Unchained Memory (The Interstellar Rescue Series Book 1)

by Donna S. Frelick

  “And what kind of cases would those be?”

  I sighed, realizing I’d said way too much. “Selective amnesia. Lost memory. Blackouts. That kind of thing.”

  Rita took a breath and broke it down: “Selective amnesia is where your kids suddenly can’t remember that you told them to be home by midnight. Drunks have blackouts. And I reckon everyone has a few hundred lost memories. So which is it for you?”

  “That’s what Ethan is supposed to tell me.” I turned and took my cup of coffee back in the direction of the outer office. Rita’s window of opportunity had just shut tight. I was no longer in a sharing mood.

  “Nine o’clock,” I tossed over my shoulder. “Time to thrust JW’s spear of indifference into the trusting hearts of the hopeful.”

  “Smartass,” Rita threw after me. “Ethan, huh? Maybe I’ll just hold the paperwork on your insurance claims for a while. I hate resubmitting all those damn forms.”

  Rita had a funny way of making it, but, as usual, she did have a point. I’d suffered a major emotional trauma. I’d been through a divorce and left behind all the friends and family I’d grown up with. I’d gone a little crazy in the first few months after I moved to Nashville, but the novelty of one-night stands had soon worn off, and I hadn’t been with a guy in months. Emotionally vulnerable and horny wasn’t a good combination. Maybe seeing a psychiatrist as attractive as Ethan Roberts was asking for trouble. And damn, but those blue eyes could look right through you.

  Maybe we could skip the therapy and go directly to the social interaction/dating/sex. No rules against that.

  But he’d said he could help me. He’d made me feel safe and warm and strong enough to wrestle my demons to the ground for good. Whether that was Ethan Roberts the man, or Ethan Roberts the psychiatrist at work, I wasn’t sure. I only knew I wanted more of it. And to hell with the rules.

  Jab-jab-cross. Hook-hook-uppercut.

  Jab-cross.

  Again. And again.

  Ethan attacked the heavy bag until the chains sang and the sand inside hissed, punished his target until his arms ached and his sweat flew. Still the battle raged, the victory undecided.

  “The problem’s in your stance, you know.” Dan Parker had coached inner city Golden Gloves teams for years; he would know. As Chief Psychologist for Nashville city schools and Ethan’s closest friend, he would know what the real problem was, too.

  Dan waved a hand. “The leg still bothering you?”

  The stark neon lights of the old boxing gym and the smell of stale sweat and rubber mats crowded into Ethan’s awareness now that his concentration had been broken. His hands dropped from their guard and reached for the support of the bag chains.

  “Damn it, I shouldn’t be so stiff. I’ve been out of physical therapy for months.”

  “From a second surgery.”

  “Do you see a limp?”

  “Not unless I squint. Are you still taking pain pills?”

  Ethan avoided Dan’s unwavering stare, but he confessed. “Occasionally. To sleep. I know I sound like somebody’s ancient uncle, but the thing aches like a sonofabitch when it’s gonna rain.” Dan didn’t need to hear that the pain disturbing his sleep was more often psychological than physical. He didn’t need to know about the dreams, either.

  Ethan tugged off his gloves and started unwinding the damp wraps from his hands as he moved toward the weight machines. “I’ve only got one refill left. I don’t intend to get another script.”

  “Glad to hear it.” Dan propped a burly shoulder against the cement wall behind the quad machine while Ethan set up. “Maybe you’re just too damn old for all this. I hear they revoke our memberships when we hit forty, and we have to go to the Y.”

  Ethan gritted his teeth through the first few lifts, his thigh muscles screaming in protest. “I still have two years, but you’re way over the limit, old man.”

  “Damn. Busted.”

  In the rest between sets, Ethan looked up at his friend. “Are you going to work out, or are you just here to give me a hard time?”

  “I was done an hour ago.” Dan made no move to leave. “You haven’t been out to the house in ages. The kids miss you. What’s new in your life? Got a girlfriend yet?”

  Ethan paused halfway into the next lift. “What?”

  A younger gym-rat at the next machine dropped his weights with a clank and barked out a laugh. “Are you kidding, Dan? You didn’t know Ethan’s nickname around here is The Monk?”

  “Yeah, dude.” The guy beside him grinned. “You have no idea how many girls have hit on the man when we go for a beer, and nothin’, zip, nada.”

  “Thus, The Monk.” The first man clapped Ethan on the shoulder as he moved to a different machine. “Our sparring partner is serious about his celibacy.”

  Ethan just smiled and let the comments wash over him. It wasn’t the first time he’d been teased about his lack of female companionship. The young men he worked out with didn’t know about Elizabeth, about the accident that had ended her life and nearly ended his. Only Dan Parker knew about any of that and he, thankfully, wasn’t sharing it.

  “Maybe Ethan isn’t interested in robbing the cradle, ever thought of that, gentlemen?” Dan made an inept attempt to save him. “It’s not like y’all hang out with a lot of ladies who might have some experience in life.”

  The guys howled at this, and the conversation barreled on to what kind of experience Parker might be getting at. Ethan let the banter roll on without him as he pushed his aching leg through his reps, and thought suddenly of the only woman who had caught his interest in . . . God, since he didn’t know when. He knew it was dangerous to be thinking of her in that way, but he couldn’t seem to help it. From the first time he’d seen her, before he’d even known who she was, she’d been on his mind. Surely it was better to acknowledge the attraction and deal with it rather than to try and repress it?

  When he thought of her now—her dark hair falling in loose curls around a graceful neck, her brown eyes so light and full of fire they seemed to be filled with gold, her smile that was like sunlight breaking through heavy clouds—his chest tightened around his breath and his heart slowed to a labored pounding against his ribs that had nothing to do with exercise.

  Her story was compelling enough in itself. The mystery of her “lost time” would probably prove to be a simple matter of trauma-related guilt, but, Jesus, who wouldn’t want to help the woman? He didn’t think he’d acted inappropriately with her that afternoon in his office. He’d listened. He’d responded sympathetically. He knew he could help her, and he would.

  And yet he couldn’t stop imagining what it would be like to feel the silky skin of her neck under his fingertips, to let his tongue follow the path his fingers had made and end with a kiss in the warm, pulsing hollow of her throat.

  He forced himself to switch his attention to the inane conversation taking place around him. Because despite the physical exertion of his workout, despite the stark setting and the curious eyes everywhere, and especially despite the inappropriateness of the situation itself, thinking about Asia Burdette was making him so hard it was going to be impossible to stand up from this machine any time soon.

  CHAPTER THREE

  The good feeling I’d enjoyed after my first session with Dr. Roberts didn’t last long. Before the week was out, the dreams had returned, as vague and haunting as ever. What was it about that landscape that was so familiar? It was like no place I’d ever seen, and yet I knew it as if I’d spent months there. But when I reached for the details, they slipped my grasp like so much smoke through my fingers.

  By the time I showed up for my second visit with Ethan Roberts, I could feel the lack of sleep pulling at the skin of my face, slowing my movements. Even my reaction to him was muted. I could recognize the impact his smile should have on me, but I just didn’t have it in me to respond fully. Not now. Maybe later.

  On the couch in his office I fought an impulse to lie down and close my eyes.

  �
�You haven’t been sleeping,” Ethan noted.

  I stopped mid-yawn. “Now, what makes you think that?”

  “I don’t mean just last night or this week.” He watched me as he spoke, alert to my reactions. “You haven’t been sleeping for a long time. Do you still dream about the fire?”

  “No.”

  “What then?”

  I shook my head. “I don’t know. Crazy stuff. It makes no sense.” I wished he’d drop it. I didn’t want to talk about the dreams; they already consumed far too much of my time. “Too much vodka and tonic, I guess.”

  “That’s probably not the case.” God, those eyes. Who had eyes that color? “But if you don’t want to talk about it, we can leave it for another time.”

  I flashed him a warning glance. “That’s not the reason I’m here.”

  “Really?” He looked at me as if he suspected I was lying, as if he knew just how big a lie it was. When I refused to take the bait, he went on. “Okay, why don’t you tell me what you think happened the night of the fire?”

  “I don’t know what happened. That’s the whole point.”

  “I didn’t ask you what happened.” He made certain I was looking at him. “I asked you what you think happened. Do you think you got drunk and passed out?”

  “I wasn’t drunk.”

  “Do you think you had a stroke, an epileptic fit, early Alzheimer’s?”

  “What the hell are you talking about?” Anger flared in my chest. Did he think this was a joke? If so, his face didn’t show it. He looked deadly serious.

  “Asia, something happened that night. You lost three hours. Could you have lost track of time at the bar?”

  “No!” I shouted at him. “I left the bar before midnight. I was sober. I headed home. The next thing I know I’m waking up on Deerhorn Road, and it’s three hours later. I can’t explain it. Can you?”

  “Yeah, I can explain it.” His gaze was level, his voice even. “You were tired. It had been a long day, and you weren’t used to being out drinking. You caught yourself nodding at the wheel and pulled over.”

  “No, damn it, I was wide awake!” Aren’t you listening? I need you to believe me.

  “You’re human, Asia. You were tired. You’d had a little too much to drink. And though your brain was not acknowledging these facts, your body did what it is programmed by evolution to do. It saved your ass by pulling over to the side of the road.”

  NO!

  “You may even have been effectively unconscious by the time that car came to a stop.” He went on, relentless. “Your body knew from long experience what to do. It’s no surprise you don’t remember it.”

  “That’s not the way it happened!” I jumped up and started to pace in front of the window. “Do you think this is the first time I’ve heard this? Every goddamn doctor I’ve been to has said the same thing. I’ve tried to convince myself that’s what happened. Hell, it’s the only logical explanation, right? But I can’t believe it. Something in the back of my mind won’t let me believe it. I want to know why.”

  “That’s just it, Asia.” His gaze followed me around the room, but his voice was as calm and still as deep water. “You already know why. There is an explanation, but your guilt won’t let you believe it. The answer is not in your mind. It’s in your heart.”

  I stopped pacing to glare at him. “You’re saying I’m obsessing over this because I feel guilty?”

  “The process is much more complex than that.”

  “The process,” I repeated, furious. “The process. Let me tell you something, Doc. The process is like having your guts ripped out. It’s like being tortured in some South American prison month after month. Only there’s no end to it because you can’t tell your torturer what he wants to know. Do I feel guilty? Yeah, you bet your ass I feel guilty. I should have been there, and I wasn’t. And because I wasn’t there, my babies are dead. You don’t ever forgive yourself for something like that. Ever.”

  I pulled up short and forced myself to sit across from him on the couch. I stared into his eyes, as if I could will him to understand.

  “I’m telling you: I wasn’t drunk. I wasn’t tired. I didn’t pull over and pass out less than a mile from my house. Something happened. Something happened, and I lost everything.”

  Ethan didn’t look away. “I know. I know, Asia. And you can never replace what you lost that night. Still, you’ve survived. You’ve begun a new life. That’s a hell of a lot. It shows incredible strength. Admirable strength. With a little help, you’ll escape that torturer. In time the scars will heal.”

  I studied him, trembling, unwilling to give up what had been with me for so long. The rage. The guilt. He gave no sign that my anger was inappropriate or disturbing, or that the tears that washed in a stream down my cheeks were anything but necessary. In the space he had created, warmed by his understanding, I suddenly felt safe, comforted. I almost felt that the future he saw was possible. The fists I held clenched in my lap relaxed a tiny fraction.

  Ethan reached across his desk and took up a prescription pad. “I’m going to give you something to help you sleep. You need to be rested before we can start work.”

  “Work?” I rubbed at my face.

  He smiled. “You didn’t think I was going to let you off that easy, did you?”

  “Well, no. But I didn’t expect to be digging ditches either.”

  “Emotional work can be every bit as hard and dirty.” He handed me the prescription.

  I took this as a signal the session was over. I rose to go, grateful that my shaky legs were strong enough to hold me. I managed a tentative grin.

  “Guess I’d better wear my overalls next time.”

  Ethan saw me to the door. “Guess you’d better.”

  It didn’t sound like he was joking.

  Arthur Claussen settled onto the battered couch in Ethan’s office as if he was afraid the furniture would give way under him. “You know, you really should get yourself a nicer office.” His gaze slid from the curtainless window to the smudged walls and back to the scratched desk before rising to meet Ethan’s questioning expression. “You can afford it.”

  Ethan regarded him with amusement. “Can I?”

  “I send you plenty of patients.” Claussen waved a hand at him. “You’re a bachelor, with no family to support.”

  “No, Arthur.” That familiar band tightened around his chest. “I’m technically not a bachelor, though it’s true I don’t have family to support.”

  “Yes, you’re right, my boy.” The old man dipped his head. “I’m sorry. Still, why do you hide away here in your hobbit hole like some college professor from the nineteen-sixties? Why not live a little?”

  Ethan lifted his chin with dramatic flair. “I refuse to take on the trappings of a corrupt bourgeois society.” Then he shrugged, dismissing the subject. His mentor had been pushing this point a bit too much lately. Ethan was comfortable in this room, in this house. He liked having some money squirreled away for the future. He had no need of a fancy car or office, though he had to admit he could use the family. That had been something he’d wanted and hadn’t been likely to get, even when he’d had the wife.

  Claussen frowned as if he could see he was getting nowhere. “I have a couple of interesting cases I thought I’d send your way. One swears she’s pregnant with an alien baby.”

  “I’m a psychiatrist, not a reporter for the Enquirer.” Ethan smiled and rearranged the files on his desk. “Besides, I don’t think I want any new patients just now.”

  “Oh?” Claussen’s eyes narrowed a fraction. “And why not?”

  “I’m still trying to resolve the last batch you sent me.”

  “The engineer with the scars? That should have been an easy case. And the schoolteacher should have resolved within a few weeks.”

  Ethan shifted in his seat. In fact, he had been able to convince the engineer his unusual scars were a previously unnoticed byproduct of an active lifestyle. And the schoolteacher had never really wanted
to believe she had been part of a science fiction cliché. Both cases had been relegated to the follow-up file.

  “There’s something else, isn’t there, Ethan?” Claussen studied him with an air of self-satisfaction. “Don’t tell me you’ve been out scaring up cases on your own.”

  “If I had, don’t you think it would have been about time?” He was trying for a light tone, but aggravation gave the sentence a bitter edge.

  Maddeningly, Claussen agreed with him. “Perhaps you’re right. What, then?”

  Ethan left his seat for a post by the window. Outside, a cold spring rain dripped from the overhanging trees and pooled in the low spots of the patchy lawn. He watched it for a while before he answered, wondering why he was reluctant to speak.

  “It’s the last one you sent me,” he admitted. “Asia Burdette.”

  “Oh, yes.” The older man spoke as if he’d been expecting Ethan’s response. “I’m not surprised you’re finding that one a challenge.”

  “She’s different, Arthur.”

  “Are we talking about the woman or the case?”

  The woman. Well, the woman was different enough to have been on his mind a lot lately. But he knew better than to admit that to Claussen.

  “The case, of course.”

  “Of course.” The corners of the doctor’s mouth revealed a knowing smile.

  “Arthur, the cases you send me all have one thing in common. The procedure we’ve developed is designed to address that problem. But Asia doesn’t fit the profile. She hasn’t mentioned the ‘a’ word once—and I’ve given her plenty of opportunity. Why did you send her to me?”

  “I told you why. I couldn’t help her. I thought maybe you could. Besides, there’s no reason our methodology shouldn’t work on any case of hysterical amnesia.”

  Ethan shook his head. “I’m not so sure.”

  “Well, there’s no harm in trying, is there? You can always fall back on standard talk therapy if the approach fails.”