by Linda Style
Natalia clicked her nails against the Formica tabletop, frowned and then rubbed her temples. “That sucks.”
“No kidding,” Serena agreed.
After a moment, Natalia shook her head and said, “What’s the purpose?”
“To make the police find the guy who did it.”
“So,” Serena said, handing Tori a latte. “Do you think it’s possible?” She carried the other two cups to the table.
“I don’t know. It’s been a long time. Because I was a minor, I wasn’t there to hear the rest of the testimony. All I did was testify in a closed courtroom.”
“But you’ve read the files, haven’t you?”
“I started once, but couldn’t go on.”
“Do you think you could do it now?” Natalia asked. “You’d like to see the slimebag in jail, too. Right? So, there’s no reason not to help Linc find him. It’s not like you’d be out there tracking down anyone.”
“Except just thinking about that night scares me to death.” Tori closed her eyes for a second. What her attacker had said afterward…that if she said a word to anyone, he’d hunt her down, slit her down the middle, dress her out like a deer and watch her die, haunted her nightmares.
“No one can blame you for that,” Serena said, snapping Tori from the horrific thought.
Then Tori remembered what her former therapist had said years ago…that facing down her fears was the only way to conquer them. She thought she’d done that, but was beginning to realize that was only because she’d thought the man who’d attacked her was in jail. She’d simply been managing the fears. Keeping them at bay.
“Okay.” Natalia stood. “So if you really want to help him, maybe you can do it by helping him search. If he’s focused on that, he won’t be trying to find you.” She shrugged. “It’s something to think about.”
It was. But she’d have to think long and hard to muster the courage.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
LINC KEPT WATCHING for Tori. When he saw her drive through the gates, a stab of excitement shot through him. But, for just a flicker of a second, in his mind’s eye he saw another face, a girl. Then she was gone. He tried to pull back the image, but it didn’t happen. His fiancée? A school friend?
He got up from the leather sectional in the family room and walked past the dogs to the game table where the laptop sat open. As Mac had recommended, he put more weight on his right foot each time, so eventually he could switch to a cane. He smiled to himself at his progress. He wanted to surprise Tori, see the smile on her face when he could walk without assistance.
Being with Tori pushed him to be a better man than he suspected he was before. He’d been serious when he’d told her he wanted to get married someday, maybe have kids.
He sat at the table and stared at the map of Los Angeles on the screen, at the X marking the address he’d found. A possible address for his father, and every time he thought about what to do with it, his heart warred with reality. One part of him wanted to talk to his father, and he was even a little excited about it. Yet, another part of him recoiled at the thought.
According to the prison visitor’s records, his father had never visited Linc, never even contacted him, not even when he was hospitalized and near death. What kind of parent could be so cold?
Both the police records he’d been allowed to see and the public court records online contained little information on his background. He knew he’d been a student at ASU when arrested, so last week he’d completed the online forms to get copies of his transcripts, which listed the classes he’d taken. Armed with that information, he could contact a professor or two who might remember him…and, he hoped, who might know the other students he’d hung out with.
One of the most important people for him to talk with was his ex-fiancée, but he’d called the apartment manager at the last listed address and discovered she’d married and moved to another state. He’d called all the people with her former name, hoping to find a relative, but to no avail. He’d done dozens of online searches, read and reread the few newspaper articles relating to the trial, but the information was old. And the person who’d wrongly identified him hadn’t been named, as was usual when the victim was a minor. But he was sure to have the name when he got the court transcripts.
In fact, when the transcripts came, he’d have the names of everyone who had testified and he had to be able to locate some of them. It had been a month since he’d applied for the trial transcripts, so they could come any day now.
He heard the security beep from a door opening. His pulse quickened. Every time he thought about Tori, he felt like a little kid with a first crush. Every time he thought of kissing her, he felt a surge that couldn’t be denied.
“Hey, what’s up?” Tori said coming into the family room.
“Same old, same old. Therapy and research.”
Seeming preoccupied, Tori walked over, then sat on the chair next to him at the game table. She leaned closer to look at what he was doing on the laptop. Too close. Her scent wafted and instantly he wanted to kiss her again. Or maybe bury his face in the sweet curve of her neck. Or other significant places.
“Is that another map of Los Angeles?”
“Yep.”
She drew back. “You found your father?”
“Maybe. This is the most current address.”
“Is there any way to get a phone number so you can call? A reverse directory of some kind?”
He inhaled deeply. “I think so, but I haven’t gotten that far.” He’d been told his parents were divorced, and even though that was all he knew about his dad, Linc got a knot in his stomach whenever he thought of the man.
Looking thoughtful, Tori opened her mouth as if she wanted to ask something, but didn’t.
“He wasn’t on the visitors’ list at either the prison or the hospital,” Linc said, “so I don’t have any idea if he even knew I was at either place.”
Yet his father was one of the few people who might be able to give Linc an idea of what he’d been like as a child, as a teenager. Had he liked sports? Had he played an instrument in school? Was he a popular kid or a nerd? His father could tell him about his brother and his mother—the woman who’d died during his trial. He needed to know about her. The person who, based on her letters to him in prison, had loved him, believed in him, even though he didn’t remember her.
“So, what will you do? How will you proceed?” Tori stretched out and flicked off her shoes.
“I haven’t decided. How’s the mural coming?”
Her eyes lit and she quickly sat up. “I’ll show you. I took a picture. Several actually, both with my phone and my camera. I like to document the stages of each work, and the camera takes better photographs than my cell.” And with that, she pulled a small camera from her purse, took out a little flat plastic chip and, leaning forward, stuck it into the side of the laptop. Her body brushed against his as she clicked a few keys, and then a photo popped up on the screen—Tori and her friends Serena and Natalia, each holding up a glass of wine. “That’s at Alcantara, a vineyard in the Verde Valley, not too far from here.”
“Nice,” he said. “But how’d you do that?”
“It’s a digital memory card.”
He nodded as a visual of…something…played around the edges of his memory. It felt like the minute she mentioned it, he knew…or understood the concept. Maybe. He couldn’t be sure of anything, other than seeing her excitement about her work made him happy.
She clicked a couple more keys and a photo of the Cosmic Bean appeared on the screen. “Holy moley,” he said. “It’s going to cover the whole side of the house?” The outline showed a schizophrenic mixture of planets, the sun and moon and more earthly things like mountains and streams. He recognized the planet Earth and its markings as it might be viewed from outer space. “Kinda different than what you usually do, isn’t it?”
“It’s what Serena wants. There’s a lot more to it, though. It’ll all be filled in quite colorfu
lly by the time I’m done. She thinks it’ll be a draw for the influx of people who come for the Jazz Festival, so I have to get it done by then.”
Interesting, except…he had to wonder what kind of people a space scene might attract.
“Lots of people come to this area because of the energy vortexes,” she said, as if anticipating his question.
“Hmm. A little extra energy wouldn’t hurt right now. Maybe I ought to check out those vortexes myself.”
“It’s kind of fun,” she said, smiling. “I’ll take you on a tour one of these days.”
“I don’t know about that. I don’t get the feeling I’m one of those woo-woo people. A can of Red Bull would probably do the trick.”
“Mac wore you out, huh?”
He shoved a hand through his hair. He was tired, but not physically. “He did. But I’m good with it.”
She caught his gaze then looked away. “I can’t imagine how hard it must be.”
“I don’t mind anything being hard if I’d just make some progress.”
“In what area?”
“Both.”
She cleared her throat. “I know it isn’t any of my business, but you haven’t mentioned the psychiatrist. Isn’t that helping at all?”
“He thinks hypnosis might work.”
“Are you going to do it?”
Sighing, he said, “Maybe. Just not yet. I have this feeling that I’m on the verge of remembering, because I keep getting these flashes of things and I know something’s going to come. But then it never does. I feel like I haven’t made any progress.”
“But you have. Your leg is on the mend and you might have located your father. That’s a lot of progress.”
“Maybe. But I can’t do anything with it.”
She moistened her lips. Her full, pink lips. Lips that made him want to kiss her again and again. His body stirred once more.
“I thought you wanted to talk to him.”
“I do. But I want to talk to him in person. I don’t want to give him a chance to disappear like before.” Linc heard the sharp edge in his voice. The anger. Loving parents didn’t leave a family high and dry, they didn’t belittle a child and beat him senseless when he didn’t behave. Loving parents simply didn’t do that.
Her eyes went wide. “You know that he disappeared?”
Linc could barely breathe. He remembered. It wasn’t a good memory, but it was something. He sucked in a breath, then let it out. “I do now.”
She removed the card from the laptop. “Okay. So, what’s the next step?”
His mind spun. “Nothing. Not until I have a way to go see him.”
She turned away but for just a second. “I can help,” she said quickly.
“No. You’ve done too much already.”
“But it’s important to you.”
“Not that important,” he lied. Seeing his father might be the most critical thing he could do to unlock his memory, but he had to do this for himself. He just had to figure out how to do it without money and transportation.
Tori launched to her feet. Linc couldn’t tell from the look in her eyes if she was tired or angry or what, but based on her body language, she was definitely reacting to something.
“I’m going to take a shower, and then I’m going to grab a sandwich and eat while I work in the studio.”
“Sure. No problem.” He watched her leave. He’d hurt her feelings. That had to be it. The last thing he wanted to do was hurt her feelings. But damn it, he couldn’t let her do any more for him.
He stared at the map, then hit the close button and slammed the laptop shut.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
TORI SHOWERED, pulled on a long, purple turtleneck top, black tights and her comfy, well-worn ballet flats, then went to the kitchen to make a sandwich. Noticing a plate filled with apples and grapes, crackers and cheese, and a bottle of wine on the table with a note taped to it, she went over. In neat, bold letters, the note carried a one word message. Cheers.
Smiling at his thoughtfulness, she closed her eyes. If he only knew how much she didn’t deserve it. A stab of remorse centered in her chest. She could never have imagined how hard this would be.
Which mattered not at all. Her feelings were inconsequential…literally nothing compared with what he was going through. Seeing him wince in pain as he slogged through physical therapy every day, knowing what horrible things he must have endured in jail, knowing he’d lost everyone he’d loved…and even his identity, how could she even think of feeling sorry for herself?
She’d taken everything from him and no matter how difficult it might be for her, she had to do all she could to help him get his life back. Even if he didn’t want her help.
Finding his father was his first real breakthrough, and if Linc wanted to talk to the man in person, then he needed to go to Los Angeles to do it. But she knew him well enough to know he wouldn’t take her money. Not even as a loan. His pride was wounded enough as it was.
Still, there had to be a way she could help him without letting him know.
She picked up the wine and brought it to the standing wine opener on the counter. After popping the cork, she put the wine, a glass and the cheese plate on a tray and took it to her studio. She needed to think, and she did that best when she was painting.
Two hours, three half glasses of wine and the beginnings of a new portrait later, she had a solution. All she had to do was implement it without Linc knowing.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
PALE YELLOW LIGHT from a full moon filtered through the skylight in Linc’s bedroom, keeping him awake. Or was it the dozens of questions that played laser-tag in his head? Whatever, the end result was the same. Sleep wasn’t happening. He sat up and threw his legs over the side of the bed, grabbed a white T-shirt from the chair next to him and pulled it on.
Mac had told him that when he couldn’t sleep, he should just get up and do something. Read a book until he grew tired. But a beer sounded like a much better idea.
Tori kept the dogs in her room, so if he went to the kitchen, he wouldn’t have to worry about running into them and having them bark and wake her up. He stood on his good leg, then gently placed the other foot on the floor, pressing down just a little, then a little more until he felt solid on two feet. He lifted his bad leg to take a step, suddenly lost his balance and leaned against the bed again.
The doc said his equilibrium might be off for a while since he wasn’t walking normally, but it rarely happened since he’d been doing PT. He waited briefly, then reached for the crutches. On his way to the kitchen, he noticed the light in Tori’s studio. She hadn’t said her studio was off-limits, but she hadn’t invited him in to see her work, either. So, he’d steered clear. He doubted she’d meant to leave the light on, though.
He went to the wide double doors and hobbled up the two steps to turn off the light, but as he reached for the switch, he saw a work in progress on her easel. From where he stood, it looked like a portrait…of a man. Was it a commissioned portrait? A boyfriend? She hadn’t mentioned anyone. But then, why would she. She hadn’t mentioned a lot of things. Still, she should have told him…at least after he’d kissed her, wouldn’t she? What the hell. Whoever the guy was, Linc didn’t like him.
He glanced over at another canvas on a different easel. Several blank canvases were stacked against the wall behind the easel, and farther along were more canvases that appeared to be in different states of completion.
He’d never thought about how an artist worked, but found it interesting that she had so many paintings going at one time. It made sense, though. If he were an artist, he might do the same.
But he wasn’t. He wasn’t anything. He hadn’t had a chance to be. In the past, both at the hospital and the weeks he’d been here, he’d done a lot of thinking about his life, what it might’ve been like. What he hoped it had been.
He’d talked big about starting a new life without remembering, but he realized now that he’d never really believed he�
��d have to. He would need to make a career for himself, but in what field? Other than knowing he had a bachelor’s degree and had planned to go on to law school, he knew little about his interests. He didn’t even know if he had any skills.
Reaching for the light switch, he saw another painting, this one hanging on the wall next to the door. It wasn’t a large work, but looked like a storybook cover.
The blend of soft pastel colors gave it a dreamy quality. At the center was a little girl with golden blond hair twirling around in a field of yellow flowers. In the background, an old stone archway revealed a forest on the other side. The distinction between the dark forest and the light meadow seemed symbolic somehow. He wondered if Tori had planned it that way. Or was it just him? It felt oddly familiar…as if he’d seen it before.
Yeah, as if he’d have had any chance to see art in prison. Maybe it was a copy of a storybook cover. Something he’d seen as a kid.
A rustling noise sounded behind him. He whirled around, lost his balance and felt his foot slip off the step. His crutches clattered to the floor. Grappling for some kind of support, he suddenly felt a warm body lodge against him, propping him up.
“Hey, easy there.” Tori quickly slid under his arm as he tried to balance against her to get his bearings.
“Sorry I startled you,” she said.
Feeling her warm skin against his, his blood pressure shot up like a rocket. Her voice sounded smoky, as if she’d just awakened, which gave him another instant reaction. Damn. Even her voice turned him on.
“I couldn’t sleep, and on my way to the kitchen I saw the studio light still on. I went to shut it off.” He turned his head so his face was touching her hair, then breathed in the sweet fresh scent. He felt like a starving man gorging on food. He could’ve remained in that position for hours.
But Tori quickly slid from under his arm, picked up the crutches, handed him one, then the other. “I must’ve forgotten to turn it off.”
