by Kristy Tate
#
Without a lot to do, Zach fought his boredom by searching Charlie’s phone. He smiled at all her photos, laughed as he looked at her Facebook page, and chuckled at her amusing tweets and Instagram posts. He was half in love with her and he barely knew her.
He dropped the phone guiltily when she entered his room. Immediately, he knew something was wrong because she kept her face averted and refused to meet his gaze. He eased off the bed and placed himself in front of her. A cold breeze blew through the opening of his hospital gown, but he didn’t care. He placed his finger beneath her chin and forced her to meet his gaze.
“You’ve been crying.”
She blinked her watery eyes at him and lied, “No, I haven’t.”
He nodded and his heart lurched. “Is it Megan?” Charlie had introduced him to the kids on the pediatric floor the day before and he’d immediately fallen under their spell. He understood why Charlie didn’t want to leave them.
“Lincoln?” he pressed.
She sniffed, pulled away from him, and fussed over his lunch tray. “It’s not any of the kids.”
“Then what is it?”
“It’s Kirk,” she said.
“Dr. Pompous Palmer?”
“He’s not pompous.”
“I beg to differ.”
“Why does everyone hate him?”
“I don’t hate him.” Zach went back to his bed. “At least, I didn’t until he made you cry.”
“He didn’t make me cry. No one can make another person cry.”
“Bull hockey.”
“Bull hockey? What are you, ninety?”
He shrugged. “You told me your mom has a strict no-swearing policy. I’m just practicing for when I meet her.”
A smile played on her lips. “When are you going to meet my mom?”
“That’s completely up to you.”
She gave herself a little shake. “Well, it can’t be anytime soon. She and my dad are going fishing with Uncle Mel.”
“Dad-burnit!”
She grinned. “How many archaic cuss words do you know?”
“Quite a few, actually. Football players have notorious potty mouths.”
“What did your brother say?” She deftly changed the subject.
“You didn’t tell me what the dastardly doctor did.”
“And I’m not going to.”
“Then I’m not going to tell you about my brother…or how my mom has moved to Australia.”
“Fair enough.” She sat down next to him on the bed. “Do you have someplace to go?”
“There’s an address on my driver’s license. I assume I live there.”
“Want to google it?”
“I already tried. It’s in a gated community. Here.” He used the phone to pull up his address, but Google Maps only showed a blurry aerial shot. “I live in the red dot.”
“Three Crowns. I love that neighborhood!”
He tried to hold the phone steady, but to his mortification, his hand shook. He dropped the phone to hide his jitters. “You know, as long as I’m here, I feel safe. The hospital has security and I’ve got that goon positioned at the door. But once I leave…I’m not sure what I’ll find.”
Charlie’s face paled. “Oh my gosh! Do you think someone is trying to kill you?”
“No. Why would I?”
“You said yourself that you feel revulsion every time you think of Eva and Clive. Maybe they tried to kill you!”
“Clive is my best friend.” He felt ill. “I’ve known him since kindergarten.”
“And you used to be close to your brother.”
He swallowed and once again tried to revive his memories. Nothing. Was it that he couldn’t remember? Or that he didn’t want to?
#
“This is ridiculous!” a woman exclaimed. “He’s going to have to talk to us at some point!”
Charlie stuck her head around the corner and spotted Eva, Clive, Layla, and Kirk at the nurses’ station—three of her (now) least favorite people congregating. She wrestled between her desires to leave such unpleasantness and stay and eavesdrop—for Zach’s sake.
Last night, as she’d huddled in bed with the latest Greta Boris novel, she couldn’t help wonder if she’d stumbled into a murder mystery of her own. Had Zach fallen first and hit his head second? Or had someone hit him on the head first and he’d fallen second?
Neither Clive, with his mop of curly hair and winning smile, nor Eva, with her runway model beauty, looked like a killer. But countless murder mysteries had taught Charlie that murderers came in all shapes and sizes.
“I am his fiancée,” Eva insisted.
“We have to respect the patient’s request for privacy,” Kirk said. “Right now, he needs to focus on healing. Upsetting him would be counterproductive. He needs peace and quiet.”
Eva harrumphed and stormed down the hall. She breezed past Charlie and left a whiff of Chanel No. 5 hanging in the air. Clive, like an obedient dog, trailed after her.
“Charlie.”
Her back stiffened when Kirk said her name. “Yes,” she responded in a surprisingly normal voice.
“Can you prep the discharge for Zach Walden?” He gave her the smile that had melted her toes since she was a child, but instead of the warm gush of infatuation she typically felt after receiving one of his smiles, she felt disgust. Not with him—well, maybe a little bit with him—but more with Layla. What did he see in her? She was silly, vain, and only liked to talk about reality TV shows. She couldn’t understand why Layla had chosen the medical field unless she’d been pressured by her family. Layla was like a jockey pretending to be an offensive lineman.
But were Layla’s reasons any better than Charlie’s? After all, she’d decided to become a nurse just so she could be near Kirk.
“Sure thing,” Charlie said, wishing she’d gone to med school just so she wouldn’t have to take instructions from Kirk.
#
Charlie breezed into Zach’s room. He stood by the window, gazing out at the ocean. He had broad shoulders and strong legs. Even when injured, he possessed an energetic grace that had probably grown from his years of athletic training.
He turned to face her. His front side was just as lovely as his backside. He’d obviously recently showered because he wore shorts and a plain white T-shirt that offset his tan and striking blue eyes. His leather boots looked out of place in the hospital.
“Good news!” she announced. “You’re going home.” Their eyes locked. “Ready to go?” Her voice caught, but she didn’t know why.
He nodded. “Want to come with me?”
“I can’t. I have to work.”
“When’s the end of your shift?”
She glanced at her watch. “Well, actually, soon.” Her heart began to beat faster. Chiding herself, she willed her heartrate to slow. What was her problem?
“Then what’s the problem?” he echoed her thoughts with a grin.
CHAPTER 3
Zach stood in the center of his living room. “I live here?” The 1920s cottage just steps from the beach looked adorable on the outside with its dormer windows and steel blue shutters and trim, but inside it looked barren and stark: gray slate floors, sleek leather seating, a chrome and glass dining set, mirrored walls that reflected the window’s ocean view. He scanned the room, looking for signs of himself—personal photographs, books he’d read, anything to remind him of the person he’d become. “I feel like I’m Scrooge in A Christmas Carol visiting with the ghost of what’s yet to come.”
“It’s a beautiful house,” Charlie said.
“It’s cold.”
“Well, let’s heat it up.”
“It’s not physically cold.” Although it sort of was.
Charlie strode across the room, her soft-soled shoes almost silent on the slate floor, and turned on the gas for the fireplace.
BOOM! Flames shot out of the fireplace.
Charlie jumped into Zach’s arms and he held her close, feeling her hea
rt beat against his.
“Wow. That was unexpected,” he said in a trembling voice.
Charlie, clearly shaken, nodded.
Gently, he set her aside and studied the inferno that used to be his fireplace. The magnificent red, yellow, and golden flames raged, snapped, and popped. “I have to turn off the gas, but I don’t know how to reach the knob.” He stepped forward, but Charlie grabbed his arm and sunk her fingers into his flesh.
“There has to be a way to shut off the gas to the house,” she said.
“I’m sure there is,” he said. “I’ll just shut it off, then turn the knob to the fireplace.”
Charlie bit her lip. “I don’t think you should stay in this house.”
“You don’t think this was just an accident?”
She stared at him with her large brown eyes. “Like your accident on your hike? You should check into a hotel.”
He shook his head. “I don’t want to run and hide.”
“Just until your memory returns.”
“But what if it doesn’t?”
She was quiet for a moment and then blurted out, “You can stay at my grandparents’ cabin in Big Bear!” as if the idea had just struck her.
“Big Bear?”
“Yes. It’s deep in the woods, remote. Empty. No one will think to look for you there.”
“I don’t—”
She cut him off. “You don’t have to decide right now but you do have to turn that off!” She pointed at the raging fire.
“The gas meter is probably outside or in the garage.”
“You’ll need a wrench or something. Do you have tools?”
“I don’t know. I know I didn’t have any when I was playing football.”
She nodded. “Let’s go look in the garage.”
“No, I’ll go and look. You stay here and make sure this doesn’t get out of control—or more out of control. If it does, call the fire department.”
#
Charlie sat down on the sofa and watched the fire. After a few moments, the flames subsided, flickered, and died. The once-white marble mantel was now smudged black with soot. The mirror above was smoking, its frame warped from heat.
“You found the shut-off valve,” she said when Zach came back into the room.
He nodded before plopping onto the sofa beside her. “And met a neighbor, who obviously doesn’t like me.”
“Why do you say that?”
“When I said hi, she snorted and slammed her door.”
Charlie rubbed his back. “Don’t let it bother you.”
He ran his fingers through his hair and then braced his hands on his knees. “What sort of person am I that my neighbors hate me and my best friend and fiancée are trying to kill me?”
“We don’t know that.”
He sighed. “When can we go to your grandparents’ cabin?”
“First thing tomorrow morning?”
He nodded, but looked unsure.
“You’ll be okay here by yourself?”
He swallowed audibly, but nodded and said, “Of course.”
#
As soon as Charlie left, a dark and heavy depression fell over Zach. He wandered around his house, picking up objects and setting them back down, wondering when and where he had bought them and why. He looked in his refrigerator at the collection of water bottles, a wedge of gouda, a few apples, a carton of eggs.
He should have offered to make Charlie dinner. She’d done so much for him—and was offering to do so much more. He promised himself he’d make it up to her. If he was as rich as everyone said he was, he could easily compensate her.
She’d offered to take him to her grandparents’ cabin and had asked for nothing in return.
His gaze flicked to his computer. He’d like to turn it on, but he didn’t know any of his passwords. He flexed his fingers, thinking back to his college days when he’d studied computer science. Surely, he could hack into his own accounts.
But then, as he put his fingers on the keys, they typed in the password automatically. As an athlete, he knew all about muscle memory, the memories stored in your brain that are like a bank of frequently enacted tasks for your muscles. When he was playing ball, he would practice over and over again so that his muscles could respond without thought.
How sad to think that his muscles knew more about his day-to-day life than his conscious mind.
#
On her way home that night, Charlie stopped by her cousin Madelaine’s consignment shop and told her the plan. Madelaine had taken over Dotty’s Dresses from their grandmother and both girls had worked there since high school. Years before that, they’d liked to play dress-up with the clothes that came in. They had draped themselves in the costume jewelry, tugged on the elbow-length gloves, tottered around on high heels, and posed in front of the floor-length gilded mirrors. When they’d been involved in the community theater, the shop had been a treasure trove for the costumes, but since Maddie’s graduation from business school and their grandmother’s semi-retirement, the shop had undergone a revival.
Charlie sometimes missed the boxes of clothes and towers of shoes, but she had to admit that the shop did look much sleeker and vogue since Maddie had taken over. Maddie’s décor, like her own personal style, was decidedly understated and sparse. She’d rolled up the tapestry rugs, swept the shop clean, and wiped the cobwebs off the mammoth chandelier.
“You’re nuts!” Maddie now said. “Taking a hot billionaire up to your family’s cabin to make Kirk jealous is craziness.”
Of course, Charlie hadn’t expected Maddie to approve, but she had hoped Maddie could help her find a jacket.
“No,” Charlie said. “I’m taking Zach up to the cabin so he can recuperate from his head injury in peace and quiet…and safety.” She threw a sly smile over her shoulder at Maddie as she rifled through the racks of clothes. “The fact that Kirk and Layla are going to be there is just coincidental.”
“There’s nothing coincidental about you and Kirk.”
Charlie sighed. “I know, right? Fate keeps throwing us together, but he’s missing the point. He can’t really like Layla, can he?”
Maddie lounged on a purple velvet chaise and balanced a laptop on her lap. “He must, or else he wouldn’t be kissing her in the supply closet or inviting her to Big Bear.”
Charlie rubbed her forehead as if she could scrub away the painful memory of Kirk and Layla making out.
“If Zach really thinks someone is trying to kill him, he should go to the police,” Maddie said.
“I agree, but it’s his decision, not mine.”
“And you shouldn’t put yourself in danger!”
Charlie held up a sweater for Maddie’s approval. “It’s hard to believe it might actually snow in the mountains.”
“Tell me about Zach,” Maddie said, “and I’ll show you the sweetest angora sweater I found yesterday.” Maddie liked to scour local thrift shops and online outlets for what she called ‘fashion and fortune fodder.’
“It’s so sad,” Charlie said. “He really can’t remember anything that’s happened in the last seven years. His CAT scan didn’t show any signs of intracranial bleeding, so that’s good. The doctors think his memory could return at any moment. Although in that movie, The Vow, the woman never did regain her memory.”
“That would be tragic,” Maddie said. “Just imagine if I couldn’t remember meeting Sean…my wedding, all my happy memories gone.”
“But Zach’s not you. Maybe he has things he wants to forget.”
“Well, that’s even sadder.” Maddie cocked her head and studied Charlie. “So, you’re not even a little bit attracted to him?”
“Oh, he’s hot!” Charlie said with a laugh. “But you know where my heart lies.”
Maddie rolled her eyes.
#
“Are you sure no one in your family is going to mind my hanging out at your grandparents’ cabin?” Zach asked as he slung his overnight bag into the back seat of Charlie’s Corolla.
“I’m positive.” Charlie climbed behind the wheel, so Zach slid into the passenger side, closed the door, and clipped on the seatbelt.
He wasn’t used to not being the one behind the wheel and being a passenger made him nervous. In fact, everything about his situation made him nervous.
She put the key in the ignition and turned the engine. “My grandparents are in Prescott, Arizona.”
“With your Uncle Mel.”
“And Aunt Mindy.”
The Corolla coasted up the street and rolled to a stop at the gates. Zach waited until they were on the Pacific Coast Highway before asking, “And your band of brothers?”
“They only come up if there’s snow so they can ski, and since there’s no snow, we’re good.”
“Tell me about them,” Zach said.
She flashed him a quick glance. “Ben, he’s the oldest. He’s an attorney and married to Jeanine. They have three really sweet kids and one wild Golden Retriever named Blondie. Jacob is a computer guy and he’s married to Lisa and they have two little boys. Dan got his MBA and works for a finance company. He’s dating a girl named Steph—but no one else in the family knows that. And Josh is in Europe trying to find himself.”
“I would love to meet them.”
“No, you wouldn’t.”
“Why do you say that?” He studied her profile. She was really pretty, but the odd thing was, she didn’t seem to know it. “I can tell from the change in the tone of your voice when you talk about them that you must really love them. Why wouldn’t I want to meet these loveable people?”
Her laugh sounded grim. “They’re loving to me. But to the guys I bring home? Not so much.” She flushed a pretty shade of pink. “Not that I’m bringing you home.”
“You’re being extraordinarily kind. I really don’t think I’m in any danger. If I am, I should go to the police.” But for a reason he couldn’t define, he didn’t want to do that. He rubbed his forehead, wishing for about the millionth time that his memory would return. “You didn’t have to drive me all the way there. I have my own car, you know.”