Memories: A Husband to RememberNew Year's Daddy (Hqn)

by Jackson, Lisa

  Disappointed, she followed Trent as he carried her bags up the exterior stairs to the third-floor landing. Each step was covered with strips of rubber for traction and the rail was well used. Once on her small porch, Nikki fumbled with the keys and, hunching her shoulders against the steady drizzle, unlocked the door.

  She dropped her suitcase and purse on the faded Oriental rug and breathed deeply of the musty, stale air. As if from habit, she kicked off her shoes and padded in stocking feet through the long, narrow attic that served as her living room and bedroom. Her hands trailed along the backs of chairs and across the dusty surface of the table, and a sense of belonging wove its way into her heart.

  “It’s good to be home,” she admitted huskily, feeling, for the first time in two weeks, that she had some bearings. She glanced at the quilt tossed over the back of her camel-backed couch, smiled at the flowers, now dry and dropping petals, on a small table near one of the windows and noticed that her brass teapot was sitting empty on the stove.

  “You remember?” Trent asked.

  She shook her head and glanced back at him. Was there just a hint of relief in his gaze? “Not really. No images. Just feelings. But…I think it’s coming.” She crossed to a window and unlatched the panes, allowing the hint of an early autumn breeze to infiltrate the stuffy apartment as she walked to the fireplace. Cool, damp air swirled into the room and followed after her as she ran her fingers along the mantel, picking up a fine layer of dust, looking for any photographs or mementos of the man she’d married. There was nothing. Not a solitary snapshot to verify his claims.

  Frowning, she eyed her desk. The calendar lay open to a date that was nearly two weeks past. Chuckling at the “Far Side” cartoon, she flipped forward two weeks. Every page was blank. Aware of Trent’s gaze following her, she turned back a few pages, noted some of the appointments she’d made and kept, she supposed, but realized that there wasn’t a single notation about Trent. Not even his initials. No dinner date or lunch appointment, no mention of a movie or drinks or anything. As if he’d never existed.

  She glanced up at him, half expecting him to come up with some explanation, but his face was unreadable, allowing her to draw whatever conclusions she wanted. “Didn’t we go out?” she asked. “You know, for dinner or something…a date?”

  His mouth lifted in the corner and his eyes turned smoky blue. “We started out way beyond the dating stage.”

  “But there’s no mention of you. Not one clue….”

  Lifting a shoulder as if her concerns were unimportant, he balanced on the overstuffed arm of the couch. The muscles in the back of his neck tightened and he seemed to grapple for the right words. “It was all very spontaneous. I didn’t analyze it. Neither did you.”

  She had no reason to believe him, no proof to substantiate what he was saying. Rubbing a kink from her neck, she sighed and glanced at the telephone recorder, its red light flashing impatiently. With a feeling of dread, she pushed the playback button and the tape rewound quickly.

  The first four calls were hang-ups. Then Jan’s voice, strained by older-sister concern, echoed through the room. “Nikki? It’s Jan. What the hell’s going on? Mom called and said you were on some island in the Caribbean and you got married there, for God’s sake. To some guy no one in the family’s ever met.” Nikki’s gaze collided with Trent’s. “Is this all on the up-and-up? Call me when you get back and be ready to spill everything! Geez, Nikki, what happened to you! This is just so…I don’t know—impulsive, I guess. I thought you’d finally gotten over all that.” There was a weighty pause when Jan sighed. “Look, it sounds like we’re trying to shut the barn door and the horse has already escaped. I guess I should congratulate you…. Well, just call me.”

  “We don’t have time for this,” Trent grumbled as the phone buzzed and clicked over a series of hang-ups.

  “Sure we do.”

  The next voice on the phone was a computer message about a fabulous deal on a time-share vacation in Colorado; the next, someone taking a survey about television programming.

  The final call was more urgent. “Nikki? It’s Dave.” She stiffened. Trent’s lips curled into a humorless smile. “For heaven’s sake, what’s going on? I called your office and talked to Connie and she let it slip that you’re married to a man you barely know! Is this some kind of a joke or something? Connie said you’d hardly dated him before taking off for that island. For crying out loud, Nikki, call me and tell me it’s a lie or a joke or…or anything. I know we had some problems, but I thought we just needed a little time and space to work them out.” There was a lengthy pause and a long sigh. “Look, if you’re really married, I hope this guy is worth it, because you deserve the best….” Nikki closed her eyes and she remembered Dave, big and blond, neat and tidy, spit and polish. At one time, he had seemed to care for her, but the images strobe-lighting through her mind weren’t filled with love or tenderness or passion. She realized that she probably had never truly loved him. He’d just seemed like the right guy at the wrong time in her life. And he’d been the one who had wanted his “space” and a little more “time,” if she remembered correctly.

  His voice filled the emptiness again. “But…well, if this is all a big lie, call me. Or if the guy doesn’t turn out to be Mr. Perfect, for God’s sake, give me a buzz…. Believe it or not, Nikki, I miss you. I just didn’t realize how much until now…. What’s the saying about being a day late and a dollar short? Well, it seems to be the story of my life. I love you, Nikki. I always will.” He hung up abruptly and his words hung on the air, silent, invisible sentinels that stood as strongly as a wall of steel between Nikki and Trent.

  “Eloquent,” Trent muttered, his lips thinning into a hard, flat line. “Maybe you married the wrong man.”

  “Maybe I’m not even married.”

  His mouth curved sardonically and he raked fingers of frustration through his coal-black hair. “Right now I don’t give a good goddamn what you believe, but we’re getting out of here.” He picked up the suitcase she’d dropped and slung the strap over his shoulder. The fingers of his other hand wrapped around the handle of her garment bag as he cocked his head in the general direction of the door.

  Nikki refused to be intimidated. “When did we get married?” she demanded, not budging an inch.

  “On the Friday we left. At noon.”

  Still standing at her desk, she glanced at that particular date on her calendar, but it was, aside from a reminder to pick up her dry cleaning and a note as to the time her plane was scheduled to take off for Salvaje, blank. As if Trent McKenzie, before he’d appeared at her bedside at the hospital in Santa María, hadn’t existed. “I didn’t write it down.”

  “Of course not.” Dropping both pieces of luggage, he strode to the desk as if he’d walked through her home a thousand times. “We didn’t know when we were getting married until that day. So we just hightailed it down to the justice of the peace and did the dirty deed.” His eyes narrowed on her, as if he were challenging her to call his bluff.

  “So it’s on record.”

  “With the city of Seattle and King County,” he said, reaching around her and drawing her into the circle of his arms. Sighing, he brushed a lock of hair from her face and struggled with his temper. “Come on, Nik. Throw some things together and we’ll go to my place.”

  “Is that what we planned?”

  “I think it’s best.”

  “We could stay here.”

  “Nikki.” He rested his forehead on hers. Tenderness softened his features. “We’re both tired. Let’s not argue—just get your things together and—”

  “Wait a minute.” She couldn’t let him sweet-talk her. As warm and inviting as his embrace was, she yanked herself free and tried to think clearly. She was running on adrenaline now and she was back in her own home. No one, especially not a man she couldn’t even remember, could order her around. “This isn’t Salvaje, Trent. You can’t use your caveman tactics on me.”

  “And I t
hought I was being nice,” he said, rolling his eyes to the sloped ceiling.

  “I want answers, answers you should have given me the first day I woke up.”

  His jaw slid to one side. “When we get to my place.”

  “How about right now?” She was on a roll and she wasn’t going to stop. “Why did you follow me?”

  “What?”

  “On the island,” she said, stepping farther from him, putting much needed distance between her body and his. When he held her, she found it impossible to think and remain levelheaded. Right now, back in the United States, they had a helluva lot to straighten out. “You did follow me, didn’t you?”

  “I was worried about you.”

  “That’s not an answer.”

  He muttered something and shoved his hands into his pockets. “I hired a man to keep his eye on you.”

  “You what?”

  “A private investigator.”

  Her temper flamed white-hot. “You low-down, lying son of a—”

  “Stop it!” he warned, his nostrils flaring slightly as his temper began to slip. “I wanted you to have a little freedom, but—”

  “Not too much. You were just giving me a slightly longer leash, is that it? Why? So I could strangle myself?” She marched back to him and tipped her chin upward. Heat radiated from beneath her skin and she knew her eyes were throwing off sparks of fury. “You’re keeping something from me. No, I take it back—not something, but everything. You’ve been pointedly vague when I asked about your family, you’ve sidestepped a million questions about our romance, and you act as if we’re in some sort of dire jeopardy. Even now. When we’re home. You told me I wasn’t pushed over that ledge, and yet you’re nervous as a cat, acting like someone’s planning to do us—well, me, at least—in. What is it, Trent?”

  “I told you I’d explain when we get home.”

  “We are home.” She planted her hands on her hips and decided to force his hand. “Why don’t you tell me what all this…secrecy and cloak-and-dagger stuff has to do with Senator Crowley?”

  His jaw hardened a little. “So you’re still onto that, are you?”

  “Absolutely.” She skirted him, walked to her computer and snapped the power switch. The machine hummed to life. “I figure I’ll know everything I want to know and a lot of things I don’t want to know about good ol’ Diamond Jim when I find my notes in this thing.” She tapped the top of the monitor with her fingernail. “Maybe your name will come up, too.”

  “We don’t have time—”

  “Don’t we?” She whirled on him, her hair slapping her in her face. “What happened to ‘all the time in the world.’ Or ‘the rest of our lives’? On Salvaje you wanted me to think we could take everything slow and easy, but now we’re back in Seattle and it’s rush, rush, rush. Are you going to enlighten me, Trent?” she asked as the monitor glowed.

  Exasperated, she plopped into her desk chair, pressed a series of buttons and scanned her files. “Let’s see, how about under ‘Crowley’ for starters?” Deftly, she typed the senator’s name, but the machine beeped at her and told her no such file existed. “Okay.” Her brow puckered and she tried to think. “How about ‘government’?” Only a half-finished story on a mayoral candidate. “Politics” was no better. “This can’t be,” she said, typing quickly, one file heading after another. She reread her work-in-progress menu again. No Crowley. No Diamond Jim. No political intrigue. Something was wrong. Biting her lip, she brought up other menus, from articles she’d finished. Not a clue.

  “Why are you so damned certain that you were working on this story?” Trent asked, eyeing the screen skeptically, then sauntering to the fireplace and picking up pictures of her family. He fingered a color photo of her sister, Carole.

  “I wasn’t assigned the story—not officially—but I have this gut feeling that…” Her voice trailed off as she noticed Trent move easily around the room, glancing through the windows, stuffing his hands in his back pockets, closing a closet door with a faulty latch, as if he knew the place inside out. As if he belonged.

  Her throat went suddenly dry. Could he have erased her story on Crowley? Destroyed all records she had on the senator?

  But why? Good Lord, her head was beginning to pound again. Maybe Crowley was the key to why Trent claimed to be her husband. Goose bumps raced up her arms. This whole theory gave her the creeps and it didn’t make a lot of sense. She swallowed hard and kept her gaze on the screen, unable to look into Trent’s eyes for fear he might read her thoughts. She didn’t want to believe he would sabotage her. Why would he lie about something so easily checked? What would be the point? And if he planned to hurt her…well, he had ample opportunity in a faraway country where the United States government couldn’t touch him. Her palms were slick with nervous sweat. “I think we need to talk,” she said, switching off the computer and swiveling in her chair to face him. He met her eyes in the oval mirror mounted over the fireplace as the machine wound down. Nikki’s throat squeezed, and his gaze, flat and unreadable, didn’t falter.

  “You’re right. But we have to do it at my place.”

  “Why?”

  “Because it’s not safe here, Nikki.”

  “This is my home and—”

  “For God’s sake!” He whirled and stormed back to her, drawing her to her feet. “Get your things—now! We don’t have a lot of time.”

  “You’re serious about this danger thing?”

  “Dead serious.”

  “And when we get to your place?”

  “You can ask me anything you want. But move it, now, before it’s too late!”

  His harsh countenance convinced her. Swallowing a knot of fear in her throat, she stumbled to the closet and pulled out a couple of pairs of jeans and some sweaters which she stuffed into an empty bag. “Are you going to tell me what we’re running from?” she asked, picking up her makeup case as he grabbed the suitcase she’d dropped on the floor. She struggled into her Reebok sneakers and denim jacket and glared at him. “Because I’m going to remember, damn it, and when I do, there will be hell to pay if I find out you’re a fraud, Trent McKenzie!”

  *

  Trent had never been above telling a lie, not if the situation warranted stretching the truth a little, but this time he’d played out his hand and was about to ruin everything. He’d managed to get himself so emotionally tangled in his own web of deceit that he was trapped. Like a damned fly in a spider’s web.

  Mentally abusing himself, he took the corner a little too quickly and the old Jeep slid a bit before the tread-free tires caught hold of the slick street.

  He slid a glance at her, small and huddled against the passenger door. Confused, half her memory gone, the other half distorted by people she couldn’t even remember. He tightened his fingers around the steering wheel until they ached.

  It wasn’t supposed to happen this way. He wasn’t supposed to care for her. When he’d met her he’d been attracted to her, of course—hell, what red-blooded American male wouldn’t be? She was put together well, with curves in the right places and a face that could stop traffic. Whether she knew it or not, Nikki was a knockout. Even now, with the remainder of the abrasions from the accident casting parts of her face in pink, she was drop-dead gorgeous, in a way never exploited by fashion magazines.

  Her eyes were clear and could cut to a man’s soul, her hair was thick and wavy and shimmered under any light and her mouth was bowed into a thoughtful little pucker that caused the crotch of his pants to seem suddenly way too tight.

  Her looks had attracted him, and her personality, part pit bull, part banty rooster and another part pure sexy feline, had kept him interested. He’d been around enough good-looking women not to fall into the usual traps, but with Nicole Louise Carrothers he’d swan-dived off a tall precipice and was still falling. Straight into the depths of emotional hell. The woman had a way of getting into a man’s blood and there was no getting her out.

  “Damn,” he swore softly. She cas
t him a quick glance, then stared steadily ahead, through the rain-peppered windshield to the curving streets that wound along the shore of Lake Washington.

  Tugging on the steering wheel, he pulled out of traffic and into a long drive that wound through tall fir trees and dripping rhododendron bushes no longer in bloom. The drive was lit by small lights. They rounded the bend, and the house, awash in the exterior lamplight, was visible through the trees.

  “This is where you live?” she asked, her voice tinged with disbelief.

  “Home sweet home.”

  He cut the engine in front of the garage and she stared up at the house, a long, rambling brick cottage that rose to two stories at one side.

  “Somehow it doesn’t fit with the Jeep.”

  “I just like to keep you guessing.”

  “That much, you do,” she admitted, stepping out of his battered rig and hauling her makeup bag with her. Flipping up the hood of her jacket, she let out a low whistle.

  Trent unlocked the door with a key on his ring.

  Inside, the house smelled of cleaning solvent, wax and oil. As they walked along wood corridors, Trent snapped on the lights unerringly, his hands finding switches in the dark, but still Nikki felt cold as death. Though she couldn’t remember her past, she was certain that she’d never set foot in this house in her life. The living room was situated near the back of the house. Furnished in high-backed chairs, ottomans and a couch in shades of cream and navy, the room offered a panoramic view of the lake, now dark and brooding, only a few lights reflecting on the inky surface.

  Nikki stared out the window and wrapped her arms around herself. Brass lamps pooled soft light over mahogany tables and the smell of pipe tobacco and ash from the fireplace tinged the air in faint scents. “I’ve never been here before,” she said flatly.

  “You’ll remember.”

  “I don’t think so.” A chill skittered up her spine. “I would remember this. I would remember being here with you!” She trailed a finger along the window ledge, then turned tortured eyes up to his, hoping to feel a sense of security, of belonging.