by Joanne Fluke
Granny Kate had died when Maura was eight, and she’d lived with them the last three years of her life. Maura could remember the time she’d spent with her grandmother as if it were yesterday. Granny Kate had brought all sorts of wonderful things with her, and Maura had spent many happy hours in her grandmother’s room, looking at pictures in the old family album, and going through Granny Kate’s wooden trunk that was full of mementos. She still remembered her grandmother’s wedding certificate, written in elaborately shaded European script. The bride’s name had been the most beautiful, with a graceful loop on the C, a loop that swirled out and under the rest of the name which was . . . Catherine!
Maura smiled as she realized what her memory meant. She’d loved Granny Kate so much, she was almost sure she would have chosen Catherine for her daughter’s middle name.
With one mystery solved, it was back to business. Maura flipped the page on her psychological profile and started to read. The first paragraph was filled with facts. Maura Bennett was an attractive widow of thirty-nine, with a sixteen-year-old daughter. She owned a successful boutique on Rodeo Drive and designed most of the clothing she sold. She was a member of an extended family, including her late husband’s brother and his wife, and a housekeeper of American-Spanish descent who had been in her employ for over fifteen years.
A physical description was next. Jan had written that Maura Bennett was five feet, nine inches tall, and she weighed a hundred and twenty pounds. She had auburn hair, green eyes, and a clear complexion that freckled lightly in the sun. Her general health was good, she had no physical abnormalities, and in the interviewer’s opinion, she exhibited signs of above-normal intelligence.
So far, so good. Maura found a more comfortable position and settled back to read on. The next section was entitled “Personal Preferences.” Maura Bennett had told the interviewer that she enjoyed most types of music. She’d said that she tried to eat a balanced diet, and she’d claimed to have no self-imposed or medical restrictions on the types of food she ate. Her favorite course of the meal was dessert, and she’d traveled Europe extensively, looking for the ultimate cheesecake.
Maura frowned slightly, and shut her eyes, trying to conjure up a mental picture of cheesecake. Her mother had never served cheesecake; she was almost sure of that. And she’d been on such a tight budget during her college years, she’d seldom gone out to restaurants. She must have learned to like cheesecake later, during those missing years. But Maura had absolutely no idea what it tasted like!
Suddenly, without any warning, the words she’d read hit Maura like a blow. She’d told Jan that she’d traveled Europe extensively. Since Maura had no memory of traveling anywhere, that must also have happened during the missing years.
Maura sighed and did her best to remember. Had she gone to Europe on some sort of college exchange program?
The memory was there, hovering somewhere behind her eyes. Maura shut them and almost immediately, a scene flashed through her mind. She saw a light blue suitcase traveling down a conveyer belt. It was the baggage room in an airport and she was reaching for the suitcase. She saw her arm clearly, emerging from the sleeve of a fur-lined parka, but the suitcase was too high, and she couldn’t reach it.
She must have said something, because a handsome man, standing beside her, plucked it from the carousel and handed it to her with a flourish. She could hear herself laughing as she raised her eyes to his, and kissed him lightly on the cheek.
Not Keith. Of that she was certain. This man had light blond hair and blue eyes the color of a winter sea. He was deeply tanned, and his face looked vaguely Scandinavian. His lips were moving, and she could see that he was speaking, although she couldn’t understand the words. It was some kind of foreign language and she was answering him in his native tongue.
Now they were leaving the baggage area. He picked up his brown leather bag, slung their ski packs over his shoulder, and tucked her arm in his. They walked past the others, who were also speaking in the same language, and went out through a double glass door. It was dark outside, and snow was falling as they made their way across the street. And then they were entering a parking lot.
Maura felt fear begin to pound through her veins, and she knew that something was wrong. The parking lot wasn’t safe, and something horrible was about to happen, something that would change her life forever.
She held her breath, waiting for the awful thing to happen, and there was a noise that made her shiver. It was a loud, frightening noise, and everything began to grow black. She tried to see through the gathering darkness, but her sliver of memory faded away, leaving her with nothing but the lingering sensation of icy tears on her cheeks.
Maura opened her eyes very quickly, and took comfort in her newly familiar surroundings. Her head was throbbing painfully, and she took off her glasses to rub her eyes. She knew her problem wasn’t eyestrain. The pain was caused by a memory attempting to surface.
Deliberately, Maura shut her eyes again. The hell with the pain. She wanted to remember. But the image was gone, and although she tried her best, it refused to return. Would she ever remember what had happened that night? Or was that part of her life lost to her, forever?
She thought about calling Jane on the intercom. Her daughter would want to know about the strange piece of memory she’d recovered. But some instinct made Maura hesitate, her fingers on the receiver. The memory had been frightening, almost ominous. She was certain that if she’d been able to recall the scene fully, she’d discover that something dreadful had happened. Perhaps it was better to wait, to keep this small sliver of memory to herself and hope that more would resurface.
But would she forget again? Were memories similar to dreams? When she was a child, she’d had vivid dreams. But in the morning, when she’d tried to tell her mother about them, she’d found that she couldn’t recall them. Dreams had no substance. They were like smoke in the breeze. The only way to capture things that insubstantial was to write them down, immediately after you’d dreamed them. If you waited too long, they disappeared.
There was a blank notebook on the table, with a pen on top. Maura opened it and wrote down her brief flash of memory, carefully listing all the details. When she was finished, she picked up Jan’s portfolio again. Would her psychological profile evoke any more strange memories?
A section on favorite colors was next. Maura learned that her favorite color was dusty pink. When asked by the interviewer if she ever wore clothing of that shade, she’d said no and explained that dusty pink clashed with her hair.
Maura began to smile as she read on. She must have told Jan about the wig, because it was here, in print. Jan had written about the time Maura had borrowed a girlfriend’s dark-haired wig, so she could wear a pink dress to a school dance. The wig had slipped, during the festivities, and Maura had been so embarrassed, she’d never attempted to wear pink again.
The next section heading was “Daily Routine,” and Maura read it eagerly. Jan wrote that Maura Bennett was a morning person, not a night person. She did her best creative work in the early morning, and she often got up before daybreak to spend an hour in her design studio.
“Design studio?” Maura reread the words aloud. Where was her design studio? She’d have to ask Jan or Nita.
As Maura read on about her daily schedule, she began to frown. At precisely seven in the morning, she left the house for her morning run. She always took the same route, skirting the perimeter of the country club. When she got home, a few minutes before eight, she showered and joined her daughter and her housekeeper for breakfast. She’d told Jan that she thought a good breakfast was critical since she was often too busy for lunch.
Maura raised her eyebrows. She must have changed a great deal in those missing years. As a college student, she’d never eaten breakfast. She’d chosen to sleep in late, hurry to her first class, and have a big lunch instead.
There was a frown on Maura’s face as she read on. The woman she didn’t remember had held daily staff m
eetings, an hour before her boutique opened. She worked though lunch and left Rodeo Drive at four in the afternoon. She spent the next two hours running errands or relaxing at home. Dinner was at seven, and she retired for the evening at ten P.M.
Maura put down the portfolio and frowned. What she read sounded highly organized and very boring. Had she really been that rigid? Of course, this profile had been written while Jan had been living at home. Her schedule might have changed when her daughter had gone off to college.
The next section was entitled “Social Life,” and Maura read it eagerly. She expected to find that she’d rubbed shoulders with the rich and famous, but Jan didn’t mention any stellar friends. Maura Bennett attended the annual charity functions that were required by her status as a Beverly Hills businesswoman, but Jan had written that she didn’t seem to enjoy socializing. She hosted one large dinner party over the holiday season, held at a famous Los Angeles restaurant, and she was a frequent guest at her brother-in-law’s house in Beverly Hills, but she never held dinner parties at home for anyone other than family.
“How strange!” Maura frowned slightly. Her home was beautiful, and it seemed only natural to invite people in to see it. But Jan had written that she almost never entertained at home. Maura Bennett must have been a very private person, preferring to keep her personal life to herself. But how had that affected her daughter? Was Jan a very private person, too?
Maura read on about her hobbies and recreations. She’d painted what she’d told Jan were “very bad landscapes,” and she’d read an average of six books a month. But these were all solitary pursuits. Hadn’t she done anything truly social? Hadn’t she made any friends?
The next sentence made Maura feel better, and she began to smile. Maura Bennett loved to dance! Dancing was social, and she must have had a dancing partner. But her hopes were dashed by the next few sentences. She’d told Jan that she’d won several dance contests when she was in high school, but she hadn’t pursued it after she’d graduated.
So much for that. Maura sighed deeply. The evidence was mounting up, and she seemed to be a loner. Jan had written that she watched television occasionally, and she preferred dramas to sitcoms. She didn’t have any favorite shows, and she never watched the soaps. When asked, she said it just wasn’t feasible. She never knew when she’d be home to watch television and she didn’t want to get involved in any serial-type story.
The next section was entitled “Fears and Anxieties,” and Maura discovered she was terrified of heights. That made perfect sense. She could remember shaking like a leaf when she’d climbed up on the roof of their family home in Brawley to help her father repair a broken shingle. It was apparent she’d never gotten over that fear, since Jan had mentioned it in her profile.
The subject claims to have no fear of dying, darkness, animals generally or specifically, fire, or drowning. She is not claustrophobic, and exhibits no sign of other common phobias. However, it is the interviewer’s personal opinion that she may have deeply seated anxieties regarding intimate relationships with the opposite sex.
Maura raised her eyebrows and read the last sentence again. Then she took off her glasses and rubbed her eyes. How could her daughter write such a thing? She certainly wasn’t afraid of men!
Or was she? Maura frowned as she slipped her glasses back on, and stared down at the sentence in question. If this was accurate, Jan had certainly been in a position to know. But what evidence had caused her to come to this conclusion? She hoped Jan had written more on the subject.
During the past ten years, the subject has not dated nor appeared publicly or privately, with a male escort. The only male she sees regularly is her brother-in-law, and in this interviewer’s opinion, their relationship is strictly platonic.
“Thank God for that!” Maura released her breath in a shuddering sigh. She was relieved that Jan had no suspicions about her relationship with Steve. But why hadn’t she dated? Hadn’t she found any men she liked?
Since there is no substantiating evidence, the following is highly speculative: Because the subject’s husband, the father of her child, was killed so early in their marriage, this interviewer theorizes that the subject may be suppressing her sexuality, rather than risk losing a second lover.
Maura raised her eyebrows. If she read between the lines, Jan was saying that she was gun-shy. Of course that wasn’t true. She’d proved it by marrying Keith, hadn’t she?
However, it is also possible that the subject may have limited her intimacy to someone she meets on her frequent business trips.
Immediately after reading this new theory, Maura’s head began to pound. Another memory trying to surface? She shut her eyes and tried to make her mind perfectly blank and receptive. And then it started, a series of images so startling, she gasped out loud.
She knew she was in a hotel room. There was a book of matches in an ashtray and a basket of fruit on the dresser. It was a lovely room, very old-fashioned with huge oaken furniture and a gold satin bedspread on the bed. She was dressed in a maid’s uniform, standing over a brown leather suitcase that was propped open on a low bench at the foot of the bed. Her hands were moving, lifting piles of clothing, looking for something. But the suitcase wasn’t hers. It was filled with sweaters and white dress shirts and trousers. Men’s clothing, but where was the man?
She heard running water, and her eyes moved toward the door at the far end of the room. He was in the bathroom, taking a shower, singing in a loud, off-key voice. She couldn’t hear the lyrics over the sound of the running water, but some instinct told her that he wasn’t singing in English.
She stopped abruptly, holding her breath as she heard footsteps coming down the hallway. They were soft footsteps, approaching stealthily, but she was alert to every sound. When they stopped outside the door, she moved like lightning to dive under the bed.
There was the sound of a key in the door and it opened with a click. She felt a draft from the hallway as the footsteps came into the room, and she huddled under the bed, perfectly immobile, inhaling the smell of stale cigarette smoke and slightly damp wool.
The sound of the water was louder now. Someone had opened the bathroom door. There was a gasp, a series of frightening gurgling sounds, and then the footsteps came back to the foot of the bed. She opened her eyes and saw two shoes, a right and a left, supple tan leather moccasins with thick crepe soles. As she watched, items of clothing began to fall to the floor, tossed there by unseen hands. A white dress shirt. A blue and black silk tie. A burgundy, cable-knit sweater. They fell faster and faster, only inches from her face, until there were piles of clothing scattered the length of the bed. Then someone swore in a rough voice, and the shoes moved toward the door.
She stayed there, breathing very quietly, burying her nose in the rug. Too soon to come out, not yet, not yet, but the room was getting very hot. Gradually, she began to detect another odor. It smelled like meat, boiling in a pot, and the room seemed to be filled with vapor. She moved then, rolling out in one fluid motion, until she saw that the room was clear. She dropped something heavy into her pocket and raced to the window, glancing out at the deserted alley five floors below.
Not the stairs. Or the elevator, either. She couldn’t use them. But there was a pipe next to the window. She opened the window and climbed out on the ledge. The alley looked small, the galvanized garbage cans mere specks from this height. And then she grabbed the pipe and started to climb down.
“No!” Maura opened her eyes with a snap. This couldn’t be her memory. There was no way she could have climbed down five flights, clinging to a pipe. Jan had written that she was terrified of heights.
If it wasn’t her memory, whose was it? Maura shivered, her heart beating hard. She was still frightened by the glimpse she’d caught of the alley far below. This must be the memory of a movie she’d seen, or a nightmare she’d dreamed. There was no other reasonable explanation.
Slightly reassured, Maura turned back to Jan’s profile again. But she couldn�
��t seem to concentrate on the printed words. The memory lingered, like a persistent fly. It buzzed around in her mind and she couldn’t seem to dismiss it.
After several moments of unsuccessfully trying to clear her mind, she sighed and reached for the blank notebook again. It was still a memory, even though it had come from a movie or a dream, and she’d promised herself she’d write down everything she remembered.
Writing it down seemed to help. As she filled the page, the memory began to recede, and when she’d finished, Maura felt much calmer. But she was much too tired to keep on reading. Jan’s personality profile would have to wait until morning.
Maura got up and walked to the bed. She took off her robe, folded it neatly, and placed it on the foot of the bed. A glance at the small alarm clock on the night table told her it was almost midnight, and she felt a sharp pang of guilt. It was much later than she usually went to bed.
She set the alarm for five A.M., and pulled out the knob on the back. Then she climbed under the covers and reached out to flick off the light. The specialist at the hospital had recommended that she get back to her normal routine as soon as possible. He’d told her that performing habitual tasks sometimes evoked forgotten memories. It was certainly worth a try, and now that she had a copy of the schedule she’d kept, she’d try to do everything just as she’d done it in the past.
As she closed her eyes, Maura thought about the day to come. She’d get up the moment the alarm went off, and go to her studio before daybreak. From what she’d read in Jan’s personality profile, that was her normal habit. Since she didn’t know where her studio was, she’d simply walk through the house, opening doors until she found it. Once she got there, she’d sit at her desk and try to remember what she’d been designing before the accident.
Her morning run was at seven. Nita should be up by then, and she could ask her for directions to the country club. Something along the familiar route might jog her memory. It certainly should. According to Jan, she’d been running the same route for over ten years.