Stop!
“No! I don’t think—”
His gesture was curt bordering on rude. “I don’t want to hear anything other than some answers. Starting with why you fainted.”
“I didn’t faint.”
“Yes. You did. And no, I don’t think you’re a weakling or a . . . a damsel in distress. So just tell me why! All I said was . . . ” His voice trailed off and his eyes widened.
As he connected more dots than he should, I shook my head. “No. No! I married her father. I know who her father was!”
“Did you really know him? You said yourself you weren’t sure why you married him.”
“I know what I said. I was there, okay? Don’t be a jerk.” My face heated, upset with him and with the memory washing over me. One I’d prefer not to have, thank you very much, except that my lousy judgment had given me an angel child.
That was the memory I clung to now. Stuck in that embarrassing night in my past was one, pure, definitive moment of transcendent beauty. At the moment, I’d actually been lucky enough to witness my daughter’s soul come to me; a shining, sparkling white angel that had popped into being and chosen me . . . me! How or why I’d been so lucky, I had no idea, but suddenly my life meant something.
Adam’s face blurred, but when I raised my hands, he stopped me. With one warm, strong hand he trapped both of mine against my knees, and brushed his free fingertips softly over my right eye and then my left. His touch felt so natural that I didn’t even think to move, and fresh tears welled with my new guilt.
“Please don’t cry . . . I’m sorry.” He cupped my cheek, and when I pulled away, he wrapped his other hand around mine, holding tightly when I tried to slide free. “I just need some answers, Lila. And not just for me. For you, and for Cara . . . wherever she is.”
How could I not tell him? I wanted to tell him. He seemed to remember everything except the truth about Cara’s disappearance. Why? What was the purpose? Was that really what Cara had wanted? Sal hadn’t told me anything I needed to know! I only had guesses! Maybe his species had been here since the beginning of humanity, and maybe they fiddled around with our development to try to help us . . . or enslave us . . . or just use us . . . or . . .
“You know something,” he prompted.
“I don’t know anything!”
“Why do you keep lying to me? To protect Eileen? Were you threatened again? What about that other person . . . your grandmother’s friend, right?”
“She’s avoiding me.” The fading note in her flower shop’s window might as well be addressed to me. Written in old-fashioned, curling script it simply said:
To my lovely friends and customers,
I am visiting with my son and immensely enjoying my vacation from daily concerns. I will most likely be back when the weather is all clear.
—Mrs. Hester L. Bell
“You’re doing it again!”
“What?”
“Thinking about the things I want you to tell me! Why won’t you open up to me?”
“Why should I?”
Suddenly my hands were free, and he was two steps away.
“Adam, look. I’m sorry. I just . . . ” My shoulders lifted and fell. What could I say?
He watched me for a long, considering moment, and then turned away. In two more strides he was closer to the front door than I wanted him to be.
“Don’t leave!” I sprang off the couch, fighting against a sudden head rush. Luckily he’d stopped near the kitchen table, so I steadied myself against it. “I am sorry. I’ve never been good at this. Even under normal circumstances.” I attempted a weak grin, but he didn’t return it.
“Why?”
“Um . . . ” My right toe wanted to dig into the floor. Because apparently a grown woman can squirm like a little girl.
“Okay, let’s start smaller. What will you tell me? What are your nightmares about?”
“Nothing. They’re just stupid dreams . . . ”
“That bother you. Enough for your daughter to notice. For God’s sake! Open up, Lila! If they’re just dreams, then spit it out!”
“Fine!” Where was the sweet man I’d come to know? It was like an alien had snatched him away and . . .
How could I even think that? What in the hell is wrong with me?!
“Lila. I swear I’m going to go crazy if you don’t start telling me what’s going on in your head.”
“You don’t want to know.”
“Do you not hear me asking? I’m practically begging!”
“And it’s really annoying, so stop!”
A boyish grin dissolved the angry cluster of lines between his eyes. “I’ll stop when you start talking.”
“Oh. My. God. Were you this relentless as a Marine?”
“Of course. Now tell me about your dreams.”
“Jesus Christ, Adam. It’s not that big a deal! I’ve been dreaming that I’m me, but I’m in other lives . . . other versions of me . . . like parallel worlds or something. And that’d be okay, I mean, they’re just dreams, except I don’t have Eileen in any of them.
“And I always start panicking because I’m aware that I should have her, but I have to fight my own memories because these other Lilas had daughters who died, or vanished, or they never had one at all.” My voice cracked, and I had to take a deep breath. “And as if that wasn’t enough to be any mother’s nightmare, I’m also delusional . . . thinking I could be trapped there. In those other lives.
“It feels like it would be so easy sometimes. It’s so hard to fight to remember her . . . Sometimes the other memories are so strong.” I finished on a whisper. Like the memories of being married to you, just for example.
“This has been happening every night?”
I couldn’t place the emotion I heard in his voice. “Pretty much.” I tried to laugh, but it sounded more like a bark. “Some nights more than once. Last night was the worst yet.”
“Why?”
“Oh . . . I brought Eileen into the dream and we almost got trapped in it. My cat saved us.” I grinned at him. “Funny, right? Pebbles . . . ?”
Slowly, he shook his head and reached for me. I was already shifting backward when I realized what he thought I was describing.
“Oh, no!”
