Hidden Identity (Harlequin Intrigue)

by Alice Sharpe

  “Would they be behind something like this?” Bill asked.

  “Not consciously, not any more than Lindy would be,” Adam said. “I can’t guarantee one of them didn’t mention our coming here to someone else, but it seems unlikely.”

  Bill sighed. “Either which way, this isn’t a good place for Chelsea.”

  Where was a good place? Adam wondered. Hell if he knew. He glanced at what was left of the truck he’d bought the day before. It had suffered right along with the trailer. They were going to have to hitch a ride or hike out of here. And how long would it be before Holton thought of another attack plan from his prison cell? The only good thing Adam could think of was that no one would know where they were once they left this property. No talkative sisters or suspicious US Marshals—no one. That should provide some margin of safety.

  “I have all the help I need,” Bill said, and then turning to Chelsea, he added, “Will you go see how Jan is doing?”

  “Of course.”

  As she moved away Bill dug in his pocket, withdrew a key and handed it to Adam.

  “What is this for?” Adam asked.

  “Jan’s old van. She wants you to have it. It’s got Montana plates and is registered to her under her maiden name so no one will connect it to you.”

  “I can’t—”

  “I want you to get my sister out of here,” Bill interrupted. “Take her far away. That’s what Jan and I both want, and before you get all dewy-eyed about our generous gift, you should know the van has almost three hundred thousand miles on it and burns oil like there’s no tomorrow. Take it. Go before we dig the grave and...well, Chelsea doesn’t need to see that.”

  “No, she doesn’t,” Adam agreed.

  * * *

  “CAR NUMBER THREE,” Chelsea said as they drove away from her brother’s property.

  The creaks and groans, to say nothing of the tired shocks, gave the green van the aura of a carnival ride.

  “You know what they say,” Adam told her. “Third time’s the charm.”

  “Where are we headed?” Chelsea asked when they hit the main highway two hours later.

  “I’m not sure,” Adam said. “Up until now, my priority has been to get you someplace safe and then disappear.”

  “My parents—”

  “Really?” he interrupted with a swift glance her way.

  “No,” she said. “There’s no point in going there.”

  “Bill called your folks before we left his place,” Adam told her. “He wanted to check about Lindy. They admitted they got the family together and shared Bill’s news about your safety and that you were going to be at your brother’s house. They were all getting ready to drive to Nevada to collect you.”

  “They’ll kill me with love,” Chelsea said.

  “And not know they were doing it,” Adam added.

  “What about Florida?” she asked.

  “You’d be willing to run away with me? You’d be breaking several laws, you know. False ID, no passport.”

  “I shot a man yesterday and killed one today,” she said quietly. The reality of killing a man had been settling over her heart like a shroud, growing heavier as the hours passed.

  Adam covered her hand with his and squeezed it. “You didn’t have a choice,” he said.

  She nodded. As bad as killing someone felt, sitting there lamenting a necessary act seemed self-indulgent, even selfish, especially as Adam had fired the shot that ended the siege and ultimately saved them all.

  He pulled into a gas station a few minutes later and they topped off the tank, added two quarts of oil to the gluttonous engine and bought sandwiches in the attached deli. They mutually decided to eat while they kept driving.

  The hours piled up as they headed south, skirting Vegas, the world reduced to a million stars and broad stretches of empty land where the moonlight illuminated it. Sometime later, Adam’s voice shook Chelsea from a half-dreamlike state, where she’d been lazing on a rope swing located inside her brother’s chicken coop. She blinked a few times to reenter reality.

  “We’re both exhausted,” he said.

  She couldn’t argue that.

  “There’s a motel up ahead. Let’s get a room—two if you want—and try to get some sleep.”

  “One room,” she said emphatically. She was not going to sit alone in a dark locked room, not tonight.

  “Sounds good.”

  The motel was one of those long chains of connected rooms fronted with a swimming pool. A few motley-looking palms rustled in the slight breeze. Truthfully, Chelsea didn’t care what kind of motel it was as long as it wasn’t green, had beds and didn’t move.

  They checked in, paid cash, parked in front of unit 101 and took their meager possessions inside the room. Chelsea slumped onto a chair, and Adam sprawled across the bed.

  After a while, they took turns showering. Dressed in clean clothes, they crawled beneath blessedly white sheets. For a few minutes, images of the day flashed in Chelsea’s head like photographs. When Adam cleared his throat, she turned in his direction.

  “You didn’t get the answers to any of your questions today like we planned,” he said.

  “I met my brother and his wife,” she said. Speaking into the dark room without the benefit of seeing his expression actually made talking easier. “He didn’t really know you, though.”

  “I warned you about that,” Adam said. “So, ask me anything you want or I can just start at the beginning and tell you the absolute factual truth of everything I know about you and everything you know—knew—about me.”

  She considered his question for several seconds. “You’re willing to be honest and forthright without fear of how it may make me or yourself look?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why now?”

  “Because it’s time. And because it looks as though you’re stuck with me. I can’t protect you if you’re not close and yet when you’re close, I almost get you killed. Seems to me like you deserve to know whatever you want. But on the other hand, I have to warn you there’s enough...information for you to absorb that it might hit you like an overload. Doc told me that one reason you might have this amnesia is because there’s a part of you that doesn’t want to remember everything, that you may be protecting yourself from...pain.”

  “From what you know of my life, is that a possibility?” she asked after a moment spent thinking about this comment.

  “Yes,” he said softly. “And that’s why I’m giving you the option of asking questions and learning what you want at whatever pace you’re comfortable with.”

  She thought for a second. “We were lovers,” she stated baldly.

  “Yes.”

  “I knew it,” she whispered. “I’ve always known it.”

  “You see—” he began, but she reached over and pressed her fingers against his lips.

  “Not tonight,” she said. “I want every detail, all at once. I want to know exactly who and what I am and what my past and future look like. But I killed a guy today and I almost died and that’s a lot to assimilate. If we’re driving to Florida, we’re going to have a lot of time in that green van. Time to talk and think. I’d like to wait until tomorrow, Adam.”

  “Are you sure? I’ve been dragging my feet. Today underlined the stupidity of that. You can handle anything.”

  “Do you think so?” she asked softly.

  The bed creaked as he turned on his side. She felt his face move close to hers. “I know so,” he whispered. “You’re an amazing woman, Chelsea Ann Pierce, whether you know it or not...you’re special, unique.”

  “Those sound like words spoken by a man who cares about a woman,” she whispered.

  His lips brushed her forehead. “That’s because they are,” he said.

  She willed him to find her mouth with his, and as his warm breath caressed her s
kin, her heartbeat tripled. “Prove it,” she said, unable to resist the temptation that seethed between them like molten lava. Something had changed that day, some mountain had been topped, a river forded—something had given way under the pressure of their experiences and left them in this bed, facing each other on a more level playing field than ever.

  His lips finally touched hers, his perpetually short beard pleasantly brisk against her skin. The kiss lit a firecracker, sparked an explosion that cascaded into more as his hands slipped up under her T-shirt to caress her breasts. Another firecracker heralded the removal of her T-shirt and then the pink thong, and as she freed him of his boxers, they were at last naked together, alone, vulnerable and suddenly so in tune with each other they began to merge into one being.

  His erection was hot and throbbing in her hand. He gently pushed her onto her back and started kissing and sucking every square inch of her from her mouth to her throat, down to her breasts, to her belly, where his hands stroked her skin. He kissed her a hundred times between navel and pelvic bone as though treasuring that most female part of her body. When he found the center of her desire, she all but jumped out of her skin. He slid inside of her with gentle urgency as they easily fell into an ageless rolling rhythm, mouths locked together, breathing labored, her hands digging into the wonderful flesh of his butt, wanting him closer, wanting to absorb him. The thought of him ever leaving her created a second of anxiety, but that disappeared as he worked his magic. When they climbed to a crescendo it felt as if the motel must have surely rocked on its foundation.

  When it was over, it still wasn’t over. Within a few moments, he’d started kissing her again, slowly this time, thoroughly, discovering places that sent her soaring just as she investigated the miracle of his body with her hands and mouth. His muscles delighted her fingertips, his earlobes were delectable. She felt she could kiss his eyelids and cheekbones forever, smooth his fine hair away from his forehead until time stopped, luxuriate in the delight of his head buried in her throat, his heartbeat so strong it traveled right through his skin into her body. She knew they had done all this before, she could tell—they weren’t carnal strangers. In fact, Adam Parish was the only real person in the world to Chelsea—everyone else from Doc Fisher to the bad guys to her brother seemed to be actors who took their few moments on the stage and then shuffled off.

  Adam was real. Adam was permanent.

  Eventually, spent and replete, they fell asleep in each other’s arms.

  Chelsea awoke around midnight. Adam’s breathing was deep and even, his relaxed, heavy arm warm across her stomach. She laid there awhile, content in a way she hadn’t been in her short memory, unafraid, ready to face the truths tomorrow would bring.

  The minutes on the illuminated bedside table continued to pass and instead of growing sleepier, she grew more and more awake. Finally, she carefully moved his arm aside and slid to the edge of the bed. The springs creaked as she got to her feet but Adam’s breathing didn’t change. She smiled as she crossed the room to the bathroom, flicked on the light, closed the door behind her and washed her face.

  Leaving the door ajar so a little light would spill into the bedroom, she found her discarded underwear and put it back on. Next she searched the bag that functioned as her suitcase and the brush she’d bought at the pharmacy. She went back into the bathroom to work the tangles from her hair. When she grabbed a towel, she accidentally knocked the clothes Adam had left draped over the towel rack to the ground.

  Leaning over to retrieve things, her attention was caught by a small gold foil card wrapped inside a wrinkled receipt. The receipt was from the last gas station they’d visited. The card was a little battered, as though it had been stuffed somewhere and folded more times than intended. Without pausing to consider whether or not she should read it, she did just that.

  “‘My beloved Steven,’” she whispered. “‘I think I know the location of the cabin you described the night you asked me to marry you. My plan is to drop these roses in the nearby river as a way of letting you go. I don’t want to do this but the reality is you’re dead. I’ll never stop loving you just as I wonder if I’ll ever understand what really happened to you or why that man from the government asked me a million questions but wouldn’t answer even one of mine. Sometimes it feels as though I’m grieving a shadow. Goodbye, my love. Rest in peace knowing I will move heaven and earth to make a wonderful life for our baby. Yours forever, Chelsea.’”

  It was dated the day of the crash. On numb feet, she left the bathroom and moved like a wraith to the small desk. She picked up the courtesy pen and found the small notepad. She wrote “Goodbye, my love.” Before she’d finished the sentence, she knew she’d written the note.

  Of course she’d written the note. She’d been the woman on the chopper. She tore the paper from the pad and tore it into pieces.

  Wait, where was this baby she mentioned? And who was Steven?

  She walked back into the bathroom, flushed the shredded paper and turned sideways to run her hand over the small swelling in her belly that she had attributed to her body type. The baby was inside of her, growing.

  That realization left her dizzy and she sat down on the edge of the tub. Adam had asked her over and over again if she was bleeding anywhere, if she hurt. He’d cautioned her about lifting heavy things and tonight, when they made love, he’d caressed her abdomen with such tenderness she’d noticed it despite the burning passion racing through her veins.

  He knew. He knew she was pregnant and he hadn’t told her. That meant Doc probably knew, too, and that’s why he’d asked those questions when he examined her. Maybe even her brother knew—everyone knew about her baby but her!

  What had happened to Steven, the man she’d apparently adored? Was his death the reason she couldn’t remember anything? Was she scared to face the pain that painted every word in the note she’d written?

  And when had Adam really come into the picture? Had he and Steven both loved her, both wanted her? Was it possible Adam killed Steven to achieve his goal? Would a man really go that far to win an ordinary woman like her?

  She picked the foil card from the floor and read it again.

  Maybe he would. She’d imagined herself capable of stalking Adam—was it so far-fetched to think he might have been stalking her? Could he have killed Steven to get what he wanted? Was he some kind of psychopath? Was the baby she carried Steven’s or had Adam and she—?

  How could she know? Adam would tell her what he wanted her to believe. He’d been doing that from the start—he’d as much as admitted it.

  She recoiled at the thought of thinking these things about him, unwilling to believe the man she’d just given heart and soul to an hour before, the man she’d felt she instinctively knew down to his core could actually be her nemesis instead of her savior.

  And yet all along, she’d known she’d too readily accepted the world as he presented it. She’d attempted to fight the temptation to fit into the niche he created, but she hadn’t fought hard enough.

  She stood abruptly and grabbed his jeans, looking for his wallet and identification, suddenly wondering if his name was even Adam Parish. The wallet wasn’t there and she recalled the way he tucked it away every night. She’d thought he was protecting it from invaders of some kind—was he really just protecting it from her?

  Sneaking back into the room, she pulled on shoes, jeans and a sweater and visually gave the room a quick search. She didn’t see the wallet but what did it matter? He’d bought a car using that ID, Doc Fisher had called him by that name—what would seeing it on a license mean at this point?

  She closed her hand around the van keys on the desk and opened the outside door. For a second she stared back at the bed, at the slumbering man. A huge part of her wanted to wake him up and demand explanations.

  But she knew he would tell her whatever he believed she wanted to hear and she also suspected she would
convince herself to be satisfied with that—for a while at least. The only way this would ever be resolved was to regain her memory of Steven, the helicopter, the roses, the baby...Adam. This was something she was going to have to do herself.

  Closing the motel room door was like stepping on her own heart. She wasn’t sure where she was going, just that she had to get away.

  Chapter Ten

  For one blissful moment Adam felt totally at peace. He opened his eyes with anticipation, anxious to see Chelsea. It was a small room and she wasn’t in it. Getting up, he pulled on the boxers that had wound up on the floor and walked to the bathroom, where he could now see the door was ajar.

  Tapping on it, he called her name. “Chelsea? Are you all right? May I come in?”

  There was no answer. Alarmed now that she might be sick or have fainted, he opened the door wide and stood there for a second looking at the empty room, taking in the fact his jeans and shirt had fallen from the towel rack, but nothing else seemed amiss.

  He draped his clothes back on the towel rack, wondering why the fact they’d fallen alarmed him. He always took his wallet out of his pants at night, was determined to guard that damning picture of him and Chelsea in San Francisco. He trotted back into the room, opened the closet and took his wallet from the highest shelf, where he’d shoved it under a stack of extra bedding.

  The wallet held the photo, just as it always did. Today he would use that picture and the foil card she’d included with her flowers to help explain to her his true identity and what they had meant to each other—

  The thought sent a shiver through his heart. Where was the card?

  It wasn’t in his wallet. He must have taken it out when he bought oil for the van—it was bulky and a pain in the neck to shove into the wallet’s limited space. He would have stuffed it in his jeans pocket.

  He almost ran back to the bathroom, but he knew with every step that the card wasn’t there. Chelsea must have found it.

  What would she think?

  He pulled on his clothes then scanned the table for the van keys. When he didn’t see them, he opened the motel door.