I blinked at the line of bright sunlight peeking past one edge of the blackout curtains in my bedroom and thought, I need a day off.
Oh, sure, I’d already planned to cancel the tour tonight. I’d start making calls and sending texts as soon as the hour was a little more decent. But this was something different. I wanted nothing to do with the store, knew if I forced myself to go in, I’d end up walking right back out an hour later.
Once or twice in the past, I’d gotten like this, but I’d had Kiki to fall back on, or Michael if Kiki was busy. With Kiki in L.A., it would have to be Michael…only I knew I wouldn’t even bother to call him. It was Saturday, and Saturdays were generally his busiest days. Usually the busiest day at the shop, too, but really, if I was going to manufacture a family emergency to beg off from doing tonight’s tour, then why not go whole hog and shut down the store for the rest of the weekend?
The thought alarmed me at the same time it thrilled me. I honestly couldn’t remember the last time I hadn’t worked through a weekend; that was just part of being a shop owner in a tourist town. My normal days off were Mondays and Tuesdays, although half the time, I ended up working Mondays, too, especially if Monday fell on a holiday when a lot of other people would be off work. It was nuts to shut down on a weekend, on the days when I got the vast majority of my sales. But….
Not too long ago, Kiki accused me of having a scarcity mentality. At the time, I’d brushed off the remark, putting it down to something my sister had probably heard one of her psychic clients say. After all, Kiki was only three when our mother disappeared, leaving me to finally call our grandparents in a panic after Kiki and I had been alone for four days. Kiki probably didn’t remember much about moving from one crappy one-bedroom apartment in Phoenix to another, or having to live off Top Ramen and mac and cheese from a box because our mother was too busy spending what little money she had on cigarettes and booze.
No, if God was merciful, Kiki had forgotten most of that, but I was eleven when we came to live with our grandparents, and so I recalled far more than I ever wanted to. The memories of those days lurked somewhere far back in my mind, and so even though I knew intellectually that I was doing just fine — the house and store were paid for, and I had about fifty grand in the bank — for some reason, I kept pushing myself, worrying that one day the bottom would fall out of everything and I’d be back to the bad old days of Top Ramen. Stupid, I knew. I could close the shop for a whole month and not feel it too badly…except for whatever customers I might piss off by being shut down for that amount of time.
Okay, that seemed to settle it. The world would not end if the UFO Depot closed its doors for one weekend. The tourists would just wander a few shops down and find something else to spend their money on, and if they were here in town for a longer stay, they might try back in the middle of the week if they really couldn’t live without an “I had a close encounter in Sedona, Arizona” T-shirt.
I hadn’t even realized what a weight had been sitting on my shoulders until after I made my decision. It would feel so, so good to play hooky.
But now that I had a day off, what was I going to do with it?
Lance
He swung by the shop to check on Kara before he went to get his ritual morning cup of espresso at the Secret Garden Café. To his surprise, he saw a sign in the window of the UFO Depot that read “Closed for the weekend due to family emergency. We apologize for the inconvenience.” It had been printed on Kara’s laser printer in big block letters that could be read clearly from the parking lot. Trust Kara to be conscientious even about blowing off her customers.
Well, he couldn’t blame her. Maybe it would be better if she laid low for a few days. After what happened last night, it was probably a good idea for her to keep a low profile…at least until Paul and Persephone got back in town and they could all discuss their next course of action.
Lance’s mouth thinned slightly at that thought. He really didn’t like the idea of waiting for anybody — after all, the group had gotten along just fine before the Olivers took up residence in Sedona — but he’d seen what Persephone had done to all those hybrids and alien-infected humans. It would be stupid to do much of anything without her around.
A quick glance at his watch told him it was just past nine-thirty. A little early for a social call, but it couldn’t hurt to swing by and make sure Kara was okay. Even though she was taking the day off, he knew she had to be up and around because of the sign on the shop’s door. And if part of him was just curious to see what exactly she had planned for a Saturday where she wasn’t at the store, well, fine. Better that she be a little annoyed with him for being nosy rather than have something actually be wrong. She could have been coerced into making that sign. You never knew.
Thus determined on his course of action, he headed back to the Jeep. He’d just put his hand on the door handle when he heard a half-familiar female voice say, “Lance? It is Lance, isn’t it?”
No choice but to turn toward the woman. When he saw who it was, he had to force himself to keep from gritting his teeth. “Hi….” Oh, shit, he’d completely forgotten her name.
“Taylor. Taylor Bradford.”
Great. She sounded like a law firm or something. “Taylor, of course. Sorry, I was thinking about something else.”
“I know, isn’t it a bummer?”
“What?”
She pointed toward the door with a perfectly manicured hot pink fingernail. “I so wanted to check out this store before we headed down to Phoenix.”
“I thought you were supposed to go to Phoenix on Thursday…or Scottsdale, I mean.”
A wide flash of toothpaste-commercial teeth. Maybe she was pleased he’d remembered that much about her itinerary. In the harsh light of day, she didn’t look quite as good as she had in the bar — skin too taut from an overdose of Botox, tendons standing out in her neck. He had to revise her age upward a few years, closer to his own. But damn, her body was amazing.
“Well, we were supposed to, but then Lindsay had to go have the worst allergy attack, and she’s spent the past two days up at some holistic center in the canyon getting hot rocks on her back and herbal inhalers and I don’t even know what else to try to fix her sinuses. But our flight leaves for L.A. at two, so I thought I’d come by this place to see if it was open. I wanted to get one of those alien T-shirts…it would’ve been so cute for the gym.”
He wondered if she would find the aliens quite so cute if they were swooping straight down at her. Probably not. In his mind, he saw Kara again, pale hair blowing in the unnatural wind kicked up by the alien ship, her clean profile outlined by its harsh, glaring lights. She’d looked like a Valkyrie…well, right up until the second he’d tackled her.
“That’s too bad,” he said, trying to sound somewhat sympathetic and not sure he’d succeeded. “Stuff happens, I guess.”
“I guess,” Taylor replied, and sent him a significant look.
Shit. He was in no mood to go for round two with her, not with the alien threat hanging over all their heads, not with the memory of Kara’s body beneath his just a little too vivid. But he also knew it would be a supremely assholish thing for him to just blow her off. Looked like he’d have to postpone that visit to Kara’s house.
“Have you eaten yet? Because I know this great place down 89A….”
She nodded enthusiastically and climbed into the Jeep with him. He tried not to sigh as he pointed the 4x4 down the highway to the Coffee Pot restaurant. They were famous for their breakfasts, and a local hangout, so that should satisfy her. He was damned if he was going to take her to the Secret Garden, his special sanctuary. A man had his limits, after all.
Kara
I used my time on the treadmill to send off all the necessary texts and make phone calls to those who didn’t text, letting them know the tour had been cancelled and that I’d be refunding their money just as soon as possible. Thank God I could log directly into my merchant account to do that and wouldn’t have to call the bank. Everyone sounded disappointed, and a few tried to ask questions, but I dodged those inquiries and stuck to the party line about there being a family emergency.
By the time I was done, I heard Grayson emerge from the shower in the other bathroom, so I judged it safe enough to get cleaned up. The house’s water heater couldn’t handle two showers at once, as I’d learned to my dismay not long after moving in with my grandparents. I really should see about replacing that crappy old thing at some point.
“I’m going to shower,” I called down the hall. “Are you okay with cereal? That’s all I’ve got left in the house.”
His voice drifted back to me. “Sure. I’ll eat and then go check on the motorcycle.”
It all sounded so normal, so prosaic. Hard to believe that three days ago, I hadn’t even known him. Then again, I really couldn’t say I knew him now. No past, no memories, a name borrowed from a TV show. I really was nuts.
I shook my head and went into the bathroom.
The day was bright and sunny, but once again, thunderheads loomed to the south and east. Hard to say if they’d make it all the way over here, but I stood in the driveway and squinted at the sky anyway, trying to figure out what the weather was going to do. Or maybe I was just attempting to avoid the curious gaze of my next-door neighbor, Felicia Martinez, who was making something of a show of watering her rosebushes but who was probably just gawking at Grayson.
Not that he wasn’t eminently gawk-able. He sat astride the Indian in the middle of the driveway, my grandfather’s old motorcycle helmet dangling from his left hand as he adjusted the mirrors with his right. The muscles in his arms did interesting things under the close-fitting gray T-shirt, and I had to force myself not to stare.
“Be careful,” I said. “You don’t have a license.”
“It would have been a lot easier if I did, wouldn’t it?” he asked, all seriousness. Then he planted a pair of Ray-Bans on his nose — the sunglasses were another relic of my grandfather’s — and pulled on the helmet before fastening the strap under his chin. “Anyway, I’m only going down the street and back. It’ll be fine.”
“Okay.”
I watched as he twisted the throttle and brought the Indian to roaring life once again. For a second or two, I’d thought that maybe it wouldn’t start, that maybe last night had been a fluke, but no, the bike sounded healthy and ready to rumble. Grayson flashed me a grin and rolled out of the driveway, balancing expertly even at that low speed. Then he was off down the street, obeying the residential thirty-mile-per-hour speed limit, although the motorcycle sounded almost petulant at being reined in like that.
“Who’s your friend?” asked Felicia, obviously unable to contain her curiosity any longer. Water was beginning to overflow the garden bed, but she didn’t seem to notice.
“Grayson?” I responded, in what I hoped was a convincingly casual way. “He’s a…friend of a friend. Actually, a friend of one of my roommates from college. When I mentioned I really wanted to get the bike up and running, she suggested him. He’s a genius at that sort of thing.”
“I’ll bet.” Felicia’s gaze was tracking down the street, where Grayson had already disappeared around a corner.
“He’s just fixing the bike.”
“Of course he is.”
I had to repress the urge to stalk back inside. Instead, I made a show of turning toward the end of the cul-de-sac and looking for Grayson to reappear. It didn’t take long; within the minute, he was back in sight, slowing down as he took the turn with casual grace. A few seconds later, he was back in the driveway.
“Runs great,” he said. “A little rough on the idle, though. She really needs a long, hard ride.”
At that statement, Felicia Gomez made an ostentatious throat-clearing noise and Grayson looked over at her, clearly mystified.
“Let’s get the bike back in the garage,” I said, sounding a little strangled myself.
Luckily, Grayson didn’t argue, but only got off the bike and rolled it inside. I hurried past him and hit the button for the garage door opener so Felicia couldn’t eavesdrop on any more of our conversation.
“What was that about?” he asked.
“Nothing. Anyway, I’m sure you’re jonesing for a road trip, but I’m not sure that’s such a great idea.”
“Why not?”
“Well, there’s your total lack of a license, for one thing,” I said. “If we get pulled over — ”
“Why would we get pulled over? You saw I can handle the bike just fine. It’s been sitting so long, it really needs a good run to blow the carbon out of the engine.”
I didn’t have an immediate answer to that. All through the years, I’d dutifully paid the registration on the motorcycle, even in its defunct state, because I never knew when I might get it up and running. It was easier to do that than register it as non-operable and then have to re-register it later. So as long as Grayson obeyed the speed limit and didn’t do anything fancy, we’d probably be safe.
Yeah, right. A hundred things could go very wrong.
On the other hand, a thousand things could go right. And, as Kiki liked to remark from time to time, Sometimes you just gotta say, “What the fuck.”
“Okay,” I said. “I think I know just the place….”
Lance
He wasn’t able to get rid of Taylor until almost eleven, and even then it required repeated texts from her travel mate Lindsay before Taylor finally climbed into her rented Camry and headed off to collect her baggage and head for Phoenix. It would take a miracle for her to make a two o’clock flight. Thank God she really did have a wedding to go to that night, or she probably would have invented yet another excuse to remain in Sedona.
Save me from clingy women. He shook his head and was just about to back out of the parking space and head up toward Kara’s when one of Sedona P.D.’s two unmarked police cars rolled up next to his Jeep and Joe Gonzales got out.
“Morning, officer,” Lance said.
“Lance,” Gonzales said, his tone guarded.
The two of them had never been buddies, mostly because Gonzales, with his cop instincts, seemed to know there was a lot more in Lance’s past than he cared to let on. Also, Gonzales knew Kara from way back and tended to be a little protective of her — his wife had been roommates with her in college or something. Anyway, he’d never warmed up to Lance, which usually wasn’t that big a deal but made their interactions, when they occurred, less than congenial.
The detective looked over at the sign on the UFO Depot’s door. “Closed? On a Saturday?”
Lance shrugged. “Family emergency.”
“I didn’t know Kara had any family anymore except Kiki.”
Well, that was the simple truth. But although Kara hadn’t heard from her deadbeat mother in years, as far as he knew, the woman was still alive and kicking, more or less. He manufactured a lie and said, “I think her mother surfaced down in Tempe or something. I don’t have all the details.”
“Oh,” was all Gonzales said, but that one word held a weight of meaning. He also knew a thing or two about Kara’s family history. “Well, hell, sorry to hear that. I just thought I’d check in on her. She called me the other day, sounded sort of strange, and I wanted to make sure everything was all right.”
“‘Strange’?” Lance repeated. Alarm bells started to go off in his head.
“Yeah, she was asking about a missing person. You know anything about that?”
“Can’t say as I do. Did you get a description?”
“Wasn’t much. Early thirties, dark hair.”
“I haven’t seen anyone like that around. Maybe she was asking for a friend or something.”
“Maybe. Kara does have quite the network, that’s for sure.” Gonzales squinted up at the sky and adjusted his sunglasses. “Looks like we’ll have rain by nightfall. Well, if you see Kara, let her know I was following up for her, okay?”
“Sure, no problem.”
Gonzales got back in his Chevy and headed north into the heart of the touristy section of town. Lance watched him go, then climbed into his Jeep, mouth grim. Missing person? What the hell?
His brain picked apart Gonzales’s words as he drove to Kara’s house. Now he was sure she was hiding something. And he aimed to find out exactly what it was.
When he pulled into her driveway and got out of the Jeep, however, he was stopped partway to the front door by a woman’s voice.
“She’s not home.”
Lance turned around and saw a Hispanic woman in her late fifties regarding him with an amused look. In one hand, she held a pair of clippers, and on the ground in front of her was a basket into which she’d apparently been dead-heading her roses. She was stocky and no-nonsense in her striped T-shirt and khaki crop pants, but something about the tip-tilted dark eyes told him she’d probably been a pretty hot tamale back in the day.
“What?” he replied.
The woman gestured with her clippers. “She took off about a half an hour ago, on the back of Jim’s old Indian. Has some friend staying with her who she says fixed up the bike.”
“Friend?”
“Well, that’s what she said,” the woman remarked with a knowing grin. “A man who looks like that, I’m guessing is a little more than a friend.”
“So what does he look like?”
“Dark hair, green eyes. Body like — ” She broke off and rolled her eyes. “Well, I wouldn’t kick him out of bed for eating crackers. Just don’t tell Mr. Martinez that.”
“Is he in his early thirties?” Lance rasped, ignoring the comment about the crackers.
“Mmm…yeah, could be. Somewhere around there. Muy caliente!”
“Thanks…Mrs. Martinez.”
Since he’d already heard far more than he wanted to, Lance stalked back to the Jeep and got in, then backed out of the driveway a little more quickly than he should have. God damn it. So this was what Kara was hiding — the fact that she had some guy shacked up with her? Was this eighth grade? Why the hell should he care who she was seeing?
Good question.
Gritting his teeth, he maneuvered the 4x4 through the clotty traffic on 89A. His thoughts roiled. What he really wanted was a drink, but it was way too early in the day for that. Besides, he knew better than to crawl into a bottle when things got rough.
He’d had his chance with Kara. And he’d blown it. She’d been giving him signals for years, and he’d ignored them. What had he expected, that she should live like a nun until he finally pulled his head out of his ass?
Based on his actions so far, that was exactly what he’d expected. And look where it had gotten him.
The thought surfaced, I was only trying to keep her safe, and he couldn’t quite ignore it. Yes, he’d been an asshole, but there’d been a reason for it…a reason he’d never wanted to discuss with her, or anyone, for that matter. Digging up the past usually made things worse, not better.
But maybe if he had…maybe if he’d trusted in the universe the way Michael had always admonished him to….
Maybe then she wouldn’t be out riding around somewhere on a motorcycle with her arms around Mr. Muy Caliente’s waist.
That was a mental image he did not need. Well, it was way too early to start drinking, but he’d go do the next best thing. Thank God he always kept a packed gym bag stowed in the back of the Jeep.
If he was lucky, he could wash away thoughts of Kara in another man’s arms by sweating them out instead of drowning them.
Kara
The road up into Jerome twisted and turned, but Grayson maneuvered the bike with casual confidence around every switchback, every loop. Now a tourist town and burgeoning artists’ colony, the one-time mining mecca clung to the side of the mountain with gravity-defying tenacity. Well, mostly gravity-defying. Some of the buildings were still sliding despite preservationists’ best efforts, and every once in a while, a structure had to be torn down in the name of public safety.
I didn’t know exactly why I’d thought of Jerome as a getaway. Once, a long time ago, I’d come up here with Alan. He hadn’t cared for it, found it claustrophobic and vertigo-inducing at the same time. Or possibly he just didn’t like the way the place got crowded with bikers on the weekends. They were mostly well-behaved, but they did give the place a sort of rough-and-ready atmosphere.
Riding behind Grayson, I understood for the first time the appeal of a motorcycle — at least for all those women I’d seen over the years riding pillion behind their significant others. It was strangely intimate, the sensation of being pressed up against his back, of feeling the hard muscles of his stomach under my arms, of having to move with him as he shifted his weight to accommodate the ever-changing rise and fall of the highway. All the same, I was almost relieved when we finally pulled into town and began hunting for a place to park. Being so close to Grayson had made me start to think about being with him in even more physical ways, and I wasn’t sure I really wanted to go there yet.
Since it was a Saturday toward the tail end of summer, the place was packed. However, because we’d ridden in on a motorcycle instead of a car, we found a spot at the long end of a row of Harleys in front of the Spirit Room, a popular hangout. Even though it was barely noon, the sound of live blues-tinged rock pounded out of the place.
The crowds milling around looked more than a little rough, and I began to question the wisdom of coming up here. Still, there didn’t seem to be much I could do except climb off the bike, since Grayson had already throttled it down and begun to unfasten his helmet.
An enormous individual in a black leather vest and faded jeans paused on the curb, looking down at the motorcycle. He probably could have put me, Grayson, and the Indian through a wall without breaking a sweat. I swallowed.
Then the guy gave us an approving nod and said, “’46 Chief, right?”
“Right,” I managed.
“Good job.” And he gave us a thumbs-up before disappearing back inside the bar.
“What was that?” Grayson asked as he looped his helmet’s straps around the handlebars and reached back to take my helmet from me.
“I think we just got the stamp of approval. Which means I guess it’s okay to park here.”
“Why wouldn’t it be? It’s a public place, isn’t it?”
“Yeah, well, there’s public and then there’s public. But I guess this old bike has a certain cachet. Just go with it.”
A look of confusion passed over his face, but he only nodded and fastened my helmet around the other handlebar. Normally, I would have worried about leaving the helmets there like that where anyone could take them, but I guessed that probably wasn’t going to be an issue here.
We headed off down the sidewalk. I didn’t really have a destination in mind, although I figured we’d grab some lunch fairly soon. In the meantime, though, Grayson didn’t appear to have any problem with wandering in and out of stores, looking at mineral specimens and antiques and all sorts of Arizona- and mining-themed tchotchkes. I’d never had the luxury of doing so with Alan, because any kind of shopping that didn’t involve buying food or electronics bored him silly. Grayson, on the other hand, appeared to be fascinated by everything, whether it was a hunk of glittering amethyst crystals or an old copper coffee pot. We spent an inordinate amount of time in a shop that specialized in kaleidoscopes, examining everything from small plastic models obviously intended for kids all the way up to an enormous brass-bound specimen that used real pieces of crystal and other minerals to create the kaleidoscopic effect.
“You should have gotten it,” Grayson protested after we finally emerged from the store. “It was beautiful.”
“It was also three thousand dollars. A bit above my pay grade. Besides, it would have been too big to bring back on the motorcycle.”
“You should have beautiful things.”
I didn’t quite know how to respond to that. He looked so earnest with the sunlight glinting in his jade-colored eyes as he gazed down at me. Obviously, the constraints of living within a budget were not something he recalled very clearly.
Keeping my tone light, I replied, “Right now, what really sounds beautiful to me is some lunch. You hungry?”
“I could eat.”
That was an understatement. I’d never seen him not ready to pack away a serious amount of calories. I had no idea where he put it, either. Maybe in his shoe. “Okay, well, that place a few doors down looks good. Let’s see what we can rustle up.”
“Sure.”
It turned out the restaurant had marvelous food. We started with stuffed portobello mushrooms and moved on from there to sandwiches — a burger for him, a chicken salad sandwich for me. Feeling a little daring, I ordered a glass of pinot grigio for myself and asked Grayson if he’d like something to go with his burger.
“Maybe a glass of zinfandel?” I suggested.
“I don’t know what that is, but sure.” He smiled across the table at me.
Something in that smile made me feel just a little melty. It wasn’t the heat of the day outside; the restaurant had great air conditioning. And it was probably reckless to order wine, what with the impure thoughts I’d had about him on the drive up here, but at the moment I really didn’t care.
“Zinfandel, check,” the waitress said, with a smile that seemed more than a little knowing.
If Grayson noticed anything, he didn’t give any indication. He picked up his water and took a few healthy swallows. It had been a hot and dusty ride up into Jerome. Then he looked around the restaurant with an air of lively curiosity, as if the odd assortment of tourists and bikers was one of the most fascinating things he’d ever seen.
“So, this is what people do?” he asked.
“I don’t follow.”
“Go out to public places and eat. Look at things.”
That must have been a hell of a knock on the head he’d gotten. How he had retained enough knowledge to resurrect the Indian from the grave and yet still seemed puzzled by some pretty basic human behavior was beyond me.
“Among other things, yes,” I replied. The waitress appeared with our wine, and I took my glass of pinot grigio gratefully before allowing myself a good swallow. “I mean, do you really not remember doing anything like this?”
Grayson reached out and picked up his own glass of wine. “No. I don’t remember…anything.”
“But there must be something,” I protested. “You fixed the bike. You rode it up here like someone who’s done that a thousand times before. I don’t understand how you can have retained those sorts of skills and yet can’t recall anything of who you are or where you came from.”
An eloquent lift of his shoulders was his only reply. Then he took a cautious sip of zinfandel, as if wanting to distract himself from the conundrum of his existence. An expression of something close to joy spread over his features and lit up his green eyes, and he followed the sip with a much healthier swallow.
“Easy there, big boy,” I cautioned him. “We still have to get down the mountain.”
“It’s supposed to have some sort of effect?”
“Um…yeah. Okay, maybe not after just a couple of sips, but still….” I drank some pinot grigio and nodded. It wasn’t enough to even start getting me tipsy, but I could still sense something of its effects. “You really don’t feel anything at all?”
He drank again, two more big swallows, then shook his head.
Nice party trick. “Well, I’d still be careful. Sometimes it sneaks up on you.” On the other hand, I thought, I might have found the world’s best-looking designated driver. “Anyway,” I continued, not about to let him permanently change the subject, “I really do think we should get you in to see someone. I have a friend, Janelle Russo, who’s a licensed hypnotherapist. Does past-life regressions, that sort of thing. Not that we need to send you back to a past life — we just want to find out what happened to the one you were living up until three days ago.”
Another shrug. “If it’s important to you.”
“Isn’t it important to you?” I asked. Part of me just couldn’t understand why he wouldn’t want to find out about his past. Having everything be such a total blank would have driven me crazy.
“I’m not sure.” He drained the rest of his zinfandel and started looking around for the waitress. “Maybe there’s a good reason why I can’t remember anything.”
Those words sent a little shiver through me. Maybe he was right and we should just let well enough alone. But I knew it wouldn’t do him any good to keep blundering on without knowing who he was and where he had come from. Even unwelcome knowledge was better than ignorance.
I’d have to keep telling myself that.