by Jean Barrett
She nodded in the direction of the adjoining bathroom. “In there. I laundered and folded them for you.”
What if he asked for a change of outfit? Clothing he hadn’t been wearing last night? What would she tell him? But he accepted her choice without question.
She watched him, making certain that he was capable of reaching the bathroom without her assistance. When the door closed behind him, she picked up the tray and retreated from the bedroom.
Her brain couldn’t be any more numbed than his had been as she moved around the kitchen, preparing a breakfast of scrambled eggs and toast, trusting that he wouldn’t expect cereal instead. Or, for all she knew, steak and potatoes.
Am I home?
The words he had uttered last night before passing out on the piazza floor made sense now. He’d been convinced he had fought his way home to his wife and was safe. All the rest were clear as well. The way he had looked at her so intimately, his thinking he was supposed to remember Tia, grasping her hand and kissing it like that. Those made sense, yes, but nothing else did.
Man and wife. How could he think it? What in his jumbled mind had led him to such a fantastic conclusion?
And you’re planning to make use of it, too, aren’t you? That’s why you haven’t told him the truth. You see this as an opportunity.
All right, so it was wrong of her to let him go on thinking she was his wife, even cruel. But the temptation was too strong for her to resist, because his assumption that she was his wife meant that he trusted her. Trusted her fully. And only if he continued to trust her would he willingly share with her whatever he knew about the photograph she had discovered inside his jacket.
Only for a little while, she promised herself, silencing the guilt that was gnawing at her conscience. Just long enough for her to tap into whatever memory he might still possess, and then she would set him straight. She had to know.
“I think I’m ready for action again.”
Eden swung around at the sound of his deep voice behind her. Her first thought when she caught sight of him standing there in the doorway was how appropriate his declaration was. He’d meant it as a simple assurance that he was feeling better, but no adult female with functioning vision could have failed to put a spin on his words. He was that impressive, with the kind of athletic body meant to be wrapped around a woman.
He definitely knew how to fill a pair of jeans to maximum effect. She hadn’t noticed it last night, but the cut of both those jeans and his shirt were western in character. She recognized the style because of her brother, Roark, who lived and worked in Texas. There was something else she observed. His skin was bronzed and his brown hair streaked in front to shades of blond, like a man who has been exposed to a desert sun. Did they mean nothing, or were they clues to his origin?
“Sit down,” she instructed him. “Breakfast is almost ready.”
He started toward the table she had been setting at one end of the parlor, when she noticed what the trailing quilt had concealed in the bedroom. He had a faint but definite limp.
“Your leg,” she said, voicing her concern over what she assumed was another of last night’s injuries. “If you’re in pain, then maybe you shouldn’t be on it. Maybe you should have stayed in bed.”
He stopped midway across the room and gazed down in puzzlement at the leg to which she referred. “I don’t have any pain in my leg,” he said. “What are you talking about?”
“Nothing,” Eden assured him, suddenly remembering that Tia had directed her attention last night to an old scar on his right leg. Then his slight lameness wasn’t the result of any recent injury but something that had happened in the past and become so much an accepted part of him he was no longer aware of its existence, particularly now when he had no memory of its cause.
After he’d settled himself at the table, she went back into the adjoining kitchen. When she returned with eggs and toast, she found him gazing with interest at his surroundings. She knew he was seeing for the first time all the elements of the parlor that she so loved—the delicate molding that had suffered scuffs and marks over the decades, the cracked but elegant marble surround of the fireplace, the worn boards of the polished floor.
But, of course, he didn’t know that he’d never viewed any of these things before. It was painful to watch him struggling to renew a knowledge he had never possessed. So painful that she was tempted then and there to tell him the truth. But, remembering Nathanial, she held her tongue.
“The painting,” he said, his gaze settling on the framed scene above the fireplace. “Do I know that place? Where is it?”
“It’s a watercolor of the houseboat that—” she’d been about to say I but corrected herself in time “—we keep up along the Ashley River.”
“For weekend getaways, you mean?”
“Yes, something like that.”
He nodded thoughtfully. “I like it. It looks quiet and peaceful.”
“You’d better eat before your breakfast gets cold.” She seated herself across from him.
He started to pick up the glass of orange juice beside his plate and then hesitated, frowning over it as if he wasn’t sure whether he liked orange juice. And if he didn’t, would he wonder why his wife had given it to him? This deception was proving to be more difficult than she’d anticipated, Eden realized. Any little mistake could arouse his suspicion, cost her his trust, which was a good reason not to waste time going after the answers she wanted.
Apparently deciding the orange juice was acceptable, he drank it. She waited just long enough to permit him to help himself to scrambled eggs before she led into her cautious interrogation. “Do you have any recollection yet of what happened to you last night?”
“Afraid not. Aren’t you going to eat?” he asked, noticing that she had nothing in front of her but her coffee mug.
“I had something earlier. No clue at all then about last night?”
“I’ve been thinking about it, and I figure I must have been beaten and robbed. Whoever the punks were, they got away with my wallet and everything in it.” Something occurred to him then, and he glanced at her quickly. “You report this to the police?”
“Not yet, but we should, don’t you think?”
“No,” he said, a sudden sharpness in his voice, which he amended with a softer “Let’s wait a bit and see if I can remember anything useful to give them.”
Was it her imagination, or did the idea of the police worry him? “Were you missing anything else?” she asked, hoping he would recall the photograph in his jacket.
“Keys. I must have had keys, and I suppose they took those, too. Did I have a car with me?”
It was a question Eden answered with an elusive, “The car is safe in the alley.” No lie. Her car was parked in its usual spot behind the house. “You were on foot.”
“Why was I out there?”
That’s exactly what I was hoping you could tell me. Again her reply, out of necessity, was an evasive one. “You had some business. Maybe it had to do with this.”
She had brought her purse to the table. She extracted the photograph from it and passed it to him across the table. Holding her breath in anticipation, she watched his face for a reaction as he took the picture and studied it carefully.
“They didn’t get this,” he said slowly, a faint grimness in his voice.
“You remember it then?” she said tensely.
“Yes. The photo was in my jacket along with your business card.” He looked up, meeting her searching gaze. “Who’s the little boy?”
Eden managed to hide her deep disappointment. “You don’t know?”
He shook his head. “Is the kid someone I’m supposed to remember?”
Hoping a name would make a connection for him, Eden considered telling him that she believed the boy in the photograph was her son, Nathanial. But she wasn’t ready for this step just yet, to risk the volley of questions that would be certain to follow such an admission.
“It seems that you should
, since you were carrying his photograph. Look again,” she urged him. “Maybe if you try hard enough, he’ll start to look familiar to you.”
Lowering his gaze, he reexamined the photo. Once again she watched him closely, studying his face for a revealing expression. She couldn’t be sure, but his features seemed to slowly tighten into something that was guarded, something so automatic that he might not even be aware of it.
“What is it?” she pressed him.
He didn’t answer her. Something else had captured his attention, something that had apparently registered in his peripheral vision. Suddenly alert, his gaze swung in the direction of the window that overlooked the piazza and the garden beyond.
“Who’s that?” he demanded.
Eden had been far too focused on her objective to be aware of anything outside. But now, head turned, she discovered a rotund figure in the garden busy filling a large basket with the debris from last night’s storm.
“Our neighbor, Skip Davis,” she said mildly. “He’s a retired navy officer. He and his wife share the garden. That’s their house on the other side.”
“Oh.” He seemed to visibly relax, but seconds later he asked Eden, “Could you adjust the blinds? The light hurts my eyes. Guess it’s a leftover from last night’s headache.”
“Of course.”
She got up and went to the window, redirecting the light and in the process eliminating any view of the garden. She knew that his request had been an excuse, that the presence of Skip Davis out there disturbed him in some way.
The interruption lost her the opportunity to question him further. When she got back to the table, prepared to resume their session, he had lost interest.
“The face means nothing to me,” he said, placing the photograph on the table and dismissing it. “I’ll try again later, okay?”
Frustrated though she was, he left her no choice. If she pushed him too hard, he might close up altogether. She had to be patient if she was going to stand any chance of acquiring what was locked in his mind. But it wasn’t easy, particularly when those brown eyes with the golden lights in them kept casting looks at her as he went on with his eggs and toast. Looks that were as warm and tender as a pair of hands stroking female flesh. They were also unnervingly possessive.
“Why do you keep on looking at me like that?” she challenged him, returning the photo to her purse for safekeeping.
“I just want to be sure.”
“Of what?”
“That it isn’t my imagination I have damn good taste in wives.”
This had gotten risky, like that moment in the bedroom when he had fondled her hand. It was time to bring an end to the scene before it got out of control.
Eden changed the subject by indicating his plate. “Have you finished?”
“Yes, and the eggs were great, just the way I like them.” He grinned at her outrageously. “Not that I’d know, of course.”
Refusing to fall in with his playful, and she feared sexy, mood, she came to her feet and rounded the table. “I’ll clear up then.”
But when she reached for his plate, he caught her high around the waist and drew her down onto his lap, snugging her tightly against the hard wall of his chest. Alarmed by his increasing familiarity with her, she stiffened in his embrace.
“This isn’t wise.”
“You’re not going to deny your husband a chance to show his wife how much he appreciates the breakfast she cooked for him, are you?” he teased.
“I am when he’s been hurt and in no condition to fool around like this.”
“Sweetheart,” he whispered, his voice at her ear raspy and seductive, “I may have a black eye and a lip that’s still tender, but I guarantee I’m recovered enough for a little cuddling.”
She felt the stubble on his unshaven jaw as he slowly rubbed his cheek against hers, felt his warm breath mingle with hers. It was a highly charged situation, one that shook her with the sudden realization that she was susceptible to it. In another few seconds he would swing her around and, sore lip or not, fit his mouth to hers. She would taste him, perhaps even welcome his tongue on hers.
The whole treacherous business was made worse when she moved on his lap with the intention of getting to her feet. Her action aroused him. She could feel his hardness strained against her as his arm shifted in order to hold her more comfortably, grazing the side of her breast, searing her. Eden panicked.
“I don’t want this!” she commanded sharply. “Let me up!”
He went very still. A long moment passed, and then the arms that had been embracing her relaxed and dropped away. Eden scrambled off his lap and turned to face him. What she saw had her heart lurching inside her breast.
His mood had altered completely, revealing an entirely different facet of him. This was not the good-natured man who had awakened in her guest room with a smile. He had changed into someone harder, colder. She could see that change in the way his mouth had tightened and in his eyes that were regarding her suspiciously. Eyes that suddenly seemed dark and stormy.
There was something else that dismayed her. Something she had failed to anticipate until his arms had secured her on his lap, until his mouth had threatened to meld with hers. On some level she was afraid to define, she had wanted him to kiss her. It was a threat she could trust no more than the man who went on sitting there staring at her silently.
Making an effort to defuse the volatile situation, Eden began to load their dishes onto a tray. “I’ll just rinse these off and stack them in the dishwasher,” she said lightly, as though nothing had happened, as though there was no strain between them so intense it almost crackled.
Wanting to get away from him, needing a moment alone to decide on a course of action, she picked up the tray and retreated into the kitchen. But when she reached the sink, she knew he had followed her. She could feel him behind her.
Turning around, she discovered him stationed in the doorway, looking big and intimidating. He was still watching her, not with admiration this time but with a narrow-eyed, speculative gaze. There was something instinctively professional in the way he stood there measuring her, making her wonder all over again just who and what he was.
“Why don’t you lie down and rest,” she suggested. “You need to rest.”
“Later,” he said, and there was no note of gentleness now in his tone.
Eden turned back to the sink and began to rinse the dishes, knowing that Tia had been right and that she had made a serious error in judgment in her blind determination to learn about Nathanial. The man she had so eagerly taken into her house was not dependably harmless and therefore manageable. He was, in fact, potentially dangerous.
She acknowledged that now. It wasn’t just because of this sudden toughness in his manner either. There were other things. Things which, as a trained investigator, she should not only have been observing all along but also suspecting. Things that ought to have warned her.
Eden didn’t ignore them now. His nervousness about reporting whatever had happened to him to the police. His uneasiness with the presence of Skip Davis in the garden. Skip, who with his naval background, might be perceived as a figure of authority and therefore a possible threat. And, most damning of all, the realization that, since he had been carrying a picture of Nathanial, he could in some manner be responsible for the disappearance of her son.
She could sense his eyes still on her, and she knew that she didn’t dare to confront him. Couldn’t risk telling him that they weren’t man and wife for fear of how he might react. There was only one thing she could do and which, had she not been such a desperate fool, she would have done at the very beginning. She had to report his presence to the police, had to get him out of her house. But how, without igniting whatever it was that she was convinced was simmering inside him?
SHE WAS A FRAUD. He understood that now. She hadn’t liked being on his lap, had plainly not wanted him to touch her. This, together with a flash of insight that had more to do with old instincts rathe
r than any actual memory, had finally warned him something was wrong. That this woman wasn’t what she’d been pretending to be.
No wedding bands, either on her finger or his. That small evidence alone should have alerted him of her deceit. Why hadn’t he observed this before? Why, instead, had he believed in her? Believed in her so strongly that he’d convinced himself he belonged both to her and this place? Had he in his confused state needed a safe refuge so badly that he could have so easily deluded himself?
Or, he wondered, examining her as she loaded the dishwasher, had he been beguiled by something else? Like a pair of pure blue eyes and a mane of lustrous dark hair? A full mouth and a tall, alluring figure? Or maybe a nature that had seemed warm and caring from the start.
Any of these could have been responsible for his fantastic illusion. And none of them mattered. Not now when he knew he had made a serious mistake in coming here, that he couldn’t trust this woman who had been willing to let him think she was his wife. Why? What did she want?
His mind was searching for an answer, seething with the frustration of his plight, when she finished with the dishes and crossed the kitchen, intending to return to the parlor. He continued to stand in the doorway, blocking her path.
“Let me by,” she said.
She stood so close he could smell the scent he found so tempting. Lily of the Valley. He looked down into her face, noticing the slight depression at the tip of her piquant nose. Noticing, too, that she wore a purposeful expression.
“Why? Where are you going?” He hadn’t meant the question to sound harsh, but that’s the way it came out.
“To my office.”
“It’s Sunday. Offices aren’t open on Sundays.”
“I need to check my answering machine for messages.”
That sounded reasonable enough. He moved aside in the doorway.
She slipped by him, caught up her purse from the table, and crossed the parlor toward a closed door on the other side.
“If you won’t lie down,” she called over her shoulder, “then at least sit down. I’ll only be a minute.”
