Part 6 (1/2)
”Bart! Maybe you shouldn't have started this now.” Cait looked alarmed.
”Relax, Caitie. I feel fine. Better than fine.” Jerry had a lopsided grin. ”I'm relaxed for the first time since Mara attacked me, truth be told. Now what?” He held out his empty gla.s.s once more.
”I think you've had enough.” Bart took the gla.s.s and set it aside. ”Now you're going to watch me, Jerry. Follow my directions. I will tell you to do some simple things, look at my watch, count, stuff like that. It will help you relax and open your mind. Hopefully you'll remember the past years. Ready?”
Jerry wiggled his toes in dark socks then nodded. ”Go ahead. I want to remember. This empty feeling is making me crazed. This woman.” He stared at me. ”Gloriana. She seems to be someone I know.” He held up a hand when I started to protest. ”I know. I know. You are someone I know.” He looked back at Bart. ”Anyway I kissed her. Just now. Held her. Drank her blood. Sweet. Tasted, hmm, really good. And, for a minute, I thought...But I couldn't hold on to it.” He rubbed his forehead. ”Hurts when I try.”
”Okay. That's progress.” Bart pulled out an old-fas.h.i.+oned gold pocket watch. ”Stare at this as it swings back and forth, back and forth. Don't take your eyes off of it. Watch how slowly it swings. Back and forth. Back and forth. Your eyes are getting heavy. You're getting sleepy. Start counting for me, Jeremiah. Back from twenty. Are you ready?”
Jerry nodded, his eyes starting to close until he blinked them open.
”Here we go. Twenty, nineteen, eighteen...” Bart continued until Jerry's voice trailed off at twelve.
”All right. Now you are totally relaxed. Take me back to the last thing you remember before you were stabbed. Describe the scene.”
”I was riding Thunder. He was restless. Had a hard time keeping him under control. I finally let him have a good run.” Jerry kept talking about his horse. A fence that was down and some sheep missing. At one point he got excited. A MacDonald had crossed his path and they'd exchanged words. He was sure the man had taken the sheep but he didn't have proof. He rode back to the castle, where he and Da planned a raid to get the sheep back.
”Do you remember going to London, Jeremiah?” Bart glanced at me. ”Remember meeting a woman with blond hair?”
”London? What business would I have there?” Jerry frowned. ”My brother Thomas and I are headed up to Edinburgh to see a play after we take care of the MacDonalds. Plenty of women and sport there. London is too far away.”
Cait made a sound and I noticed she was crying.
”What is it?” I hadn't heard anything that upset me so far except that I wasn't in Jerry's mind.
”Thomas. He's our brother who was killed on that raid to the MacDonalds' holding. After that Jerry hied off to London. He never admitted it, but he took Tommy's death hard, blamed himself for it. We never did prove that those sheep came from our lands.”
”Can you go forward, Jeremiah? Do you remember living in America?” Bart reached over and squeezed Cait's hand.
”America? Who?” Jerry's hands began to shake and he pressed them to his temples. ”The pain! Make it stop!”
”Never mind. I'm going to count to three. When I clap my hands, you will wake up, refreshed, and the pain will be gone. All you'll remember is that you had a nap and a fine drink.” Bart counted then clapped his hands.
Jerry opened his eyes. ”Well, that helped me feel better. Did I remember anything?” He frowned at his sister. ”Caitie, why are you upset?”
”You didn't remember, Jerry. I just wished this had worked, that's all.” She wiped at her cheeks. ”I guess we'll have to give you more time.”
”Yes, we've been rus.h.i.+ng this.” Bart helped Cait stand up. Jerry was already on his feet.
”Time? While I'm going mad?” He stomped into his boots, then sat to get them on properly. ”Surely there's something we can do.”
”Drugs. But you don't like needles. And there's only one doctor I know of who has done serious work on posttraumatic amnesia with vampires.” Bart put his arm around Cait. ”You're not going to like who it is.”
”Why not?” She looked up at him. ”Spit it out. Who is it, Bart?”
”Ever hear of Ian MacDonald?”
Six.
The ride back to the Campbell town house wasn't exactly a fun time for all. After refusing to have anything to do with a MacDonald, doctor or not, Jerry was trying to be the stoic warrior. Cait had strapped him into the seat belt which he'd endured with only a few choice words for the way she'd made it too tight, then she'd announced she was going to catch a ride later with Bart after she discussed Jerry's case with him. That left me in the driver's seat. You can imagine what Jer thought about that.
”Are you sure you know how to run this machine?” he finally asked after I'd b.u.mped the post for the fourth time.
How the h.e.l.l had Cait gotten this car into the tiny parking s.p.a.ce? I wasn't all that current on s.h.i.+fting gears either and the car kept groaning objections and dying.
”I've got this, give me a minute.” I tapped the car in front of us and its alarm went off. Fantastic. I backed up quickly, made a hard turn then managed to get us out of there before an angry car owner came out to check on his Bentley. Yes, this was an expensive neighborhood. As far as I could tell, I hadn't done more than dust his b.u.mper.
”There. We're on our way.” I made a grinding s.h.i.+ft into second and hit the gas. ”You all right?” A glance showed me he really wasn't. If his brain had been in this century, he would have been livid about how I made his Jag suffer through my gear s.h.i.+fting.
”What happened to all the horses?” He held on to the strap that dangled by the window, his other hand braced on the dashboard when I made a turn.
”People still enjoy horses. As a hobby.” I stopped for a red light, the car died, and started rolling downhill. Edinburgh is all hills. Not exactly where I'd have chosen to relearn standard transmissions. d.a.m.n. I put both feet on the brake while I waited for the light to change before I started the engine again. ”There are still race courses and events where people show off their horsemans.h.i.+p. But horses aren't used for transportation anymore.” Green light. I got us going again, barely. It took a minute or two and the car behind me blasted his horn when I almost rolled back into his front b.u.mper.
”What's that noise?” Jerry grimaced, his head obviously still hurting.
”An a.s.s who wants me to go faster.” I sped up. ”You're still having headaches. Maybe that means you're trying to remember.”
”Of course I'm trying to remember!” he shouted, his hand inadvertently b.u.mping the gear s.h.i.+ft during one of my wide corner turns. ”d.a.m.n it, Gloriana. Slow this monster down.”
”Sorry.” I pulled over and stopped to study his pale face. He'd looked almost ruddy right after he'd fed. Now he was fading again. So soon. ”Really sorry. I know this is h.e.l.l. I can't even imagine it. Well, I sort of have a clue. A guy I knew once made me forget we were ever together. Seems he just erased a year of my life.” I shook my head. ”But that's not nearly the same.”
”Another man? How many have there been when we were supposed to be in love for centuries?” He leaned back against the gla.s.s. ”Fill in some of the blanks in my memory, Gloriana. This relations.h.i.+p we had. How was it?”
”We took breaks from time to time, Jerry. You would see other women. I would see other men.” I looked out at the dark street, remembering. It beat me if I could understand now why I'd been so dead set on my independence. Surely we could have worked out a compromise without going our separate ways.
”That doesn't sound like love to me. What happened to being faithful? Vows?” He b.u.mped his knees against the dash. ”I have to get out of this thing. How far are we from the town house? This area looks familiar. It must not have changed that much since...You know.”
”No, it hasn't changed in centuries. The Campbell town house is just up that hill.” And the hill wasn't doing me any favors again. My legs ached with the effort to keep from coasting back when I needed to go forward. ”Go ahead. Get out. And this 'thing' is your luxury vehicle that costs more than my shop makes in profit in a year.” The car died again and I pulled up the emergency brake. I opened his seat belt and he reacted like he'd been released from a straightjacket.
”There. Now you can walk. I'll drive and meet you there. You'll recognize the place. The old stone buildings are historic, preserved exactly as they were back in the day.” I knew I had to give him some s.p.a.ce but hated to see him distance himself again. He fumbled with the door latch and succeeded in making the window go up and down a few times before finally managing to open the door.
”They were built to last. I guess Da put more effort into keeping the town house in shape than he did the castle since we're staying there.” It wasn't a question. Jerry climbed out, slammed the car door and strode away.
I started the car again, tried not to strip the gears and drove on up the hill, keeping an eye on Jerry in my rearview mirror. When I pulled up in front of the door, a servant came out to greet me and put the car in the garage. I just stood there, waiting.
”A letter came for you, Ms. St. Clair.” The servant handed me a thick envelope then got in and drove the car around to the back.
I turned the envelope over and saw a strange seal impressed into red wax. It was right out of an ancient playbook. Olympus? I broke the seal and pulled out an engraved invitation.
”The pleasure of your company is requested at nine o'clock tomorrow night. A car has been arranged to collect you. Semi-formal attire.”
I couldn't believe it. My mother certainly worked fast. Couldn't her guy have at least given his name? I really, really wanted to decline this ”invitation.” Ha. It was more like a command performance. There was no place to RSVP. If I was a no-show, I was sure there would be consequences. To Jerry. Who would stab him this time? Or would she go straight for the lightning bolts?
He walked up just then, his face tight with pain.