*Despite being tired, Tessa couldn’t fall asleep. Her brain felt too full of thoughts, trying to figure out the future when she didn’t remember the past. At least the present was coming together. No pun intended, she thought, smiling.
Your mind is spinning like a hamster on a wheel.
Tessa sat straight up in bed. The words hung in the air as if she’d heard a man speak in the room. She could picture him. Khaki pants and a flannel shirt. A crumpled straw western hat and muddied boots. A cigarette pack in his shirt pocket. His face was as grizzled as his voice. The southern drawl as familiar to her as the sound of her own voice. Her heart pounded, waiting for the name to pop into her mind. But it didn’t.
That did it for sleep. She went to get dressed. She had a pair of jean shorts, but she didn’t have any more clean shirts. She slipped on her canvas shoes and went back to David’s bedroom. He wouldn’t care if she borrowed one of his tee shirts.
David’s room was above the porch. The windows looked out on the lake, giving a breathtaking view of the water and the ridge on the left. She’d ask him tomorrow if they could go see the caves on Outlaw Ridge. She opened dresser drawers until she found a stack of tee shirts. Since she wasn’t wearing a bra, she chose a gray tee, with a Houston Texans logo. Beneath the stack, she saw the edge of a blue-backed document.
David had been reading that on the plane. Curious, she pulled it out and lifted the cover sheet. Pain roared through her. Her legs wouldn’t support her. She sank to the floor. Her hands shook as she spread the two documents on the floor in front of her.
In the Matter of the Marriage of Tessa Galloway and David Galloway.
Agreement Incident to Divorce.
Everything went black. Pain cut through her. She gripped her head. Just as quickly as it had come, it faded.
Tessa remembered. Everything. The heartbreak when David had presented her with these documents that August morning. The call to Nate who told her the file was safe. Nate of the gravelly voice. Her father’s Vietnam buddy who had stolen her medical file. He’d made her disappearance after college possible. He’d taught her to shoot. He’d helped her fake her death and her new identity. Helped her start a new life far from Arkansas. It just hadn’t been far enough. Xavier Kyle, her stepfather, had found her. She’d made the mistake of falling in love with and marrying a high-profile man. After their marriage, their picture had been published in the Houston newspaper and in other newspapers where David’s family was known. Kyle had seen it somewhere.
She didn’t have to worry about him raping her again. He only got off on little girls. Even the pain he liked to inflict didn’t concern her. It was the other things he could do that would destroy her. Like tell David how damaged she was. She never wanted David to know what had happened. It was just too awful. He’d demanded the blackmail file she’d used to make her mother agree to let her live on campus. She’d got her education, all the time planning and preparing to disappear.
Kyle showed up the day after they were home from Vegas. He threatened to tell David how she had seduced him. How she’d gotten pregnant with his child. Revulsion filled her. She’d been too scared, too insecure, afraid David would believe the lies. All the old ugliness rushed into her head, negating the therapy and counseling she’d had. She’d shut down emotionally, unable to be touched without thinking of her past. She’d destroyed their marriage, and in the end, that had destroyed her.
The divorce papers had sealed her doom. She wasn’t going to fight it. David deserved someone … normal. Someone not damaged. She’d retrieved her handgun from the safety deposit box and set out for Arkansas, prepared to confront Kyle and her mother who had pimped her out in exchange for the mansion in town and the money in the bank accounts.
She loved David so much. She rubbed her chest. Her heart ached. This time with him had meant … everything to her.
Tessa picked herself off the floor and pulled on the tee shirt, mechanically knotting it at the waist since it was so large.
What to do now? She looked down at the papers on the floor. Nothing. She’d do nothing. Give David his freedom if that’s what he wanted. That would be better than seeing the look in his eyes when he learned the truth about her.
The bridge that night. The truck that hit her. She knew it had to be Kyle. Maybe even her mother. Dear old mom wouldn’t want the nasty truth to come out when she was preparing for a governor’s race. Wouldn’t that just looked wonderful splashed all over the news?
Tessa fell to her knees in front of the window and wept for the second chance she’d been given that she couldn’t take. Not having a memory had helped her return to the normal she’d had before Kyle entered her life again. David hadn’t wanted a romantic getaway to rebuild their relationship. He’d wanted her away from the public so he could talk her into signing the property settlement and the divorce papers. She couldn’t even blame him. For anything.
Finally, all cried out, she got off the floor and staggered to the dresser where she’d seen a pen. She picked up the papers and scribbled her name at all the yellow flags on the documents. Then she threw the pen and papers on the bed.
David deserved better. He deserved someone not broken.
Tessa caught herself blindly staring out the window. Something moved and broke her trance. Her gaze focused. Who was skulking around the trees at the bottom of the slope? The man stepped out, and the sunlight caught pale hair. She swayed. “It can’t be.” Her eyes remained on the man who stepped over the low stone wall and disappeared from sight. Terror filled her. She didn’t stop to reason with herself that Kyle couldn’t be here. She opened the window, and the security alarm shrieked. She didn’t hesitate. Out the window and onto the roof. The electronic squealing echoed in the quiet summer afternoon.
*
David was halfway to the Diamond Bar Ranch when his cell phone sounded a strident tone. He picked it up and looked at it. The security alarm at the lake house had been set off. He grinned. Damn. He really needed to get Tessa a cell phone. He waited for the alarm to be reset. When it wasn’t, he braked. He got this bad feeling and made a U-turn in the middle of the road and headed back to the house. He called the Sheriff’s Department and got one of the deputies who told him the Sheriff had already left for the lake house.
David punched the accelerator. All he could think about was how Tessa had disappeared before. He raced back to the house as if her life depended on it because he feared it just might.
*
Tessa knew if Kyle got to her, he’d kill her for sure. She managed to roll off the roof and hang from the gutter to make her way to a downspout. She hit the ground running, sprinting for the hill. A shot rang out behind her. She ran faster.
She almost made it.
Kyle tackled her before she reached the tree line. All the rage inside her exploded. She fought with everything she had, kicking and clawing, but he was a brute of a man. Even in his fifties, he was strong like a bull. He laughed as they fought. When he finally had her face down on the ground with his knee on her back, and his fist wrapped in her hair, she still wouldn’t give up.
“Terry, little Terry. You used to be such a sweet girl?”
He stood and pulled her up then he punched her in the stomach. She doubled over, and he let her fall to her knees, retching.
“You’re pure evil,” she said. “I’m not afraid of you.” It was a lie, or maybe it wasn’t. She was beyond fear.
He backhanded her. His laughter was loud, raucous. “Keep it up. I like it. But you better be careful. You make me mad, and I’ll do your husband when he gets back and make you watch.”
Icy fear paralyzed her, but only for a moment. She lowered her head and then jumped to her feet, ramming into his groin with everything she had. He screamed. “I remember when you punched me down there,” she said, staggering, still trying to breathe normally. “You ruptured an ovary. Caused me to miscarry. You left me with only one ovary. You robbed me of the chance to have children.”
She managed to get close to him and raised her foot, prepared to stomp him where it would hurt the most. She miscalculated. He jerked her foot, and she was the one on the ground now. He stood and grabbed her right ankle and started pulling her toward the lake. Tessa kicked and screamed, even knowing no one would hear her.
Oh, God, what if her body wasn’t found? David would be accused again. She found the strength to curl her body up and catch his lower leg, making him stumble.
“You goddamn bitch,” he shouted, pulling the gun from the waist of his pants.
Tessa rolled away and rose to her feet, swaying. She heard the roar of an engine and looked toward the house. David! The truck catapulted through the low wall and headed for Kyle.
Kyle shot. Glass starbursts appeared on the windshield, but David kept going. He hit Kyle dead on. His body flew backward and landed in the shallow water at the edge of the lake.
David jumped out of the truck and raced to her. “Tessa. Sweetheart!”
Tessa smiled and walked into his arms. “I love you, David.” Then she fainted.