by Anna Keats
“Oh, okay, I’ll check in back at base and get my head down for a few hours. What with one thing or another, we haven’t been getting much sleep here…,” he grins. He runs his fingers through his blond-brown hair, glinting in the sunlight.
Immediately a ripple runs through me as if the shaft of light has brought my mind suddenly to life. Something on this windowsill must have triggered me.
The wonder of being perched on the edge of a memory thrills and delights me. But I am not expecting what comes next…
Scanning my eyes across the windowsill, across the abandoned cups is a small silver paper knife, glinting in the morning sun. In a split second, a vision flashes before my eyes; a knife – larger than that, maybe a kitchen knife, in someone’s hand, being thrust and thrown.
I don’t know where it’s come from or what it is and, in a trice, before I even knew it had happened, it had gone – disappearing entirely like a stone sinking into a deep lake. I catch my breath suddenly.
“Are you okay?” he asks, turning towards me. “You look pale…”
I gather my head. “I’m fine…,” I assure him.
The memory of his lingering kiss imprints itself into the nape of my neck. It is warm and tender and retains his heated scent. As I watch him walk down the gravel path out through the dark, rusted gates beyond, I feel a tinge of something inside.
Maybe it’s pride or contentment. Of finding something that I can call my own, despite it all.
Possibly it is even love, I couldn’t possibly say.
Chapter 11
“Miss Rogers?” the voice makes me turn in surprise.
When I look, I see a pair of sparkling blue eyes, belonging to an older gentleman, perhaps seventy-five, his light-colored skin rippling with the tide of time. He smiles at me cheerily, as I step onto the train from the platform.
“H…hello?” I say unsure. He looks so friendly, and unthreatening, but every encounter with a stranger leaves me wondering whether I am supposed to know them or not – and there have been quite a few of those already today!
So, as the man’s twinkly eyes peer into mine kindly, I am already I beginning to tense up.
“I… I just wanted to ask if you had made a full recovery…?”
His voice hangs in the air about the platform. It’s a cold day, but there’s something about the structure at Sunset Tracks which seems to trap the cold air beneath the art deco façade.
“Yes?” I say, fixing a smile to my face. I am thinking about my ankle, which throbs painfully.
“Forgive me, you might not recognize me, but I was there… and so was my wife… she helped you come around on the tracks… perhaps you won’t remember…”
My eyes scan around the sparse carriage, right there, by his side is a slight woman, with sloped shoulders and clothed entirely in gray. As soon as I set eyes on her, I recognize her as the old woman from the platform, before. She nods and smiles shyly.
“I do. Thank you…,” I say, politely. “Both you and Adam saved me…I can’t thank you enough…,”
“Ah, yes, Adam, the one who…,” the woman’s voice trails off. “Yes, he was very… good… but…. Forgive me for talking out of turn Miss, but he’s been quite a fixture at yours ever since…,” she casts her eyes down as she says this. I feel my heart quicken pace.
“But there’s been some, concern about him and…his intentions…,” she immediately blushes a deep pink and refuses to meet my eyes, although her husband looks at me genially and says;
“There are stories everywhere, of unpaid debts and other, more murky things…,” he says vaguely. His wife murmurs something vaguely as if attempting to dissuade him.
“To put it bluntly, he’s a conman…,” he blurts.
I burst out laughing. A small town like Sunset Tracks has taken some getting used to; the gossip and the chatter follow me around wherever I go.
“Please, Mr.…,” I break off, trying not to appear rude.
“Marshall,” he says.
“Mr. Marshall. I am touched by your concern, but Adam has been the only person here for me since this whole thing started. If it wasn’t for him, I don’t know what I would do…”
The pair look at each other, sharing a silent look. Then the lady touches me gently on the arm and says;
“Just take care, my dear…”
That was the morning. But now, it’s growing dark. The night skies beckon in from the far edges of town, bringing with a deep, dank air. It’s cold and is getting colder. I quicken away from the train – the last one of the day. Twelve hours, I have spent, going backward and forth, up and down and across branch lines. At least one thing I can say is that I have got my travelcard’s worth. But, sadly, little else.
Forlornly, I wonder just what I was doing at Sunset Tracks, that day; an interest still shared by the police. But, if I am hoping for the train to jog my memory, then I am sadly disappointed. Absolutely nothing of note comes back to me. However, the old couple’s words return to me several times and make me wonder why so many people are suspicious of Adam.
“There’s been some concern about his intentions…,” one of them had said. Frowning, I think of Adam’s demeanor at the solicitor’s and odd things, such as referring to the house as “ours”.
It has taken a while for it to dawn on me that I am actually now, a very wealthy woman; even, an heiress!
And it takes a while longer still for it to dawn on me that as such, everyone in this two-bit town is talking about me. In fact, I have been the sole topic of conversation for weeks.
I wend my way from Sunset Tracks station - my ankle aching intensely, across the winding avenue and back down to the lodge. It stands quite a long way back, at the end of a private road, potholed and unmarked. Just before it is a small layby, hidden from the main road, the high hedges offering respite from onlookers. I imagine it to be popular with the local courting couples.
As I approach, from somewhere around, I hear a low murmuring voice. For a minute, I think it is coming from my phone, but, drawing closer I realize there is someone parked up in a car there.
Inside a battered Ford hatchback comes a man’s voice, slightly insistent, speaking into a phone. “Listen, there’s no stress. You’ll get your money, the casino will get their money back…,” he says.
I catch a glimpse of the interior of the chassis, from the rear window. It’s a mess, with clothes strewn all over and what looks like a sleeping bag on the back seat. And that’s not all; it’s covered in casino chips.
But he hasn’t seen me yet and keeps on talking, his head hunched close to the dashboard.
"I can repay it all, just give me a bit more time, I promise…," he continues. "There’s no need to call the police…it’s just a… cash flow situation…”
A nagging feeling starts in me from the pit of my stomach; I know this car. In fact, I have been in it.
The blond man’s head glints in the moonlight and I do a double-take; it is Adam.
Chapter 12
“Aurelia! Oh, Jesus, I’ll call you back…,”
I drop the cellphone has been cemented to my face for the last three-quarters of an hour.
I am holed up here, in HQ, dealing with epic amounts of shit. And now, it seems like there’s more to come.
“Adam… what… what’s going on?” she asks, her golden hair billowing down around her waist. She looks at me quizzically for a moment, casting her perfectly blue eyes over the sleeping bag and casino chips. Then, she stares straight back at me.
“Everywhere I go, people are telling me to be rid of you, that you’re no good and just after my money. Now, this…,” she looks disparagingly at the debris in the car, then continues;
“If I didn’t know better, I would say you are sleeping here… but why? You said you had a place downtown…?” she asks, more curious than hurt.
“I do, it’s just that…I…,” my mind launches into emergency mode, desperately concocting some bullshit to tell her. And I’ll be able to do it, I k
now, I just need more time. So, I say. “Let me tell you about it back at the house…”
Hopefully, that will buy me the time I need to come up with a plausible excuse for sleeping in my car when I supposedly have a perfectly good townhouse in a desirable part of Sunset Tracks.
Fortunately, Aurelia takes the bait. She looks a might confused, but all the same, accepts my arm as we meander away from the layby and down to the house. We are just about to cross the threshold when she turns to me suddenly and says;
“Why are you sleeping in your car, Adam?”
I look into her deep blue eyes and give a deep sigh. I just can’t; all the bullshit I had ready and waiting to tell her just dissolves on my liar’s lips. God knows what is happening to me, but I think that I love this girl, and maybe I always did. I just can’t lie.
“Because…,” I say, feeling lost. “I’m a liar and a chancer….and a thief to boot… but the thing is, I don’t need to anymore…”
This is obviously not the answer that she’s expecting, because she almost topples backward, on the front doorstep, as we go between the front porch and the inside of the house.
“So… it’s all true…?” she asks, in an odd-sounding tone.
If Aurelia is surprised, then I am shell-shocked. My heart is pumping desperately, beating harder than it ever has done. Despite the damp chill in the air, my palms are clamming up and I am starting sweat. My mind is crash landing in territories unknown, into a strange place called the truth. It’s not somewhere I am well acquainted with.
“Yes…,” I say, dejectedly.
“That you are scamming me…?”
“No!” I say loudly. “Not about that. But the rest of it is true. I’ve got debts and well, let’s just say a ton of people after me…”
“I see,” she says, biting her lip. “And your big house, with the pool and the stables?”
“Made up,” I say. “But it as imaginary houses go, it was pretty cool…,” I can’t resist it. I want to see her smiling – even if the timing is out.
She stares at me directly.
“Not funny,” she says. But I can see, a smirk creeping across her symmetrical face, playing in the corners of her lips.
Then looking serious again says; “give me one reason why I should trust you right now?”
Clack, clack, clack. A noise like a ticking clock comes towards me. But thinking it was just in my mind, I filter it out.
“I can give you more than one…,” I say, pulling her close. I can’t help it. It’s desperate, it’s cheesy, but it’s the only thing I’ve got. And besides, I really, really want to kiss her.
Aurelia melts into my arms for a minute, then stops abruptly. She coughs loudly.
“And… you are….?”
“I am really called Adam…,” I say, slightly confused. “I didn’t make that up…and I was in your high school… I can prove it…”
But Aurelia isn’t looking at me anymore; her gaze goes beyond that and out, somewhere just ahead. For a minute, I wonder if she is about to lose consciousness again. Then she says.
“Not you…her...”
“Her? Who?” I spin around and nearly trip over the doorstep. In front of me is a woman with long blonde tresses, done up in a spookily similar style to Aurelia’s.
She is well dressed, in a slimline black dress, cut to accentuate her features. Everything about her screams money.
“Yes…remember me Adam?” she begins.
And then I realize.
“I’m Aurelia Rogers…”
Chapter 13
“Well, this is embarrassing…,” the voice of the blonde woman on the doorstep cuts into my core like a knife. “That the conman was conned too… still, you shouldn’t feel too bad. I mean, she has the entire town convinced that she is me. Well played, I would say…,” then she pauses, and frowns theatrically. “Except if it wasn’t for the small matter of my house and all my money…!”
Her blue eyes hiss at me, silently, like a cat’s. I don’t know who this woman is right then. Or what is happening. All I know is that I have got to get out of here; to run and keep running.
“I’m Aurelia Rogers. This woman is an imposter…although I guess maybe, she does look a bit like me…”
Then she stops, looks at Adam and laughs. “Oh my God. Your face…!”
“But…,” Adam splutters. I can tell that whatever else he might have done; he’s not faking this. He really did think I was this woman.
But now, I watch as his face gradually changes to one of recognition. “It really is you… but…?”
The blonde woman stands back, satisfied. Adam’s face reels around from me to her and back again. She is attractive enough, but the sly twist of her smile renders her face cruel.
“We’re not that alike!” I say, to no-one.
“I know,” she agrees. “I could feel quite hurt…you didn’t recognize me!”
Adam looks breathlessly at the woman. She is confident, alluring, stylish; dressed from head to toe in designer clothing. In short, she is everything I am not.
“But I hadn’t seen you since high school…,” Adam says, weakly. “People change…”
“Not you…,” she says, a grin twisting on her lips. “You very much are the same person you were back then. Still a total stranger to the truth…!”
She eyes him, triumphant. But my heart is now beating so fast, it ripples beneath my ribcage. My breath is fast and I feel something squeezing hard on my chest. I can’t breathe. I am done here. If I stay in this madness any longer, I will be consumed. Without another word, I pick up my heels and flee. Away from this crazy woman, away from a man whom, until a few minutes ago, I had thought to be genuine and true. Away from this house, which is no longer my home – if it ever had been. Every step aches, with my ankle on the verge of buckling, but I am determined. As I go, the woman eyes me, with faux sympathy.
“So soon? Don’t you even want to see my I.D? After all, I could be anyone…!” she says, the cruel smile returning to her lips.
But I don’t want to see it and I don’t want to listen to her self-satisfied voice. I have to get out of here.
“No!” Adam calls, from the front of the house. He is flanked by the woman. Her; the real heiress. “Aurelia!” he says.
Immediately, both of us turn around, but his amber eyes connect with mine, not hers, which for a moment or so is strangely gratifying.
Then, I remind myself the land is shifting here and I have no idea of the lie of it anymore. This man is a blackguard and a thief. There is no telling what he might say and in my vulnerable state, there’s a chance I might believe it.
I need to getaway. So, this time, I really do start running and don’t stop, until I have made it to Sunset Tracks station and leaped onto the first train I see.
As the train pulls away from the station, all the craziness and madness of the last half an hour piles up on top of me. It has a bodily presence, like a stone, pressing me down and making me feel physically unwell.
The platform disappears from view, in a mush of evergreen hedging and deciduous trees, combining to weave a web of tawny-green. I don’t care where this train is going. As long as it takes me away from here, away from them… away from him…
A pang of sadness starts inside of me. Before I know it, tears are streaming down across my cheeks and blotting out my peripheral vision.
“Aurelia!”
A voice makes me turn sharply, and it is him.
Adam is here, inexplicably, somehow beside me in the carriage. I do a double-take, close my eyes shut for a second and then open them again.
“I ran all the way here, Aurelia!” he says.
“That’s not my name…” I say, despairingly. “In fact, I haven’t got one at all…Right now, I’m a Jane Doe…”
“Well, I can’t exactly call you that, can I?” he says, gently setting his arm on my hand. “You’re shaking…,” he says.
I look down. It is true. My nerves, which have only just been hol
ding up these last couple of weeks are truly shot to bits. I am in pieces. Like an idiot, I dissolve into tears, sobbing into his shoulder until it is all wet.
“There…,” he says softly. “It’s not so bad, is it?”
I look at him, incredulously. I am so incensed that I can hardly get the words out.
“Not bad…?” I say, in disbelief, repeating the word, slowly. “Not so bad? I’m guessing she is really is who she says she is…?” I ask. He nods, silently.
“Yeah, thought so. As soon as she turned up, it all just made sense. No wonder I can’t remember anything about the house, the town, who I am… my life…. about you…!” I say, staring into his almond-shaped eyes. "It was never mine!"
I'm still lost in his hazel eyes. They are so perfectly shaped, I knew I couldn’t have forgotten them.
“Well, that’s it. Before long, she’ll have the police onto me…. pretty soon, the whole town is going to know..., and the worst of is I don’t even know who I am. I officially don’t exist. Have no idea who I am. There’s no way I can possibly go back there!”
“I’m not here to get you to go back there,” Adam says, a conspiratorial glint coming into his eye.
Despite myself, despite everything that has happened to give me reason to distrust him, I feel something dislodge itself from deep inside me as if it melts.
Adam’s brown eyes sparkle with mischief.
“I’m in it too deep for that…,” he says, and I wonder what he means by that. “No…I followed you out of there and straight onto this train, not because I want you to go back… but because… well… I want you to come with me…”
He stops, facing me plainly for the first time; his amber eyes working their hot magic upon me, sending a rush of pure lust up and down my latter half.
Damn! I should not be feeling like this.
But he has trapped me, he has got me. Adam’s hand weaves its way around my shoulder blades, massaging me sublimely. There is nothing I can do. I feel myself submerged in his charm.