FORGOTTEN VOWS

by Maggie Shayne

  FORGOTTEN VOWS

  By Maggie Shayne

  Copyright © 1994 by Margaret Benson

  This Edition Copyright © 2012 by Maggie Shayne

  http://www.MaggieShayne.com

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  This is for Jessica,

  my special heroine,

  who has a heart as big as

  the moon and a smile as

  bright as the sun.

  I love you.

  Chapter One

  He was the key.

  She shifted in the hard little chair and studied him. It was the first time she'd seen him...with her eyes. Everything was the same, though. The square, cruel jawline, the thick, dark lashes that tried to soften its effect, the tiny, crescent-shaped scar amid the curling black hairs at his wrist. His hair seemed blue black against the stiff, white linens. The only difference was that, at present, he was breathing. Even his scent was exactly as she recalled it. A blend of blatant male virility and some spicy shaving cream. Such a potent mix was a pleasant distraction from the disinfectant aroma, and that of the floor wax they were constantly slopping on, in hospitals the world over.

  His eyes opened, blinked into focus and narrowed as he studied her. Beyond the curious expression she saw nothing. They were empty, those deep brown eyes. Vacant, just as the doctors had warned her they would be. It was cruel, what she had to do to him. And even then, it might not work. She'd been warned not to attempt to alter what was preordained. But what choice did she have, really? She'd foreseen her own sister's murder. It was going to happen right after the murder of the man in the bed.

  "Do I know you?" He sat up slightly as he spoke and the sheet slipped down to his waist. He wore no hospital gown. The sight of his tanned skin, stretched taut over a broad chest and liberally sprinkled with dark, springy curls, shook her. In answer to his question, she nodded. He shook his head, frustration showing in the way his gaze intensified. "Bad enough I couldn't remember my own name. I can't believe any blow on the head would make me forget you, lady."

  She felt a flush creep up her neck, and yet another round of doubt attacked her. She wasn't certain whether his finding her attractive would make this easier or harder. Especially since the feeling was mutual. She'd prepared herself for the sexual magnetism this man held for her. She'd sensed it before she'd ever come here. She'd decided she could handle it. But if it were a two-way street, traveling it might get damned complicated. For a moment she seriously considered getting out of her chair, walking out the door and never turning back. Then she glimpsed his chest again, and in a flash that left her dizzy she saw it bloodied. She saw the paleness of the skin between the splashes of crimson. She felt the stillness of once-powerful lungs, and the deadening silence of a magnificent heart.

  "Hey. Are you okay?"

  She forced her white-knuckled grip on the chair arms to ease and dragged her gaze from his chest, back up to his milk-chocolate eyes. Numbly she nodded. She shifted in the chair, leather creaking against vinyl.

  "You going to tell me who you are, or am I supposed to guess?" The dark brows were still drawn together in concern and curiosity.

  "You'd never guess in a million years," she said softly to the man she'd never met until today. "I'm your wife."

  "My...what?"

  "Your wife."

  He shook his head slowly and she could tell by the shrinking of his pupils that it ached. A white bandage at the back of his skull stood like a banner of surrender amid the soft, sooty hair. The car accident that had put him here had caused no other injury. Only that one blow to the head, and the resulting memory loss. For Joey's purposes, it was the perfect opportunity to intervene in a deadly situation.

  "My wife." He closed his eyes briefly, then opened them again, studying her with poorly disguised skepticism.

  "You don't believe me."

  He shrugged, eyes narrow, almost mocking. What had happened to the emptiness? Her mind was wide open. The problem was, she had no control over what she "picked up," and what she didn't. The images, the feelings, were random. God knew there were some things she'd rather not feel at all. Sickening, horrible things.

  "I don't believe much of anything unless I see proof," he told her. "That's just the way I am."

  She frowned. "And just how do you know what way you are?"

  The sardonic smile died and the clouds returned to his eyes. "I don't know. That just came out" He shook his head slowly. Joey felt a rush of sympathy for him, followed quickly by a rush of guilt. Her presence here wouldn't make things any easier.

  "It must be pretty lousy, forgetting your entire life." Worse yet, with what she was doing to him.

  He searched her face. "I've talked to the people I work with—"

  "At the Chronicle," she inserted, just to show him she knew.

  He nodded, his gaze intensifying, never wavering from hers. "They filled in a lot of the blanks for me. But no one mentioned a wife. How do you explain that?"

  She wasn't unprepared. She'd known which bases would need covering, and she'd covered them. He had no family, or none she'd been able to trace. There would be no doubting in-laws to contend with. She called to mind the lines she'd rehearsed for this moment and cleared her throat. "Did they tell you about your weekend in Vegas?"

  He nodded, his face wary. "I went there to follow up a lead on...a story I was working on."

  "The Syracuse Slasher." His eyes widened, but he hid his surprise quickly. "Your lead was a dead end. But the trip wasn't entirely wasted." She licked her lips, reached down to the backpack on the floor beside her and pulled out the rolled, ribboned document. The scent of fresh ink worried her, but she doubted he'd notice that. She handed it to him, hurrying on as he unrolled it. "When you asked me to go along, I had no idea what you were planning, Ash."

  He frowned over the marriage certificate that proclaimed Ashville Allan Coye and Josephine Belinda Bradshaw were husband and wife. He would find no flaw, she was certain. The forger she'd hired was one of the best.

  Finally he shook his head. “So I have a wife. It's so odd. It's like I've never seen you before in my life. I hope that doesn't hurt your feelings too badly."

  "I knew what to expect when I came here." She swallowed, failing to remove the hard lump in her throat

  "So we were just married on Saturday? And no one else knew about it?"

  "That's right. We arrived back on Sunday night. I went to my house and you went back to your apartment...to pack a few things, you said. When you didn't come back I didn't know what to think."

  "And now that you know?"

  She drew a bracing breath and steadied her tingling nerves. It was necessary, she reminded herself. If she let him out of her sight for a minute, it could mean disaster. And this was the only way. She couldn't very well go to the police. They'd laugh her right out of the building. They'd never believe her. Very few people ever had. It was sickeningly ironic that she could get people to accept lies more easily than the truth. The super at the building where Ash lived, for example. He'd bought this same story, hook, line and sinker, and unlocked the apartment for her. If she'd told him the truth he'd have called the "guys in white." It was always that way.

  Except with her father. He'd never doubted her gift. He'd never accused her of having an overactive imaginati
on. And he'd always known when she was lying. But he was nothing to her now. Less than nothing.

  "Well?" Ash prompted, reminding her he'd asked a question.

  She straightened her spine, met his velvety brown gaze. "I imagine we'll pick up where we left off." She let her eyes search his face, tried to put longing into her expression. It was easier than it ought to be. "At least, I hope so."

  #

  Ashville felt his brows leap up. She wanted to play house with him. Well, that would require some serious consideration. He studied her again. Her hair was a mixture of pale brown and honey gold and strawberry blond. It was wild and long. She reminded him of a calico kitten with all those swirling colors in one head of thick, crazy hair. The feline image stayed with him when his gaze lingered on her exotically slanted, emerald green eyes and the black velvet forest surrounding them. She was small, no more than five feet tall, and she had incredible legs. No contour was hidden beneath the skintight leather pants she wore. The rest of her shape was concealed by the matching black jacket, unfortunately. She smelled of fresh air and leather, and she looked at him as if trying to see right through him.

  "Can we do that, Ash?"

  He licked his lips. "I'm thinking." Who the hell was she, anyway? What was her game?

  She rose, scooping her backpack up and dropping it on the chair. She turned her back to him and bent over it. He heard the rasp of the zipper. Then she rummaged inside. Watching the subtle movements of her black-leather-encased, perfectly squeezable little backside, he felt himself inclined to go along with her scheme, whatever it was.

  When she turned she held a pair of jeans—his jeans— and a button-down dress shirt of pale gray. The cat had been in his apartment.

  "These are for when you're released." She opened the narrow closet opposite the bed and busied herself hanging the clothes. She'd brought socks, too, underwear, his cross trainers. She licked her lips again, and he noticed that her hands trembled just slightly as she stowed each item in the closet. "I wasn't sure what kind of shape your other clothes were in, after the accident."

  He just watched her prattling on, nervous, seemingly making things up as she went along. She couldn't seem to hold his gaze or sit still or stop filling the tense silences with inane chatter. "Is there anything else I can bring you? Magazines or books or—"

  "No." He was baffled. "Look, um..." He glanced down at the marriage certificate in his hand. "Josephine—" She grimaced and her nose wrinkled. Damn. When she wasn't outrageously sexy, she was unbearably cute.

  "It's Joey, and I'll only forgive that mistake once, amnesia or no amnesia."

  He couldn't help but smile as he tapped the paper in his hand. "That's not what it says here. Josephine Belinda Bradshaw."

  "Well, regardless of what it says there, my name is Joey." Her lashes lowered over those green eyes and she added, "Joey Coye."

  He shook his head. He'd have to resist the cries of his body that were telling him to go along with her scam, whatever it was, just long enough to exercise a few husbandly prerogatives. He reminded himself that women like her were a dime a dozen. This was a serious game she was playing. She was up to something.

  "Okay. Joey, then. Do you mind me asking how you got into my apartment?"

  Her eyes focused on his, filled with enough innocence to fool the devil himself. "You gave me a key, Ash."

  "Oh."

  The investigative reporter inside jumped with questions. His libido was making noises of surrender. Loud noises. But the still-small voice of self-preservation squeaked its dissent

  Because, after all, the accident had been no accident. Someone was trying very hard to kill him.

  Then again, forewarned was said to be forearmed, right? And what better way to beard the cat than in her den? She certainly looked harmless enough.

  "Ash. Is anything wrong?"

  He sighed. "No. As a matter of fact, you couldn't have come at a better time. I'm getting sprung today."

  Her eyes doubled in size at that instant. "T-today?"

  "Yeah. So if you'll hand me those clothes, I'll be ready to leave in just a minute."

  "Leave?"

  "You are taking me home, aren't you?" He was enjoying her panic, but he was careful not to show it. He kept his expression blank, trusting.

  "Home? I don't—"

  "No." He stopped her before she could say anything else. Eyes downcast, he bit his lower lip to keep from grinning. "It's okay, I understand. I thought when you said you wanted to pick up where we left off..." He swallowed an imaginary lump. "It's all right. What kind of a husband would I be, like this?"

  He'd called her bluff. He'd watched her squirm, and now he was giving her a way out. Obviously whatever scam she was pulling wasn't meant to extend beyond this hospital room. He could wait until later to do a background check on her, figure out what this fiasco had been all about.

  But wait a minute. She was tugging the clothes from the hangers, bringing them to the bed. She set them down and perched on the mattress, and her hands were gripping his shoulders. Her eyes stabbed into his with unmistakable sincerity.

  "Don't ever let me hear you talk that way again. Look, I was just taken by surprise. I didn't realize they'd let you go so soon. With a head injury this serious, I figured..." She shook her head fast and her crazy curls swung back and forth over her face. "Of course I'm taking you home. I wouldn't have it any other way."

  He frowned and searched her face. "Are you sure—?"

  Her shoulders squared and her spine stiffened. Determination lit her eyes. "Get dressed, Ash. I'll go and see about getting your release forms and we'll get out of here."

  He nodded and watched the sway of her hips, as mesmerizing as a hypnotist's pocket watch, as she turned and left. When the door closed, he shook himself. He got out of the bed, went to the door and cracked it, just to be sure she wasn't standing outside. Then he grabbed the phone.

  When he heard the city editor's voice on the line, he didn't waste time with preamble. "There's a drop-dead gorgeous little cat here claiming to be my wife, Radley. She wants to take me home. I'm going."

  Radley Ketchum chortled. "Wake up, Ash. You're still dreamin'. No, wait a minute, you can't be. You might dream about going home with her, but you'd never dream you'd married her. What's going on?"

  "Look, I'm serious." Ash darted a glance toward the door and rushed on. “She has a certificate that says I married her in Vegas on Saturday."

  "And she expects you to buy it? You? The most dedicated bachelor in the state of New York?"

  "Well, she probably figures I don't know that, don't you think?"

  Radley was silent for a long moment. "Look, you better not go with her. This whole deal was supposed to keep you alive, not get you killed."

  He thought about the look in her eyes when he'd pretended emotional agony. "I don't think it's her."

  "Oh, no? What makes you so sure?"

  Ash shook his head. "I don't know. Gut feeling, maybe."

  "Does she smoke?"

  "How the hell do I know if she smokes? Look, I'll let you know where I am when I get there, okay?"

  "She lights up a cigarette, my friend, you get the hell out. You have any urge to stick around, you just think about those butts with the coral-frost lipstick stains on them that the cops found at the scenes of all three murders."

  "Yeah. Don't worry, I'm not suicidal."

  "One more thing. You get her address on record somewhere before you leave that hospital, just in case you can't call with it later. Phone number, too. Give me her name right now and I'll see what I can find out about her."

  "Her name, she says, is Mrs. Ashville Coye."

  "Very funny."

  "The marriage certificate reads Josephine Belinda Bradshaw. Calls herself Joey."

  "Got it. Take care of yourself, pal, and, Ash?"

  "Yeah?"

  "Just in case she is our slasher, you be real careful not to let on that the amnesia is just a cover."

  He hung up the
phone and got dressed just in time. She was back at the speed of sound and, moments later, leading him into the corridor. She seemed nervous. Her glittering emerald gaze darted around, seemingly watching everyone. Ash veered toward the desk, taking her with him. She had a death grip on his forearm, but he didn't think she was quite aware of it. He asked the nurse on duty for a pad and a pen and turned toward his "wife."

  "What's your address?"

  "Eight twenty-nine Gaskin, in Clay. Why?"

  He jotted it down. "Just in case anyone tries to reach me here, I want to let them know where I am."

  Her eyes widened. She reached past him to rip the top page from the notepad and then crumpled it in her fist "I don't think that's such a good idea."

  Ash leaned negligently against the desk, eyeing her. There was a heightened color to her cheeks. Her full lips were parted slightly in agitation. She was one hell of an attractive woman. "Why not?"

  "I just don't like my home address being so readily available to any nut case who happens to ask for it That's all." She tugged the pen from his hand, leaned over the pad and wrote something down. She shoved it across the desk to the nurse. "If anyone tries to reach Mis—my husband, give them this number."

  "So during my sentence, will I be allowed visitors?"

  She whirled to face him, her hair flying. God, she was jumpy. He smiled so she'd know he was kidding. He wasn't, but it wouldn't pay to let too much show. His "wife's" expression eased slightly, and she picked up a large zippered bag from the desk. She offered him a shaky smile in return, turned her back to him and started for the elevators.

  Ash caught up within a second or two. "What's that?"

  "What?" She thumped the down arrow repeatedly, gaze raking the halls.

  "The bag...honey."

  Her brows lifted, but she handed him the bag. "Your personal effects. The stuff they took off you when you were admitted. You know, wallet, loose change." She averted her eyes. "Wedding ring."

  Oh, man, she didn't miss a trick, this jumpy, long-haired cat of his.