The Memory Painter

And then he saw it—Constantijn’s spirit shimmering in her eyes. Bryan turned away, disconcerted. Rarely did he recognize a soul that had crossed over to the opposite sex. This was also the first time he had envisioned his mother as a man and the idea felt alien to him. But still, to recognize Constantijn within her, and as he held Christiaan’s clock … His anger melted, and he swallowed the lump in his throat. “If you’d like, I can fix it for you.”


“That’s right, I forgot you went through a watchmaking phase.” She shook her head at the memory. “I’ll never forget when I came home and found you with all our clocks and wristwatches in pieces on the table.”

Bryan remembered it too. That had been right after he had recalled Christiaan’s life. He had rebuilt clocks every day for months, explaining it away as a new hobby. And he hid his new fluency in Dutch and French—although he did allow himself to get As in math from then on out.

He tried to make a joke of it. “Hey, I put them back together.”

“That’s true.”

They smiled at each other as Bryan placed the clock back in her flea market bag.

Barbara asked, “Are you going to stay for dinner?”

“Sorry. I’ve got plans.” He saw her disappointment and added, “We’ll do it soon, though. Promise.”

“At least have some of your birthday cake. Your father’s been eating it all.”

“That’s okay, thanks.” He picked up the bag and left before she could say anything else that might get him to stay.

*

Bryan drove down the street, parked his car, and pulled out the clock. He sat for a long time hugging it to him, filled with a yearning that always came when he handled something that had once been his. He closed his eyes and let the feeling wash over him. How he would love to go home and fix the clock, to lose himself in Christiian’s world, but that would be a distraction. Doc’s keys sat heavy in his pocket, and he knew answers lay locked away in Michael and Diana’s things. He only wished that Linz could help him go through them.

Linz. He needed to help her remember. Juliana or Diana—at this point it didn’t matter. She just needed to start remembering something. His thoughts landed on the painting. Before he went to clean out the storage shed, he had to get it.



FOURTEEN

Linz rode the elevator down to the tenth floor. It was one of five housing genetic research. Her lab was at the end of the hall, and she couldn’t have designed a better workspace. Everything was state of the art—no expense had been spared. Boston was the epicenter of Medicor and it showed.