“YOU’RE RUNNING OUT OF TIME, MacGuire,” Conlan said after Melinda left them alone in the hospital waiting room. “That woman is going to do something to screw things up thoroughly, and soon.”
“I know,” Matthew said. “Believe me, I know.”
“So what are you gonna do about it?”
“Follow her home. Watch her. Try to keep her alive until this is over with. What else can I do?”
MELINDA PULLED HER CAR into her driveway, popped the trunk and got out. She went around to the back where she’d put the can of gasoline she’d bought on the way home. It was a three-gallon container. She’d had to buy it at the gas station, but she’d paid cash and kept her face averted from the security cameras. That she’d even thought of those things seemed to prove to her that her history as a crime fighter was real. They were things that would not have occurred to her before.
She set the can down and went into her house for a lighter and the bag full of fabric she’d used as drop cloths when she’d repainted her bathroom six months ago. For once, she was glad she never threw anything away.
Slinging the bag of old sheets over her shoulder, she headed back outside, picking up the gas can on the way. Tonight, she was going to get those animals out of her neighborhood once and for all. Yes, the actions she planned were drastic. But the sight of her best friend lying beaten half to death on the sidewalk fueled her. They were sending her a message? Well, they’d better be ready to deal with her reply.
When she got close to the drug house, she crouched in the snow-dusted bushes and waited. Watching and listening. It was nearly midnight, but the place was still busy. People coming and going. Deals going down all night long. She didn’t care. She waited, and she waited some more. It was cold outside. She could see her breath. But she didn’t shiver. Anger kept her warm.
When the place quieted a bit, she got up and crept closer, and then, slowly, she moved around the house. She tore fabric and poured gasoline as she went, stuffing wadded-up, gas-soaked rags against the house, sloshing more gas onto the walls and the bushes, which would make great kindling once the snow melted off, she thought. She drenched the front steps and the windowsills. She didn’t want a stick of this place left standing when she finished.
Finally, she tossed the gas can into the bushes. Now, all she needed to do was get everyone out. Because as angry as she was, she didn’t want a half-dozen dead thugs on her conscience. She just wanted them to go away.
Was that odd? In her memory, her former boss—or the voice she thought of as that of her former boss—had told her she had killed many criminals. She was trained to do so. Why would it bother her to do the same to these criminals? Wasn’t that the whole point of getting her memory back?
But she hadn’t really got it back, had she? Aside from that one conversation, she didn’t remember a thing about that former life. Not one detail had surfaced in her mind.
She stomped down her misgivings and kept on working. She was leaving footprints in the snow here and there, and she didn’t like that. But she hoped the firefighters would stomp all over them when they arrived later, obliterating any sign that she had been there. Oh, they’d know it was arson. But they wouldn’t know who’d done it. She imagined thugs like these had lots of enemies.
Finally, when all was ready, she marched to the front of the house. She faced the door. Her plan sort of faltered at that point. She wasn’t at all sure this final part would work, but she hoped so. Hefting a suitably heavy rock she’d found around back, she hurled it with all her might.
It smashed straight through a window.
Commotion from inside came fast, and she stood there just long enough to be seen.
“It’s that damn schoolteacher!” the fat one, Delaney, shouted.
“That’s it,” his scrawny cohort replied. “I don’t care what the boss says, I’ve had it.”
“Let’s get her.”
“I don’t want any part of this!” That was a female voice, but Melinda didn’t have time to figure out which of the heroin twins it was. The big guy who’d tried to steal Annabelle’s bag came surging out of the house, pausing on the front porch to stare at her as if stunned to find her still standing there.
“Yeah, right, you’re going to come after me,” Melinda shouted, though her throat was tight with fear. “Who are you trying to fool, Delaney? We both know you’re nothing but a coward. Stealing purses from little old ladies. Kidnapping geriatric cats.”
“Cats? What the fu—”
“Come on. Come see what you can do with someone as strong as you are. Stronger. Come on! I dare you!”
The other man came outside, tapped the fat boy on the back, and then the two of them surged toward her. With no more time to wait, she ran. She weaved and dodged through the entire neighborhood. And they gave chase. There were still two more inside, that she knew of. The women. She needed them to leave, as well.
But first, to outrun the pair on her tail. She got far enough ahead for her hastily formed plan to work and then ducked into an alley and through the back door of an empty duplex down the street from her own. She closed the door behind her, went to lock it, but found the lock broken, which explained why she’d been able to get inside so easily. She’d expected it to be more of a challenge. Maybe things were finally going her way.
Quickly, she went to a window, crouched and waited, watching the alley.
As soon as the two men ran past, she headed to the front of the house and out that door. Then, she pulled the lighter from her pocket, held it in her hand and returned to the drug house, just in time to see the two women leaving in the rust-bucket of a car that had been parked in the driveway. They spun their tires as they vanished into the night.
So the house was empty. She hoped.
She threw another rock through another window, hoping to draw out anyone who might still be inside, then she dashed around back and flicked her lighter. If there was anyone still in there, they would move toward the front, drawn there by the sounds of shattering glass. They’d be near the exit, and on the opposite side of the house from where the fire began. It was the best she could do, and better than they probably deserved.
Crouching in the bushes, she flicked the lighter.
That was when a hand came around her face from behind and clapped over her mouth, while another hand wrested the lighter from her grasp.
She struggled, got her lighter back and shoved it into a pocket, but he still held her and his grip was unbreakable. Backing into the bushes, he crouched with her, and when she strained her neck to turn around and see him, he held her even harder.
“Stay quiet and be still! I mean it!” he whispered harshly.
Familiar. That voice. The feel of those arms. The subtle scent of him. Blinking in stunned disappointment, she whispered, “Matthew? What are you doing here?”
He didn’t answer, just stared at her, apparently searching for words. Then someone else spoke. “Huh. So that’s why you wouldn’t let us take care of her.”
This voice came from the darkness, and then slowly, the fat guy and the skinny one stepped into sight. The skinny one said, “We kept telling you this broad would be trouble, Boss, but you wouldn’t listen. Now here she is trying to burn us out.” He kicked her empty gasoline can as he said it. “And here you are, trying to protect her.”
Matthew’s grip went slack in surprise, and Melinda took the opportunity to yank herself free. She spun around and smacked him hard across the face.
Panting, she faced him while the other men laughed.
“Boss?” she asked. “You?”
Matthew held her gaze, and there was something that looked a lot like regret in his. “Yeah, me. You’re alive because of me, though, so don’t act quite so arrogant about it, okay?”
She narrowed her eyes. His voice was different. Altered. Gruff and unpolished. “Why?”
He had to look away. “Why does anyone do anything? There’s money in the drug trade, Melinda. Lots and lots of money.”
“I know that,” she whispered. “I meant why did you tell them to leave me alone?”
“Why do you think?” the fat one said. “Pesky bitch that you are, you’re still a prime piece of tail.”
She didn’t look at the jerk, only kept her eyes on Matthew and wondered, too, what the old Melinda would do in a situation like this. Fight now? Or wait and bide her time? Would she even have any more time? What was she supposed to do with the bitter hurt that was, even now, trying to cripple her. He’d been using her. Using her, the whole time!
“Come with me,” Matthew told her.
The other men looked at each other and then at him. “Are you effin’ kidding, Boss?”
“I’m taking her. Stay out of it.”
“No. No way, I don’t like this one bit, man. This don’t seem right. This seem right to you, J?”
“J” shook his head slowly, left then right. “Hadn’t seem right in a while now,” he said, and his pronunciation made the English teacher in Melinda wince, despite the direness of her predicament.
“To me, neither,” said the fat ass. “I think we ought to call the Big Dog.”
Matthew sent them a wide-eyed look. “There’s no need to do that—”
“You just proved there was, just by the fear in your eyes, Boss.” The fat guy pulled a gun, nodded at the others. “Tie ’em both up. We’ll talk to the Dog, let him decide what to do with ’em.”
“Toss ’em in the basement with the old lady’s cat.”
“I knew it!” Melinda said. But she didn’t struggle as the men bound her hands and escorted her and Matthew down into the house’s dank basement. She was slammed into a wooden chair, quite unceremoniously. Matthew was shoved inside as well, his hands tied behind his back. The two men bound their feet, too. She thought about kicking their teeth in, but decided to wait it out. Then the door was closed and bolted from the outside.
A plaintive yowl drew her attention, and Melinda looked down to see Percy curling around her legs. “Looks like they’ve been feeding him, at least.”
“He wandered in and one of the girls took a liking to him, decided to keep him,” Matt said softly.
“Yeah, that figures. Their kind take what they want. They don’t care who they hurt in the process. And what about you, Matthew?”
“What about me?”
She shrugged. “You’re the boss.”
“Yeah. Only now, thanks to you, my own gang is turning on me.”
“Because of me? Or because you’re not who you say you are at all?”
He frowned, but averted his eyes.
“You couldn’t have been more obvious. The minute they said they were going to call this Big Dog, your panic was clear on your face.”
He smiled slowly. “Yeah. Because that was what I wanted them to see.”
Her brows went up.
He leaned closer. “I’m not a teacher, Melinda, and I’m not a drug dealer, either. I’m a cop. I’m undercover. Conlan and I are working on this together. They put me at the school to get a close-up view of the kids and their buying habits, which led me to this neighborhood. Then I got inside with them—I was the new boss sent by the Big Dog to manage things here. Only the real guy he sent is cooling his heels in jail.”
“And no one knows what he looks like?”
“This Big Dog is cagey. Never sees anyone face-to-face. No phone numbers, no email addresses, nothing that can be traced. The only reason this drug house has been allowed to stay open is because we’ve been trying to find out who this mysterious leader is. He’s the money behind a dozen drug dens like this one—and those are just the ones we know of. Your impatience might have screwed up the case I’ve been working on for six months.”
She wanted to sigh, or maybe cry, in relief. She’d known he couldn’t be one of them. And yet, he was using her all the same, wasn’t he? Maybe she shouldn’t be relieved at all.
“My impatience,” she said at length, “seems to be the impetus behind finally getting this head honcho to come into the open. You should be thanking me.”
He smirked. “I’ll thank you if we live through this.”
“Oh, we will.”
“You sound pretty confident.”
It was her turn to smirk. “That’s because there’s something you don’t know about me, Matthew.” She frowned. “Is that even your real name?”
Matthew nodded. “First name, at least.”
She went silent, then, lowering her head as the reality of all of this finally settled over her. “So you aren’t really a teacher at all. Or a dealer. Or a MacGuire.”
“No.”
“And all of this attention you were paying to me. That was just part of the case, too, wasn’t it?”
He lifted his brows as if surprised by her assumption.
“You don’t have to answer,” she said. “I knew. I knew from the beginning that it was too good to be true. I was believing in a fantasy. Something that I only wished was real.” Tears welled up. She lowered her head and tried to blink them away, but they spilled over. Some tough chick she was turning out to be.
“Yes, Melinda, you have been believing in a fantasy. But you’re all wrong about the rest of it. The stuff that’s real and the stuff that’s make-believe—you’ve really mixed them up.”
She sniffed, shook her head. “Don’t try to spare my feelings. I’m tougher than you think. There’s a lot you don’t know about me, Matthew.”
“What don’t I know?” he asked.
She fought past the pain, clinging to her alter ego, drawing from the depths of her strength, her confidence, because Melinda didn’t have any of her own left. “I used to work undercover, too. On a far higher level than you. I know twenty-five ways to kill a man with my bare hands. I’ve taken down terrorists and assassins. I’m one of the best there ever was.”
He blinked at her. “So that’s what you…remembered while you were under hypnosis?”
“Yes. That’s what I remembered.”
“Yeah, I figured it was something like that after I talked to Rodney.”
She nodded, then lifted her head, met his eyes. “And ran a background check, no doubt.”
“I admit it, I did.”
“But my true history didn’t show up, did it? Just my cover as a mild-mannered schoolteacher.”
He nodded again. “So tell me, how is it you only remembered this past of yours now?” he asked.
“When I decided to retire, they had to erase my memory. It’s standard with agents with clearances as high as mine. I was privy to some supersensitive info.” It was easier to ignore the pain of his rejection when she delved more deeply into the life she’d lived before.
“Sensitive information, huh? Such as?”
She frowned. “I wouldn’t tell you if I could.”
“But you can’t.”
Pursing her lips, she shook her head left and right. “No. No, I haven’t remembered many details yet.”
“Many details? Or any details?”
She shrugged. “You sound like you’re doubting me.”
He looked up quickly. “I talked to Rodney at length. We went over and over that session you had with him, and I keep getting hung up on one little detail.”
“What little detail would that be?”
“You were under. The telephone rang, and he got up and left the room to answer it. Correct?”
“Yes.”
“When he came back, the television was on. Correct?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“And this was on Tuesday night, sometime between 8:00 and 9:00 p.m.”
She blinked. “That’s right.”
He shrugged. “I phoned Rodney’s father, asked him if it were possible for you to hear something on TV and interpret it as a real memory in your ultrarelaxed state. He said it was more than possible. It was likely. He said a person with a natural eagerness to please others makes for a person who is extremely vulnerable to the power of suggestion.”
She frowned, tipping her head to one side.
“So you think…I heard a TV show and interpreted it as my history?” It was ridiculous. It was almost…laughable.
“That’s what I think,” he said.
She pursed her lips, closed her eyes and shook her head no. “That’s not possible. I’m sorry. It’s a great theory, but this…feels real to me.”
“I checked the listings, Melinda. There was a rerun of a spy movie on, right at the time you were at Rodney’s. A movie where a female superspy whose memory has been erased is called back into service. There’s a scene in the first fifteen minutes where her former boss tells her who she really is and that her life as a mild-mannered journalist is just a cover.”
She blinked. “Journalist?” That voice in her mind had said journalist, she recalled. She remembered correcting her own memory—hearing journalist and thinking, No. Teacher.
“But…I stood up to a guy three times my size. I took him out when he tried to steal Annabelle’s purse. I tricked them all into chasing me, and then I eluded them.”
“Because you believed you could.”
“I stood up to the bully on the train, and my colleagues at work and the troublemakers in my class. I even got my car back from my sister.”
“Yes, you did. You did all of that.”
“So it had to be real! Don’t you see, I could never have done any of those things before. Not until I remembered—”
“Not until you believed you could. According to Rodney, when you believe your memories are real, they basically are. Your brain doesn’t know the difference. So you were able to do all those things simply because you believed you could.”
She blinked slowly and shook her head. She felt, very clearly, as if she were shrinking into herself. Her mind turned inward, in search of the woman she had, temporarily, believed herself to be. But all she found waiting there was the frightened, shy victim she had always been.
“I should have known it was too good to be true,” she whispered. “I’m…I’m the same little nobody I’ve always been. It was all just a fantasy.”
Tears bubbled up from somewhere deep, and her eyes burned as she fought not to let them spill over. Her hands were tied behind her, so she couldn’t even dash them away, and within a moment, she felt them burning their salty trails down her cheeks. “I feel like such an idiot.”
“No. Melinda, that’s not what—”
“Oh, God!” She realized suddenly just what a mess she had got herself into. She was the captive of a gang of murderous drug dealers. “They’re going to kill us, aren’t they? We’re done for.” Her eyes widened, and her entire body began to shake and tremble. It was no longer the toughest chick in town sitting there, bound and plotting her revenge on the thugs who dared to best her. It was Melinda, the shrinking violet, the weak, scared doormat who would walk a mile out of the way to avoid confrontation.
And she didn’t stand a chance.