“Luke.” She was dazed, confused.
It was Luke, wasn’t it? His face was altered. A long, jagged scar ran the length of his right cheek. His left profile, though, was the same as she remembered. His hair was longer than he’d worn it while they were married. It was still blond and curly but was in the typical bowl-cut style she’d seen on the Amish men in the surrounding area.
A chill swept through her. What had happened to him? How was it that the man she’d loved and mourned was standing before her dressed like an Amish man? He’d left that life behind when they got married.
“Mama, Mama.” LJ ran to her side, clinging to her legs. Her sweet baby. She squatted down to peer into his eyes. He seemed uninjured. Terrified, but other than that, unharmed. She stood and lifted him in her arms, settling his weight against her hip. LJ rested his head on her shoulder. She dropped a kiss on his curls.
When she glanced up, she saw that both men were watching her. Luke’s eyes were still puzzled. Disappointment sizzled through her at the lack of tenderness he displayed. Had he used the accident to return to his community? They had never even discussed the possibility of her becoming Amish. She’d thought he was happy with their life.
Raymond’s gaze, however, was much more concerned. Actually, as he focused his attention on her son, dread was dawning in his gaze.
He doesn’t know, she realized. Raymond had no idea that she and Luke had been a couple. Was her husband ashamed of her?
She opened her mouth to say something. Then closed it. She didn’t even know where to begin.
“I think we need to decide what to do about the man who attacked you before we get sidetracked by anything else.” Raymond laid a hand on Luke’s shoulder all the while staring at Jennie and LJ. His voice interrupted her musings. She put her questions aside for the moment. He was right.
Luke rubbed his chin, his eyes never leaving her face. He still looked perplexed. “I saw a news report this morning. A man named Steve Curtis escaped from prison. I don’t know why, but I thought you might be in danger.”
Luke’s voice was the same one she remembered, softly spoken and deep, with just the barest edge of gravel in it. Textured—that was the word that came to mind when she thought of his voice. His words struck her as odd. “You don’t know?”
He’d rescued her from Steve once before. That was how they had met. After that, she’d worked with Luke for several years on various housing projects. They’d been inseparable, and she had shared everything about her past with him. Surely, he had to know that the man was a menace.
Luke opened his mouth. “How do—”
“Later.” Raymond narrowed his gaze at his brother. Jennie itched to ask Luke what he was about to say. “He got away. Now what?”
She shook her head. They’d both seen her attacker’s face. She didn’t understand the confusion. “That was not Steve Curtis.”
“Are you sure?” Doubt rang clear in Raymond’s voice.
“Of course,” she bit out. Then winced at the curt tone. Well, she had both their attention now. “I don’t know who it was. He didn’t speak, although I think his intent was clear.” She rubbed her throat with the hand that wasn’t holding on to her son. “I guess we should call the police.”
She didn’t give either man the chance to argue, not that either of them made a sound as she pulled out her phone and dialed. While they waited, she went into the kitchen under the guise of getting her son something to eat. In truth, she wasn’t sure if she was more unsettled by the escape of her stepfather and her subsequent attack, or the reappearance of her deceased spouse.
Within fifteen minutes, two Pennsylvania State Police troopers stood inside her apartment. Raymond and Luke discreetly edged toward the kitchen, letting her talk with the troopers privately.
“We’ll want to talk with you, too, when we’re done,” one of the troopers said to Luke and Raymond.
Luke frowned, but neither he nor his brother protested. Jennie remembered that the Amish she’d met while she and Luke had been together hadn’t been keen about involving outside law enforcement, for anything.
The troopers efficiently took her statement, then went about investigating the apartment. One trooper headed out into the hall and the other disappeared into the kitchen.
“You said you saw this man at your son’s preschool?” the trooper in the hall asked.
She nodded. “Yeah. I saw him leaving the school on a motorcycle as we were walking to the car. He must have taken a shortcut.”
“Did you see the motorcycle when you arrived home?”
She resisted the urge to roll her eyes. “No. If I’d seen it, I wouldn’t have gotten out of my car.”
He accepted that with a grunt and made a note on his tablet. Her mind wandered.
Her attacker had been inside waiting for her. Just the idea of someone hiding in the home that she shared with her son made her queasy. He must have beaten her there by mere seconds. Where had he parked the motorcycle? She knew she hadn’t seen it. He must have parked in the back of the building and come in through that entrance.
She frowned. Who was he? It had to have been Steve’s doing. No one else had anything against her. Steve, however, had gone to prison not once, but twice, because of her. The second time, she was sure he’d be there until he died.
How had he escaped prison?
And almost as important—who had helped him?
What if Steve came next to finish up his lackey’s failed attempt? The questions continued to whirl through her brain like a vortex, making her dizzy.
Suddenly the haven she lived in seemed like a cage.
They couldn’t stay there. But where could they go? A longing for her brother welled up inside her. Aiden would know what to do. Not only was he her older brother, but he used to be a cop before he married Sophie and began teaching criminal justice at a university. But he wasn’t even in the country. He didn’t plan to return until next week. She had no family other than Aiden. She didn’t have enough money saved up for a hotel, nor would she feel comfortable in such a place.
And what about her job? She dismissed that as unimportant. She could always find another job. Companies were always looking for tech support. And she knew that she was skilled with computers and other technology.
Panic was pulsing in her veins when the first trooper tromped back up the steps and into the apartment. In his hands, he held a cheap Santa suit.
“Fresh motorcycle tracks in the yard out back near the dumpster,” he reported.
She’d been right. Not that it brought any comfort.
Within half an hour, the troopers were ready to leave. As it was a few minutes shy of noon, most of the other tenants were at work. Their parking lot had no camera surveillance, so even if her attacker had parked in the lot outside, there was no record of it. Jennie had never taken note of what kinds of vehicles were parked at the apartment complex on a daily basis.
The troopers quietly talked with Luke and Raymond for a few minutes before returning to ask Jennie to come down to the station later to look at some images in their data files.
“You got a look at his face,” one trooper remarked. “It’s possible that you might be able to ID him.”
“Of course.” She didn’t want to, but it wasn’t like she had a choice.
“Thanks.” The trooper smiled and walked out the door. “Come in soon, Mrs. Beiler.” The door shut behind him and his partner.
“What?” the brothers said simultaneously.
Shocked, Jennie turned to stare at them.
“Your last name was Forster,” Raymond insisted.
Luke’s face was the color of all-purpose flour. “Why did they call you Mrs. Beiler?”
Astonishment held her frozen as the truth finally sank in. He didn’t remember her. Jennie swallowed hard.
“Because that’s who I am.” She narrowed her eyes at him, took in the disbelief, the shock as he swayed on his feet before catching himself. “We were married six years ago. This is your son. And I am your wife.”
His wife. He had a wife. And a son?
His shattered heart started beating like a freight train. Was that sweet little boy with the blond hair and blue eyes truly his flesh and blood? But why would this woman lie? This woman that seemed so familiar, yet not. It seemed incredible that he could have forgotten this lovely woman with her dark brown hair, hanging in a ponytail partway down her back. Her eyes were dark brown with glimmers of gold in them. There was such an air of fragility about her, but he could also sense that she had a solid core of strength.
“I—I was in an accident. I have no memories of my life from seventeen until I was twenty-two.” He forced the words out of his tight throat. How did someone forget that they have a wife? “How old is your son?”
He winced at her frown. He couldn’t say our son. It just wasn’t real to him. Not yet.
“Here,” Raymond interrupted. “Let me take him, jah? We will go into the other room while you two talk.”
The child wasn’t keen on the idea of leaving his mother at first, but Raymond managed to coax him out of her arms. As soon as Luke was alone with Jennie, he moved over to sit on the couch. She joined him but sat perched on the edge, ready to take flight at a moment’s notice.
Had they had a good marriage? At least he knew why she had seemed so familiar to him even though he was missing a huge chunk of his memories.
“To get back to your question about our son—” he didn’t miss the emphasis on the word our “—he’s four. I had just found out I was pregnant when they told me you were dead. I was devastated.” Her lovely brown eyes glistened with tears. “The baby was all I had left. LJ is my whole world.”
“LJ?”
“Luke Junior.” She shook her head. “I was told you were killed in an explosion at the plant you worked at. I buried an empty casket because there was no body. If only I had known you were still alive!”
She huffed and hugged her arms across her stomach. For a scant second, anger blazed out of her eyes. Then her lovely face changed, became sad.
He felt that sadness all the way to his bones. “I had no idea who I was. I woke up in a ditch, my leg injured and clothes in tatters. In fact, I thought I was still seventeen.”
Her eyes grew huge and her mouth dropped open.
He nodded in understanding. “When I returned home to Mamm and Daed, they told me that I was twenty-two and had been gone for several years. I couldn’t recall any of it.”
“Until today?”
His heart broke at the hope in her voice. He shook his head, shattering that hope. “Nee, I still have no memory. Not really. When I saw that news report, I knew that man was no gut. In my mind, I could see your face, but I had no idea why.”
She sighed.
“Jennie, can you tell me about Steve Curtis? When I saw his picture, all I could think was that you were in danger. I didn’t remember who you were, but I did know that you were important.”
For the briefest moment, her eyes softened. It was gone so fast he might have imagined it.
“I hate talking about him.”
Luke waited. He couldn’t force her to tell him, but he hoped she would.
She sighed. “Fine. I’ve already told the police everything. I guess it won’t hurt to repeat it one more time.” Slapping her hands down on her knees, she pushed herself to a stand. Then she removed her hair from the band that was holding it loosely at the back of her neck. He was momentarily distracted by the wealth of shining brown hair streaming down her back before she caught it up again in a tighter ponytail.
“When I was a kid, my mother married Steve. My brother, Aiden, and I didn’t know at first how terrible he was. But soon we found out. While Mom was at work, Steve was at home, drunk and angry. He attacked me when I was eleven.”
Luke froze, horrified.
“My brother went after him and knocked him down, then locked us in my bedroom. The police arrested Steve and he stood trial. I had to testify. It was awful. His defense attorney tore me apart. Somehow, it was my fault. I was a kid. The jury didn’t buy it, and he was sentenced to four years in prison. Four years!” She snorted.
Luke couldn’t speak. He clenched his fists to hold in the anger rushing through him.
She wasn’t done. “My brother and I thought we were free, but we weren’t. We were taken away from my mom and placed in foster care. In separate homes. My mom had had enough and gave us up. I blamed Aiden for years for not protecting me. For leaving me. But he was only fifteen. When he aged out of the foster care system, he came to find me, but I wanted nothing to do with him. We didn’t actually reconcile until almost five years ago.”
“What about your mom?”
She shrugged. “I never saw her again.”
“Steve, he was released four years later?”
“Yeah.” Her voice crackled, as if her throat were suddenly dry. She cleared it. “Actually, it was less than four years. And he came after me, to pay me back for costing him everything. I was fifteen. You were on your rumspringa. I was walking back to my current foster home after school, and suddenly he was there with a knife.” She rubbed her shoulder. “You heard me scream and rushed to my rescue. He assaulted me, but you were in time to save my life.”
She’d had to be strong to survive the blows life had dealt her and still be able to love and nurture a child. And apparently, she’d once loved Luke, too. Now he understood the strength he’d sensed about her.
He swallowed. He could clearly see the scene in his mind, the stabbing knife, the blood on her shoulder. And he knew the knife wound hadn’t been the worst part of the attack. His heart ached for her.
“When I was released from the hospital,” she went on, “my foster parents decided that it was too dangerous to bring me back into their home.”
He blinked. “You hadn’t done anything wrong.”
“I had someone coming after me. Even though Steve would go to jail, they didn’t want me. I ended up in a new foster home, close to your uncle’s house.”
“You worked on housing projects with us, building homes, didn’t you?”
She smiled, just the smallest lift of the corners of her mouth. He found himself wanting to see a full smile from her. “I did. I was relegated to do the painting. Your uncle said I was hopeless with a hammer. Kept dropping all the nails.”
Luke wanted to find out more. There were still so many questions that weren’t answered.
“Do you—” She stopped.
He waited, frustrated when she didn’t continue. “Do I what?”
She grabbed a hank of hair lying over her right shoulder and began to twist it around her fingers. He remembered that gesture. It meant she was unsure of herself. He wanted to tell her she could ask him anything, but held his tongue, not wanting to make her more flustered than she already was.
“I was just wondering... Well, I know you lost some of your memories.”
More like five years’ worth of memories. His gaze zeroed in on the pictures on the wall. Pictures of LJ as a baby until now. His son’s entire life. He nodded for her to continue.
“Well, do you, you know, still have nightmares about fires?”
His mouth dropped open. He closed it. His teeth clicked. Swiping his hand across his top lip, he wiped away the sweat that had formed at the mere thought of being trapped inside a blazing building. “Jah, I do. Did I tell you about the fire?”
She nodded. “Not everything—you were kinda closemouthed about it. But I know that you were in a fire when you were fourteen and one of your cousins died.”
His cousin had died because Luke had failed to pull him out of the inferno. It wasn’t something he was willing to talk about. Maybe one day, but not yet. Especially not with a woman who was a virtual stranger to him, no matter how they might have been connected.
Raymond exited the kitchen with LJ. LJ’s face had a smear of jelly in the corner of his mouth. “He said he was hungry, so I made him a peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich.”
“That’s fine,” Jennie said.
“I know you guys have a lot to talk about, but are you going to the police station soon?”
“I should go now.”
“I’m coming with you,” Luke blurted out. When they both stared at him, he grew irritated. “What?”
“What do I tell the driver?” Raymond demanded. “Or what do I tell Mamm and Daed?”
Luke stared at his brother. Why was any of that important? He had just found out he had a wife and child. It seemed obvious that everything else would be a lower priority right now. He cut his eyes to Jennie. She hadn’t responded. He tilted his head to the side and lifted his eyebrows at her, a silent question.
“Nothing,” Jennie mumbled.
He was disappointed. Her voice gave no indication of how she felt about him now. Not that he had any idea what his own feelings were. They were a jumbled mess. However, the truth was that he had a wife and a son, even if he didn’t know them. He wasn’t leaving her alone again.
“Mama,” LJ said, tugging at Jennie’s jeans.
“Yes, pumpkin?”
“Who is that?” LJ pointed a timid finger at Luke.
There was a pause. “That, LJ, is your daddy.”
“I have a daddy?” LJ beamed a wide grin across the room at Luke.
Luke blinked as his vision blurred.
Nee, he was not leaving. Not now.