Part 7 (2/2)
”Do you you think you're crazy?” think you're crazy?”
She hesitated, but only for a second. ”No. I think.... I don't know what to think.”
He doubted that. She had a theory, she just wasn't ready to voice it, probably because it was so off-the-wall. Nor was he sure he was ready to hear it.
”Has your memory ever come back after one of these blanks before?”
She shook her head. ”Only the birth of my baby. If it's really a memory.”
But she had remembered something else. She'd remembered that he drank Glenlivet Scotch straight. It was a small thing, but it made him wonder if her memory wasn't coming back and that was why she'd come to him. Again. He hoped to h.e.l.l he was right.
But the question was, what had caused her memory loss in the first place?
”How long do these memory lapses last?” he asked.
She shrugged. ”They vary. Usually I just sense holes in my memory. Time has pa.s.sed but I can't remember what happened during that time-obviously something when you realize you're pregnant and yet can't remember even meeting a man, let alone....” She looked away, seeming embarra.s.sed. ”That's why it's so hard for me to believe that the memories of the birth were real. I'd never remembered anything, not even vaguely.”
”Maybe it was the trauma that caused you to remember,” he suggested, wanting to believe something was spurring the return of her memory.
”Or maybe it was love? I wanted this baby more than anything. I'm sure that seems odd to you, considering that I don't know who the baby's father is. But while I can remember nothing of those missing months, I have a good feeling about the man who-” She broke off and took a drink of her cola.
She had a good feeling about him? Is that why subconsciously she'd known to hire him to find the baby? Their baby?
Or was she pulling his string? The thought had crossed his mind, especially in light of the day he'd had. He didn't trust anyone. He was even beginning to question his own instincts.
”I don't know what is real anymore,” she said, sounding close to tears as she got up to refill his gla.s.s. He hadn't even realized he'd drained it. ”Just that I have to find my baby. And save her.”
He watched her go to the bar again, wondering what she had to save her baby from. And knew she had to be wondering the same thing. He started. ”Her?”
Holly didn't respond.
He watched her turn. Her eyes were vacant, her face ashen. ”Holly?”
He'd known a boy in school who was epileptic. Rather than seizures, he had lapses where he would just zone out for short periods of time. Looking at Holly now, he was reminded of that boy.
”Holly?”
She blinked, her eyes luminous and filled with fear as her gaze came back into focus. ”I said her,” she whispered, sounding scared. ”Oh, I remember her.”
He waited, almost afraid of what she'd say.
”During the delivery, something was wrong. They were rus.h.i.+ng around, frantic. I tried to see what was going on. I thought something was wrong with my baby.” Tears welled in her eyes. ”One of them left the room. When the door opened, I heard another woman, another patient. She sounded as if she was in labor.”
She looked down at the gla.s.s of Glenlivet in her hand as if she couldn't remember how it got there, then handed it to him. But instead of returning to her chair and her cola, she walked into the studio.
He sat for a moment, not sure if he should follow her. To his surprise, she returned a moment later, carrying a large canvas. He knew without seeing the painted side what it was. He could tell by the way she held it, the way she frowned down at the work in her hands.
”That's why I believed the room was soundproofed,” she said more to herself than to him as she propped the painting against the wall and moved back to stare at it.
The light cast an eerie glow over the acrylic monsters huddled around the delivery-room scene. He was filled with even more dread each time he saw the work. There was something so raw about the paint slashes, so chilling. He felt a cold draft move through the room.
The three monsters were huddled together, hunched over, waiting with obvious antic.i.p.ation, making it hard to distinguish their shapes beneath the garb they wore. They could have been men. Or women. Or just figments of Holly Barrows's nightmarish imagination.
”I remember being scared,” she continued in a hushed voice as if the walls might be listening, her gaze on that d.a.m.ned painting. ”Something was wrong with my delivery. Or my baby.” She glanced back at him, no doubt knowing what he was thinking. That all of these images could amount to nothing more than what Inez Wellington believed they did.
”I must have blanked out again. I woke to the sound of a baby crying,” she said slowly as if the memory was playing out in her head. ”I opened my eyes. My baby was lying on a small table near my bed. She was kicking her legs.” Holly turned back to him. If she was putting all of this on, she was one d.a.m.ned good actress. She must have seen his skepticism though.
”I saw saw her,” she whispered fiercely. ”She was close enough I could see her birthmark.” her,” she whispered fiercely. ”She was close enough I could see her birthmark.”
He felt a chill. ”A birthmark?”
She nodded, her gaze still glazed as if focusing inward. ”It was heart-shaped and on the calf of her right leg and...she had this little dimple in her cheek.” She blinked. ”How could I remember something like that if it wasn't real?” There was a pleading in her tone. ”How is that possible to see something so clearly, if it never happened? My baby was a little girl-not a boy-and she was alive. I saw her!”
A heart-shaped birthmark and dimples. He stared at her, his pulse pounding in his ears. The dimples were genetic; he knew that well enough. But a birthmark?
s.h.i.+vering, he reached up to rub the back of his neck, suddenly anxious to leave. But he couldn't leave without Holly. He wasn't sure what was going on. And he had no proof that anyone was after her. No more than he'd had this time last year. All he knew was that he didn't feel safe. And neither should she.
”I don't think you should stay here alone,” he said, wondering how he could convince her.
She looked at him in surprise. ”You're starting to believe me, aren't you?”
What did he believe? That she'd given birth to their baby? That monsters had stolen the baby? That the baby had dimples and a birthmark just like his twin sister Sh.e.l.ley's? And that Holly Barrows was starting to remember, not only the delivery but-him?
”Yeah,” he said as he got to his feet and walked to the window. Parting the curtains, he looked out into the empty street. He believed that the Santa on the street below his office on Christmas Eve had reported to someone that Holly Barrows's memory was returning. That meant he also believed that someone had tried to get Holly to forget.
Not that what he believed mattered in the least. Because what the h.e.l.l did he know? But he wanted to help her. How much a.s.sistance she needed was still debatable. All he knew was that he'd have a better chance of helping her if the monsters in the painting were real than if they were in her head. And if the monsters were real, then he had to find their baby-and fast. Too much time had already been lost.
He tried not to think about it. The whole thing scared the h.e.l.l out of him. Because it was so far out there. And because it didn't make any sense. If the specialists couldn't find any physical reason for her memory lapses, then that left psychological causes.
And that opened up a whole can of worms. The woman he'd met a year ago certainly had been different from this one. But a whole different personality? He didn't buy it.
”Look, let's say you're right and these...monsters stole your baby,” he said carefully. ”If they find out you're starting to remember the delivery-and them-well, I'd just feel better if you weren't alone right now.”
She seemed to study him. ”You think I should go stay with my sister-in-law?”
G.o.d, no. That couldn't be good for anyone. He didn't like the fact that Inez had talked her into committing herself. Holly seemed too smart for that. He wondered again what hold Inez had over her. ”No. I think you should come stay with me.”
He had so many questions, but he figured she didn't have any more answers than he did. And the questions could wait until he got her to Sh.e.l.ley's. He parted the curtains again, taking one last look out the window. The street was still empty, the sky clear and cold, making the fallen snow glow.
As he turned from the window, he heard a sound. ”What are you doing?” he demanded, surprised by the intensity in his voice.
She jumped and almost dropped the gla.s.s of cola in her hand, the small plastic container in the other. ”I was just going to take my pill.”
He stepped to her and took the container. ”Where did you get these?”
”It's an old prescription that Allan wrote for me. Inez had it refilled....”
<script>