by Sheryl Lynn
“You’re not Laura. You’re not my wife.” Emotion choked up in his throat and he couldn’t say any more. He jammed his hands in his back pockets and lifted his face to study the ceiling.
For the longest time she shuffled through the private eye’s report. Soft noises marked the diminishing tissue box as she absently wiped her face and throat, dabbed at her eyes and blew her nose.
Finally, she looked at him and whispered, “This is what I’ve been telling you. My mother, my apartment. I’m Teresa Gallagher?”
Taking her calmness as a good sign, he gingerly sat on the edge of the bed. “You’re Teresa Gallagher.”
“I’m not your wife? Abby’s mother?”
“You were never married to Donny. You never tried to kill me.” He dropped his face on his hand. “I wish you hadn’t called Solerno.”
“This is me. I’m Teresa. How long have you known?”
“I got proof today.”
She blinked slowly, once, twice, three times. “How long have you known?”
He hung his head. “Since that night you first came to my bed. Laura never loved me the way you loved me.” Heat climbed from his throat and spread over his face. “And I’m pretty certain you never loved another man, either.”
She lifted a hand to her mouth.
“I’m not going into details, darlin’, so trust me on this. If you need more proof than what’s in that report, a blood test can prove you aren’t Laura.”
She kept looking at him as if his face was covered with polka dots.
“Say something.”
She looked at the report again.
“I never meant any harm to you,” he continued. “I had no cause to think you weren’t my wife. By the time they let me see you, they’d shaved your head and you were so beat up no one could have recognized you. Not me...not the doctors.”
“Until we made love.” She frowned. “I was a virgin?”
He lifted his shoulders. “I think so.”
“That was weeks ago, Ryder, why didn’t you say something?”
“I wasn’t sure and I didn’t want to do a fool thing unless I had to. And—and—and I love you.”
She raised the report so the lamp shone fully on the pages. “This is me. My life. I’m not your wife.” All color drained from her face. “I’m not...what are we going to do about Abby?” she whispered. “What are we going to do?”
“More importantly, what are we going to do about Solerno? She suspects something anyway. She was there when I picked up the report. The private eye was trying to get me to say you hurt Laura or I did. She’s not going to let this go.”
She reached for him. She lifted her hand to his face, hesitated, then lowered it atop his hand. He turned his hand and entwined his fingers with hers.
“We have to tell the truth,” she said. “I’m not Laura.”
“We don’t know what the truth is. Do you remember who shot you?”
“No.”
“Do you remember why you came to the ranch?”
She lowered her face. “No.”
“That tape Donny had. Did he leave a copy? Did anyone else see him?”
“No.” Her chin quivered and her eyes teared up. “I was alone. You were gone and Mrs. Weatherbee was gone. It’s just my word against his about him threatening you. I’m so scared.”
Ryder envisioned the heyday the newspapers and television stations would have with this. Folks had pretty much forgotten the wrecked Mercedes and Laura’s—Teresa’s —horrendous injuries. But this would definitely renew interest.
The telephone rang. Teresa and Ryder swung their heads to face it. Neither made a move to answer.
“Outside line,” she whispered. “It must be Becky.”
“You better answer.”
She did, bringing the handset to her ear as if it physically hurt her. “Oh, hello, Becky.” She closed her eyes. A single tear coursed a silver path down her cheek. “Yes, sort of, it’s very complicated I think I better tell you in person.” Her eyes flew wide. “No! I swear, I’m okay, but I just can’t tell you over the phone. Tomorrow morning? Fine. I’ll be here.”
TERESA SAT on a lounge chair in the courtyard. All around her the terra-cotta pots were filled with geraniurns, pinks and other bright flowers. She watched a hummingbird flit around a feeder hanging beneath a balcony. Masked by the drug, her aches and pains had faded to dull thrumming. Her body felt sluggish as a mud puddle, but her mind raced a million miles a minute.
Teresa Gallagher.
She kept rolling the name over her tongue. It wasn’t quite familiar, yet It gave her a sense of belonging. Teresa Marie Gallagher, only daughter of Antoinette. She couldn’t remember her father. Her mother was as clear and real as the clouds overhead and the white stucco walls. She had a past and it was real and it was hers.
She had no future.
A catch in her throat choked her for a moment. Ryder wasn’t her husband, Abby wasn’t her child. Because of her, they might both be in mortal danger. Where was Laura Hudson?
A door opened and Ryder stepped outside. He held the door as Abby marched with unusual care through the doorway. With both hands, she held a tray of cupcakes. With exaggerated motions, the little girl set down the tray on a table.
Teresa had barely made it through dinner without breaking down. Seeing Abby so proud of the cupcakes she’d helped bake and decorate made tears rise in Teresa’s eyes. She rubbed her fist over the base of her throat.
Teresa took her time examining each frosted cupcake, bright with colored candy sprinkles and M&Ms. “Those are the most beautiful cupcakes I have ever seen, honey.”
Abby shot her father a smug grin. “Can I eat one now?”
Ryder took a seat. “Sure. Pull yourself up a chair. We need to have a little family talk.”
A cold Teresa had never even imagined gripped her body, infusing her very bones. She couldn’t bear to look at Ryder, knowing his handsome smile would never again be for her, knowing his beautiful midnight eyes would never again gaze upon her with heated love.
Abby plucked a cupcake off the tray and offered it to Teresa.
Don’t cry, she repeated silently in her head. No more tears. This was no longer about her, or Ryder, it was about Abby. The grown-ups no longer mattered.
Abby scooted back on the chair seat and her boots wagged to an unheard rhythm. She greedily peeled paper off the cupcake.
“We have something to tell you, sugar bear. Something that might be hard to understand. So you need to listen real careful. Okay?”
The girl nodded, but looked more interested in licking off the frosting than in her father’s somber words.
“Do you remember how your mama’s car crashed into the quarry and she was all bandaged up and couldn’t walk?”
“Uh-huh.” Her tongue lapped the sprinkles off the frosting.
“And she couldn’t remember anything. Not her name or you and me. Do you remember how Daddy went to the hospital every day.”
“Sure.”
Abby acted too casual. Her nonchalance worried Teresa. It had to be self-protection, for she was an unusually sensitive child.
Looking flustered, Ryder leaned forward. “Folks make mistakes. Even grown-ups. Sometimes those mistakes are doozies. Like for instance, the doctors and I and everybody else, even Mrs. Weatherbee, made a big old mistake. We have to fix it now and put it right. That’s what we do about mistakes. For both grown-ups and little kids—if something is wrong, it’s up to us to fix it. You understand this?”
“Uh-huh.” Frosting gone, Abby nibbled the moist chocolate cake. A blue sprinkle clung to her upper lip.
Ryder laid a hand atop Teresa’s. “Come to find out we’ve made a mistake about your mama. You know she loves you and she wouldn’t ever do anything to hurt you. But she—we—have to fix the mistake.”
Abby took a big bite out of the cupcake. She appeared engrossed in the sweet, except for a hot glitter of emotion in her eyes.
“I love you, Abby,” T
eresa said. “If I had my wish, I’d...oh, Ryder, I can’t.”
He squeezed her fingers. “What we’re trying to say, sugar bear, is your mama isn’t exactly your mama.”
Abby popped the rest of the cupcake in her mouth. She chewed hard once, then mumbled, “I know.” Her eyes darted warily, as if judging their reactions.
“You know what, baby?” Teresa asked.
“You’re not my real mama.” She swallowed. “But I like you better.” Her face flushed bright red and she began kicking her boots against the chair. “You’re Teesa.”
Teresa could have fallen off the chair. A glance at Ryder showed him just as dumbfounded.
Tears shimmered on Abby’s lower lids. She kicked the chair so hard her boots heels were putting dents in the redwood. “I’m sorry, Daddy. I didn’t know it was a mistake. I’m sorry.”
Teresa lunged from her chair and gathered the little girl in her arms. Abby wrapped her arms around Teresa’s neck and let loose a wail. Horrified, Teresa looked to Ryder.
They finally calmed the child. Holding her on her lap, Teresa eased strands of hair off Abby’s face. “You have nothing to be sorry about, baby. Nothing at all.”
“I wished it,” she mumbled, pressing her head firmly against Teresa’s shoulder. “I wished real hard for Mama to go away and Teesa come be my mama. I wished and wished and wished. When you gave me butter rums, I got my wishes all true.”
“Oh, my,” Teresa breathed, remembering the funny urge to buy Lifesavers for Abby. When she went for her weekly medical appointments, she always bought a roll of candy. It had become a game between them for her to slip the candy to the child on the sly, always with the admonition, “Don’t tell your mom, kiddo.”
“Listen up, sugar bear. Wishing didn’t make your mama go away. Wishing didn’t turn her into Teresa. It just happened. It was a mistake. Now we’re going to fix it.”
Abby locked her chocolate-stained fingers in Teresa’s blouse. Her little body trembled with wiry determination. “Teesa is my mama. She’s mine! You can’t take her away!”
IT HAD TAKEN hours for Teresa to settle Abby, but finally the poor child had fallen asleep. Teresa had not the slightest idea how to dislodge the child’s notion that her wishing had caused the accident that switched Teresa for Laura. From a child’s point of view, the logic was unassailable, and the only upsetting aspect was that fate or her father might undo her wish.
Now in Ryder’s bedroom, she slumped on a chair and stared at the bed that was no longer her bed. Ryder emerged from the bathroom. He was barefoot, but still wore his shirt and jeans He looked as awkward as Teresa felt.
“Why would Abby wish her own mother away?”
“Oh, darlin’, I don’t know where to begin.” He flopped onto the bed. “Laura turned up on my doorstep when Abby was a few days old. The only reason she went through the pregnancy was to try to keep her marriage together with Weis, but he didn’t want the kid. He dumped her.” He rubbed his temples with the pads of his fingers. “She hated that baby.”
“That isn’t possible.”
“I was living in my cabin where Tom Sorry lives now. Laura dropped Abby on the couch, then acted like she didn’t exist. After about an hour of squalling, I picked up the baby. That’s all she wanted, someone to hold her. Poor little scrawny thing. Laura never even looked at her. That’s what I remember most. Laura never looked at her.”
She rubbed her belly, unable to imagine how a woman could ignore her own baby.
“I’ve had mares do that. Drop a foal, then walk away. It’s like a switch turned off or something. No mothering instinct. Old Mrs. Weatherbee laid one look on that baby and fell straight away in love.” A sheepish grin pulled his lips. “Me, too.”
“Did Laura abuse her?”
He nodded. “For the first three years or so, Laura acted like Abby didn’t exist. Never touched her or talked to her. When Abby started talking, Laura got it in her head that a right proper little girl was a Shirley Temple doll.”
“Did Laura physically abuse her?”
“There’s other ways to hurt a baby, darlin’. Trust me. Do you remember Laura?”
Teresa thought hard, but finally conceded defeat. “I wish I could say, whoopee, I’m cured, but I don’t think I am. I still don’t quite remember being Teresa Gallagher.”
“I don’t know why I didn’t see it before I married her. Or maybe I did, and it didn’t matter. She can’t stand not being the center of attention. She sure can’t stand anyone telling her no. She used Abby against me. If I made her mad, she threatened to send Abby to boarding school. Or give Weis custody.”
“That is so sick.”
“The only way I could protect Abby was to take it on the chin myself. Trouble was, the more she treated me like dirt, the more she got to liking it. I wanted a divorce, but she wasn’t about to give up my money or let another woman have me.”
“She wanted you dead instead.” She shuddered, feeling his shame and his pain.
He suddenly pushed upright. “I don’t want to lose you, Tess. In spite of everything, this past year has been the happiest time of my life. I’ve done you wrong. I didn’t mean to, I didn’t know, but I did wrong, anyway. I want to make it up to you.”
Her shattered heart throbbed in agony. “Don’t blame yourself.”
“I kept explaining everything away. Like when you took down the portrait, I told myself it was just your vanity not wanting reminders. When you were nice to Abby, I said it was personality changes from the accident. Even when you started working in the office, I pushed the suspicions aside.” His expression skewed in a pained grimace. “The docs and I kept calling you crazy. I’m extra sorry about that.”
“That no longer matters. What matters is getting this straightened out. Do you think it’s true what Donny Weis said? That Laura tried to kill you?”
He chuckled. “A few days before your accident somebody cut the brake lines on my truck.”
She gasped in horror. “Did you tell the police?”
The chuckle turned into a laugh. “I thought you did it.”
“Me? Whatever for?”
“Because it was a dumb thing to do—more to make a point, maybe, than to actually kill me. I wouldn’t have gotten out of the driveway before noticing I had no brakes. The worst that would have happened would be crunching the bumper, and probably not that. And you had a right to be mad as hell because of Laura firing you. Do you remember that?”
She thought hard. It was as if her brain was filled with potholes. “No.”
“You ended up in her Mercedes somehow. I’m pretty sure she’s the one who shot you and that’s why she’s hiding out. She must have taken your car and skipped the state.”
“What happens if Donny finds out I’m not Laura and we can’t convince the police he’s trying to blackmail me? What then? What will stop him from taking Abby?”
“I’ll stop him.” Ryder clenched his fists. “I’ll kill him if he tries. Truth is, I’m more afraid of the state. If the cops get wind of this, they’ll take Abby out of the house just to be on the safe side. If she goes into foster care, I’ll never get her back.”
And she’d called the authorities herself. “I can’t think anymore.” Wearily, every joint aching, Teresa attempted to rise. When the first try failed, she tried again. Ryder was on his feet and at her side in a second. He caught her around the waist and steadied her.
Her eyes locked with his, and the physical pain was nothing compared to what was happening inside her heart.
“I never meant to hurt you, Tess,” he whispered.
Tess, Tess, my darlin’ Tess...
“Did we—I mean, you and me, before the accident— did we ever...you know?”
“If you’re asking if we had an affair, no.” His hand tightened ever so slightly on her hip. “You were—are—the best assistant I ever had. We were friends. You were always smiling and if there was a problem, you just went ahead and fixed it. You kept my life humming along, at least the ar
tist part. I could count on you.”
Now her very presence threatened his life.
“I used to wonder about us. What might have been if I’d met someone like you first.”
“Laura is so beautiful. Would you have even noticed me?”
“Maybe not,” he said honestly. “We’re making this pretty hard on ourselves.”
“I know.” It had to be up to her. She gently pushed away. Just as reluctantly, he turned her loose. “Good night, Ryder.” She limped out of the room, refusing to look at him, knowing if she did, she was lost.
Chapter Thirteen
Ryder’s attorney arrived at eight o’clock sharp. Portly, garbed in a thousand-dollar suit, Gary Holstead had the smile of a clown and the soul of an IRS auditor. When Ryder and Teresa explained the situation to him, his only comment was, “You should have called me before you called the police.”
Ryder sent Abby and Mrs. Weatherbee to Denver. First they’d go to Elitch’s, an amusement park Abby had been begging to see all summer. Then Mrs. Weatherbee was to take the girl to visit Ryder’s aunt, who lived in Westminster. If Becky Solerno decided to play bureaucrat and call in social services, Abby would be far out of their reach.
Becky Solerno arrived at nine o’clock sharp.
They gathered in the living room. Teresa and Ryder sat side by side on a love seat. Gary Holstead sat on a leather wing chair. A tape recorder rested on the table next to him. He held a notebook open on his lap. He and the investigator smiled at each other. Becky remained standing.
Teresa cleared her throat. She plucked at her skirt and smoothed it over her knees. “I suppose I should start. This is going to be a little difficult to believe, Becky.”
The investigator held up a finger. She tracked a slow path through the air, pointing in turn at the attorney, Ryder and Teresa. “Let me guess. You’re not Laura Hudson.”
Teresa gasped. Ryder snapped backward as if punched on the chin. Gary Holstead kept smiling.
Becky slapped her knee. “I knew it! It has been driving me crazy trying to figure out how the woman I know is Laura Hudson. Sure, your looks changed, but your personality? The doctors say personality changes can happen, but this is too much. You don’t match any of the comments people make about you. Are you Teresa Gallagher?”
