“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “But I don’t know you.”
His words stopped me dead, but then I let out a cold, sharp laugh, taking a step back. “Is that honestly the best you can do? I’m Lily Reid, in case you’ve forgotten. What is this? I caught you in a massive lie and now you think you can spin an even bigger one in front of your wife to get out of it?”
“Maya’s not my wife,” he said, shaking his head, and I laughed again, but it came out as a shrill, practically neurotic sound.
“He’s telling the truth,” Maya said. “My brother—”
“Your brother?” I stared at Jack. “You never told me you had a sister.”
“Stepsister, technically,” he said. “And I don’t know why you keep calling me Jack. My name’s Ash. Asher Bennett.”
Undeterred and unconvinced, yet confused and angry about what he was doing, and why, I pulled out my phone and swiped through the photos. “You told me your name was Jack Smith. See?” I pushed the screen into his face, flicking through photo after photo. “This is us. Here. In this one. And this one. And this one. You and me. Jack and Lily. We live in Brookmount, in Maryland.”
Jack looked at Maya. “I got into the trailer in Maryland.”
“Ash...”
He ignored her, touched the screen with a fingertip before whispering, “Lily. Lily.”
The renewed uncertainty in his voice glued my lips together and I looked at him, I mean properly looked at him for the first time since I’d started my rant. His furrowed brow, his lost expression—it was as if he’d never seen me before. This wasn’t right, this wasn’t an act. Something was terribly wrong. I wanted to reach for him again and pull him close, but an invisible wall had now gone up between us, keeping me at even more of a distance, making me feel as if we were strangers.
“What happened to you?” I whispered.
“I woke up on a beach in Maryland,” he said.
“Yes, you went swimming one night after work. You never came back.”
“I didn’t know where I was,” he continued. “Or who I was. Only that I had to get to Maine. They think I have retrograde amnesia—”
“What? Oh, my God.”
“—and ever since I arrived here, Maya has helped me.”
I glanced at her. “You remembered your stepsister?”
“No...” he said quietly. “Someone called her, and Maya brought me home.”
“But your home is in Brookmount. With me,” I said.
Ash grimaced, face flushing with embarrassment. “I don’t recall anything from before. I want to believe you, and the photos must mean we knew each other.”
“Knew?” I let out a laugh. “We took them last month.” Tears stung the backs of my eyes and I opened and closed my mouth, unsure what to say. This wasn’t how I’d pictured our reunion in my fantasies. There was crying, yes, but tears of joy, not this, anything but this.
Maya stepped in front of him. “Ash has been under a lot of stress with his condition and you showing up is making things worse. We need to go.”
“G-go?” I stammered. “You can’t leave. I need to understand. I want to know why—”
“Can’t you see you’re upsetting him?” She looped her arm around his.
“Maya, she knows me,” Jack said, his voice raised. “I need to talk to her.”
“Ash—”
“No. Lily, maybe you can help me figure out what I was doing in Maryland.” He didn’t spot Maya glaring at me, but I didn’t care. The only thing that mattered was not losing him again.
“You have a doctor’s appointment,” Maya said.
“Who cares about Dr. Adler?” Jack snapped in a tone I’d never heard him use before.
“I do,” Maya said, her voice firm, nonnegotiating. “It’s important, and he’s going on vacation as of tonight. You have to see him. Today. Now.”
“I know, I know, you’re right,” Jack said with a grimace and I fought back more tears. I didn’t want him to leave, couldn’t bear us being apart any longer. He was alive.
He lifted his hand a little as if he might reach for mine, but instead of touching me, his gaze dropped to the bracelet on my wrist, the one with the heart-shaped charm he’d given me for our first Valentine’s Day, a look of concentration taking over his face. “We live at...uh...”
“Twenty-two forty-nine Birch Road,” Maya said. “Come at seven.”
“I’ll be there,” I whispered, wanting to shove a hand into my chest and cradle my heart as I watched them walk away.
18
ASH
Lily had long disappeared from view, but until she had, I’d watched her stand on the same spot, arms by her sides, as if she were a statue. The image of her—cat-shaped sapphire eyes, bow lips, and long blond hair gently blowing in the breeze—still hadn’t left me. As I thought about her sudden arrival in Newdale, panic rose. What if her departure was just as abrupt? What if this was just too plain crazy for her and I never saw her again? I needed to know what she knew, including why she’d insisted my name was Jack. From the sincerity in her voice and on her face, I had no reason not to believe her, but unless Maya, Fiona, Dr. Adler and even Keenan were a bunch of liars, my name was Asher Bennett. I wanted to tell Maya to turn around, go back so I could talk to Lily properly, but my head felt as if I’d shoved it into a vise and squeezed it for days because the confusion about my identity could only mean one thing.
“I lied to her,” I said. “Why the hell did I tell Lily my name was Jack Smith?”
“I don’t know.” Maya stared ahead, her eyes focused on the road, unblinking.
As I replayed the conversation with Lily in my head, I turned to Maya. “What did she mean when she said you told her my name was Gordon?”
“Shit.” She exhaled deeply, her knuckles whitening as she clenched the steering wheel. “She called me
