Charity Colton
Faith Morrison
Hope Williams
WindSwept Narrows
Book Thirteen
Karen A. Nichols
Copyright 2011 by Karen A. Nichols
Smashwords Edition
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Chapter One
Nico Setopoulis stepped out of his unit and moved carefully over the wet ground. The winds were blowing around him and despite it being a few days before Valentine’s Day, it was cold. Growing up in the Northwest, he told himself he should have long adjusted to how erratic the weather could be. Regardless of what the calendar or the weather people claimed it should be.
He saw the now familiar gold colored cap near the gate to the employee entrance but today she wasn’t moving. She leaned against the fender of one of the cars, ignoring the light rain coming down. He pushed the locked gate wide and stepped into the parking area where the resort cart waited for him. A chill ran down his spine when she looked up from the ground at him, an unusual nothingness in her stare that made him stop.
“Hello,” he began carefully, stepping up to her and leaning heavily on the cane in his left hand. “Are you alright?”
Lashes a mix between pale and red-gold blinked at him. It felt like she was sitting back and watching the inside of her brain, she thought vaguely. Hundreds of little lights flying around but not touching one another. That’s how she saw her thoughts, her memories. There was nothing connected, she realized, her mouth opening and closing, her head tilted to the side.
“I don’t know,” she answered finally. “I…”
“My name’s Nico Setopoulis…” He waited, training kicking in when that appeared to puzzle her. She was wearing her usual thigh length thick navy colored coat, a small bag crossing her body and at her side. “What’s your name?” He asked when nothing was forth coming.
She looked at him, up and down, before turning the wide blue eyes on herself, gazing down at her feet and landing on the bag at her side. Fingers lacking gloves lifted it and opened it, pulling a small black wallet from inside. She gazed at the unfamiliar photo on the front of a small rectangle and looked up at him.
“Is that me?”
“It is,” he answered quietly.
“Charity Colton,” she said slowly. “It’s a nice name…I should be somewhere,” she said with a small frown, zipping the bag at her hip closed and gazing around the damp parking lot.
“I think maybe you should come with me,” Nico suggested slowly, offering his palm and finding it ignored. “Over to the health center…”
“I don’t feel sick,” she told him, standing up carefully and drawing in a long, slow breath. A wince crossed her features that wasn’t missed by the man standing in front of her.
“Charity…are you hurt?”
“A headache…I’m sure it’ll fade. I’m supposed to be somewhere…” she nodded to herself. “I have to go…good bye,” she said before striding off toward the entrance to the back of the resort building.
Nico didn’t make it to the door before it locked, his fist hitting the strong metal as he ambled back to the cart, driving himself to the health center to do some research.
Mia watched the woman enter the employee area, frowning at her.
“Charity?”
“I’m sorry…am I late? I don’t know…I know I’m supposed to be here,” she said, rambling as she found a familiar locker and began putting her coat inside. “I’ll get changed right away. Almost breakfast time…” Bits of information were joining slowly together inside her mind.
“Charity, stop,” Mia put her palm up, gently touching her chin and turning her head slightly. “You are hurt,” she said quietly. “What happened?”
“I am?” Her hand rose, slim fingers touching her head and making her wince. “Oww…I suppose I am…I’m alright…”
“You are bleeding,” Mia Santori said firmly, lifting the cap Charity had placed on the shelf in her locker and nodding at the stain. “Let me see,” she ordered, pushing until Charity was sitting on the wide bench, her fingers gentle on the short red curls. “To the health center with me, Charity. Come…Caroline! Let them know I will be back shortly…and Charity is with me…”
“But I’m alright…I have to work...I…there are people…”
“Charity…look at me,” Mia looked into the eyes of the woman her age, her head shaking slowly. She was a boss for a reason. “No…no, we are going to the health center, now.” She reached into the locker and removed the cap Charity had been wearing, the woman her age glaring at her like a teenager.
“I really am alright…I feel fine…”
“Caroline, get someone to cover the cafeteria until we return,” Mia took Charity’s wrist and tugged, growling at the dragging feet.
“But…”
Mia came to a stop, barely avoiding the both of them colliding. “What is my name?” She felt her heart pulled when her eyes filled with tears, hugging the woman tightly. “No…I am sorry…you don’t know what happened? How much you were hurt?”
“I…” she shook her head, her feet moving when Mia walked forward with her.
“We must go to the health center,” she said firmly, taking the underground moving walkway. “You don’t know if you fell…” but she saw the answer in Charity’s eyes, brimming with unshed moisture.
“I just want to work,” she said quietly, cursing the little beads of light flying around in her brain. Why couldn’t they all join together and help her think?
“Come…this way,” Mia led her through the double doors, gesturing to a familiar figure in the hall. “Nico! Please…”
He turned carefully at the sound of his name, his palm up and waving her toward an empty bay. “She works for you?”
“She does…one of my best staff…but something…she is bleeding…”
“I feel fine,” Charity looked at the familiar face. Men with straight hair can’t really do much but crew cut it, she thought at the dark blond strands came to rest on his brows and the edges of his glasses. She noticed he had pale blue eyes. “Hi again…”
“I tried to bring her here earlier, Mia,” He said with a sigh. “Can you sit up on the gurney?”
“Doesn’t seem to matter what I want, does it?” She asked, looking from one to the other and sighing. “Nope…didn’t think so…” She hopped lightly to sit on the low gurney.
“I brought this…she was wearing it,” Mia tipped her wrist up. “I must return to my kitchen. Take care of her for me, Nico.”
Nico took the cap,
his attention on the pursed full lips and thoughtful gleam in the blue eyes. “Thinking of making a run for it?” He pulled his phone out after taking a look at the cap and the side of her head. “Cassidy Parker, please…Dr. Setopoulis at the health center…just tell her I think we have an assault and I’m in the emergency room with the victim.”
“You’re a snitch,” Charity commented sullenly.
“And you look like a fifteen year old caught out after curfew,” he returned, casually running the reader over her badge and turning to the computer screen. “But you’re not fifteen…how about laying down for me?”
“Sure…I live to serve…”
“Somehow I don’t buy that for a minute,” he murmured, moving the tray closer to her head and adjusting the light. He lifted a set of goggles and peered through the amplified lenses at her scalp and then at the fuzzy cap he had been handed. Using tweezers, he pulled bits of stone and sand from the cap, dropping them into a small glass plate on the tray before turning to her scalp.
“You ever wonder about people who lose memories? Why only certain things?” She asked curiously, crossing her arms beneath her head with a sigh. She didn’t see Cassidy Parker enter the bay, the small recorder she wore on immediately.
“Dr. Setopoulis?” Cassidy looked at the stretched out Charity, recognizing the small purse she wore. “Charity? What happened?”
“Heck if I know,” she returned, lifting her head a little only to hear him mumble. “Sorry…who’re you?”
“At least you’re not pretending to know this time,” Nico remarked, his palm on her head firmly. “Do not move.”
“No, sir…or is that yes, sir…”
“Pretending…” Cassidy groaned. “She doesn’t remember?”
“I can tell you she was assaulted,” he handed her the cap. “Stone and sand, not from the pavement. Something with a sharp edge and heavy. She must have turned and it caught the curvature of her scalp instead of hitting her flat on….that and the cap probably kept her alive.”
“Someone hit me with a rock? Seriously?” Charity sighed.
“I usually see her leaving for work at the same time I do,” he continued, carefully cutting some of the red hair from the long cut.
“You don’t have a barber’s license, do you?” Charity grumbled.
Nico shook his head, moving to prepare the shot. “This is going to sting a little…”
“Now there’s a surprise…owwww…”
“Anyway, when I got to the gate, she was leaning on a car, just staring,” he looked over at Cassidy. “I talked to her…she didn’t know who she was until she looked at her badge…then said something about having to get to work and ran off.”
“I’ll pull video and go take a look,” Cassidy said quietly. “I doubt whoever it was would cart the rock back out with them.”
“There’s hundreds of little fireflies in my head,” Charity murmured, relaxing now that the stinging part was over. She vaguely felt the edge of a razor and then bits of pressure on her head. “And I think they’re memories…but they can’t join together. It’s like they all speak a different language…and can’t talk to one another…”
“Has she been like this…” Cassidy looked at Nico and saw him nod.
“I am fine,” Charity said firmly. “Don’t you ever wonder why memories fly around? Why can I remember miserable school matrons and bullies that tell you how ugly you are and I can’t recall my own name? Don’t you find that odd? I find it very odd…I think I understand just how Alice felt…”
“I think I’ll go investigate…” Cassidy said quietly, taking the cap and small baggie of stones and sand with her.
“Now she thinks I’m nuts,” Charity sighed. “You were in the war thing, weren’t you?”
Nico looked up, peering over the edge of his glasses at the closed eyes.
“I was.”
“Is that how you were hurt?”
“I don’t suppose it would do any good for me to tell you it’s none of your business?”
“Sure…give it a shot,” she returned with a chuckle. “Trying to find things to put in all the empty slots in my brain, that’s all.”
“Yes, it’s where I was wounded.”
“What’s wrong? Does it hurt?”
“No, it doesn’t…they were kind enough to nick the nerve, tendon and muscle…no pain, but I’m a little off balance,” he answered quietly.
“I know the feeling,” she said with a sigh.
“I don’t suppose there’s someone to look after you,” Nico said carefully, stitching the deep center of the cut tightly closed.
“I’m not a goldfish. I can look after myself,” she said with a frown into her arms. “Is it very deep?”
“Yeah…but it didn’t hit the bone…so no fracture,” he answered. “You might have a concussion…the rambling leads me to think that…I’d like you to stay here for the rest of the day and over night.”
“I have to get to work,” she answered immediately. “And I have dance tonight…now how did I know that? How funny…I can hear the music and see the steps…I’m helping with the review…Stacy fell off the stage and sprained her ankle…I think I’m nervous…”
“The review?” Nico remembered seeing the flyers around the casino and hotel. “In the lounge? The burlesque review?”
“Yes…two songs Friday and Saturday and Wednesday,” she answered, the frown deepening. “I can sing…” she said as if just realizing it. “You know…if I find out who hit me, I’m going to smack them. Hard. A lot,” she said firmly, her eyes closing with a tired sigh.
“Mind if I take a look in the purse thing you have?” Nico asked, peeling the gloves off and dropping them into the trash.
She lifted it from her side and handed it to him, opening one eye and watching. She slipped the slim band over her head and very carefully eased up to sit on the gurney.
“I never looked into it….am I missing stuff?”
He opened her wallet and showed her the cash and two plastic cards, closing it again and handing it to her.
“I’m going to see about a room for you, be right back,” he said, tapping over the records on the screen and going out through the curtain.
Chapter Two
Charity knew he probably accepted her blind agreement and hoped he wasn’t too terribly disturbed when he returned and found the bay empty. She slipped to the floor and went out the other side of the drape shrouded bay, walking back the way she had come with Mia at her side. She found herself staring and drinking in the surroundings, realizing that everything was new since there didn’t seem to be a place inside her head for anything right now.
She quickly found her apron and changed shoes, her locker closed and smile in place when she greeted Katherine in the cafeteria, thanking her before launching herself in her duties. By the end of the day, she knew she was a pretty good actress because all the people who greeted her never knew that she had no clue who they were. A bright smile went a very long way, she decided, sliding her feet from her shoes and finding her boots in the bottom of her locker. She was still puzzling through instincts that were guiding her to the dressing rooms behind the lounge.
“You’re early…you’re not scheduled until seven…” Jamie checked her watch and shrugged. “It’s after four…you can relax for a couple hours, Charity. You’ll do great…I’ve watched the rehearsals.”
“Thanks,” She dropped her bag to the top of the make-up table and stretched out on the sofa. It was an hour before other girls began filling the area, talking and laughing and changing into their outfits. She sat up slowly and stretched, lifting her purse and finding the locker she somehow knew was hers, she began getting changed into the costume for the review.
Her friends noticed the quiet. “What’s wrong, Charity? Nervous? You’ll be fine once you’re out there,” a petite blonde commented. “Just remember practice.”
Charity just smiled and took her turn at the make-up table, letting Jaime work her magic before a lo
ng sigh broke free, her eyes closing when she heard the voices in her head.
“Remember,” Jamie said firmly. “After your song, come right back here so I can get you changed.”
“I’m sorry to be such a bother,” Charity answered with a sigh and a nod. “I will…”
“A bother?” Jamie looked at the others curiously. “You saved our skins, Charity, but I know you’re not…well, this isn’t your usual gig…so you aren’t used to the hustle that has to happen between songs.”
“If you hadn’t…”
“If Chuck hadn’t found you singing on the beach…” A dark haired girl shook her head. “We’d be out and the review wouldn’t have happened. Next stint is Broadway hits and we’re not there yet for that one.”
“We’ll do good,” another girl assured her, patting her on the shoulder as the music began. “Alright…it’s time…”
Charity knew she wasn’t really in control of her body or her mind. She followed the others and moved into a position with a cape draped around her and bowler hat dipped low over her face as the strains of music just seemed to take over.
Nico had been leaned back in his seat, his leg stretched out in front of him and one hand wrapped around a cold brown bottle. He’d been staring at the colorful label when the deep, husky voice filled the large lounge area. Him and the rest of the audience were suddenly quiet and mesmerized by the voice and the following dance routine.
It was very possible the rambling was part of her nature, he decided after watching the intricate moves all while belting out the lyrics to the song. When she slid to a quiet close, head bent, the audience made their appreciation known, her slender body up and bowing graciously before disappearing to the back of the large stage area.
Charity stood still while the two women quickly had her out of one costume and into another. A few swipes at touching up her make-up and she was standing in the wings with the others waiting for their entrance. She listened to the opening strains of the song and began strutting to the music, the girls following and the audience focused on the large shadowed screen where she performed the pantomime, her voice clear and melodic.
WindSwept Narrows: #13 Charity, Faith & Hope Page 1
