Buch lesen: «The Legacy»
HE MAY HAVE QUESTIONS ABOUT HIS PAST, BUT NOT HOW HE FEELS ABOUT HER…
Reeling after being left at the altar, Paige Graham seeks comfort in her secluded cabin. But there’s someone sleeping in her bed—a sharp-eyed, sexy stranger who claims to have no memory. While a little digging reveals John’s true identity, Paige knows there’s more to his past…and more to her feelings.
He may have been told who he is, but bodyguard John Cinca isn’t satisfied with the answers, especially when they place Paige in danger. With his protective instinct in high gear, John vows to uncover his true identity while keeping her safe. But what if recovering his memory means he is the one Paige should be afraid of?
Who was he, and what was he doing in her cabin?
Now that she’d seen his face, she wasn’t as frightened of him, and why was that? There wasn’t one cuddly thing about him. She should be running for her life.
Instead, cleaver still in hand, she sat down on a chair opposite him. “You think you fell down a waterfall?” she asked.
“I don’t know for sure,” he said, touching his lip and wincing.
“You must know something,” she insisted.
He raised his gaze to hers. “I wish I did, lady, but I’m afraid that what you see is what you get.”
This book is dedicated to my best friend, my lover and my partner—my husband, Arnold Sharpe.
Undercover Memories
Alice Sharpe
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Alice Sharpe met her husband-to-be on a cold, foggy beach in Northern California. One year later they were married. Their union has survived the rearing of two children, a handful of earthquakes registering over 6.5, numerous cats and a few special dogs, the latest of which is a yellow Lab named Annie Rose. Alice and her husband now live in a small rural town in Oregon, where she devotes the majority of her time to pursuing her second love, writing.
Alice loves to hear from readers. You can write her c/o Harlequin Books, 233 Broadway, Suite 1001, New York, NY 10279. SASE for reply is appreciated.
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CAST OF CHARACTERS
John Cinca—He awakens after apparently falling down a waterfall. He’s lost his wallet and his memory. Now he’s wanted by both the police and a terrifying killer. If he’s going to save his life and that of the woman who risks everything to help him, he needs to find out what happened.
Paige Graham—Left at the altar, she does what any brokenhearted gal would do—she goes on her honeymoon by herself where she can count on the fresh Montana mountain air to rejuvenate her spirit. If she can survive the man she finds in her bed.
Jack Pollock—He’s a retired ex-policeman who refuses to even own a gun. That may have been a bad decision on his part.
Anatola Korenev—Big, mean and single-minded, exactly who is this guy and why is he so determined to kill John?
Katy Graham—Paige’s little sister’s stubborn streak is going to exact a heavy price.
Brian Witherspoon—The man Paige was supposed to marry, he changed his mind at the last moment. However, not everybody knows the wedding didn’t take place—some think Paige is his wife, and that means he’s in the way….
Natalie Dexter—Clues suggest she is important to John. How important is the question.
Chuck Miner—It’s generally accepted his coma is due to a beating delivered at the hands of John Cinca. If he can wake up in time, he might be able to reveal the truth.
Matt—A bodybuilder gifted with a streak of nice, he’s the one Katy counts on for help. But who’s going to help him?
Irina—She knew John many years. What she remembers of his past helps him to not only regain his future, but also catch a glimpse of the man who wants him dead.
Carol Ann Oates—This older woman may hold the key to John’s lost memories, and that’s why it’s imperative he speak with her before it’s too late.
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Excerpt
Chapter One
Something was wrong.
He must have fallen asleep in a strange position.
He opened his eyes slowly, concentrating for a moment. Rocks, from the size of a pea to a man’s fist. Ragged and round, all colors, russet and ivory and gray. A confetti of rocks…
And the nearby thunder of falling water.
But there was something else.
Nausea washed through him as he raised his head, but he kept pushing until he’d dragged himself into a sitting position, wincing as the torn flesh on his hands grated against the rocks. His vision wasn’t so good. He gingerly patted his face, felt the puffy skin around his left eye and the tear across his chin. His fingertips came away stained with bright red blood.
He was dressed in a suit, but he was sitting on a rocky beach. The swollen waters of a river washed over his loafer-clad feet, but he was so numb he couldn’t feel it. He pulled his legs clear of the water with the same sluggish sense of unreality with which he took in his surroundings.
Mountains and trees and a rocky riverbank. Rushing water and boulders. The sun was low in the sky. Where was he? How did he get here? He looked upriver and saw the waterfall and then looked down at his torn gray suit and the cuts and bruises on the skin that showed.
Had he fallen down that waterfall?
Who was he? Quick now, what was his name?
Wait. He must have a wallet with identification of some kind.
He patted his soggy suit pockets but found nothing except a few coins. A tight strap across his chest produced a holster under his jacket, and it still cradled a semiautomatic pistol.
What was he doing with a handgun out here of all places? Working on instinct, he pulled back the slide and ejected the clip. He was loaded and ready for—
Ready for what?
He snapped the gun back together and peered down the shoreline. A small bird perched on the tip of a rock. He moved ten feet to the right and targeted a knot on a piece of driftwood. Five seconds later, he pulled the trigger. The wood disintegrated as the startled bird flew toward the trees.
The gun worked.
But the shot echoed along the riverbank, and it came to him with a jolt that he’d just announced his exact location as though issuing a challenge. The hair on the back of his neck stood up; the nearby trees sprouted eyes.
Head spinning, he stumbled to his feet and once again glanced at the sun. It was not only lower in the sky, but drifting behind darkening clouds. He’d been going from one chore to the next at a steady pace, but it must have been in slow motion. There couldn’t be more than an hour or two of daylight left, and once the sun went down the temperature would drop. There was already a bluish cast beneath his fingernails, and if he didn’t make a point of forbidding it, his teeth clattered together.
But which way did he go?
His gut said he’d come from on top of the bluff. No way he could get back up there before dark. There was no point in following the river and there was no hope of crossing it. He turned toward the forest and started walking. There wasn’t a part of him that didn’t hurt.
As he limped under the evergreen cover he tripped, falling heavily onto the needled floor. His intention was to get up, keep going. Instead he closed his eyes and sank gratefully into oblivion.
* * *
PAIGE GRAHAM LEFT THE Pollocks’ cabin soon after dinner, driving off into the rain without looking back.
They were nice people and she’d welcomed their company, even if they were at least a generation her senior. Over the course of the evening she’d learned a lot about them. He was a retired Chicago cop on a pension and she was a retired first-grade teacher. They’d raised four kids and had seven grandchildren. They lived in this area of remote Wyoming mountains year-round, modern-day pioneers who enjoyed a challenge.
In short, they had accomplished what Paige had always dreamed of: a true marriage, a lifetime commitment.
Kind of hard to witness right now. She’d left as soon as it was polite.
She slowed down as the car hit a mud puddle. A moment later, a bolt of lightning flashed in the sky. She counted. One-one-thousand, two-one-thousand… She got to five before thunder shook the car.
It was early in the year to be staying in the mountains, especially for a city girl like her, but she hadn’t intended on being here alone. She had six more nights of tranquility ahead of her, but she wasn’t sure she could take six more minutes of it.
Some honeymoon.
As she was the only one renting a place during the middle of the week, she wasn’t surprised to find the other cabins dark. But her place was unlit, as well, and that did jolt her, as she’d specifically left the porch light burning.
More thunder heralded the dash between the car and the porch. She patted the outside wall, searching for the switch and finding it. It flicked up and down without result, which had to mean the electricity had gone out. The owner had warned this could happen. There was a flashlight inside somewhere. She just wasn’t sure where.
Perfect. Now she couldn’t even amuse herself watching the one fuzzy channel the antiquated television picked up. She couldn’t call anyone because her cell didn’t work due to all the trees, nor could she connect to the internet.
And just whom would she communicate with even if she could? Her mother? No, thanks. Her sister? Ditto. Her friends? Man, she’d bet they were having a heyday, half outraged on her behalf, half rabid for details. Who didn’t like a nice juicy scandal—besides the people involved in it, of course.
Thoroughly out of sorts now, she unlocked the door and went inside. At least there was a semblance of warmth due to the small fire still burning in the woodstove, and that also gave a tiny bit of light.
A graphic designer by trade, she could probably work on the laptop for a couple of hours. She’d brought along the work for the Red Hook album cover. Surely the battery was up to that, but was she? Maybe it would be best to just go to bed and get the night over with. Tomorrow was a brand-new day, and if it started like this one was ending, she’d drive home early. But if the weather cleared and she was able to stop feeling sorry for herself, she’d take a walk by the river.
She got ready for bed in the dark. The flashlight could wait until morning. As she’d left for this cabin directly from the chapel, the only nightclothes she’d packed had been flimsy little silky wisps appropriate for sashaying in front of a new husband. Needless to say, she hadn’t unpacked them. She’d spent the past two nights in sweats and a long-sleeve T-shirt, and they were where she’d left them that morning, hanging over a towel bar in the bathroom, which she found by touch.
She hurried across the freezing floor, contemplating digging in her suitcase for another pair of socks but abandoning that idea because of the dark. She pulled back the covers of the unmade bed and flung herself down onto the mattress, curling into a tight ball and praying for warmth.
And knew immediately she wasn’t alone.
Brian…
He’d changed his mind and come after her. She could almost hear him whispering her name.
Did she want him here? No! Who did he think he was?
Funny, she hadn’t seen his car.
That wasn’t the only thing that was funny. Something smelled kind of earthy.
She reached out a hand slowly and touched a piece of wet fabric. “Brian?” she whispered.
Someone grasped her wrist in a decidedly unfriendly fashion.
Screaming, she wrenched her hand free and bolted out of the bed. But her legs got tangled in the covers and she fell flat on her face. Breathing heavy now, she pulled at the sheet and blankets that constrained her, desperate to escape.
Hands clutched her by the arms and pulled her to her feet. A man—it had to be a man; it was too big to be a woman—shook her.
“Shut up,” he said.
Like hell. She screamed louder and kicked.
“Stop it,” he said, and shook her again.
She could not get free. Who was this brute who lurked in her bed, wet and steamy and terrifying? What had she been thinking to come to such a remote spot by herself? She could scream all night and no one would hear her.
She gulped a deep breath and tried to gather her thoughts. She had to do something or she’d end up the headline in a newspaper: Woman Found Raped and Beaten to Death in Mountain Cabin.
She shut her mouth and recoiled at the sound of his deep, labored breathing.
“Thank the Lord,” he said, and his grip lessened a fraction. She wrenched away again and took off. This time she ran right smack into the wall.
He was there again, towering over her, peeling her away.
“Calm down,” he muttered.
“Wouldn’t you like that? Who are you? What do you want?”
He was silent. Was he making a list or something? She struggled a little, but his hold on her was firm.
“Turn on the light,” he finally said.
“I can’t. The electricity is out. Let me go. I’m warning you, my husband will be here any minute and he’s ex-military.”
His finger rolled over the top of her left hand. “You’re not wearing a ring,” he said. “And there isn’t anything in this cabin to suggest a man was ever here. Don’t start yelling again, please. I’m not going to hurt you.”
“Who are you?”
It took him a few seconds to mutter, “I don’t know.”
“What do you mean you don’t know?”
“I don’t know if I’m Brian,” he said, and his voice was strange, too. Slurry, as if he’d been drinking, but his breath didn’t smell of booze. “I don’t know who I am.”
“Will you let go of me if I promise to hear you out?” she asked calmly, but her heart was jumping in her chest. Nothing he said made any sense.
“If you run into the night you’ll freeze to death,” he warned her.
“If you stand here in those wet clothes much longer, you’ll freeze to death, too,” she countered.
He slowly dropped his hands.
She scooted out of reach, but this time he didn’t come after her. His shape was large in the small room, but a little stooped. His breathing was uneven. “Are you hurt?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“How—”
“I don’t know.”
“So you don’t know who you are or how you got hurt.”
“No. I may have fallen down a waterfall.”
“I’d better have a look at you,” she said.
“Are you a doctor?”
“No, but I’m the only other person here, so I guess you have to settle. First I need to find a flashlight. I’m going out to the kitchen.”
“Okay,” he said, and she heard the squeak of the bedsprings as he sat down.
She took her first deep breath as she left the bedroom, feeling the walls to keep from tripping. The living room wasn’t pitch-black, thanks to the meager firelight, but she ran into an ottoman anyway and swore under her breath. She should leave. Damn, her keys were in her jeans pocket, and the pants were back in the bathroom.
Okay, then she should keep going to the door and run back to the Pollocks’ house. It was only a mile or so. Better then winding up a headline.
She kept going to the kitchen. She needed that flashlight and maybe a nice big butcher knife.
It took a few minutes of opening drawers and rummaging through the contents in the dark, but her fingers finally touched a smooth, cylindrical object. She fumbled with it until she found a switch and pushed it.
“Let there be light,” the man whispered from a few feet away.
She turned the beam onto him. Judging from the arm he threw up to his face, she’d blinded him.
“Sorry,” she muttered, lowering the light. She held a cleaver in her right hand, down by her side. If he took one step toward her—
“Well,” he said. “Am I?”
“Are you what?”
“Am I Brian?”
Of course he wasn’t Brian. His voice was too deep and he was far too big, and anyway, Brian wouldn’t act the way this man acted. But she raised the light again to get a good look at her intruder and found a well-built man in his late thirties wearing a torn, wet, bloodstained suit that might once have been pretty sharp looking. His face was scratched and bruised. One eye was puffy and swollen. His bottom lip appeared cut, and there was a split in his chin that probably needed stitches if it wasn’t going to leave a scar.
Pushing a mat of thick black hair away from his battered-looking forehead, he gazed at her with dark eyes that revealed nothing. He didn’t look like a businessman. In fact, he looked as if he’d be more at home in an alley than in a high-rise, but that could be because he also looked as though he’d gone ten rounds with a prizefighter—and lost.
“No. You aren’t Brian,” she said.
“Pity.”
She shook her head. “Not really.”
He pulled a chair out from the table and sat down as though it was either that or fall on his face.
Who was he, and what was he doing in her cabin? Now that she’d seen his face, she wasn’t as frightened of him, and why was that? There wasn’t one cuddly thing about him. She should be running for her life.
Instead, cleaver still in hand, she sat down on a chair opposite him, the two of them trapped in a puddle of yellowish light that portended poorly for the flashlight batteries. “You think you fell down a waterfall?” she asked.
“I don’t know for sure,” he said, touching his lip and wincing.
“You must know something,” she insisted.
He raised his gaze to hers. “I wish I did, lady, but I’m afraid that what you see is what you get.”
Chapter Two
While she built up the fire, he told her about waking up on the riverbank in his current condition. It was a struggle to get the words out. For one thing, his head felt as if it was going to explode. And for another, he was tired beyond endurance.
He didn’t mention the gun, which was still in its holster tucked under his jacket. He wasn’t sure why he was reluctant to tell her. He just was.
“The second time I woke up I was in the forest. It was almost dark and it was raining,” he added as she handed him a cup of tea she’d brewed on the gas stove in the kitchen. She was a restless woman, or maybe she was just nervous, which, given the circumstances, wasn’t surprising. Still, given the state of his head, he wished she’d stop moving around so much.
He had a feeling that at any other time in his life, he would have enjoyed watching her move. She was very slim with blond hair cut kind of uneven in a quirky way, falling long over one side of her face. Her ears were each pierced two times, and she wore small stones that glistened in the flickering light from the fire just as the whites of her eyes did. She looked to be in her late twenties.
“So you just stumbled around until you came to my cabin?” she asked.
“I broke into another one first,” he admitted. “But there wasn’t anything to eat. Yours looked lived in, so I came through a window in the mudroom. You had food in the fridge and your bed looked too good to pass up.” He paused for a heartbeat. “In retrospect, probably not the best idea to pass out in an obviously occupied place, but my thinking was a little fuzzy.”
She studied him a minute. “You really don’t know your name?”
“No.”
“I have to call you something.”
“Call me John Doe. It’s as good as anything else. What should I call you?”
“Paige Graham. Okay, John Doe. What do you want to do?”
“Sleep,” he said, quite honestly. “Though if you want me to leave, I understand.”
“I’m not going to force you out into a thunderstorm,” she said.
“I appreciate that.” He rubbed the back of his neck and did his best not to groan. “How about we put off making further decisions until morning? Maybe if I sleep, my memory will return. You take the bed—”
“That’s okay. It’s kind of…swampy. You can have it. I’ll take the couch. If you’ll hand me your damp clothes, I’ll hang them here by the fire. And I should bandage a couple of these cuts—”
He waved her off with a limp flick of his fingers. “I’m too tired to worry about anything right now. You’re sure about the bed?”
“Positive.” He saw the way her gaze flicked toward the front door. There was no way to keep her from leaving as soon as he closed his eyes. Nor was there any way to make sure she didn’t use the big knife she’d hidden in the desk drawer unless he tied her up, and he wasn’t going to do that. Frankly, at that moment, he didn’t particularly care what she did. He had to sleep.
He got to his feet and looked into her gray eyes. “Good night, Paige Graham.”
She almost smiled. “Good night, John Doe.”
* * *
THE LIGHTS WENT ON AT 6:45 a.m. Paige knew this because she’d spent the night sitting on the sofa with the cleaver, just in case. At the moment when the lamp blazed, she was staring at the clock, trying to figure out what to do.
Getting power back made that decision easy. The first order of business was to see if there was anything on the news about an escaped convict or a serial killer. She got up quickly and crossed the room to the small television set that sat inside a hutch. She turned it on and adjusted the old-fashioned rabbit ears until the only channel she’d been able to pick up was clear enough to watch.
She heard the shower start running, but she kept the volume low anyway. More rain was predicted for today. A woman in New York had won the lottery. Firemen had saved a puppy that fell through the grating into a culvert. Interest rates were up. Unemployment was down. She was about to give up and go start a pot of coffee when the picture on the screen changed to one of a forest. A reporter stood next to what appeared to be an abandoned campsite.
As Paige listened to the sketchy details, her fingernails bit into her palms. At a nearby park that was still closed for the season, an unidentified man had been savagely attacked. He’d been airlifted to Green Acre and was listed in critical condition and in a coma. Another man was wanted in connection with the attack. His name was John Cinca and he was a bodyguard working out of Lone Tree, Wyoming. Police were combing the area looking for him. A car rented under his name was found abandoned in the park. Another car was there, as well, abandoned, this one stolen. There were no witnesses and the reason for the attack was unclear.
They flashed a picture of John Cinca on the screen.
John Doe.
Paige found herself standing. She had to get out of here! She ran to the door and looked through the window.
During the night, the rain had turned to snow and left a few inches on the ground. She would leave a visible trail if she attempted to walk away. Her car was right there. She had to get her keys.
But John was in the bathroom, and so were her jeans with the keys in the pocket. The bedroom door was ajar and opened the rest of the way noiselessly. She all but floated across the floor to the bathroom. That door opened silently, as well. She could discern the outline of John’s body through the shower curtain. Yikes, he was muscular! She grabbed her jeans, closed the door and retraced her steps across the bedroom.
Once in the living room, she pulled the keys from the pocket and snagged her coat and handbag off the back of a chair. She glanced back at the bedroom door—the coast was still clear although the shower had gone off. Man, why hadn’t she grabbed her shoes? No matter, just get out while the getting is good.
She opened the door and tiptoed onto the deck, avoiding the plank she’d noticed squeaked the day before. Looking back as often as she looked forward, she made it to the car but chose to unlock it with the key rather than risk the noise it made with the keyless entry button. The door opened quietly and she slipped inside. She left the door unlatched but the car started beeping when she inserted the key, so she closed it, wincing at the thud it made.
Taking a deep breath, she turned the key while staring at the front door. The car roared to life, but at that second, the door opened and John emerged wearing his slacks and nothing else, glaring at her as he advanced across the porch.
“Stop,” he yelled.
Sure. Pushing down on the gas pedal, she jammed the shift into Reverse. The car jerked backward. John looked mad enough to jump in front of the car. Let him.
Instead, he raised his hand and she saw what she hadn’t noticed before. He was holding a gun.
Merciful heavens. He was going to kill her! She shifted into forward and gunned the engine again, but the back end had apparently wound up in a ditch or something and the car wouldn’t go forward. The tires just spun uselessly in the muddy snow.
She reached down and pushed the door lock button, still revving the engine and going nowhere fast.
He was at her window. “Stop the car,” he demanded.
The rearview mirror revealed blue smoke billowing out the tailpipe. There was no point in burning up her engine. She took her foot off the gas pedal.
“Stop the car and get out,” he said. He didn’t raise the gun; he didn’t need to. He knew he’d won.
She switched off the engine and pounded on the steering wheel, then opened the car door.
He grabbed her arm and hauled her out. His powerful chest was as bruised and battered as his arms. “Get in the house,” he said.
She walked through the snow, her feet in the wet socks freezing now. He was barefoot and gave no sign he even felt it.
“This is the thanks I get for letting you have the bed?” she snarled as he closed the front door behind them.
“You mean the swamp?” He ran a hand through his hair. “What happened, Paige? Why did you bolt?”
So, what did she do? Inform him he was wanted for nearly killing a man? Might that not give him ideas? Her gaze strayed to the television. She hadn’t turned it off but the volume was so low she couldn’t hear it from ten feet away. The same reporter as before was back on the screen. They were replaying the same story.
She looked away, but too late. She’d caught John’s attention, and he stepped behind her to see what she had been watching. His picture filled the screen, then faded away as an ad came on.
John looked down at her, the gun by his side.
“Why was my picture on television?”
“You seriously beat a man,” she said. There was no point in not telling him. All he had to do was wait for the story to loop around again.
“Tell me what you know.”
She repeated the few details, pausing after announcing he was actually John Cinca, looking for some sign the name clicked with him. There wasn’t one. He made a brief comment about the coincidence of giving himself a pseudonym that was actually his real first name, but that was it.
Next she told him he was a bodyguard living in a city two hundred miles away and that he’d rented a car that was still in the campground although probably impounded by now.
As she spoke, he made a fist of his left hand and gazed at his knuckles as though searching for proof he couldn’t have beaten someone senseless. But his hands were not only large and powerful, they were covered with bruises and cuts. And the knots of muscles in his chest and upper arms that flexed when he moved were further proof that if motivated, he could easily inflict some serious harm.
A shiver of fear snaked down Paige’s spine. There wasn’t an ounce of fat on his lean frame. Whoever he was, he kept himself fit.
“So, you tried to leave because you realized you were in a small cabin with a would-be killer,” he said.
“What would you have done?” she whispered.
“Tried to leave.” He shook his head. “I obviously have a gun. Why would I beat someone up?”
“I don’t know, John. Noise, maybe?”
“Where did this happen?”
“At the park on top of the bluff.”
“I wonder how I ended up in the river. Wait, were there eyewitnesses?”
“They didn’t mention any.”
“Then they don’t know for sure I did it, right?”
“I don’t think so. But they’re looking for you. It’s only a matter of time before they start checking out these cabins, you know.”
He nodded in a distracted fashion.
“What are you going to do?” she asked him.
“Beats me.”
“Well, for starters, could you maybe put the gun away?”
He fiddled with it for a second, she assumed flicking on the safety. Then he looked into Paige’s eyes and offered her the gun.
“What are you doing?”
“You have to look out for yourself. If I’m capable of something like what you described—”
“Then you could easily kill me with your bare hands,” she said, and then stepped back inside her mind and stared at herself a second. Was she crazy? The man had confronted her over the barrel of a gun just a few minutes ago. She took the weapon. It was the first time in her life she’d ever held a gun, and she was surprised at how heavy it was.
She handed it back to him. “Take out the bullets.”
He ejected what looked like a slender package of cigarettes. “It’s called a clip.”
“Give me the clip, then, and you keep the gun.”
He smiled at her.
Okay, really, he had the sexy, glowering alpha male bit down to a T. In fact it seemed effortless. But when he smiled, he turned into a guy who probably had a perfectly normal life somewhere. A wife maybe, or a girlfriend. Children. A mortgage.
