Midnight Bride

by Barbara Mccauley

Was she crazy? She’d assured Caleb that she wasn’t a lunatic on the run from a mental institution, but now she wasn’t so sure.

  Confusion closed over her like a heavy fog. All evening that man’s words kept chipping away in her brain. My wife…lost the baby…paranoia…

  Could it be? She drew in a long, shuddering breath and hugged her knees tightly to her. No! She refused to accept that that man—Sam Phillips—was her husband. And how could she possibly forget she’d lost a child? He was lying. She knew he was lying. But why? Why would someone make up such an elaborate story? There had to be a reason. I’ve got to remember!

  And the voice, his voice. She squeezed her eyes shut and pressed her hands over her ears, wishing she could stop hearing the words. Paranoia…paranoia…my wife…kill her…kill her…

  Her eyes flew open. Had he said those words? Was it possible that this was the man that had caused her accident? Heart pounding, she stared into the glowing red coals in the fireplace, willing herself to relax…to remember….

  Rain. Lightning. Those things were clear in her mind. And the darkness. The headlights cut into the darkness no more than a few feet. Headlights! She was in a car…three men. An explosion…no, a flat tire. And then she was running. She slipped in the mud, and one of the men grabbed her. She bit him, then kicked.

  Kill her…kill her…kill her….

  And then she was falling—

  “Sarah?”

  She screamed and fell backward, raising her arm to ward off a blow, before she realized it was Caleb kneeling beside her. Her heart slammed against her chest. He took hold of her shoulders and steadied her.

  “I…didn’t hear you come in.”

  “You all right?” Concern furrowed his brow.

  She drew in a slow, fortifying breath and nodded.

  He sat beside her. Firelight shadowed his face, causing eerie shapes and contortions. There was no warmth in his eyes, only a cold, dark intensity. His mouth was set in a firm, hard line, and his touch was not the touch of a man who had kissed her earlier and desired her. It was the touch of an angry stranger.

  “Tell me,” she whispered. The words felt raw in her throat.

  His gaze met hers. She felt a chill seep down clear to her bones.

  “It checked out, Sarah,” he said quietly. “Sam Phillips is your husband.”

  Caleb had no smelling salts; he certainly had never expected he would need them here in the mountains. A cool compress would have to do, he resolved, and pressed the wet washcloth to Sarah’s forehead. He’d caught her when she’d fainted a minute ago, then laid her on the sofa. She’d felt so small in his arms, so fragile. And the look in her eyes before she’d passed out—like a frightened doe cornered by a grizzly bear.

  And he was the grizzly bear.

  He went into the kitchen and filled a glass with brandy, then moved back into the living room and stood over her. She lay so still, her breathing shallow, her skin pale as moonlight. With a mind of its own, his hand reached out and tucked a silky curl of hair behind her ear, then lightly traced the smooth line of her jaw. His chest constricted at the contact, and he quickly drew his hand away.

  How could he hand his woman over to another man?

  Good God! He staggered backward at the thought. His woman? He had no right to think of her as his. She wasn’t a wounded kitten found in an alley, she was a woman. A married woman. He’d known from the beginning she had another life, that there was a possibility she had a husband. He thought of Phillips, and his stomach churned. He still couldn’t believe that man was her husband, but Mike had checked everything out and it cleared.

  Dammit, dammit, dammit!

  Sarah stirred, then moaned softly. He sat beside her on the couch, and when her eyes fluttered open, he removed the washcloth from her forehead.

  She rose on her elbows and stared at the glass in his hands. “I hope that’s something strong.”

  He held the glass to her lips and she swallowed, then started to cough as the bitter liquid scorched her throat. He tossed back a long swallow himself.

  “It’s not true,” she said hoarsely. “It can’t be.”

  “A friend of mine pulled up your DMV and police file. Your maiden name is Grayson, married name Phillips. You live at 5234 Bedford Avenue in Valencia. There are no warrants or arrests, but as of a few hours ago the police are on alert to call your—” he hesitated, found he could barely say the word “—husband if you’re picked up.”

  She hugged her arms to her and closed her eyes. “What else?”

  A muscle jumped in his temple. “You’re listed as mentally unstable.”

  She opened her eyes, and the hurt and fear he saw there cut through him like a knife. He struggled with every fiber of his being not to drag her into his arms.

  “Paranoid.” The word hung in the air.

  He just stared at her and nodded. -

  “There’s nothing I can say to convince you, is there?” Her shoulders slumped with defeat.

  “You’re in the computers, Sarah,” he said. “You and Sam both. Even his importing business in Los Angeles was real.”

  “Computers lie, Caleb. Just like people.” Her eyes went empty, blank. “You’re going to take me back, aren’t you?”

  His hand tightened on the glass. He nodded.

  “When?”

  “In the morning.”

  “All right.”

  She swung her feet off the couch and stood. Her hand shook as she combed her hair away from her face. She moved silently toward the bedroom, then stopped at the doorway.

  “I would have died without you, Caleb,” she said quietly without turning around. “I want you to know I appreciate everything you’ve done for me.”

  She stepped into the bedroom and closed the door behind her. He stared at the glass in his hand and drained the contents.

  Twenty minutes later Caleb was still staring at the same glass. He’d lost count how many times he’d refilled it, but it wasn’t enough. Not yet. Not as long as his chest felt so damn tight and the look of betrayal in Sarah’s eyes was still clear in his mind.

  He had to take her back, dammit. What choice did he have? He’d followed Phillips and his buddies when he’d gone into town earlier, watched them as they’d had dinner at the Cougar Caf&e2;. Phillips had played the part of worried husband well. He’d shown Sarah’s picture to everyone, stuck to the same story he’d given Caleb, and he had filed a missing person’s report. Caleb had discreetly checked with the sheriff and verified it.

  And then he’d called Mike again and asked him to run a check on Sarah and Sam Phillips in California, using the plates from the Suburban. It was a match, right down to the fingerprints Caleb had sent Mike. According to the computer, Sarah was married to Sam Phillips. Caleb had even had Phillips’s police records pulled to see if there were any reports of spouse abuse. Nothing.

  Sarah needed help, he told himself. Once she remembered who she was, she’d be fine, happy even to return to her husband.

  So why was his inner voice telling him—no, screaming at him—that something was wrong?

  But was it his inner voice, or was it something else? He was attracted to Sarah; he wanted her. And he sure as hell didn’t want her to belong to another man, even though he knew she could never belong to him. Was it his own inner desires that he’d denied for so long that had suddenly mutinied and refused to listen to reason?

  But something was wrong. He knew it, he’d felt it the second he’d opened the door and found Phillips and his buddies there. He’d been too wound up to listen, and the possibility too unbelievable to accept.

  They were agents.

  The thought struck him like a lightning bolt. Good God, was it possible? They had the look, in their eyes, the way they stood, their mannerisms. Especially Phillips and the guy with the bandage on his hand.

  Sarah had told him that she’d bitten one man’s hand until she’d tasted blood. That would probably require stitches.

  He ran a hand over his face and s
hook his head. It was too improbable, too implausible. He’d been working for the government too long, he thought, when he found conspiracy in a family drama. Everything had checked out. DMV, police, the business. He had no right interfering.

  Computers lie. Just like people.

  His eyes narrowed as he remembered Sarah’s words.

  Computers lie…just like people…

  He sat up straighter. If people lied, of course computers could lie, too.

  An agent had access to the average citizen’s files. Computer records were easy to change, Caleb had done it himself when necessary.

  He slammed the glass down on the coffee table and started for the bedroom door. He had to try. They’d stay up all night if they had to. Go over every detail again and again, until she did remember.

  He didn’t knock on the door, just opened it and stepped inside. The air inside the bedroom was cold. Too cold.

  “Sarah.”

  She didn’t respond. He moved beside the bed and flipped on the light.

  She was gone.

  Sarah stood at the edge of the dirt road, watching the moon as it slipped behind a bank of dark clouds. Darkness closed over the forest. The wind whipped through her, then howled through the tops of the trees.

  Shivering, she waited for the moon to appear again. The clouds had been gathering and building for the past hour, impeding her vision as well as increasing her fear.

  She should have arrived at the main road by now. Caleb had told her his cabin was a little more than a mile in, but she was sure she’d walked at least two. She could still hear the creek down below and had assumed that it followed the road to the highway.

  She’d obviously assumed wrong.

  The road must have turned somewhere. Split into another road. She’d have to backtrack and make her way to the highway quickly. She had no idea how far it would be back down the mountain and into the city, but she had to at least try before morning came.

  Before Caleb discovered she was gone.

  She didn’t blame him, of course. If even a computer said she was married to Sam Phillips, then why would Caleb believe her, a woman who had obviously lost not only her memory, but her mind, as well?

  The moon reappeared, throwing silvery light over the dirt road, and she hurried back the way she’d come. The air felt heavy and cold, and even though she wore jeans and boots and a borrowed denim jacket from Caleb, she couldn’t stop from shaking.

  She hated leaving without saying goodbye. He’d saved her life, taken care of her. But she knew that what she felt for Caleb was much more than gratitude. Even when he’d kissed her, and she’d certainly kissed him back, she’d denied her feelings. But when he’d told her he was taking her back to Phillips, she couldn’t deny the truth any longer.

  She’d fallen in love with Caleb.

  She knew it was insane. Falling in love with a man she hardly knew. One more thing to prove she was “mentally unstable,” as Phillips had told Caleb.

  But whatever her feelings were for Caleb, she had no intention of going anywhere with Sam Phillips, even if she was married to the man. She was going to fight this. Alone, if she had to. Once she got to the city, maybe she would remember something, some little thing that might help her sort this out.

  She jumped at the sound of an owl hooting close by. The moon had disappeared again, and the blackness made it impossible to see. Leaves rustled behind her, and the snap of a twig made her freeze.

  Stay calm, stay calm, she repeated over and over, but she barely heard herself over the pounding of her heart. Slowly she backed to the edge of the road. The swollen creek rushed in the blackness below her. Another snap of a twig. The moon reappeared in time to catch the shadow of a dark, thick form moving straight at her. She screamed and stumbled backward, over the edge.

  She caught the branch of a bush, struggled to hold on. The creek rose in the blackness below her like the open jaws of a great monster. Above her the dark form closed in.

  The branch snapped off, and she cried out as she slid down another foot before grabbing on to a rock. Her boots slipped in the damp earth, and she heard the sound of rocks and dirt falling into the water below.

  “Don’t let her get away, dammit! Kill her if you have to, but don’t let her get away.” Rain pelted her, lightning flashed, illuminating the man’s face above her. It was the devil himself, with angry dark eyes. He grabbed her arms, pulled her toward him…she struck out at him…

  She fell…

  “Sarah!”

  She fought against the hands that held her, struggled with every ounce of strength she had, but he was too strong, too determined. He pulled her upward, away from the creek and rocks below. Desperate, she lunged at him and sank her teeth into his knuckles.

  “Sarah, dammit, stop! It’s me, Caleb!”

  Caleb?

  She released her hold. Caleb? Confused, she went limp, then felt his strong, warm body against hers as he pulled her into his arms. They tumbled back onto the road together. She cried out again as Wolf barked, then licked her face. The animal reluctantly obeyed when Caleb ordered him to sit.

  “What in the hell were you thinking?” he said raggedly, dragging her closer to him. His breathing matched hers, hard and heavy. She rested her forehead against his chest, felt the pounding of his heart.

  “You can’t take me to that man,” she gasped between breaths.

  “I won’t.” He held her closer.

  Relief poured through her. She burrowed her face against his neck, drawing strength from his masculine scent.

  “Sarah, we’ve got to get back to the cabin. It’s going to rain.”

  She shook her head and twisted her fingers into the lapels of his jacket. “Caleb, you’ve got to listen to me.”

  “I won’t take you to him,” he repeated. “You have my word.”

  “No, you don’t understand.” She pulled away from him. “My memory, who I am,” she said, her voice shaking. “I remember. I remember everything.”

  Six

  “My name is Sarah Jane Grayson. I’m twenty-six years old, and I’m a librarian at the Los Angeles County Library. I live at 5234 Bedford in Valencia and I drive a blue Honda.”

  Rain hammered on the roof, and an occasional crack of thunder shook the walls. They’d been caught in the initial downpour and had been soaking wet by the time they’d gotten back to the cabin. Sarah had changed into her skirt and one of Caleb’s white shirts, and he’d put on dry jeans and a flannel shirt. Sitting by the fire now, with Caleb beside her, Sarah felt safer than she had in a very long time.

  “Several days ago,” she went on, “three FBI agents came to my apartment, asking about a friend of mine, Robert Burke, an art journalist I dated and often helped with research at the library. Robert was killed three weeks ago—a hit-and-run accident. Or at least I thought it was an accident. Now I’m not so sure.”

  Caleb handed her a glass of whiskey. She took a sip, then coughed as the liquid burned a fiery trail down her throat. “I don’t usually drink,” she gasped.

  He raised a brow. “You don’t say.”

  She smiled. “My grandmother didn’t approve of the spirits…in any form. You were right, by the way. I was raised in South Carolina until I was eleven, and my family moved to California. My parents were killed in a car accident when I was fourteen, and I went to live with my grandmother, but Granny got sick shortly after that, and I took care of her until she passed away six months ago. I moved into a small house of my own and felt like a little kid again, scared and excited all at the same time. I even bought a bottle of champagne, though I’m sure Granny turned over in her grave because of it.”

  Caleb shook his head. “Quite the rebel, aren’t you?”

  Sarah knew he was making fun of her, but she was so happy to have her memory back, to have a name and a past, she didn’t care. “As a matter of fact—” she lifted her chin “—I drank half the bottle.”

  His expression was dubious. “And?”

  “And I was
sick all night, of course.”

  He took the glass from her and set it on the hearth. “Tell me about the agents.”

  She nodded grimly. “They wanted me to come in for questioning. The one who did all the talking was Howard, Special Agent Victor Howard. Tall, short blond hair, maybe around forty.”

  “That’s our man,” Caleb said tightly.

  “He wanted to talk to me about Robert. I told him I was leaving in the morning for Mexico. After Robert’s death, I realized how uncertain life really is and I decided to do something daring and go on an exotic vacation by myself. It was my first real vacation since Granny had taken ill. Actually, it was the only vacation I’d ever planned. My bags were packed, I’d rented a little house on the beach in Puerto Vallarta. I’d even bought my first bikini.” She laughed at herself, then looked away. “A real woman of the world, huh?”

  Caleb knew there were women who selflessly gave up their own lives, sacrificed their own wants and needs for loved ones; he’d just never met one. For the first time in his life he felt truly humbled.

  “Agent Howard was insistent,” she said, continuing. “He assured me he’d have me back in time to get a good night’s sleep, and I couldn’t very well say no to the FBI, could I?”

  Sure you could, Caleb thought. He’d done it dozens of times. But he also understood how easy it was to intimidate a civilian. Especially a young, single female. He wasn’t exactly proud of it, but he’d done it himself more than once. If Howard had wanted to bring her in, there was nothing Sarah could have done to stop him.

  “What happened then?” he asked.

  “He said we were going to his headquarters so he could take an official statement, but he just kept driving. When he turned off into the mountains, I questioned him, but he just smiled and said that his division in the FBI had an office up there.”

  A flash of lightning illuminated the cabin, and a roll of thunder rattled the windows. Sarah jumped, and instinctively Caleb slipped a hand over her shoulders. She drew in a sharp breath and relaxed again.

  “It started to rain hard,” she said, her voice strained and quiet. “Agent Howard was driving, and I was in the front seat with him. The other two agents were in the back seat. It was creepy. The bigger one, with straight brown hair and squinty eyes, he frightened me the most, but neither one of them ever said a word, they just stared at me. There was something in their eyes, something in the way they were looking at me, as if they knew some secret about me that pleased them.”