Shadow Lake. B.J. Daniels
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don’t you tell me,” he said.
She shot a look at the doctor. He looked worried as if he feared—as she did—that something had happened to make Officer Walker more suspicious of her. She knew she didn’t have to answer his questions, but she had nothing to hide. At least she hoped that was true. And at this point, Officer Walker seemed to know more than she did about what had happened last night.
“I was the one who didn’t want the divorce in the first place,” she said.
“You don’t recall seeing your husband at all last night?”
She shook her head slowly, a vague memory pulling at her. An ugly argument. But she’d had so many arguments with Marc… “I can’t be sure.”
Walker sighed and looked at the doctor.
She felt dread settle in the pit of her stomach. Something was wrong. She knew she should stop the police officer now, not answer any more of his questions. But she desperately wanted to know why he was asking them, why his manner was even more suspicious than it had been earlier. “Why are you asking me all these questions?”
“Your husband said he not only saw you last night, but that the two of you argued. When you left, he said, you were threatening to kill someone.”
“That’s ridiculous,” she snapped. “You don’t know Marc. He…” She thought of something Gillian had once said about Marc. He likes drama in his life. It’s his drug of choice. He gets high on it. And when he doesn’t have enough drama, he makes it. Or forces you to.
“Marc overreacts sometimes,” she said simply.
“Have you been under the care of a psychiatrist?”
“No, I mean, I was but I stopped going.”
“Mrs. Collins, did you purposely drive your car into the lake last night?”
“Of course not!”
“Were you even in the car when it went into the lake?” he asked, sounding aggravated with her.
She felt close to tears. “Why would I lie about something like that?”
“You tell me.”
She couldn’t believe this was happening.
“Maybe for the same reason you threatened to kill someone? To get your husband’s attention?”
She wanted to argue that even if she was stupid enough to pull a stunt like that, she no longer cared enough about Marc to even threaten to kill herself—let alone try. Nor did she believe Marc would care.
That thought rang so true she was momentarily stunned by it.
“If you’re telling the truth, Mrs. Collins, then you don’t remember what you did last night, isn’t that right?” the cop asked.
She blinked, focusing again on him and his question before she slowly nodded. She’d lost the hours before she’d swerved to miss the deer. Just as she’d lost the reason she was on that highway to begin with.
And the truth was, in the state she’d been in since coming out of the coma, she couldn’t swear to what she might have done. Maybe she had tried to kill herself last night. But she had to wonder what would have pushed her to that point.
“I suppose you also don’t remember being so upset that you forgot about getting a speeding ticket about thirty miles outside of Shadow Lake.”
She shook her head.
“Or telling Dr. Brubaker to look for your son?” The cop sounded angry.
“No.” A headache was building. “I told you. I was confused when I first woke up. Everything I’ve told you is the truth.”
“Why didn’t you tell us, Mrs. Collins, that your son Tyler is dead?” Walker snapped. “That he was killed eight months ago in a hit-and-run accident. The same one that left you in a coma.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
DR. BRUBAKER’S GAZE shot to Anna’s at the cop’s words. The sympathy Anna saw in his eyes made her want to weep. She felt awash in confusion, her emotions running too high.
“Why were you driving to Shadow Lake, Mrs. Collins?” Walker asked.
“I don’t know.” She heard the hysteria rising in her voice again and tried to tamp it back down, but it was impossible.
“It’s her head injury, Walker,” the doctor said quietly. “The loss of memory is normal. It’s a form of retrograde amnesia. Memory of the traumatic event is not the only thing lost, but often minutes or even hours leading up to the event.”
She looked at the doctor with gratitude. Clearly Officer Walker didn’t believe her memory loss. Or anything else she’d told him.
The cop glanced at the doctor, then at her, before taking out his notebook. After a moment, he removed the pencil from behind his ear and held it over the paper. His gaze rose again to hers.
“You have a global-tracking device in your car, Mrs. Collins?”
She frowned. “Yes,” she said hesitantly.
“When your car went off the road and the air bag deployed, a call went out to the police station here. I talked to your in-car system provider. It seems your last communication to them was a request for a route from Seattle to Shadow Lake.”
This town had been her destination? “I have no idea why I would have done that.” She could hear the apprehension in her voice. “As far as I can remember, I’ve never even heard of Shadow Lake before.”
“There was a suitcase in the backseat of your car,” he said.
A suitcase? She had a flicker of memory and saw herself packing furiously. “Maybe I was going on a short vacation.” But the clothes hanging in the hospital room closet certainly didn’t go with that theory. She feared what she would find in her suitcase.
“It’s a little early for a vacation in Shadow Lake,” the cop said. “Most of the motels and cabins aren’t even open yet.”
She sighed, exasperated by his inability to accept that she couldn’t remember. “How many times do I have to tell you I don’t know?”
“You also asked for directions to the Shadow Lake Police Department,” Walker said.
Out of the corner of her eye, Anna saw Dr. Brubaker swing his attention to the cop in surprise.
Anna tried not to let her own shock show. She couldn’t imagine any reason she would be interested in where the police department was located in Shadow Lake. Maybe someone had programmed her car. Even as she thought it, she knew how ludicrous that sounded.
For some reason she’d come to Shadow Lake—and thought she was going to need the police.
“I have no idea why I did any of those things. Please, tell me why you’re asking me all these questions.”
“Why don’t you tell me, Mrs. Collins?” Walker said. “Why drive up here in the middle of the night?”
“Don’t you think I would tell you if I knew?” Anna said, hearing the panic in her voice. “None of this makes any sense to me. You act as if I’m hiding something from you. I’m telling you everything I know.”
“But you didn’t tell us about your son,” he said.
“I think we should give Mrs. Collins a chance to rest,” Dr. Brubaker said.
“Just one more question,” Walker said, without looking at the doctor. His eyes were locked on Anna. “I want to hear about this person who you say was in the lake with you.”
“Not with me. In the water outside the car.” She swallowed, afraid that when she told him what she’d seen, he really would believe her a liar. She took