“What?” Sam moved closer.
“This is going to sound nuts, but I got scared. I leaned over the balcony and suddenly I was in all those people’s heads, picking up what they were feeling.” She shut her eyes and refused to look at him. “See? I told you. It even sounds crazy to me. Maybe I’m going crazy,” she rambled, and he stopped her by gently tucking a stray strand of hair behind her ear. Her eyes popped open. His touch stirred some lovely, odd feelings inside her. The way he looked at her made her feel as if what she had said wasn’t so crazy—not to him.
“Jesse’s here,” he said.
She must have been staring like a fool, because he coughed to break the spell and held out his large hand. When she placed hers into his, it was like a soft wing stroking her skin, tipping her belly with a faint thrill while she allowed him to lead her inside.
A large canvas bag lay heaped on the scratchy beige sofa, a crumpled airline tag dangling from the strap. The kind dark-skinned detective was wearing the same rumpled blue suit, but with a clean light blue shirt and striped tie. He eyed her now with a look that had Marcie taking a step back. Something’s happened. He doesn’t trust me.
“Jesse retrieved my bag from the airport,” Sam explained.
Jesse shrugged his bulky shoulders and loosened his sloppy blue tie, but his hard eyes remained glued on her. “It was the least I could do for an old friend. Funny thing though, Marcie; I couldn’t find yours.”
Her stomach twisted. “I don’t understand?”
“Come on, Jesse. It’s more than possible the airline lost the luggage,” Sam said.
“Sure it is. They do it all the time. Why, just last year they sent mine and the missus’ to Florence. Always wanted to go there. At least my bags got to go.” He chuckled at his dry attempt at humor, except Marcie couldn’t shake off the implied distrust. He looked at her with the same hardness he had used when speaking of Elise the night before, and that worried her.
“Don’t forget the backpack, Jesse. Maybe it was her only piece of luggage.”
“Okay, maybe. But then, what woman carries only an itty-bitty backpack with all her things for a trip? None I’ve met. But hey, there’s always a first.”
Hearing Jesse’s assumption raised questions she hadn’t thought of. She paused, confused, looking at her pale hands and her long, slender fingers. She had really tried to clear the muddled darkness clouding her past, except it made her anxious. At the same time, though, her loss of memory filled her with an unexpected blissful peace.
“So what do you suppose was so valuable in that backpack you were carrying?”
Sam cocked his head and frowned. He took a step toward Jesse. “Now, what are you implying?”
“I’m not implying anything. Just asked a question, is all.”
Sam looked Marcie square in the eye and then exchanged another scrutinizing glance with Jesse, as if trying to piece together a puzzle.
Okay, now would be a good time for her memory to return. She pressed her fingers to her head and struggled to pull the backpack in question out of thin air. Just as quickly, she felt an urgent need to backpedal. “I don’t remember having a backpack, even though I was told I had one.” She stumbled for words and some tangible explanation, but even she had to admit something was off. She didn’t want to remember, or maybe it was that damn dream. She couldn’t shake it—or maybe Sam didn’t believe her. Once a liar, always a liar. Steamy heat rose in her cheeks from the obtrusive voice that squeaked in her head. Now she really wanted to hide. Instead, she stared at her bare toes and the dingy hardwood floor.
“What about the passenger manifest, and all the planes arriving at that time?” Sam paced and circled his hand in the air for emphasis.
Jesse cast his rough gaze at Marcie. “We know from security footage that you came off Sam’s flight, but I couldn’t find a Marcie listed on the manifest. Why’s that, you suppose?”
Marcie didn’t know what to say, she was dumbfounded. The floor softened beneath her feet, while a spiraling sensation rippled through her. Disconcerted, she searched out to Sam for help, but he too narrowed his now accusatory eyes.
“Oh, no, I swear I don’t remember.” Just confess. The pressure became too much. Her throat closed up, and her lip trembled when bubbled tears flowed with a noisy sob. She scrunched her eyes shut to block out all doubts. She couldn’t suck back the cry no matter how hard she tried.
“Oh, no, woman crying. Sam, I don’t do the crying girl thing. Do something.”
“Shut up,” Sam muttered.
Marcie clenched her trembling hands.
“Marcie, stop. Come on.” Sam touched her, except she could tell by his hesitant, distant, awkward squeeze—an obligatory touch—that he’d pulled inside himself. Why bother? It was such an affront that she was mortified and took a step back, and Sam’s hand fell away.
She clutched her hands under her chin and tried to see Sam through the film of tears that coated her swollen eyes. “Sam, I don’t remember. I know I lied when I didn’t tell you about the dream. I’m positive it was a memory, and you knew. But I think I did something really bad, and I don’t know what it was. Maybe I don’t want to know. I don’t want to be a bad person. Please help me.”
“What dream? She did something—Sam, what the hell’s going on?”
“Marcie, come sit down.” He grabbed his bag and tossed the canvas tote so that it landed with a heavy clunk on the floor, just missing Jesse’s foot.
“Hey, watch it,” Jesse said.
Sam slung his arm around Marcie’s shoulder, being kind again as he settled her on the sofa. He hunkered down across from her on the now cleared coffee table. His long legs encased hers, and he leaned in and rubbed her arms. How could he be so nice? He should have tossed her out.
Jesse cleared his gruff throat. “Look, Marcie, I just don’t want to see my man here tromped on again by another deceitful woman, and there’s something about you; with no luggage, robbed in a crowded, busy airport for your backpack—it leaves me with a lot of questions.”
Sam wiped his hand across his forehead. “Mother of God, will you stop, Jesse? I’m not a kid anymore, and I somehow don’t think Marcie’s here to rob me blind,” Sam snapped with pure annoyance. “Did you find out anything useful?”
Jesse held up both palms in surrender. “I’m telling you the passenger log doesn’t list a Marcie or Marcia or anything similar. So I still don’t know who she is.”
“Maybe Marcie’s a nickname. Have you thought of that? Can’t you get her face up on the news and see if anyone recognizes her?” Sam sounded pissed.
Marcie jumped up when an icy shiver raced up from the center of her belly. Her face lost all color. The room swayed. This time, Marcie knew she was going to faint. Her vision tunneled. Sam’s firm hand on her back sat her down and pushed her head between her knees.
“Take a deep breath. If you feel like you’re going to puke, let me know. Jesse, grab me that bucket under the sink. Come on, hurry.”
Chapter Eight
Sam loved Jesse like a brother, even after the angry rift that had torn their friendship apart; Elise—his first love—his wife. Maybe that was why he understood how Jesse could assume the worst about Marcie, why he had questioned the backpack.
Marcie was in the bathroom, attempting to compose herself. Water trickled from the bathroom tap, squeaking through old pipes, cutting through the silence. Jesse impatiently drummed his fingers on the checkered kitchen counter.
“Sam, what the fuck was that about a dream, and what did she lie about? She did something wrong? This whole thing isn’t sitting right in my gut. Could you fill me in?” Jesse lowered his agitated voice.
Sam pushed aside the scattered papers on the corner desk in the cluttered living room. “I don’t know. She’s freaked out about something and was about to tell me when you showed up.”
Jesse crossed his arms and firmed his full lips. “Please don’t tell me you’ve been fooled by yet another pretty face?”
> Sam turned away from his cleaning spree and leaned his hip against the half wall separating the living room from the kitchen. “She’s not Elise, and I think you know that. Elise was street smart, savvy.…”
Jesse cut him off with a grunt. “Elise hopped in and out of the back of cars with any guy who’d offer her a free ride. Then she’d empty their wallets. She was a player. She’d steal anything she could flip for money. She planned to go into a store to take. She had no morals. Did you forget her first abortion at fifteen, a second at seventeen? And you, you dumbass, took her and paid for each one; even though neither was yours.”
Sam’s eyes glazed over with a frosty, distant hurt. He gritted his teeth, shook his head. “Why are you doing this? Why now?”
Jesse shuffled closer to Sam. “Don’t you think it tore my heart out to watch you twisted around her finger? You couldn’t see what she was doing. She went from one guy to the next, and you were always sitting by the sidelines. What’d you promise her so she’d marry you?”
Grief and anger waged an ugly war inside of Sam. He glared at Jesse, then snapped, “I dared her, because I knew it was the only way she would. Are you happy now?”
Jesse didn’t touch him, but his gruff voice softened. “I was never happy watching the way you were ripped apart from the back forty. I knew you loved her, and maybe she loved you, too, as much as she could. But she was never honest with you, and that I can’t forgive her for.”
The floor squeaked behind Sam. “Good God, woman, you scared me. How long you been standing there?”
“Long enough. Jesse, I hope to God I’m not dishonest. Just the thought…”
“Marcie, Jesse isn’t saying that.”
She stepped closer to Sam. “Well, actually, Sam, Jesse’s trying to protect you from being hurt and deceived by another woman. He’s watching your back. Friends don’t come any better than that.” She crossed her arms. “I’m thinking I did something. I don’t know what’s going on, but I seem to be picking up on feelings and stuff.…” Her hand shook when she paused. “I have a feeling I may be listed under a different name.”
“And what name might that be?” Jesse responded.
Sam ran his hand up and down the back of his head, pacing in a circle over by the balcony.
Marcie shrugged, seeming like a frightened child. “I don’t know. It’s just a feeling I have.”
“Jesse, you should be able to find out from security at Sea-Tac airport.”
“That’ll take time—time my boss ain’t gonna give me. This morning, he told me to wrap it up, no chance of catching the thug who robbed her. He don’t give a rat’s ass about her lost memory.” Jesse firmed his lips and looked down with a mix of distant concern, maybe trying to decide if Marcie could be trusted. “I’ll ask Dev in airport security to contact them for me. He can find out.”
“Actually, Jesse, I’d like to see the security video. Any chance you could get me in to watch it?” Sam asked.
“Why?” Jesse puffed out his chest and crossed his arms
“Just a hunch I want to follow up on. Humor me, please.”
Jesse merely grunted while keeping his hard, dark eyes focused on Sam. “Let me guess; you’re not about to share this hunch.”
Sam paused before a faint boyish grin lit up his striking face. He slowly shook his head.
Jesse threw his hands up in the air. “Let me see what I can do.”
“Last night, I had a hard time sleeping. At one point, I fell into a dream. Except I think it was a memory of something I did or was part of.” Marcie faced Sam.
Jesse wandered out of the kitchen and leaned against Sam’s cluttered desk.
“It was real, Sam. I swear, and this will sound crazy, that it was a cover-up of something. I was staying on this large rural property in a trailer. There were two guys I knew there, Richard and Dan.” Her eyes widened. “I don’t know where that came from. I don’t remember anything about them.”
“But you know their names?”
She shrugged and glanced at Sam and then Jesse with an irritated, helpless look. Sam moved back beside Jesse and leaned against the half wall, struck by Marcie’s natural beauty, which flowed all around her. The soft skin at the bridge of her pert little nose wrinkled while she concentrated. He blinked to get back on track.
“There were other trailers, campers on this vacant land. Dirt piles, cleared lots like a new housing development. The house burning was old and rundown. I don’t know why I know that.” Her eyes widened. “The weird part was this old wood shed behind a fifth wheel trailer. There was something about the padlocked door and closed-up windows. I can’t explain it, but it felt as if we were hiding something. I was afraid of being caught, as if it was my responsibility to keep everyone away. This last part is going to sound weird. A woman appears: blond, gorgeous, and very much dead. She laughed and mocked firing a gun with her hand, like kids do, except I heard the distinct chambering and shots of a real gun. It was pointed right at me. Then she wandered around the RV to the shed, and I panicked. No one was supposed to go back there.”
Marcie moved behind the sofa, dropped her head into her hands. Long strands of gorgeous, damp, wavy hair fell like a curtain over her face. Sam crossed his arms. His head screamed to distance himself. She was involved in something, all right, if this dream was real—if she was telling the truth. Except, why would she incriminate herself?
“Marcie, let’s back up. What were they trying to cover up?”
Marcie brushed her hair back with her fingers. “I don’t know. First, it was something about the old house. They needed to make sure everything burned. And I knew it, because I screamed at them to hurry. They kept going even when the fire guys tried to shut them down.”
“You’re talking about arson there, girl. Were you involved?”
Tears pooled and glistened in her vivid blue eyes. She pursed her trembling lips as if refusing to allow one tear to fall. “I don’t know. That’s what scares me. What if I did something wrong?” Her thickened voice cracked.
Weird didn’t begin to explain this story. On the surface, Sam realized that now would be the time to walk away. If he was smart, he would. But he wasn’t—smart, that is, with this whole convoluted mess with Marcie. He was doing his best to bring logic to this tale, except her story reminded him of his strange and mysterious training grounds, Terrebonne Parish, where he had grown up and learned to trust his instincts, stifling his logical mind’s need to explain the unexplainable. So why stop now? Well, for one, her dream wasn’t reality, and reality was where he chose to live.
So why did he feel this need to protect her? Maybe it was her genuine honesty and fear and the fact that she needed him. When was the last time someone had really needed him? If he were candid with himself, he’d admit Elise never did. It had been the other way around.
Sam walked over to her and traced the soft contour of her plump cheek and the outline of her chin, all in a gentle caress that invoked a deep longing dead center in his gut. Her chin wobbled. He could see the hurt in her eyes. It only added to the massive puzzle he found himself entangled in. What was it about this fiery, patient, sweet girl that made him want more? Instincts, not his head, had him opening his arms, and Marcie walked right into them.
His arms closed around her. She shivered and fisted her hands in his shirt.
“What do I do now, Sam?” Her warm breath whispered against his chest as she spoke.
Sam rested his chin on top of her head, torn by duty as a federal officer and bound by a strange connection to Marcie, a link that he clearly understood could jeopardize his career if, in fact, she was involved in something illegal. Except his inner voice, which had saved him time and again from past adversity, was warning him to put aside his black and white sense of duty, and he didn’t know why.
Jesse cleared his throat and looked away before he gallantly left the room.
“One step at a time, Marcie, and first things first. We need to find out who you are.”
Ch
apter Nine
Jesse, true to his word, arranged with airport security for Sam to watch the surveillance video. Jesse planned to meet them there, but, first, he needed to check in with his captain. He had a heavy caseload, and not a lot of priority was to be given to a woman robbed. Apparently, those had been his boss’ exact words first thing this morning.
Marcie, tired from her restless sleep, lay on the sofa, bunching the blanket under her head while Sam walked Jesse out. She told herself she’d rest her eyes a moment, except she allowed her mind to still, breathing deeply until an image of a golden autumn forest appeared as she flew over, dusk settling in. Lower now, moving through golden leaves, until a large owl, with great wings and feathers, perched on a thick oak branch. She instinctively recognized it as a symbol of death and renewal.
The scene changed, flashing to full dark, and this time she raced down the center of a dirt and gravel road. A full moon and shining stars blazed in the northern sky. Scattered distant lights from nearby rural properties provided a beacon out of the surrounding darkness. Smoky shadows poked her fears and then deepened into the alders trailing both sides of the road. Overwhelming terror gripped her heart right before an awful, anxious hum sizzled up her spine. She was late and needed to hurry.
Jogging shorts and a T-shirt were no protection from the cold air pinching her bare skin. She ran on, faster, steadily gaining a solid rhythm until her chest burned. She had to stop, slow down, but she couldn’t. Her nerves, her senses, were cranked as if the devil himself was biting at her heels. She was in trouble, and she damn near jumped out of her skin when she caught sight of a golden-haired man illuminated under a sparse country streetlight twenty feet in front of her. She blinked. Where had he come from? Her heart jerked and slammed against her ribcage when she dug her heels in and stopped.
Danger Deception Devotion The Firsts Page 75