There was a yell from outside. The women looked in time to see someone throw a glass of beer on a hamburger that had burst into flames on the grill.
Emily tsked. “Well, as long as you stay away from Tweedledee and Tweedledum and their fire pit of disaster, you’ll be safe.”
Emily finally coaxed Laura outside. Holding her hand, Carol took her around to all the guests she knew Laura couldn’t remember and introduced them.
Earlier, Rob had taken her around and reintroduced her to the few of their friends she hadn’t met yet. Like Tilly’s guys, and Clarisse, Mac, and Ross.
Not many memories returned, but Laura remembered three people before Carol’s introduction.
Rob watched from the grill, where Steve poked him, leaning in close. “Stop it, son.”
“What?”
“You’re frowning. No frowny time. Happy time. Happy, happy, happy.”
He shook his head. “Easy for you to say.”
“Come here.” He grabbed Rob’s shirt and dragged him through the kitchen door, closing it behind them. “Look, don’t think this is harder on you than it is on any of us, all right? I know you love her, but we love her, too. I’ve known her a hell of a lot longer than you have. So has Carol. She’s like a daughter to us, and you don’t get to corner the market on being upset. Now get that friggin’ head of yours on straight and go out there and look like you’re enjoying yourself.”
Rob leaned against the counter, arms crossed, staring at the floor. “She’s like a whole new person. She talks differently. She walks differently.” He finally looked up at Steve again. “What if she wasn’t really in love with me?”
Steve stepped close. “Stop it. Quit feeling sorry for yourself. You know damn well that’s not true. She is a different person because she doesn’t have her memories. As her fiancé, you’re the one who needs to take the lead and help her.”
“I don’t want to force her.”
“Talk to her. Tell her how you feel.”
Rob turned and watched Carol lead Laura around the backyard, from person to person. “What if she doesn’t want to?”
“Well dammit, you won’t know until you try, will you? You’ve got to start somewhere.”
Steve’s house had a good view of the southern end of Lemon Bay. After dinner, Rob found Laura and got her alone for a few minutes. “Will you come watch the sunset with me?”
She nodded. He held out his hand and finally, timidly, she took it. He led her to the end of the dock, away from everyone else.
He sat down and patted the dock in front of him. She hesitantly sat, leaning against him and accepting his arms around her.
It felt right. She couldn’t deny that.
As darkness fell, a snook hit the surface of the bay a few yards from them, rippling the water. She was afraid to break the spell, worried there might not be too many moments such as these again in her life.
“This isn’t fair to you,” she said.
“This isn’t about me.”
She turned to face him. “Half your life is gone. It’s about you as much as it is me.” From a few private conversations with Carol at the shop, and with Shayla while still in the hospital, she’d learned a lot about Rob, too embarrassed to ask him herself.
She learned they had been nearly inseparable, before. That she’d told Carol, Shayla, Steve, Bill, and others that he was the love of her life, but could she honestly say she loved him now when he was still a stranger in so many ways, regardless of how he made her feel?
Those thoughts led to more guilt.
Rob brushed a stray hair from her face. “Laura, I love you. I have loved you for years, and I will always love you. If that means I have to wait, I’ll wait. You are my life. I will take whatever I can get. If that means sitting back and waiting, I can do that. I will do that.”
Laura didn’t know what to say. She leaned back against him and they watched the boats on the bay in the deepening dusk.
Back at the house, Bill offered to go ahead and take Doogie home and left Laura with Rob to give them some alone time.
She hoped she hadn’t screwed things up between them so badly that it couldn’t be fixed. “Will you stay tonight?” she asked him. “At the condo? Please?”
“Is that what you want?”
She nodded.
He gathered her hands in his and kissed them. “Okay.”
She relaxed a little, relieved. “Thank you for a nice evening. I appreciate all the trouble you and Steve and Carol went through to put that together at such short notice.”
He nodded and looked at the floor. “You’re welcome. I’m sorry you didn’t get more memories back from it.”
“It’s okay.”
“I need to go grab some stuff.” When he returned he found her curled on the couch and listening to a CD. John McLean’s Better Angels album.
“You like it?” he asked.
She nodded. “Did I always like it?”
He smiled. “It’s one of your favorites. You ripped it to your iPod. You’d put it on and play it over and over while you were writing. You’ve got two kinds of music, writing and driving. This was one of your writing music selections.”
“How can you put up with me when I don’t know anything?”
He sat next to her on the couch and held her. “Because I love you.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Monday morning, Bill drove Laura to her next appointment with Dr. Collins. He sat in the room with her while Dr. Collins once again tried hypnosis. The nightmares about the door and the shadow hadn’t stopped.
If anything, they’d grown more intense, the shadow gaining substance with every repetition.
Unfortunately, by the end of the session Laura hadn’t recovered anything helpful about the dreams, or the rest of her life.
She made another appointment for the next Monday and slumped in her seat on the ride back to Englewood.
“Don’t let it upset you,” he gently chided.
“I need to figure this out.”
“You won’t do it driving yourself crazy. If it comes back, it comes back.”
She rode up to Tampa with Steve to take Bill to the airport Tuesday morning. After checking in, he stood with her in the main terminal near the shuttle that would take him airside.
She felt like she was losing one of her lifelines.
“I’m going to miss you.”
“I’ll miss you, too, sis.” He hugged her close. “I’ll come back in a few months.” He laughed. “Sooner, if you decide to get married.”
She laughed but pushed back the melancholy over that statement. It felt like she’d hit a stalemate in terms of new memories. But that evening, after Rob got off work, they were going to meet at a restaurant on Boca Grande that he told her used to be one of her favorites.
Maybe it would help trigger something.
Later that morning, while she was working at the shop, Det. Thomas called her to update her on the investigation.
“Well, do you want the good news, or the bad news?”
Laura closed her eyes. “Is the good news that you’ve got him?”
“No, but we know more about who he is.”
She sighed. “What’s the good news?”
“The DNA evidence we recovered from underneath your fingernails pinged several hits in the national database. We can link him to several crimes all over the country.”
She swallowed hard. “What’s the bad news?”
He paused. “The other victims were all raped and murdered.”
Her heart pounded in her chest. “How many?”
“Do you really want to know?”