Forgotten Marriage

by Paula Roe

  And anger.

  She let the heat of that last emotion burn with welcome relief, taking comfort in it. It was a far more polarizing emotion than the sudden heat of arousal that had blanked her mind of all rational thought.

  She took a firm step forward, then another, until she was finally standing in front of him.

  “If you’ve come all this way to tell me you’re kicking me out…”

  “And goddag to you, too, Ally. I’m not kicking you out.”

  The short reprisal combined with that curt admission brought her breath in sharply. “So it was just a ruse to get me here?”

  “It worked, yes?” he said softly, his richly accented tongue wrapping around the syllables almost tenderly.

  She clenched her teeth. “I should just leave you here.”

  “Don’t.” His hand shot out, gripping her arm. His touch electrified her skin, shocking her. She opened her mouth to snap out a demand, but he stymied her with his withdrawal and, “Thank you for coming out so late.”

  Confused but unsure why, she glanced around the crowded arrival hall. “No cameras or bodyguards for the vice president of Sørensen Silver? Makes a change.”

  “The press think I’m in Sweden taking a break. And the bodyguards only attract more attention. Here I’m just another tourist.”

  He swept his eyes down her body appraisingly, as if cataloging the changes since their parting. She nearly put a protective hand over her stomach but stopped herself just in time.

  Not trusting herself to speak, she remained silent as his eyes continued to study her like a thousand trained spies.

  She shifted her weight from one foot to the other. Adult Ally wanted to give him a controlled smile and coolly tell him she wasn’t interested in anything he had to say. The other Ally—impulsive Ally—who’d trusted so easily and fallen even more easily in love, wanted to smack him in the eye for all the pain and hurt he’d made her go through alone. And then throw her arms around him and never let go. But you did. She reminded herself. You did let him go.

  His familiar woodsy aftershave tapped against her hard shell of protectiveness, begging entry.

  Cool or crazy, both ideas were stupid. Instead she said the first thing that came to mind. “Traveling light?” She nodded to his luggage trolley.

  “Ja.”

  That’s a good thing, right? So he’s not staying long. A trickle of nervous sweat beaded down her back, sticky warmth heating her armpits as she reached for the trolley. “Well, let’s go. Where are you staying?”

  “The Crowne Plaza at Coogee Beach. Ally,” his hand tentatively covered hers, sending an intimate warmth buzzing up her arm. The small gasp welled up in her throat, but she choked it back down. He was so close she could feel his chest brushing her shoulder, the familiar intense heat of his body scorching into hers. So close she could reach out, trail her fingers down his cheek and savor the welcome graze of his five-o’clock shadow.

  “What?” She swept her eyes downward, away from that too-inquisitive scrutiny.

  “Thank you. I—”

  Ally snatched her hand away. “You traveling alone?”

  “Ja.”

  “So what’s this favor you want?”

  He frowned, cupped his cheek in his palm and rubbed. The familiar gentle rasp of stubble against skin sent screaming memories flitting across her subconscious, sending the butterflies in her stomach into a crazy dance. His I’ll-take-what-I-want-because-I’m-so-charming arrogance had disappeared. In its place was something akin to uncertainty. The lines around his eyes denoted weariness, as if extreme sadness had personally etched out every one.

  Confused, she found herself staring. Finn never bottled up stress, never agonized over past mistakes. He dealt with it and moved on. Whatever was eating at him must be serious.

  Compassion flooded in, prompting her to gently touch his arm.

  “What’s wrong?”

  Weary eyes met hers, so full of confusion and pain that she felt as if she’d been hit by the four-fifteen to Bondi Beach. She swallowed. Maybe she didn’t want to know.

  A second later, the look was gone and Finn’s expression eased back into the familiar, in-control one.

  “Let’s get out of here.”

  Knowing she wasn’t going to get any answers until he felt like giving them, she nodded and led the way out.

  Driving in loaded silence, they pulled into the hotel car park fifteen minutes later.

  Check-in was a blur, as were the smiles of the desk clerk, the offer to carry Finn’s luggage and the elevator ride up to the presidential suite.

  The elevator slid open to reveal a plush hallway with a door at either end. Finn turned left, leading the way as if he’d been occupying five-star hotels all his life.

  And that, Ally realized as he carded the door and stepped aside to let her enter first, is just another of our many differences. With a gloomy cloud now over her thoughts, she took in the opulent suite in subtle gold and beige furnishings, the spacious lounge area that was bigger than her entire apartment. During the drive, her anger had been put on the back burner as nervousness of the unknown swiftly rushed in to fill the void.

  She kept replaying that look on Finn’s face. The sorrow. The hurt. The bare emotion so rarely displayed outside the bedroom. And it twisted her up inside wondering what—or who?—had put it there.

  He sank into a plush lounge chair with a relieved sigh. “I forgot how long it took to fly to Sydney. How do you stand twenty-six hours in a cramped cabin?”

  “I don’t.”

  Ally placed her keys on the mahogany writing desk and glanced around the room with more calm then she felt. Ignoring his thoughtful gaze, she went over to the French shutters. Sweeping them open, she then unlocked the sliding glass door that led onto a private balcony and let the salt-and-ocean breeze sweep in. It lifted the hair off her neck, sending the shorter curls across her cheeks. She shoved them back, took a deep breath and exhaled, feeling the tension in her body ease a fraction.

  “Do you want coffee?” he said from the couch.

  She smiled thinly and turned. Ever the gracious host. “Then you’ll tell me what you want?”

  He nodded shortly.

  “Fine. Tea, please.”

  It was a shock to the system watching Finn play the hired help—plugging in the dripolator, tearing open the ground beans packet and dumping it in the filter. By the time he laid out the sterling tea service on the antique coffee table and finally turned to give her his undivided attention, nauseous anticipation had seeped in. As she felt his eyes run over every inch of her body as though he’d not seen her in a lifetime, her resolve was slowly going into meltdown.

  She nervously tucked a heavy lock of hair behind her ear—which only conjured unbidden memories of Finn doing the exact same intimate task. She quickly dropped her hand and sat on the couch arm as Finn brought the tea service to the coffee table.

  “Don’t tell me you came all this way to hand-deliver those divorce papers,” she said at length.

  He crossed his arms, bands of muscle tightening across his chest. She met his eyes, half expecting the cold, hard cynicism reflecting in the green depths. But he just walked silently past her to the balcony door, giving her his back. She let her gaze drag down his long body as he stared out into the dark star-speckled night. The broad shoulders, the trim waist. The fabulous backside that always set off a pair of jeans to perfection…

  “No. But they shocked the hell out of me.”

  Ally shook her fuzzy head. Focus. The divorce papers. She put the sugar bowl on the tray with a thunk. “Why? We were over. I was never good enough for your family, for the Sørensen’s blue-blood son.” She poured a dash of milk in her cup. “I had no money, no breeding and no class. I left and you moved up to the vice presidency. Coincidence? No.” She glanced up just in time to see him turn and shoot her a puzzled look before she focused on the herbal tea box. “How does your new girlfriend feel about this little visit?”

 
“Jeanette left while I was in hospital.”

  In the claustrophobic silence that followed, Ally thought he was waiting for her to say something, to offer condolences. She refused. Vocalizing false comforts would make her a liar and she wasn’t about to start doing that.

  Hang on. Hospital?

  As if reading her mind, he said, “My father and I were in a car crash. He died last month.”

  Her spoon clattered on the saucer. “Oh, Finn, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know…” Of course you didn’t. She paused and stood, feeling uncomfortably inadequate, before blinking away tears. “When? How?”

  “Before Christmas. A drunk driver. My father was in the passenger seat.”

  Worry thumped her heart double-time. “You’re okay, aren’t you? Were you hurt?”

  “I cracked a few ribs, got a concussion. Nothing permanent except…” He tapped his head.

  “Brain damage?”

  He smiled thinly. “An infection put me in a coma for a week. It wiped out a lot of my memory.”

  “Your—? Amnesia?” Ally stared, her eyes rounding. “So you blocked out the accident?”

  He nodded grimly, that one gesture revealing a sea of frustration behind it as shadows twisted his expression again. It was starting to get to her. It made her itch to smooth away the lines of worry. To hold him. Comfort him.

  “I can read and write, all the basics. And after rehab a lot more returned. But the last few years are still one big blur.”

  He paused, waiting for her to join the dots. Ally knew her mouth hung open, her look one of frank disbelief, because it clearly reflected in his eyes. Before she had a chance to assimilate that revelation, Finn spoke again.

  “I’ve been trying to remember but I come up blank every time.”

  Ally jumped as he closed the distance between them in a blink. When he placed his hands on her shoulders, his touch seared through her thin shirt, branding her with familiar aching heat.

  “I’ve been reading your old letters and I…” He paused, took a jagged breath. “I spent hours trying to find a trigger to unlock my memory. There was nothing except those damned divorce papers.”

  Ally could only stare at him as her heart hammered in her throat. Shock, disbelief and dread all mingled in the pit of her stomach, threatening to rise up and choke her. He didn’t want her back. He didn’t know about the baby. He wanted…What did he want?

  His green eyes, complicated windows of bundled emotion, bored into hers. “I need answers. I need you to help me get my memory back. And Ally…” he stared down at her, determination overshadowing the questions still warm on her lips. When his gaze swept her flushed cheeks, a blast of raw emotion swamped her. “I need to remember. You have to help me. You’re my last chance.”

  Two

  She made a shallow choking sound then swallowed, drawing Finn’s attention to the smooth skin of her throat, to the wildly throbbing pulse below the surface.

  “Why?” she said faintly.

  He remembered staring into the hospital mirror a month ago, recognizing his face, the features withdrawn and pale from the absence of sun and fresh air. And feeling a deep and utter sense of displacement, as if stuck between two planes of existence. A drifter. Someone belonging nowhere.

  He couldn’t—wouldn’t—tell his woman that.

  When he didn’t answer, she tried again. “Finn?” she prompted in that chocolate-thick voice. “Why is this so important to you?”

  A jolt of heat flared in his groin, flooring him. For helve. His mind was blank. Except for the lust…

  He yanked away as if she’d grown fangs and bitten him, stunned at his lapse in control.

  “Part of my life has gone. Wouldn’t you do the same?” he said curtly.

  To her credit she recovered quickly, tucking the remnants of shock back behind an expression of careful scrutiny.

  “I would. But you…”

  “Me, what?”

  “The Finn I know wouldn’t have come all this way for something like this,” she continued cryptically.

  “Something like what?”

  “Digging up the past just to remember an old relationship. You don’t dwell, Finn. You move on. That’s what you do.”

  “Maybe I’ve changed.”

  She quirked up an eyebrow. “Really? So there’s nothing more to this than a trip down memory lane? No reputation to keep spotless or for-the-good-of-the-company spin?”

  If she’d planted a kiss square on his mouth it couldn’t have thrown him more. His surprise must have shown because she sighed and placed her hands on her hips. “Start by telling me the truth, Finn. We owe each other that much.”

  So much for your careful planning, Finn thought grimly. What to do now? The reality wasn’t scenarios and well-thought-out plans, it was Ally’s defensiveness, the anger still simmering below the surface.

  And her bizarre familiarity, her total certainty of his thoughts and reactions.

  He took a breath and stuck a cautious toe in the water, unwilling to submerge himself completely.

  “You know my father built up his business from nothing,” he said. “Everything is tied up in it. And Marlene, my stepmother, will get a controlling share.”

  “So why don’t you contest the will?”

  “Nikolai made an amendment, a…” He frowned, searching for the English equivalent.

  “Codicil?”

  “Yes. It cuts her off completely. But we can’t find it.”

  Finn watched her reach for her cup. As she blew on the rising steam from the rim, curls of rich chestnut hair swept forward, curtaining her face away from his scrutiny. The sudden and inexplicable desire to tuck those stray locks behind her ears sucker-punched him in the gut.

  He dragged in a confused breath, astounded by his body’s reaction. “I got the feeling Marlene didn’t like you,” he probed carefully.

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I ruined her plans. Look, when I met you, I didn’t know who you were. You never fully explained until we landed in Denmark, but that didn’t stop your friends and family thinking I was only after your money. You were—are—a corporate wonder, Finn. A celebrity in your homeland.” She flicked him a glance. “And when your stepmother told me the truth—”

  “What did she tell you?”

  “That we wouldn’t last. That you were engaged before you left for Australia. That I should go quietly and take her money as compensation.”

  Finn absorbed the second stab of betrayal with outward calm, slowly swallowing his fury. “Did you—?”

  “I didn’t take her money.”

  Her quiet admission, full of conviction, instinctively told him she was telling the truth. He nodded, relieved. “I’m sorry about that.”

  She shot him a look of wide-eyed disbelief over the teacup, as if he’d suddenly sprouted a third eye or something.

  “Can you really not remember? Anything?” she ventured.

  “No.”

  “Not our wedding? How we met? Our…” She flushed. “Arguments?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Wow. How do you feel here, now?”

  “Weird.”

  “Just weird?”

  “It’s…disturbing,” he amended. “Like I’ve caught you spying. You know practically everything about me and I…” He paused, then said softly, “Apart from a few flashes, I don’t remember you at all.”

  The half truth clenched his muscles into a tight, tense knot. It must have registered on his face because her wary expression softened.

  “I’m sorry about your dad,” she said gently. “Did he…suffer?”

  He didn’t want to think about that, but the sudden pain forced a sharp breath out, tightened the muscles in his chest. “He was fine when he got to hospital, which was when I believe he wrote the codicil. The next day he had an aneurysm and never recovered.”

  “Oh. He is—was—” she stumbled here, blinking quickly “—a good man. I liked him.” Even though she smiled,
it was a fleeting one, one full of sadness.

  “I thought…Marlene told me—”

  “That we’d hardly spoken? That we didn’t get on? Or that we got on a little too well?”

  Finn said nothing, waiting as she shook her head in disbelief.

  “He was a charmer. Said I made him feel young again. I remember…” She swallowed then plowed on. “I remember one day—he skipped out on a meeting to take me to Tivoli. We’d been in Copenhagen two weeks and he was surprised you hadn’t shown me the sights yet.”

  “I was probably working.”

  “Yes,” she echoed.

  Irritated with her agreement but unsure why, he said, “So Marlene was jealous.” When she shrugged, he raised his eyebrows. “If you’re being vague to spare my feelings, then don’t. I know what Marlene is capable of.”

  Even given a green light, she still squirmed on the couch. Finally she settled on, “Nikolai was fun. A charismatic, attractive flirt with a wicked sense of humor. But he was also my father-in-law. Marlene didn’t see it that way and accused me of…well, you get the picture.”

  Another piece of the puzzle fell into place. It did look damning, especially in the face of Nikolai’s will and Ally’s controlling interest. He had to know. “Was there any truth to—”

  Before he had a chance to finish, she snapped to her feet, her face flushed with anger. “Oh, my—No! NO!”

  “Marlene’s made her stance perfectly clear.”

  “I’ll bet she has.” Ally brushed her hair away from her face with one angry swipe.

  “And then there’s your apartment.”

  She frowned. “We talked about property values in Sydney, I said beachside blocks are always in demand. He bought it as an investment. When I came home I had nowhere to stay so he offered me a place for free for as long as I needed. I wanted to pay, so we agreed on a monthly rent—too low, in my opinion, but…”

  Under Finn’s sudden silence, she added sarcastically, “There were no secret meetings, no unchaperoned visits. Everything was aboveboard, Finn. I was in love with you. And Nikolai’s first priority wasn’t cheating on his wife, it was Sørensen Silver. Just like it was—is—yours. His dedication and driving force made it into a multinational company.” She said that with an almost sad inflection. Yet it only confirmed what he already knew.