Chapter 10
Kelsey stared out through the French doors and down at the millions of tiny lights that dotted the Santa Barbara coastline below. She wished she could cry, wished she could summon tears and get rid of the emotion that choked her like hands around her neck. Except she was too angry to cry—angry or frightened, she couldn’t tell which.
Her fists closed into tight balls, and she pounded them against her thighs. What had happened? What had caused Coop to drink like that? It was as though he’d been trying to be unpleasant, had purposely wanted to spoil the evening.
She closed her eyes to the magnificent nightscape, feeling a sense of dread start to build in her chest—that awful dread that lived in those murky black depths where her memories lay hidden. What was in all that darkness that frightened her so? What had happened in that time she had lost?
She opened her eyes, turned from the window and glanced across the room at the hospital bed. That bed had disturbed her from the beginning. It didn’t belong there. It didn’t make sense. Coop had given her an eloquent explanation about doctors’ orders and providing her with the utmost comfort during her recovery, but it had been six weeks. Why were they still sleeping in separate bedrooms?
Anxiety rose in her throat, tasting bitter and vile. What was it she’d blocked out? He’d sworn to her there was no other woman, but there had to be something. Had their marriage been in trouble? Had Coop developed a drinking problem? What could have happened to explain why they weren’t sleeping together?
She thought back over the past several weeks, thought of Coop’s careful attentions, of his affection and his concern for her. The feelings had been real between them, she was certain of that.
She glanced at the faded T-shirt he’d given to her to use as a nightgown. She might have forgotten a lot about the past, but she still knew him, still knew her husband. When he’d told her he loved her, he hadn’t been lying. She’d seen the love in his eyes, felt it in her heart.
She walked across the bedroom and ran a hand along the cold rail of the hospital bed. So why was this ugly thing still here? If there were problems, if there was something she’d forgotten, something wrong between them, why hadn’t he just told her? Was there something he was protecting her from, something he didn’t want her to know?
Pressure throbbed fierce at her temples, tension from a long, frustrating evening spent alone in her room. She had to stop this, had to stop guessing, had to stop letting her fears and anxieties get the best of her. There was a good chance tonight had nothing to do with her amnesia. It might have been nothing more than a wife getting annoyed with her husband—a common, ordinary marital dispute. Surely they weren’t immune. She could certainly remember arguments they’d had in the past. Why did it have to be more than that?”
She ambled through the darkness, then flipped the switch in the master bath, bringing the room to life with light. At the moment, it really didn’t matter what kind of argument they were having, or why. It had caused one hell of a headache—and it was making it difficult for her to think straight at all.
She rummaged through the medicine cabinet and pulled out the small plastic bottle of pain relievers. If she could get the throbbing to stop long enough, maybe she could fall asleep. After a good night’s sleep, maybe things would look better.
“Oh, no,” she moaned, slipping off the cap and looking into the empty container. She stared at herself in the mirror, frowning and feeling the painful pulsing inside her head grow worse. “No, no, no, no!”
She thought of the full bottle of aspirin on the cupboard shelf in the kitchen and cringed. Leaving the bedroom meant seeing Coop again, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to do that right now, not when she felt so angry—or so vulnerable.
When he’d returned to the patio with a second bottle of wine, she’d decided she’d had enough. She had gotten up and—despite her weak leg—stomped down the hall and into the bedroom, slamming the door behind her.
It had been a brilliant exit, dramatic and theatrical, and she didn’t doubt it had demonstrated to him just how displeased she was with him. Unfortunately, it also left her stranded with an empty bottle of aspirin.
Of course, it might have been different if he had come after her, had made some attempt to apologize or make amends, but he hadn’t. She’d been left to while away the evening alone in her room, coping with her fears and letting her imagination run wild.
She looked at her reflection in the mirror, watching her frown lines deepen. How had Coop spent the evening? Had his been as long and as frustrating as hers had been? Did he regret what had happened, or had he finished that second bottle of wine and fallen asleep in front of the television?
“Forget the aspirin,” she said to her reflection, deciding it wasn’t worth it. The last thing she needed was to find him sprawled across the sofa sound asleep.
She switched off the bathroom light, feeling her way through the darkness to the bed. She would tough it out, would just force herself to forget about the pounding behind her eyes, forget about the tension crawling up her neck, and simply get some rest.
She pulled the covers back, climbed in and settled back against the pillows. It was, after all, just a headache. It wasn’t as though she’d never had one before. How bad could it be? She would relax and use a little mind over matter, just concentrate on her breathing like women in labor did and—
She sprang into a sitting position. Something was clicking in her brain. Something had been triggered and was finding its way out of those lost regions in her memory.
Breathing. Relaxing. Labor. It was so close, so close. It was right there, right on the outskirts of her memory, right in back of her brain. She almost had it, she could almost remember...
Only as suddenly as it had come, it disappeared again, fading into the abyss.
Kelsey sank against the pillows again, her heart pounding furiously. She’d almost had it, had almost been able to grab it and to pull it back. Except now it was gone.
She closed her eyes tight and pounded her fists against the mattress. Just a few seconds more, that’s all it would have taken. A few lousy seconds, and she would have had it.
“Mind over matter,” she murmured again, feeling her heart pound in rhythm with the tension in her head. “Mind over matter.”
She tried to relax, tried to fill her thoughts with all those things she’d been thinking of when the memory had started to surface. She stared at the dark ceiling, taking deep breaths and trying to figure out what it was about women in labor and breathing techniques that had seemed so familiar. Had it been because of her job? Something in pediatrics and working with newborns that she’d almost remembered?
She pounded her fists on the mattress again, straining to remember, hoping that faint spark of recognition would come back, that it would flame and grow and trigger something again. But nothing came, no glimmer, no hint of anything. Restless and frustrated, she thrashed about, trying to relax, and only succeeding in stirring herself up more.
“I can’t stand it,” she muttered, kicking the covers aside and sitting up. But the motion was too sudden, too harsh, and pain exploded at her temples and behind her eyes.
She paused long enough for the painful throbbing to ease, then slowly swung her legs off the bed and came carefully to her feet. She checked the time on the clock beside the bed. Eleven forty-six. Chances were Coop had gone to bed. Not that it mattered. Running into him was a chance she’d have to take, because she needed something for her headache, and she needed it now.
Pausing at the doors, she listened before she turned the knob. But there was no sound coming from the other side. Cracking the door, she peered out. The hallway was dark and deserted. The whole house looked dark and deserted.
She took a few hesitant steps forward, then paused and listened again. The door to his room was closed. No doubt he had gone to bed.
Relaxing a little, she quickly made her way down the hall, through the breakfast nook and into the kitchen. There wasn’t any need for lights. She knew the way by heart. The small bottle of aspirins was just where she’d expected it to be, and she snapped the cap in one smooth motion. The tablets tasted bitter on her tongue, but she didn’t mind. She just wanted them to dissolve, wanted the medication to start moving through her bloodstream and take the pain away.
“Better,” she whispered, washing the tablets down with several sips of bottled water from the refrigerator. “Yes, better.” The water tasted sweet and icy cold and very refreshing after the aspirin’s acrid bite, and she took another long drink. “Much, much better.”
She walked to the sink and looked out the kitchen window to Jonathan’s house across the street. Despite the late hour, lights burned bright inside the house, making it look warm and inviting with its flower-lined walks and manicured lawns. It looked full of life, of happy times and children.
She followed the path of a car as it passed slowly along the street, wondering what her house looked like to an outsider. Did it look as dark and cold and empty as it felt to her at times? Would it ever have that warm, lived-in look? Would it ever be filled with children?
She thought of Coop, of the plans they’d made and the family they hoped to have. Was that the reason they were still sleeping apart? Did he not want to risk a pregnancy until she was completely over her injuries and her lost memories had returned? Or was it that he’d changed his mind, that a family wasn’t something he wanted any longer?
“Kelsey?”
She’d walked right past him. At first he’d thought she was ignoring him because she was too angry to speak. Not that he blamed her. He’d acted like a jerk, sloppy and rude. He wouldn’t be surprised if she never talked to him again.
Except as he watched her he realized she hadn’t seen him sitting there in a dark corner of the breakfast nook. She wasn’t ignoring him—she didn’t even know he was there.
He took a moment, watching her as she pulled the aspirin bottle from the cupboard and popped several tablets into her mouth. He’d been stupid to drink the way he had, to think alcohol would do anything more than inflame his already heightened senses. He might have succeeded in making her angry tonight, might have been able to make himself so unpleasant that she’d locked herself in her room all evening. But it had done nothing to stem his desire, nothing to stop him from wanting her.
It had been hours since he’d had a drink, since alcohol had burned through his bloodstream. But sitting in the darkness watching her, he felt the same potent sensation. The moonlight through the window caught the locks of her hair, making it shine soft and silky. It made her look more like an angel than a flesh-and-blood woman, more like someone from a dream or a fairy tale.
Only she was real, she was flesh and blood. The faint outline of her bare breasts and slim shoulders against the thin fabric of his old T-shirt made that very clear. She wasn’t an illusion. She was the woman he loved, the woman he wanted.
“Better. Yes, better. Much, much better. ”
Her soft words surprised him, and for a moment he thought she was talking to him, that she had become aware of his presence and was addressing him. But she had no idea he was there. The shadows of the dark corner had obscured him from her view completely.
He figured the wise thing would be to just sit there and let her pass him again, let her walk back to her bedroom alone and shut the door behind her. Except he wasn’t feeling very wise tonight. He was feeling lost, miserable, and he couldn’t just let her walk away.
“Kelsey?”
The sudden sound of his voice out of the silence made her jump violently, the plastic bottle of water slipping from her hand and falling clumsily into the sink.
“C-Coop,” she stammered, spinning around and finding his shadowy silhouette in the murkiness of the breakfast nook. “You ... you scared me to death.”
“I’m sorry,” he said, leaning back in the chair.
“How long have you been sitting there?” she asked, straining to see him in the darkness.
“An hour,” he said with a careless shrug of his shoulder. “Maybe two—I don’t know.”
“Oh,” she mumbled, unnerved to think how close he’d been all this time. “I—I thought you’d gone to bed.”
He shook his head. “Couldn’t sleep.”
Her gaze narrowed, and she forgot about being angry for a moment. “Are you...all right?”
“You mean am I drunk?” He breathed out a cheerless laugh. “No.”
“I, uh, came out for the aspirin,” she said, lifting up the small bottle she still held in her hand.
“Headache?”
She nodded. “Yeah. You?”
“Oh, yeah—a killer.”
It made her self-conscious that he could see her, but she couldn’t see him. “Want some?”
“No, thanks. I gave up on aspirin hours ago.”
She couldn’t tell if he was looking at her or somewhere else, and it made her uncomfortable. “You had a lot to drink.”
“Yeah,” he murmured, watching how her breasts pressed tight against the T-shirt with every breath she took. “Too much.”
“Is...everything all right? I mean, it isn’t like you to drink like that—at least, not that I can remember.”
“Don’t worry,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest and leaning back in the chair. The T-shirt just barely covered her torso, and with the cast gone, her legs looked long and smooth and seemed to go on forever. “I haven’t become a drunk, if that’s what you mean.”
“It crossed my mind,” she admitted, sensing his movements in the darkness even though she couldn’t see exactly what they were. She pushed herself away from the counter, taking several hesitant steps across the cool tiled floor toward him. “After all, I’ve forgotten a lot.”
“Yeah,” he muttered, watching her move and feeling his blood start to heat. “A lot.”
“Maybe...” She hesitated only briefly. “Maybe we should talk about some of those things I’ve forgotten.”
“And maybe you should just go back to bed.”
She shook her head. “No, I’m not going anywhere.”
“Go to bed, Kelsey,” he said again. “Just get out.”
She stopped. “Is that what you want?”
“What I want?” He slowly leaned forward in the chair. “What I want doesn’t matter.”
She could see him better now, sitting in the dark corner with his shirt off and his feet bare. His face looked pale and gaunt, and his eyes had a raw, hungry look. Something stirred in her, knotting in her stomach and radiating like an ember giving off heat. “It matters to me.”
He looked at her. “Don’t do this.”
“Don’t do what, care about you? Love you?” She shook her head again. “Too late, Coop—I already do. You’re my husband. I love you.”
“Husband.” He snorted, raking a hand through his hair. “Yeah, I’m some kind of husband, all right.”
His voice sounded different, strained and tense, and she heard something so sad, so wounded in it. “Coop, what is it? What aren’t you telling me? What’s happening here?”
“Nothing,” he insisted, slamming his fist on the table and glaring at her. “Nothing is happening here—and nothing can happen here.”
His violent reaction made her stagger, shocked and surprised.
“I—I don’t understand,” she whispered. “I don’t understand any of this. All you’ve done for weeks now is push me away. If something’s wrong, Coop, just tell me. Tell me, because it couldn’t make me feel any worse than I do right now.”
“Kelsey, please,” he pleaded, the pain in her voice tearing at his insides. How did he make her understand when he didn’t understand himself? How could he explain that he wanted to do the right thing—even if none of this seemed right? How could anything be right when it hurt her so much? “Just go to bed.”
“What is it?” she demanded, her lip quivering and tears glittering in her eyes. “What is it you’re not telling me? What is it you think you’re protecting me from?”
“You want to know?” he growled, the hurt and the fear on her face and in her voice causing something to snap in him. He stood, grabbed her by the arm and pulled her to him. “I’m protecting you from this.” He crushed his body tightly against hers. “From me.”
He found her lips and ravaged them, kissing her with all the emotion, all the longing and desire that had been building in him for weeks. Her taste invaded him, entering his blood, torching it until heat exploded through him like a brushfire out of control.
This was right, the two of them together, Coop and Kelsey, husband and wife. Not making up excuses, not living a charade, not cruelly rejecting her over and over again. It was what she wanted and what he was ready to die to have.
All he wanted was to love her. How could that be wrong?
“Kelsey,” he gasped. Her name sounded sweet to his ears, as sweet and as pure as it tasted in his mouth. “God forgive me, Kelsey, I want you. I can’t help myself.”
Even as he captured her mouth again, even as he felt her hands clawing to get at. him and the soft groans escape from her throat, he knew God would forgive him—he just wasn’t sure she ever would.
Kelsey heard the need in his voice, felt his hard, strong body pressing against her, and a fireball replaced the knot in her stomach, twisting tight. This was what she wanted, what she needed—to feel him in her arms, to feel his need and to know he wanted her. If there were problems she’d forgotten, they didn’t matter now. She still had Coop. Still had his passion, his fire, and most important, she still had his heart.
“I want you, too,” she murmured against his lips, her hands moving around his waist and slipping beneath the fabric of his jeans. “I want you, too.”
The feel of her hands at his sides and along the swell of his bottom made rational thought drain from his brain and hunger gnaw at his soul. He gave the civilized, thinking part of himself over to the primal being that shared his skin, the primitive, feral creature whose only purpose was to appease his appetites.
He pulled her closer, his hands wild in an effort to touch and caress. He found the end of the T-shirt, caught it and pulled it from her in one smooth motion. He found the waist of her panties and tore them free, leaving her bare and exposed before him.
“Beautiful,” he murmured, his voice raw and tight in his throat. “So beautiful.”
At the sight of her, the air stalled in his lungs, and his heart lurched violently in his chest. He took one moment—one brief, fleeting moment for reverence, for wonder, for admiration—but only that. He couldn’t deny himself any longer. Desire pounded in his brain. There wasn’t time for slow, careful exploration—not with the fire in him burning out of control.
He pulled her to him, bringing them body to body, flesh to flesh. He ravished her willing lips, heard a soft groan reverberate through him, not knowing if it came from his throat or hers. He lifted her up, trailing a path of wet kisses from her lips to her neck, then to the gentle swell of her breasts. She tasted warm and rich—like life and love and woman, and he paid tribute to her beauty with all he had.
Kelsey closed her eyes, giving in to his wild passion and feeling herself become wild, as well. His hands on her felt like fire, igniting her blood and sending it racing through her veins. They had been man and wife for years, had made love countless times before, but she felt as desperate, as hungry as if they’d been apart for years.
“Coop,” she groaned, her voice sounding coarse and husky to her ears.
His lips on her breasts were driving her crazy. Tension coiled in her belly, and her legs trembled beneath her. She felt the hot, potent blasts of his breath against her skin, felt the strength and the power in the arms that held her. He was her anchor, her mainstay. She wanted to lose herself in his passion and find herself alive beneath his touch.
Her hands slid down, finding him hard inside his jeans. She tugged at the buttons until they finally gave way, opening the fly and freeing him to her unrestrained touch.
“I love you, Coop,” she whispered, feeling the strength and the power of him. “I love you.”
Coop moaned, the sound rising from his soul. What burned in his blood was hotter than fire, more blistering than desire—it was a maelstrom of emotion, encompassing all he wanted, all that was his, all he would ever need.
He half-dragged, half-carried her down the hallway, starting for the master bedroom that had once been theirs to share. But catching a glimpse of the double doors, he suddenly thought of the narrow hospital bed that waited inside, of the hard metal bars and adjustable controls. He wasn’t going to make love to her on that—an ugly, institutional-looking hospital bed that only reminded him of the lie he’d been living.
Stopping suddenly, he swept her up in his arms, kicked open the door to the room he’d been using and carried her inside. Maybe there was a poetic justice in all of this, that they should make love there, on the low-lying futon bed where he had spent so many nights alone, knowing how close she was yet not being able to show her how much he cared.
He was touching her now. Like something out of a dream, he was holding her and kissing her and feeling her heat. Moving with her as he lowered her onto the bed, he was aware there would be a price to pay. But feeling her beneath him, hearing her soft groans of arousal and finding her moist and ready for him, there was only one truth that mattered. They were meant to be together. For a moment or for a lifetime, they were man and wife.
Kelsey felt the hard firmness of the futon along her back, felt the solid weight of his body pressing her against it. Anticipation surged in her belly, causing tension to build and the fireball inside her to burn white-hot. She had to have him, had to make him a part of her or she was going to die from the need. She’d survived a building collapsing, survived the forces of nature, but she wasn’t going to make it without his love.
And then he was there, moving over her, bringing his body close, pushing deep. Everything within her reacted when he pressed into her—heart, soul, mind, body. There was a moment, one brilliant, clarifying moment when all she could do was lie there in wonder, but that was only a moment. After that there was only need, and yearning, and a desire that blocked out everything else.
Had it always been like this when they’d made love, the mindless need, the wild abandon? Because that’s how she felt, mindless and wild, unaware of anything except the man in her arms and the hunger that clawed at her. She was ready to burst, grasping at him like a lifeline. She had forgotten a lot since the accident, but could she have forgotten this? Could she have forgotten what it was to be with him, to be filled by him, to be made desperate from the pleasure?
Suddenly the coil inside her snapped, and the fireball burst free, shattering apart in a brilliant explosion of light, sound and action. Every muscle in her body convulsed, hurling her past the boundaries of pleasure, past the confines of satisfaction and gratification. Clinging to him, she held on for dear life, letting his strong, powerful movements carry her over the edges of madness to the outer limits of peace.