Chapter 9
Kelsey reached for the towel, watching through the kitchen window as a car pulled into the drive across the street. As she dried her hands, she saw Jonathan run from the house and tear across the lawn toward the car.
“Daddy’s home.”
She could hear his muted voice through the window and felt a ball of emotion form in her throat. He lunged at his father with arms wide open, and his dad swallowed him up in a big bear hug.
Kelsey turned away, slipping the towel onto the rack. She grabbed the crutches propped against the counter, then carefully. made her way across the tiled kitchen floor and into the family room.
“How long have the people across- the street lived there?”
Coop shrugged, his eyes fixed on the television screen. “A year maybe, year and a half,” he said, leaning forward and reaching for the soft drink can on the coffee table in front of him. “I’m not sure.”
“Did I know them?”
The soda can halted halfway to his mouth. He turned slowly and looked at her. “I...I don’t know,” he lied, lowering the can to the table. There was no way she could have known them. Holly and Christian Harding had moved into the neighborhood six months after Kelsey had moved out. “I don’t think so. Why?”
“No reason,” she said with a shrug, moving the crutches silently over the plush carpet and around the sofa. “Jonathan was over this afternoon.”
Coop pictured the four-year-old in his head. “The little boy?”
“Yeah,” she said, smiling as she remembered Jonathan’s impish brown eyes and endless energy. “He helped - me in the yard.” She slid her crutches to one side and sat next to him on the sofa. “I just wondered if he’d ever done that before.”
Coop forgot about the news broadcast he’d been watching and shifted his body toward hers. The last several days hadn’t been easy ones—in fact, they’d been tense and uneasy.
How he wished he could go back to that night in the shower. How he wished he’d handled things better, had shown more control. Instead, he’d hurt her, and the whole situation had left them both so awkward and uncomfortable with each other they hadn’t even been able to talk about it and clear the air. They’d gone back to their daily routines, being overly polite and artificially courteous and trying to pretend nothing had happened. But the peace was phony, and that only seemed to make matters worse.
“Did Jonathan say something?” he asked, kicking himself for having left her alone. It hadn’t been easy keeping her away from friends and neighbors who might let something slip, but it was essential to make the pretense work.
“No,” Kelsey said, shaking her head. “As a matter of fact, he told me his name and how old he was, so I assumed he didn’t know me.” She turned and looked at him. “He knows you, though.”
“Oh, yeah?” Coop thought of the times he’d waved to the children across the street, of the holidays when they’d delivered homemade goodies to his door, and last Halloween when Jonathan and his baby sister were dressed as Snoopy and Woodstock.
“Yes, and apparently so does his mother.”
Coop turned on the sofa and looked at her. “Oh, really.”
“Really,” Kelsey said, one brow arching. “As a matter of fact, it seems his mother is under the impression I’m your new girlfriend.”
“Girlfriend?” The skin on the back of his neck tingled. He couldn’t exactly blame the neighbors for having noticed her coming in and out with him. They weren’t exactly accustomed to seeing a woman around the place. Despite the divorce, it had never seemed right to bring a woman home with him—not here. This had always been Kelsey’s house, their home together. To have brought another woman here would have felt like cheating.
“The other night you mentioned there was something you needed to tell me,” she said, steeling herself with a deep breath and looking at him. “Maybe you should tell me now.”
Her face was calm and expressionless, but Coop saw the apprehension in her eyes, sensed the dread and the tension. She’d given him an opening to tell her the truth, given it to him on a silver platter. He had only to say it, had only to open his mouth and let it all come tumbling out. Only he needed time to prepare, time to find the words, to separate the truth from the lies and try and figure out how to explain the pretense from what he felt in his heart. How did he know if she was ready or not, how did he decide if it was right?
He dreaded the truth. The truth wasn’t going to set him free, it was going to sink him. It was how he was going to lose her again.
“Kelsey,” he said, drawing in a shaky breath. “I’m...I’m not sure this is the time for all this—”
“Don’t lie to me, Coop,” she said, cutting him off. Breathing deep, she looked him square in the face. “Be honest with me. Is there another woman?”
The question hit him like a glass of ice water in the face, only more startling. Of all the things he’d been concerned about, of all the things he’d thought she might question, that was about the last thing he’d expected her to ask.
“Another—” He cleared his throat and shook his head. “You think I’m involved with another woman?”
“If you’re waiting until I’m strong enough to tell me, I’m strong enough now,” she said, squaring her shoulders. “I want to know.”
“Why would you think there was someone else? Because of what Jonathan said?”
“That,” she admitted, her resolve showing signs of weakening. “And because...” Her voice started to quiver, and she struggled to clear it. “Because since the accident things have been different between us.”
Coop felt a knot in his stomach. Of course things had been different, they were divorced. They hadn’t been together as man and wife in over two years. If she was sensing anything, she was sensing that.
So how did he tell her that? How did he assure her without telling her everything? He needed time to think, to consult with her doctors, to decide if he should confess everything or lose himself again in a sea of lies.
“Of course things have been different,” he said with more force than he’d intended. “Have you forgotten about the accident?”
“I get the feeling I’ve forgotten a lot,” she said, her blue eyes narrow and suspicious.
“Well, let me remind you,” he snapped. “You nearly died. You were unconscious for four days, and you’ve had some pretty devastating injuries to recover from. Things are bound to be a little different for a while.”
“For a while? Or forever?”
The hard knot was still in the pit of his stomach. “Is that what you think?”
“I don’t know,” she said, struggling. “I don’t know what to think. I just know that ever since the accident you’ve been pulling away.”
“If this is about the other night—”
“Of course this is about the other night.”
He saw the same hurt and confusion in her eyes that had been there on that night. He drew in a tired breath. “Kelsey, sweetheart, you’re making too much of that.”
“Am I?”
“Yes,” he insisted. “The other night meant nothing.”
“I don’t remember you ever walking away from me before.”
“And you think it’s because of another woman?” She looked away. “It would explain a lot.”
“No,” he said quietly. “It would explain nothing, because it isn’t true.” He reached out, put a finger under her chin and tilted her head so she had to look at him. “Look, I know I handled things badly the other night. I hurt you, and I never meant for that to happen.” He reached for her hand, bringing it to his lips and brushing a feathery kiss along her fingertips. “It’s just, you touched me, and I lost control.”
“But...you stopped,” she whispered.
“Because the time wasn’t right.”
“And that really is the only reason?”
He turned her palm to his lips. “How could you think there was anyone else?”
“I’ve forgotten so much—”
Coop stopped her with a finger to her lips. It was only then he realized just how fragile she was. She looked strong, and her physical wounds had all but disappeared, but emotionally she was only beginning to heal.
“I love you,” he murmured. The time would come when she would be strong enough to know everything, but not now, not tonight. “You. There could never be anyone else.”
He pressed a kiss on her palm and looked into her clear blue eyes. She needed time to gain strength and confidence. Maybe they both did. He was still in love with her, and he wasn’t sure he was strong enough to let her go again, wasn’t sure he had the strength to face a future without her.
“Forget about the other night,” he murmured, gathering her into his arms. “Just know that I love you, and I always will.”
He pressed a kiss against her lips, feeling her body relax against his. She was warm and soft, and he wished at that moment he could hold her like this forever.
“Oh, Coop,” she sighed, pulling away and looking at him. “I feel so stupid.”
“Stupid? What do you have to feel stupid about? I’m the one who was slamming doors and acting like a two-year-old.”
“You were upset,” she said, pushing a lock of hair from his forehead. “It’s just after the other night—I don’t know, I had this awful sad feeling, a lost, lonely feeling—it’s hard to explain. Anyway, I started thinking about all the blanks in my past, imagining the things I might have forgotten.” She looked at him, giving her head a shake. “I started wondering what there was about us I’d forgotten. Were we as happy as I remember? Were we the same people? And then Jonathan started talking about your girlfriend, and I thought maybe...”
“I might, have a girlfriend stashed somewhere?” he said, finishing for her.
She looked at him and grimaced. “I’m embarrassed now.”
He didn’t have the energy for any more lies, didn’t have the stamina to think of another excuse. “Kelsey, there’s never been anyone else, I swear. I love you—only you—and nothing that’s happened between us could ever change that.”
“Is it your feeling that you should tell her?”
Coop’s grip on the telephone receiver tightened, and he mentally counted to ten. He’d had a long night, and his patience was at an end. He wasn’t in the mood to deal with doctor doublespeak and question after question.
“It’s my feeling, Dr. Crowvell,” he said in a tightly controlled voice, “that I don’t know what the hell to do. I want help, not to sit here and talk about my feelings.” He knew he was losing control, and forced several calming breaths into his lungs. “Dr. Cohen thought since you see Kelsey regularly, you’d be in a better position to advise me. So advise me. Do I tell her or don’t I?”
“Well,” Gloria Crowell said thoughtfully, “from what you’re telling me...” She paused, and Coop heard her flipping through some papers. “From some of the things we’ve discussed in our last session, I think it’s safe to say something’s going on. She does seem to be sensing something—but she’s not having actual memories.”
“Is that normal? I mean, does this mean things are coming back?”
“It could,” Dr. Crowell told him. “It’s as though she’s remembering the feelings before remembering the events that caused them. It would explain her sense of loss, of sorrow.” She paused. “It could be her way of preparing herself to remember—dealing with fragments of memory a little at a time.”
Coop sighed heavily, feeling the muscles in his stomach tighten into hard knots. “Then what do I do?”
“I’m not sure you need do to anything. You and I both know those are going to be very painful memories for her when they come back.”
“So you think I should do nothing, just let her keep thinking everything is hunky-dory?” He blew out an angry breath. “I got to tell you, Dr. Crowell, even Kelsey isn’t buying some of these lame excuses I’ve been giving her.”
There was another pause, a longer one this time. “Believe it or not, I can appreciate the position you’re in.”
“Oh, can you, now.” He snorted sarcastically. “I doubt it.”
Dr. Crowell seemed unfazed by the sarcasm. “Until now, Kelsey had assumed certain things about her life—she was in love, she was married. What was there to be curious about? Now she’s sensing something. She’s got these feelings, she’s starting to think maybe things weren’t quite as hunky-dory as she’d thought. That sounds like progress to me. It sounds like something’s happening.” She paused a moment on the other end of the receiver. “But I’m not going to lie to you, Cooper. Things could be rough ahead. There’s nothing I can tell you that will help that.”
He shook his head. Things were pretty rough already. “Then wouldn’t it just be kinder to tell her everything?” he asked in a quiet voice. “Wouldn’t it be better for her to know the truth rather than for me to be telling her everything is all right when she feels that it isn’t?”
“Maybe,” Dr. Crowell replied. “And maybe the shock would shove those memories away for good.”
Coop closed his eyes again, drawing in a deep breath. “So you’re saying there’s nothing I can do.”
“I’m saying that if she’s going to remember, she’s going to do it in her own sweet time, in her own sweet way. Coop, you’ve invested a lot of time in this, you’ve put your whole life on hold in order to give Kelsey the opportunity to remember, and now it’s looking like it might work. Do you really want to risk all that by jumping the gun now?”
“You really think it is working?” he asked, his voice flat and unemotional. “You really think she’s remembering, I mean really remembering, not just bits and pieces?”
“Everything I see points in that direction.”
Coop felt a little like the bottom had dropped out of his world. “Okay, Doc, I get the picture.”
“Tell me something, Cooper,” Dr. Crowell said. “I get the feeling you might have some mixed emotions about the possibility of Kelsey getting her memory back. Has there been some changes between you two I should know about?”
Change? Coop closed his eyes. He’d been in love with Kelsey when she’d been his wife, he was in love with her now that she wasn’t. Nothing had changed.
“I want her to get better, Doc,”. he said, his voice weary. “That hasn’t changed.”
“Anything you want to talk about?”
Coop had to smile. “You don’t have to worry, Doc. There’s nothing wrong with my memory. I remember we’re divorced—and I, don’t have any illusions about what’s going to happen once she remembers, too.”
“You seem pretty sure about that.”
He laughed, a rough, grating sound that had nothing to do with humor. “You forget, Doc. I’ve been through this before.”
“It doesn’t have to be that way.”
“What is it with you doctors?” he asked, giving his head a shake. “You and Mannie Cohen run a lonely hearts club on the side or something? Advice to the lovelorn?”
The doctor laughed. “You don’t believe in second chances?”
“I believe, Dr. Crowell, that you can’t go back,” he said, rubbing his eye with the palm of his hand. “I believe that history is history, and nothing can change that. You know what happened, you know what having kids and a family meant to her. When she found out that wasn’t going to happen it nearly killed her.” He stopped, pain swelling in his throat and making it difficult for him to continue. “And it killed her love for me.”
“Yet you did this for her,” she said quietly. “That means something.”
“Yeah, it means I’m a real Boy Scout,” he said with a tired laugh. “And it means I’m earning my merit badge in story telling and avoiding the truth.”
“This is getting to you, isn’t it?”
He released a long breath. “I’m just tired. I’m tired of the pretense, of piling one lie on top of the other.”
“When she remembers,” the doctor said 0sympathetically, “she’s going to know the sacrifice you’ve made.”
Coop’s mind moved to the night she’d surprised him in the shower. She was also going to know he’d touched her and kissed her when he had no right. “When she remembers,” he said quietly, in a voice barely above a whisper, “she’ll be gone, so it’s not going to matter, anyway.”
“Surprise!” Coop slammed the car door and gazed across the roof of the car to Kelsey on the front walk. “Surprise?”
“Yeah,” she said, lifting her arms out and turning around in a small circle. “Surprise.”
“Hey, you don’t have your crutches—” But he stopped abruptly as his eyes traveled the length of her. “The cast—my God, it’s gone.” He looked at her. “Your cast is gone.”
“Are you surprised?” she asked, watching as he rushed around the car toward her.
He stopped when he reached her, giving his head a shake. “What do you think?” He reached out a hand, slipping it around her arm. “How—I mean, when? When did this happen?”
“This afternoon,” Kelsey said in a burst of excitement. “Dr. Hamilton was in town on a consultation and came by to check up on me.” She looked at Coop, the shocked surprise on his face making her smile even wider. “He took one look and said he might as well save me a trip up to Santa Ynez.”
“And he took it off, just like that?”
“Just like that,” she repeated, making a play of snapping her fingers.
He forced himself to smile, forced an enthusiasm he truly didn’t feel to cover the tension gnawing at his insides. At least with the cast on her leg he’d had an excuse to be cautious, a physical reminder to keep his distance. Without it, she looked fit and healthy and very, very appealing.
“Should you be standing on it?” he asked after a moment, his grip on her arm tightening a little. “I mean, is it okay for you to be up and walking around? Maybe you should be sitting down—”
“Of course it’s okay,” she insisted, cutting him off. “As a matter of fact, I should be up and walking—build up the muscle.” She made a small, slightly awkward turn in front of him. “It’s weak—but I start physical therapy on Monday.” She turned again. “I’ll be running marathons before you know it.”
Coop gave her a bewildered look. “You want to run a marathon?”
She laughed. “Do I look crazy to you? Of course I don’t want to run a marathon.” She grabbed him by the arm and pulled him up the walk toward the house. “It’s just that after dragging a cast around on my leg for six weeks, it’s kind of nice to know I could, if I wanted.”
Coop let her lead him up the steps and into the house. She moved with a speed and agility that seemed to defy her weakened leg, but it really didn’t surprise him. Her recovery had been remarkable from the first, and looking at her now, it was hard to imagine that just six short weeks , ago, she’d been fighting for her life. She was alive and bursting with energy. Anyone could see that.
It had become futile for him to try to convince her to slow down and take things easy, or that she needed him around twenty-four hours a day to take care of her, so he’d given up on both. In the past week, he’d felt a little like he’d been living in a time warp. With her no longer incapacitated by her injuries, there was no unusual circumstance, no special condition to cast him in the role of caretaker. Suddenly he was a husband again, and they were acting very much like a normal married couple.
Reluctantly, he’d returned to work, taking a few of his regular flights and—with Doris’s help—clearing some of the details and paperwork that had piled up over the last six weeks. And while he almost welcomed the respite from lying to Kelsey, settling into the comfortable routine of married life hadn’t made his life any easier.
Their days had fallen into a familiar pattern, familiar because it wasn’t unlike the one they had followed when they had been married. Of course, with her memory loss still a problem and her job on hold, Kelsey stayed closer to home than she had before. She was always fearful she would run into someone she wouldn’t know or wouldn’t remember. Still, she managed to stay busy with her gardening and their redecorating project, and even though their sleeping arrangements hadn’t changed, she was up with him for breakfast each morning and to see him off to work. They would then go their separate ways until dinner, when they would relax together and talk over what they’d done with the day.
He knew there was nothing exceptional in these activities, nothing that millions of other couples didn’t do day in and day out. But after two long years alone, after the torment of the divorce, after the pain of separation, it was like breaking new ground, like sunlight after a storm. He’d been pretending to be her husband for weeks now, but in this past week, he’d begun to feel like her husband, too.
“Come on,” she said excitedly, pulling him inside. “I’ve got dinner waiting.”
“You cooked?” he said, closing the door behind them.
She gave him a cool look, then breezed through the family room to the patio. “You don’t have to sound so shocked. I do know how, you know.”
He had to smile at the dry humor in her tone. “I just meant with getting the cast off and everything, I wouldn’t have thought you had time.”
“Well, actually, I didn’t,” she confessed, walking to the patio table she had covered with a checkered tablecloth. “I called Vince’s. I thought we should celebrate.”
Coop bent and lifted the lid of the covered casserole dish resting in the center of the table. “Hmm,” he murmured, inhaling deeply. “Ravioli.”
“Your favorite.” She beamed, pulling out a chair and gesturing for him to sit down.
“My favorite?” he asked, giving her a skeptical look.
“Your favorite, my favorite, what’s the difference?” she said impatiently, motioning for him to sit. “You want to argue details, or you want to eat?”
He looked at her for a moment, emotion swelling in his chest. What he wanted was for this never to end. “I want to eat.”
“Good,” she said, tugging on his arm. “This is a celebration, so let’s celebrate. And I’ve got another surprise for you.”
“Another surprise? I’m not sure how much more I can take”
“You can take this,” she said breezily, walking around the table and sitting across from him. She leaned across the table and lowered her voice. “There’s cheesecake for dessert.”
He watched her as she dished out the pasta, an eerie sense of déjà vu nagging at him. How many times had they sat like this, talking casually while enjoying a meal together? He had that uncomfortable feeling again, like the last two years had been a bad dream.
“Dr. Hamilton said I was so good with the cast and crutches, I actually built up some of the muscles in my arms and thighs,” she said, handing him a plate.
“So you were sort of doing physical therapy while you were waiting for physical therapy.” He laughed. “Only you could be laid up for six weeks and come out in better shape than you went in.”
“I wouldn’t exactly say I was in better shape,” she insisted, picking up the salad bowl and offering it to him.
“Maybe you wouldn’t,” he murmured, taking the bowl from her. “From where I’m sitting, you look great.”
Kelsey looked up, blinking. “Really?”
He reached for the bottle of wine, uncorked it and gave her a deliberate look. “Of course you do, you know that.”
“Maybe,” she said, her smile broadening. “But it’s nice to know you think so.”
the poured her a glass of wine. “Oh, I think so,” he mumbled, pouring himself a glass and gulping down a mouthful. Suddenly he felt restless and impatient, and looking at her in the soft light of the patio only made those feelings stronger. “There’s never been any doubt about that.”
“Well,” she said, taking a small sip. “For an old married lady, that’s nice to know.”
“You’re hardly old.” He snorted and took another drink. She wasn’t married, either, but he didn’t want to think about that.
He also didn’t want to think about how she had felt in his arms and how much he wanted her at that moment. Hunger gnawed at him, the kind of hunger the meal before him wasn’t going to satisfy.
He finished his glass of wine and poured himself another, hoping it would dull his senses, take the edge off his need. Except that a warmth began to slowly seep into his system, heating his blood and easing the tension in his muscles. It did nothing to take the edge off the hunger—it only made it worse.
He drained the glass, then poured himself another. He felt relaxed and uninhibited, and everything about her aroused him even more. The movement of her hands, the motion of her lips...it was as if the meal became a performance, a demonstration that stirred and inflamed his already overworked and overburdened emotions.
“You’re not eating.”
Coop jumped. “I know,” he said, taking another gulp of wine. “I’m drinking.”
“I can see that,” she said, lowering her fork to her plate. “You’re not hungry?”
He glared at her over his glass, his voice barely above a whisper. “You have no idea.”
“Coop, what are you doing?”
He looked around innocently, giving her a shrug. “What? I can’t have a little drink?”
Her frown deepened. “Is...is everything all right?”
“Everything’s just dandy,” he murmured, draining his glass again and watching the little line between her brows deepen. To appease her, he reached for his fork and took several bites of pasta, but he had no taste for its spicy flavor. He wanted more to drink, wanted to make the hurt go away.
“Coop,” Kelsey said as he reached for the wine bottle again. “No more, please.”
“Just one more glass,” he promised, giving her a theatrical wink.
He finished the glass in one gulp, watching the disapproval in her eyes and realizing right then what it was he had to do. He had to get drunk, had to make himself as offensive and unpleasant as he could. He had to do everything he could to anger and upset her, because it was all he had left. There was no cast on her leg. There were no internal injuries or bruised flesh to rely on, no physical barriers to distract him. But he had no right to want her the way he did.
He poured the last of the wine into his glass and lowered the empty bottle to the table. His judgment was a little off, and the bottom of the bottle hit the curved lip of his spoon, sending it flying through the air in a spectacular arc. It landed noisily on the terra-cotta tiles of the patio floor.
“Oops,” he said with a grin, the word feeling thick and heavy on his tongue.
Kelsey didn’t smile. She didn’t even move. She just sat there, looking at him and lightly tapping her finger against the side of her wineglass.
Coop drained his wine, feeling the patio list toward the ocean. The alcohol was working, and it looked as though his plan to make her angry was working, as well. He wanted her so mad she wouldn’t welcome his touch. Then maybe she’d stop him if he decided to do something stupid, if he decided to push the dishes to one side and pull her across the table to him.
“Maybe you’ll think about eating something now,” she said in a tight voice, nodding at the empty bottle on the table.
Coop looked at her, desire pounding at him like a drum, and slowly rose to his feet.
“No,” he said, shaking his head. “I want more wine.”