by Edie Claire
Teagan’s pulse quickened. The card could be important. It could be evidence. Maybe she shouldn’t show it to Jamie at all. Maybe she should take it straight to the police…
Screw the police, she thought angrily. Why would they care about a card that was probably from some kindly grandmother, when they were too busy to run a simple address check? Wouldn’t it make more sense to find out what she was dealing with first?
She flipped the envelope over. Her fingers ripped open the flap and pulled out the card. A bouquet of daisies graced its cover. The heading read “Fondest Wishes for Your Recovery.” Without further debate she opened the card and looked inside.
I don’t know who to say “dear” to, because I don’t know your name. But I heard about what happened to you, and I just want you to know that my thoughts and prayers are with you. I have never had injuries such as yours, but I was hospitalized at Northside General for quite some time when I broke my hip last winter, and I know from experience—
Teagan relaxed. It was nothing. A legitimate get well card from a legitimately concerned citizen. Or perhaps just a lonely one. In any event, it was nothing to worry about. Perhaps Jamie would enjoy it.
She folded the card closed, planning to stuff it back in its envelope, but then she hesitated. The handwriting seemed odd. It was unsteady, as one might expect from an older person. But it was printed rather than in cursive, and the letters seemed stilted. It looked like a man’s handwriting.
Teagan opened the card again. Men did break their hips, and some probably did send get-well cards to strangers. But not as often as women did.
She glanced down at the signature. “Yours Truly, Alice.”
Teagan’s eyes narrowed. Her gaze returned to the top of the long paragraph of scrawl, and this time she read through to the end.
…I know from experience that it’s not pleasant to be in the hospital for any length of time, especially when you don’t have your loved ones around you. I hope your family is with you now. I don’t have any family and that made my illness very hard for me. You see, I was diagnosed with glaucoma and cataracts, and I’ve had surgery a couple times for a narrowed urethra listen to me, please. this is all a misunderstanding. What happened was an accident. I know you’ll remember soon, and when you do, Please, please call me before you talk to anyone else. We can work this out. I’ll make it worth your while. I promise. Then when I got out of surgery for that, I started having trouble with my heel and needed foot surgery. So you see, I know what it’s like to have a lot of health problems and feel alone. So I thought maybe this card, even though it’s from a stranger, might help. God bless you, my dear.
Teagan’s face flushed with heat. “You bastard!” she cried out loud. “You think you’re so damned smart!”
She dropped the card onto her desktop as if it were on fire. Accident, my ass! It was him. The man who had left Jamie to die. He knew he was in danger of exposure and he wanted to buy Jamie off… or worse. If she made that call, would he ask to meet her someplace? Someplace deserted, perhaps?
“So sorry!” Teagan sputtered with venom. “But Jamie’s not that stupid. And neither am I.”
Her hand reached out. She picked up the phone.
***
It took several seconds for Jamie’s eyes to adjust to the light—or lack thereof—on the inside of the solid wooden door of Vermelli’s Restaurant. Only the landing on which she now stood was at street level; the rest of the space was underground. She placed an unsteady hand on the wrought-iron railing and felt her way down the plush carpeted staircase, half feeling as if she were walking in a dream.
The aroma was as familiar to her as any scent could be. Coffee. Alcohol. Grease. A hint of cooked meat. The navy blue and hunter green checked carpet beneath her feet was worn in all the same places. The metal light fixtures hanging from the walls were just as dusty, and their funnels of thick red glass still subdued what little light was shed by the cheap bulbs within. She had tried to slip in a hundred watt once, by the cash register, so she could read the stupid checks. The boss had gone ballistic.
She did remember, didn’t she?
“Have a seat anywhere. I’ll be with you in a minute,” a woman in a black apron called out with disinterest. Jamie stared after her as she disappeared through the swinging door to the kitchen. The black uniforms were new. Hers had always been green. They’d had to wear black pants, a white button-down shirt, and the green apron. She hated white shirts. She had sworn that once she left, she would never wear a white shirt again.
“Where would you like to sit?” Eric asked her.
Jamie started. She had forgotten he was with her. But now that she heard his voice again, it too seemed a familiar part of the surroundings.
She glanced into a back corner of the room, the short arm of an L that wrapped around the bar. She walked to where she could see the booth in question: a circular corner unit that could seat eight or nine. It had been the law students’ regular spot. They would drink Iron City draft and gorge themselves on buffalo wings and nachos. Neither appetizer was Italian, but they stayed on the menu anyway. Old Man Vermelli was a businessman, not a purist.
Jamie stopped short of the booth. There was no one else in the restaurant yet; the lunch hour always tended to be lean. She moved sideways and slid into one of the tall booths along the wall, positioning herself where she could watch the back corner. It held a fascination for her, yet she didn’t want to be any closer.
Eric sat down opposite her, removed his coat, and laid it on the seat beside him. Jamie left her own coat on; she was anything but warm.
“Are you really all right?” he asked quietly, studying her. “I’m guessing that what Kirsten said back there came as a shock to you.”
Jamie had no intention of discussing the matter. She was doing her best to beat back the fear in her gut, to wall it off, compartmentalize it. It would still exist, but no one else could see it.
“I remember working here,” she announced. “It’s all just like it was. Except for the uniforms.”
The waitress approached, delivered two laminated cardboard menus, and left with their drink order. Jamie knew that she should be hungry, but her stomach balked at the selection. She tossed the menu back onto the table, a queer irritability growing inside her. “You’d think they could serve one thing I haven’t personally seen defiled in the kitchen,” she said sourly.
Eric peered at her over his own menu, his voice detached. “The oriental salads are new.”
Jamie didn’t answer. Her eyes were staring at the plastic salt and pepper shakers, but her mind was seeing something else. She remembered the place vividly now. Her first day, her first paycheck. It was the first chance she had ever had to earn tips, and she had milked it for all it was worth. For once, she had gotten paid to be a flirt. Her natural inclinations were no longer a distraction; they were a bona fide business plan.
She knew she had considered herself lucky to work here, and that for a while she had been relatively happy. Yet at the same time, the sight and feel of the place filled her with a smothering unease.
Was this all she had ever done? Served food and drinks, flirted for tips? She knew that she had gone to college, but she could not remember whether she had graduated. Maybe she had dropped out. Maybe teasing men for money was the only thing she had ever succeeded at. Her plan had always been to keep reaching higher, to keep moving up. So what had happened? What the hell kind of life had she been living to be dumped like garbage in a park?
“Jamie,” Eric said heavily, his voice treading the line between concern and exasperation. “You’re worrying me. What are you thinking?”
She raised her chin and looked him in the eyes. Obviously, he could tell that it wasn’t the Vermelli’s menu that had turned her stomach. She also supposed he was not going to leave the subject alone. That being the case, she might as well get some information from him.
“Tell me the truth,” she demanded, her husky voice carefully controlled. “Was I really
found in a blanket?”
Eric’s sympathetic eyes didn’t blink. “All I know is what Teagan told me. But that’s what she said, yes.”
Jamie stared back. Fear and anger battled within her, but it was anger she preferred, and anger that would have driven her to bang both fists on the tabletop if her arm didn’t already ache. “Then why didn’t she tell me?” she raged. “Nobody tells me anything!”
Eric slipped cleanly into lawyer mode. “Whatever decisions Teagan made, she made in your best interest. The police always hold back some details—in this case, they probably didn’t want to bias your memory. Plus, I’d imagine that your doctors didn’t want you stressed unnecessarily. Surely you can understand that."
The waitress delivered their drinks, took their stiffly delivered lunch orders, and left with haste. Jamie stared at her ice water in silence. It looked cold. Everything was cold.
She had been freezing that night too, hadn’t she? Being bashed on the head and smothered wasn’t enough…
“I had a nightmare,” she blurted, unable to stop the traitorous words from escaping her mouth. She wanted to stop there, and she would have stopped there, if it weren’t for the softly spoken words that echoed in her head—advice from a loving mother to a frightened child. If you tell your nightmare out loud, Jamie, it won’t seem so scary anymore.
“This morning,” she continued before she could think better of it, “I dreamed I was wrapped up in something—that I couldn’t breathe. And there was this noise, and a vibration. Like an engine.” She stopped and took a breath. “I woke up in a sweat. I thought my mind was just making things up. But now I’m not so sure.”
Eric said nothing for a long time. She didn’t know what he was thinking. Her eyes were fixed on her hands.
“I don’t know what to say to you, Jamie,” he said finally, gently. “All this is way out of my league. I do think you should tell Teagan about the nightmare, because it might mean something. But even if it does, you know you’re safe now, right?”
Jamie raised her eyes to his. She took in the sincerity of his expression, the compassion in his earnest eyes. She knew those eyes well. There had been a time when she adored them.
“You think so?”
“I know so,” he said confidently. “You’re going to remember who it was that hurt you, and the second you do, the bastard is toast.” He offered an unexpected smile. “We’ll plant evidence if we have to. I know one of the assistant DAs, and he’s totally amoral, so he’ll go along.”
Jamie smiled back.
“No man gets the better of Jamie Meadows, that’s all I know,” he finished, taking a swig of cola from his thick glass mug.
Meadows. Of course!
Some measure of warmth returned to her. It started with a flush in her cheeks, then spread pleasantly to her fingers and toes.
“Is that so?” she baited.
He chuckled. “You, Jamie, are one of the most hardworking, motivated, independent, take-no-prisoners women I’ve ever met. You’re also a master manipulator who can twist three quarters of the male population around her pinky on demand. That last part is a talent you were always quite proud of, by the way.”
Jamie grinned broadly. Clear as day she could picture Eric with his law student buddies, sitting in the back booth, drinking beer and downing huge plates of greasy nachos with jalapenos. Eric loved the jalapenos. She always made sure the cook gave him extra.
“And were you in that three quarters of the population?” she dared. Whether he was specifically trying to make her feel better about herself or whether he was merely trying to distract her from her fears didn’t really matter. Either way, he was succeeding.
His eyes narrowed playfully. “For a while.”
Jamie cast another glance at the corner booth and was struck with the memory of the day they met—the first time Eric had joined the already regular crowd of law students she’d been flirting with since fall. She had liked all those guys. They talked about interesting subjects and they had the smell of future money about them. But she wasn’t looking for any MRS degree; she wanted money of her own. She had wanted to drop her serving tray, slide into the booth, and be one of them.
Eric’s appearance in the group had been an unexpected treat. She was drawn to him immediately, though she had been at a loss, then, to explain why. At twenty two he had been skinny and fresh faced, hardly the dark and dashing hero type she claimed to prefer. Looking at him now, she wondered if—in the back of her mind—she hadn’t taken his sunny smile and red hair and converted him into a Walton. John Boy, Ben, or Jason—any of them would do. When her foster homes had cable, she had always found the retro show somewhere. The Waltons were the big, loving family she had never known, and she had watched their travails with rapt fascination, never admitting, even to herself, how she longed to step bodily into that fiction.
Goodnight, Jamie.
Goodnight, family.
Whatever the attraction, Eric had always stood out from the pack. At work she would flirt with anything bearing a wallet, but when it came to actual dating, she was very selective.
He had made the cut.
“I remember meeting you now,” she admitted, feeling unexpectedly awkward. “Your friends were so much fun—very sweet. It almost made up for them being such lousy tippers.”
Eric laughed. “None of us had any money, you know. Steve and Brian used to skip other meals just so they could afford your beer and buffalo wings. They were all half in love with you.”
The smile disappeared from his face. Jamie felt a pang in her stomach, and squelched the question that sprang immediately to mind.
And were you?
Instead she reached for a packet of sugar, tore it open, and dumped it into her still untouched ice water.
She hadn’t been in love with him, had she? She couldn’t swear it, being that she still wasn’t sure what romantic love was. She had been fond of him—very fond. He had been good to her. He had been fun. But in searching her databank of warm fuzzies, the memory of him failed to touch her the way memories of her mother did. That indefinable pull, that depth of connection that made her feel secure and vulnerable at the same time simply wasn’t there. Whatever she felt for him, it hadn’t been strong. Not half as strong, even, as what she felt for Teagan.
But still, there was something. She watched him as he sipped his cola, eyes averted, on edge, yet tolerant. She had hurt him, no doubt—as she seemed to hurt everybody. But he didn’t appear to be holding it against her. Last night she had perceived some antagonism from him, but she felt no hint of it now. Rather, he seemed to be doing his best to help her. What he stood to gain from it, she couldn’t imagine, except perhaps the appreciation of his wife. But he was just as likely to get grief from that corner, whether Teagan intended it or not. So why should he give Jamie the time of day?
She continued to study him as he sat, eyes focused on some distant point, his thoughts inscrutable.
I love you, Jamie.
The memory was sharp and crisp. He had said the words as they lay cuddled on a twin bed, their bare skin concealed in the darkness, sated, content. And what had she said in return?
She couldn’t remember.
Her eyes followed the line of his jaw, tracing his neck down to the curve of his shoulder.
She hadn’t been in love with him.
But maybe she should have been.
Chapter Fifteen
The detective appeared in Teagan’s office within an hour of her call. He leaned his thin, forty-something body across the front of her desk, tapped at the edge of the card with a pen until it faced him right side up, and squinted. He was an unimpressive man physically, small in stature and pale skinned—a stark contrast to the impression formed by the deep, rumbling voice Teagan had heard over the phone.
“Clever,” he mumbled, rubbing bony fingers over the smattering of gray stubble on his pointed chin. “I wouldn’t have guessed that.”
Teagan leaned closer, her heart beating loudl
y against her ribs. “What do you mean?”
The detective pursed his lips a moment before answering. “First impression on a case like this would be that we were dealing with a hot-tempered boyfriend, maybe an outside chance of a drug deal gone bad. Either way, we’re looking for a bully—a thug. But this card doesn’t fit. Somebody went to a lot of effort to get that message across confidentially. It was deliberate. It required a brain.”
Teagan felt a shiver. Being beat up by a witless bully for no particular reason was bad enough. Being attacked by someone calculating, for a specific reason, was worse.
“There’s also the fact that he seems to know about her memory loss,” the detective continued grimly. “That wasn’t reported by the media, which means he must have tapped into the grapevine here at the hospital.”
“But we have—”
He held up a hand. “Don’t lecture me about HIPPA. Staff talk; we both know it. What’s significant is that he was savvy enough to get the information without tipping anyone off.” The detective frowned. “This guy’s obviously got a lot to lose if the victim comes forward and identifies him. Maybe his problem with her was personal, like he’s married and needs to stay that way, or maybe the victim knew something about him and his business that she shouldn’t have. Maybe he meant to kill her; maybe he only meant to threaten her originally, but things got out of hand. Either way, her pulling through just made his situation a whole hell of a lot worse.”
Teagan nodded mutely. Her head swam with unpleasant scenarios as the detective carefully dropped the card into an evidence bag and then collected her fingerprints. There could be others on the card, he explained, that would match an existing criminal record.
He moved towards the door.
“Did you get a current address yet?” she asked anxiously. Jamie’s going home now was out of the question, of course. Wherever she had been living would not be safe until her attacker was behind bars. But getting a good look at the place, even from a distance, could jump start her memory.