Conard County Marine. Rachel Lee
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didn’t move. After a minute, Glenda turned in her seat. “Kylie, if it’s really too much, I’ll ask Coop to move to the motel. I’m sure he and Connie will understand, under the circumstances. But give it a try for me, okay?”
Kylie managed a stiff nod. “I will.”
Glenda sighed and reached for the door latch. “This has got to be hell for you, not remembering the last few years. I can’t imagine it. So be patient with me, okay?”
Kylie felt a rush of warmth for her sister. “If you’ll be patient with me.”
Glenda smiled. “The house is pretty much the same. I think you’ll remember most of it.”
All of a sudden Kylie reached out and touched her sister’s arm. “Glenda?”
“Yeah?”
“I may have forgotten other things, too. I have no way to know.”
Glenda nodded. “I guess we’ll see. We’ll talk about it more, but let’s go inside and make you some coffee or something. And you must be hungry by now.”
Maybe. Her stomach was still knotted with the trepidation that never quite left her anymore, but she forced herself to get out of the car.
The back steps were concrete, and still had the crumbled corners she remembered. At some point a larger crack had been patched, the concrete a different, lighter gray. The screen door still screeched the same old protest. The glass-topped inner door opened soundlessly on well-oiled hinges.
One step into the kitchen and she paused, looking around, dragging in the familiar smells with a deep breath. Little had changed indeed. The cabinets had been repainted, but the same white. A few new appliances sat on the counter, but otherwise it carried her instantly back to her childhood. She smiled for the first time in ages. “Do I smell marinara?”
“I made some last night. If you want, we can have it later. Let me get your suitcase.”
A suitcase. She had a whole bunch of possessions from an apartment in Denver, but most of them might as well have belonged to someone else. She’d brought a few keepsakes she remembered along with her, and Glenda had ruthlessly put everything else in storage until Kylie decided what she wanted to do with it all.
Gratitude toward her sister once again flooded her, and she made up her mind to do her best with this Coop guy in the house. Besides, he’d probably spend an awful lot of time visiting Connie, Ethan and their children. She probably wouldn’t have to see much of him at all.
Glenda rolled the suitcase inside. “You get your old room,” she said. “It’s always been yours, but you know that.”
“Thank you.”
Glenda smiled. “You don’t have to thank me. What are sisters for? Anyway, this house belongs to both of us.”
Glenda was a few years older than Kylie, which, when they were children, had always given her a superior position. It didn’t feel that way anymore, Kylie realized as Glenda parked the suitcase in one corner of the kitchen and waved her to sit at the old table. The years had at last made them equals...at least to some extent. Kylie definitely felt at a disadvantage with her memory loss, but those were years she hadn’t lived here, anyway.
Glenda buzzed about. For a woman of thirty-four who’d been through an ugly divorce, she looked good, Kylie thought. Even with the gap in her memory she was barely able to note changes in Glenda. She still wore her light brown hair in a ponytail and moved with the ease of someone who was fit, and still seemed to prefer scrubs to jeans. But then Glenda was a nurse, too, like Kylie.
A sharp contrast there, Kylie thought with a touch of humor. Kylie herself was moving much more cautiously these days, since parts of her were still healing. Almost there, she assured herself. Soon she wouldn’t feel the hitches of scars from all the knife slashes, or the ache in her ribs from the beating. Soon she’d be almost normal again.
If she’d ever be normal with a three-year hole in her memory. Three years that had included her own long-awaited training as a nurse-practitioner. Stolen from her by some creep on the street.
As she sat at the table waiting for Glenda to make the coffee, she closed her eyes and listened to the house. It still sounded the same, she realized. An odd thing to notice, but she did. Sounds moved the same way through the structure, echoed in the same way. Even the sound of the refrigerator turning on carried her back in time.
At last Glenda joined her at the table. “Tired?” she asked as she poured the coffee and pushed a plate with toasted bagels closer to Kylie.
“No, not really. I was listening to the house.”
Glenda arched a brow. “Listening? It’s awfully quiet. Not like when we were running around here constantly making noise.”
“That was a long time ago.”
“Yeah, it was.” Glenda sighed. “So three years are missing?” Until now, Glenda had devoted herself to dealing with each matter that arose, but they really hadn’t talked between them about Kylie’s amnesia. As if Glenda needed some time to deal with it, too. Or maybe Glenda had just been glad to have a chance to rehash her divorce with someone who didn’t already remember every detail of it.
“Pretty much. I can’t remember my training, or my apartment, or anything else. Denver seems like a place I’ve never been before. But the truth is—” Kylie bit her lip “—I can’t be sure I’ve forgotten everything. Or even sure that I haven’t lost even older memories.”
“Memories are a funny thing,” Glenda said, reaching for a buttered bagel. “We rewrite them all the time. So my suggestion to you is that you not get wrapped up in knots over details. It’s not like I could tell you every minute from a day four years ago.”
For the first time Kylie felt like laughing, so she did. “That’s a good point.”
Glenda grinned. “I’m full of good points. I know it must be disturbing, but the doc said there’s a good chance you’ll get at least some of it back. I hope it’s just the good parts.”
Kylie heartily agreed with that. She definitely did not want to remember the attack, although she felt bad that she couldn’t identify her attacker. It might have protected some other woman from the guy.
“And you can always start your training again,” Glenda added cheerfully.
That was exactly the wrong thing to say. Kylie battled back a sense of darkness that threatened to swamp her. She’d been pursuing her master’s in nursing with an eye to becoming a physician’s assistant. She couldn’t do that here. To do that would mean going back to Denver, to the program that had promised to reinstate her entire scholarship so she could afford it, and she couldn’t imagine any possible future path that would take her back to that city. Not now. Not ever.
She heard Glenda sigh and opened her eyes.
“Sorry,” Glenda said. “I was trying to be positive and I guess I put my foot right in it. But there are other schools in the country.”
“It’s okay.” But it wasn’t okay. In the broad daylight of a late afternoon, Glenda had brought the nightmare back. Usually the evil darkness pursued her only in her sleep, but now here she was wide awake and she felt as if a demon were looking over her shoulder. God, she hated the feeling.
Just then, causing her to start, there was a knock at the side door.
“Coop,” said Glenda, pushing back from the table. Kylie could see only the silhouette of a man on the other side of the sheer white curtains, and her heart hit an immediate gallop. Stop it, she told herself. Stop it. She was safe. She was not alone. She was home.
Glenda opened the door. The sun was at a perfect angle to bathe the man standing on the top step in golden sunlight so brilliant that Kylie had to blink. For an instant she couldn’t make out any details while her eyes adjusted to the brightness.
Then, stepping out of that halo came