped Frankie inside, then stopped to turn up the central heat. As he did, she swayed. He reached to steady her, his hand brushing her breast, then lingering at the curve of her waist.

She watched his nostrils flare and then saw his mouth soften. She leaned forward, offering herself out of both love and desperation.

He didn't move.

She tensed, waiting for him to come closer, to take her in his arms and tell her how much she meant to him, how glad he was that she'd come home.

But the moment never came. She lifted her chin, her voice bitter with tears. “You know something, Clay? I never figured you for a quitter.”

Then she took her bag from his hands and made her way down the hall without him. It was the longest twenty feet of her life.

Clay watched her go, wanting to go after her. But he kept remembering the years of believing she was dead—of being hounded mercilessly by the police and the press. A part of him was afraid to let go of the safety net he'd built around his heart.

“Coward,” he muttered to himself, then stalked into the kitchen to make some coffee.

An envelope and a small pile of clothes were lying on the kitchen table. He'd forgotten to put them away. He picked up the clothes, fingering the fabric and looking at the labels. He wasn't much of a judge of women's clothing, but it was obvious that these were not off any department-store rack. He dropped them on the table, reached for the envelope and looked inside, still incredulous that Frankie had been carrying this kind of money.

He turned toward the doorway. Frankie was coming down the hall. Suddenly he wanted to see her face when he showed her the money. If she had something to hide, he would know it.

She walked into the kitchen with an empty pill bottle in her hands. Her expression was closed, her body language posting an “off-limits” sign that any fool could have read.

“I have a headache. We're out of painkillers,” she said.

He tossed the envelope on the counter and headed for the cabinet over the sink.

“Here you go,” he said, shaking a couple out in her hands.

“Thank you.”

Clay's conscience tugged. She looked so hurt, so confused.

“Francesca…”

“What?”

“Look, I'm sorry if I've hurt your feelings, but you have to understand my—”

“Why?”

He hesitated, frowning. “Why what?”

“Why do I have to understand your feelings? You don't seem inclined to understand mine.”

He took a slow breath. He didn't want to fight, he just wanted answers.

“How can I understand anything, Francesca, when everything about you is still a big mystery?”

Tears surfaced again. “And no one regrets that more than I. But there's one thing I haven't forgotten.”

His interest heightened. “What?”

“How much I love you.”

He paled. The pain in her voice was palpable. “And I love you, too,” he whispered, his voice shaking with emotion.

Her chin began to quiver. “Then why, Clay? Why are you keeping me at arm's length?”

His hands were shaking as tossed the envelope toward her. Money spilled from inside as it flew through the air.

“This was in the pocket of your slacks. Where did it come from?”

Frankie saw it fluttering to the floor, but her mind was already moving beyond the action to a scene from her past.

She rolled him over, shocked by the blood trickling from his lips. Then she gritted her teeth and thrust her hand in his pockets. She would need the money to help get away.

“Frankie?”

She looked up, her expression blank.

“I asked you a question.”

“I'm sorry, what did you say?”

“I asked you where the money came from.”

The answer came out of nowhere, surprising her more than it did Clay.

“I thought he was dead.”

Clay jerked as if he'd been slapped, then grabbed her by the arm, forcing her to look up at him.

“What the hell did you say?”

She covered her face with her hands. “I don't know, I don't know,” she mumbled.

But Clay couldn't let it go. “Who, Frankie? Who did you think was dead?”

Dark eyes—white teeth—smiling—always smiling.

Then the image disappeared, gone too quickly for her to see his face.

“I don't know,” she moaned.

He cursed and turned away.

Suddenly it was all too much. Frankie sank to the floor on her knees, desperate for Clay to believe. “For God's sake, give me a chance.”