She's My Mom

by Rebecca Winters

  For one thing, she might be living with a man.

  “Tell me one more time exactly what happened when the maid started up the stairs.”

  It took Brett a minute to compose himself enough to relate the incident. His story didn’t change.

  Lord… What to tell Brett?

  There were only two explanations that made sense. Either Susan had true amnesia, or she’d pretended not to know her son.

  Grady could suggest several chilling reasons for the latter possibility, but he didn’t think Brett would be able to deal with them right now. Grady wasn’t sure he could.

  No bodies had been found after the explosion, but the police had discovered fragments of both her car and Geoffrey LeBaron’s. That meant evidence had been planted for the police to find.

  Before tonight, Grady hadn’t known what to think. His colleagues had believed LeBaron was guilty of tax fraud and had committed murder-suicide because he knew the IRS was going to audit his books. They maintained that he didn’t want Susan—who’d been assigned by the Lytie Group CPA firm to work on his accounts—to give expert testimony against him in court.

  But Grady could throw that scenario out the window because she was alive!

  That was definitely her picture on the copy of her job application. Her handwriting. The dates fit. More important, Brett had seen his mother on the stairs. He’d been an eyewitness.

  Now Grady’s mind was grappling with the possibility that she’d had a relationship with LeBaron socially before she’d ever thought of looking for a job.

  If they’d become romantically involved, LeBaron might have been the reason she’d chosen to work for the Lytie firm. That way she had a legitimate excuse to see him while she worked on his books. No one would be suspicious of the time they spent together.

  If Grady was right, then it explained why he’d felt distanced from her during the last seven months of their marriage.

  Taking it another step, he imagined that when she and LeBaron weren’t satisfied leading double lives and wanted to run off together, they faked their deaths in order to be free of their families.

  Grady shook his head to think that Susan wasn’t the woman he’d thought she was, that she could walk past her own son tonight without giving herself away. Yet the old adage about truth being stranger than fiction applied here.

  Such an explanation wasn’t palatable, yet he’d worked on similar cases in the line of duty and knew they could happen.

  There could be another explanation, aside from amnesia—the kind of scenario that had happened to a judge in Reno a few years back. A prison escapee had taken revenge on the judge, who’d sent him to prison for life. The criminal had murdered his whole family.

  Perhaps some felon who’d done time in prison because of Grady had been released. Maybe it was a criminal with Mafia ties who’d decided to find a creative way to pay Grady back.

  What better method than to plan a diversion that made everyone believe Susan had died in the explosion?

  With no one the wiser, he could have set her up at the Etoile with a job, a new name and identity, warning her she would stay alive only as long as she kept her mouth shut. The moment she didn’t cooperate, she could watch the TV news about the brutal deaths of her husband and son.

  Yet Grady still couldn’t imagine the wife he’d loved for so many years being able to ignore her own child on that stairway.

  He ran trembling hands through his hair, trying to deal with the shock. All this time, she’d been alive in the same city, only a few miles from their home.

  Was he letting his imagination run riot? Grady was no stranger to the bizarre. He knew that anything was possible.

  Maybe she was suffering from amnesia; in that case, she might have been an accidental victim in the bomb blast.

  Or its target.

  But right this minute, Brett didn’t need to know everything Grady was considering.

  “Son?” He turned to him. “Let’s suppose for a moment your mother has amnesia, the kind you heard about in that documentary.”

  “Yeah?”

  “We’re going to be total strangers to her. When she answers the door, she might not even remember seeing you on the stairs. You’ll have to be prepared for that.”

  “I am. Does that mean we can go over there now?”

  Seeing his mother was all Brett could think about.

  Seeing his wife was all Grady could think about.

  However, he had to try to prepare his son for more pain. Something told him the agony they’d suffered up until this point was only a small portion of what was still to come.

  “Yes. Just remember we might make her nervous. She could ask us to leave.”

  “Mom won’t do that when we tell her we’re her family!”

  The faith of a child was still alive inside his thirteen-year-old son.

  “Maybe. Maybe not.”

  “Then we’ll come up with a plan so she’ll want to live with us again, won’t we, Dad?”

  “Brett, she’s been away from us for six months. If she’s got no memory of her past, it’s possible she could be involved with another man.”

  If, God forbid, she was the prisoner of an ex-felon, then Grady needed to ascertain that before any attempt at contact was made.

  “So what? When we tell her who we are, she’ll want to let us in.”

  “Not necessarily.” Not if she was only pretending with you.

  “Dad, if you had amnesia, wouldn’t you want to find out about your past?”

  He couldn’t hold out against the hope in his son’s soulful eyes. “Yes, of course I would. But we’re not your mom. We don’t have a clue what’s going on inside her.”

  “I know one thing we can do.” Brett sounded brighter than before. “Let’s go back to the house and get our photo albums. She’ll have to believe us then!”

  “That’s an excellent idea, but she still won’t have any feelings for us.” That is, if she truly has amnesia.

  According to what he’d heard from experts in the police department, amnesia was virtually impossible to fake in front of a loved one.

  Grady had seen car accident victims who suffered from temporary memory loss. Their families went through anguish waiting for the trauma to pass.

  Brett might understand it on an intellectual level, but emotionally he’d have a difficult time accepting the fact that he was a stranger to his own mother.

  “I don’t care. If I knew I belonged to a family that loved me, I’d try to get to know them again. Let’s not tell her about the explosion. Why don’t we just say that one day six months ago she disappeared and we’ve been looking for her ever since. Maybe being around us will make her memory come back.”

  He didn’t want to raise his son’s expectations. “According to the documentary you saw, it doesn’t sound very likely.” Especially if there was another man.

  Lord—the thought of anyone else touching Susan…of her responding to someone other than Grady…

  “Then we’ll have to get her to love us all over again,” Brett said in a quiet, determined voice.

  Oh, Brett. Grady had never loved his son more than he did at this moment.

  “All right. Tell you what. There’s a house next door to the apartment. I’m going to park in front of it and leave you in the car with the doors locked. While you wait, I’ll have a little talk with the manager of her building. Our next move will depend on what I find out. Okay?”

  “Okay,” he muttered.

  Grady started the car and made a U-turn. Within seconds he’d pulled up to the house and shut off the engine.

  “I’ve set the lock. I’ll be right back.”

  Fresh tears of pain and anger gushed from Brett’s eyes as he watched his dad disappear inside the apartment house. Defeated for the moment, he rested his head against the window.

  He’d grown up with a father who was far more cautious than all the other fathers he knew. His mom had told him it was because of his profession; his father was inst
inctively protective, and being a cop, with everything a cop knew and saw, made him much more so.

  Though it was hard, Brett had learned to live with it. But tonight was different.

  Anyone else who’d just found out his wife was alive wouldn’t have been able to wait to see her. Except for his dad. No, his dad had to talk to the landlord first and wouldn’t let Brett go with him.

  More and more he resented being treated like a baby. That was why he liked his uncle Todd, who was open and talked about things as if Brett were a grown-up. Even Mr. Stevens didn’t make him feel like he was still in grade school.

  If Brett’s father had been the one taking them to dinner tonight, he would’ve walked them to the elevator to make sure they got on safely.

  Brett was surprised his dad hadn’t chewed him out for using the hotel stairway. He could hear it now. “Those stairs are there for the staff and for emergencies. Not only that, the stairs are often deserted and they can be dangerous. You boys can wait your turn at the elevator.” But if he and Mike had waited, Brett would never have seen his mom.

  He stared at the apartment building. She was probably in there right now.

  Maybe she did have amnesia and really hadn’t recognized him.

  But after all the things his dad had said, Brett was starting to worry. What if her memory had come back after the explosion and she didn’t tell anyone because she’d decided not to live with him and his dad anymore?

  There were moms who left their kids. He’d heard stories about them on the news. In fact, he’d seen cop shows on TV where the mom just took off.

  Did he have a mom like that? Was that why she’d gone to work in the first place? Because she didn’t like him or his dad anymore?

  Perhaps what Brett had once feared was really true. Prior to the accident, his parents might’ve been planning to get a divorce, but they’d been too nervous to tell him. That would mean his dad had lied to him earlier tonight.

  Now he was being all secretive by going into the apartment by himself, playing the big detective. When he came back to the car he’d probably say, “We can’t try to see your mom tonight. Before we approach her, I have to check on some more things.”

  Brett couldn’t stand it.

  He reached for the cell phone his dad had left lying on the seat. He needed to talk to his uncle Todd in California right this minute and tell him that his mom was alive. He didn’t care how angry his father got.

  No sooner had he dialed the area code than his father opened the car door and slid behind the wheel. Brett dropped the phone on the seat. For once his dad didn’t seem to notice his furtive movement.

  “I found out your mom lives with two other women who work at the Etoile with her. We’ll go home and get a photo album. When we return, I’m going to let you do most of the talking.” He started the car and they drove off.

  Brett couldn’t believe it!

  His father was acting a lot more excited than before. After what he’d just said, Brett felt kind of guilty he’d had so many mean thoughts about him.

  “Dad?”

  “Yes?”

  “Did you find out from the manager if she has a boyfriend?”

  “He said he’d never seen her with one.”

  “That’s good, huh?”

  “It’s very good.” He reached out to squeeze Brett’s shoulder.

  “How long has she lived there?”

  “Since she started working at the Etoile.”

  Euphoric that Susan wasn’t an ex-con’s prisoner or some man’s lover, Grady found himself driving over the speed limit. It would be ten-thirty before they could get back to the building. Too late to be disturbing people, but he couldn’t wait any longer to see his wife. None of this would be real until he’d done that, until he’d seen her face-to-face.

  His heart slammed into his ribs as he thought about looking into her eyes again…and watching her mouth break into that smile that always took his breath away.

  “KNOCK, KNOCK.”

  Martha lifted her head from the pillow. She was dead tired after her shift. “What is it, Tina?”

  “Sorry to bother you, but there’s a police officer out in the hall wanting to talk to you.”

  She sat straight up in bed, clutching the sheet in her hands.

  “H-how do you know it’s a real policeman?”

  Months ago she’d been taken to a women’s shelter without any memory of her former life. Several of the residents had said her head wound might have been the result of a beating from a jealous boyfriend.

  With her looks, they said she could’ve been any thing from a call girl to a showgirl or exotic dancer, even a stripper who’d somehow fallen into disfavor.

  When one of the women at the shelter found out Martha had been found on an Indian reservation, she suggested Martha might’ve been a mob boss’s girl friend.

  Apparently that was how Mafia types got rid of people who knew too much. Dump their bodies out in the desert and let the vultures take care of the rest. If she was smart, the woman had said, she’d change her hairstyle and color, just in case the guy was still looking for her.

  Terrorized by the thought, Martha had followed her advice. So far she hadn’t met with any trouble. Until now.

  “He showed me his picture ID. The photo matches the face. Let me tell you, hon, he’s the best-looking cop I ever saw. He probably saw you in the hotel, got your address and came over here to ask you out.”

  “That’s ridiculous.”

  “No, it’s not. Most of the guys on the staff have asked you out and you always say no. Carlos hasn’t stopped begging me to set him up with you.”

  Tina meant well, but she was obsessed with men and couldn’t understand why Martha stayed away from them.

  Neither Tina nor Paquita, their other roommate, knew about Martha’s amnesia. The three of them were maids who’d started work at the Etoile at the same time and had the same shift. They’d decided to share apartment expenses to save money. Tina had a car, which got them to and from the hotel. Everyone contributed to the apartment’s upkeep.

  The girls had no idea that Martha lived in constant fear that either someone had tried to kill her and could still be looking for her, or that she was a bad person whose past would one day catch up with her.

  The possibility that she might have been a criminal herself, or had a prison record, lurked at the back of her mind. Maybe she’d been in the middle of committing a crime when she’d hurt her head.

  To satisfy the girls’ curiosity, Martha had said she was divorced and from Arizona and that she didn’t want to talk about her problems. They didn’t ask her any more questions after that.

  Frightened that this police officer had come to arrest her, Martha’s first impulse was to climb out the bedroom window and run away. But she was so tired of being a fugitive with no recollection of her past. Maybe it would be better to face him. At least then she’d learn something about her life, even if it was awful.

  The only person who understood her torment was the priest at the church Paquita attended. Before her memory loss, Martha had no idea if she’d been religious or even went to a church. But she’d heard that a priest couldn’t tell anyone the secrets people told him in the confessional, so she felt safe talking to him.

  Father Salazar encouraged her to keep coming to talk to him and never to lose faith that one day she’d find out who she was and what had happened to her. Though nothing had changed yet, she found it helped to have someone who listened to her fears, someone who encouraged her to pray—and to hope.

  “Martha? He’s waiting.”

  “I’m coming. Tell him just a minute.”

  She slid out of bed to get ready. In addition to her jeans, she only had a couple of nice outfits. She’d been saving as much money as possible to go in with the other girls on a condo in a nice part of town. She went to the closet she shared with Tina and studied her skimpy wardrobe. If the police officer was going to take her to jail, she wanted to look as presentable a
s she could.

  Deciding on the short-sleeved pink dress she’d bought at a discount store, she dressed quickly. After stepping into her white flats, she hurried to the bathroom to brush her hair and apply some pink lipstick.

  She took a deep breath to compose herself, then walked through the small two-bedroom apartment. Tina was watching TV in the living room, sitting on the hide-a-bed couch. It was her bedroom for the month. Every month they changed rooms in order to be fair. It had worked so far, giving each of them a measure of privacy.

  Tina wriggled her expressive brows, as if to say Martha was one lucky woman.

  Wouldn’t her roommate be shocked if it turned out the officer had come to take her in? Martha would die if she was hauled away from the apartment wearing handcuffs. She hoped Paquita’s boyfriend wouldn’t be bringing her home yet to witness her shame.

  With her heart in her throat, she stepped out in the hall, pulling the door shut behind her.

  In the dimly lit corridor she caught sight of a tall, well-built man, mid-thirties, dressed in a tan business suit. He had dark hair, more black than brown. As he moved closer, she caught the glint of hazel eyes fastened on her with such intensity, she felt her body break out in perspiration.

  “Ms. Walters?” he asked.

  “Yes?” she whispered.

  “I’m Detective Corbitt from the Las Vegas Police Department.”

  He flashed his identification in front of her. She could see he resembled his picture. Tina was right; he was an exceptionally attractive man. However, he’d clearly come here on official business.

  “H-have I done something wrong?” Better get it over with right now. She couldn’t stand the suspense. Her legs were shaking so hard she didn’t think they’d hold her up much longer.

  His face darkened, as if her question was the last thing he’d expected to hear. “No.”

  “You mean it?” she cried in disbelief. “You’re not here to arrest me for something?”

  His searching eyes played over her features. “Not at all.”

  “Thank heaven.” She blinked back the tears that were threatening.

  “I’m sorry if my presence alarmed you. I’ve been working on a missing-person case.”