Black Jack Page 3

  She was going to obey the dictates of what she wanted rather than what her mother would consider acceptable. It was a dangerous urge to follow. At least, six years ago it would have been.

  And there they were. Snug, low-slung jeans. There were low boots made of soft, supple leather on a stand beside them. Boots that looked sexy and stylish while being practical and easy to run in. Which made her wonder. What would she be running from?

  “Victoria, we’ve discussed this denim fetish you seem to have acquired,” her mother stated worriedly as she moved closer and fingered the denim jeans. Tension seemed to thicken the atmosphere. “Really, Victoria. The dresses are much nicer.”

  Lilly had to clench her teeth in irritation.

  Lilly, she thought. Her name shouldn’t be Victoria, she had always disliked being called Victoria. She was Lilly. But she couldn’t recall a single time that her parents had called her Lilly.

  She was Lilly. Lilly . . . something. She tilted her head and stared at the material as she rubbed the pocket between her thumb and forefinger. Lilly. Not Lady Victoria Lillian Harrington. Not even Lilly Harrington. But who?

  “Can I help you?” the saleslady asked just behind her.

  “The jeans,” she told the red-head as she moved to where they hung. “I’d like to try these, please, as well as the boots.” She moved to the boots and chose the correct size before stepping to a particular rack of blouses.

  “Oh my God, you wouldn’t dare! Victoria, Desmond would have a stroke if he caught you dressed in such clothing.” Her mother was outraged, as she stared at the flat-heeled, sinfully black leather over-the-knee boots and snug jeans.

  No, it wasn’t Desmond who had a problem with the clothes. It was her mother. Angelica Harrington demanded a certain image be presented at all times. Jeans did not fit that image, nor were they allowed in her mother’s presence.

  Ignoring her, Lilly walked over to the nearby shirt, reached out and ran her fingers over the soft, expensive olive-green Egyptian cotton.

  “Desmond will not appreciate this,” her mother warned, her voice tight.

  Desmond was her stepfather now. In the six years she couldn’t remember, she had managed to lose her father, and her mother had married his younger half-brother.

  “This blouse, please.” The dull olive-green cotton would fit tightly, conform to her body and shape her breasts enticingly. She wasn’t certain why she was suddenly drawn to the color, though.

  She turned to the polite saleslady trailing them. The other woman smiled gently. Long red-gold hair fell to her shoulders and an understanding smile crossed her face.

  In the meantime Angelica fussed in the background about the jeans and the drab color of the blouse.

  “Victoria, really. The dresses are much nicer.” Angelica continued to object as her daughter moved toward the dressing room.

  She glanced back at the door. There was a spot just between her shoulder blades that refused to stop itching. She could feel the eyes on her. His eyes. Somehow, he was still watching her, still waiting for her. Would he be as surprised by the jeans as her mother seemed to be?

  As Lilly entered the dressing room she breathed a sigh of relief and leaned wearily against the wall, closing her eyes and taking a hard, deep breath.

  She opened her eyes and stared back at the woman in the mirror.

  She wasn’t Victoria any longer.

  Who the hell was she, really? And why wasn’t she comfortable with the knowledge of her own identity, her own looks?

  The soft cotton material of the short gray dress skimmed over her breasts and hips, ending at a barely decent length just below her thighs. The soft gray material didn’t seem appropriate somehow. Just as the green eyes staring back at her didn’t seem right.

  She had once had hazel eyes. She had always had hazel eyes.

  Her hair was a dark red now. It had once been a rich deep brown. Her doctors were amazed at the fact that somehow her eye and hair color had been permanently changed.

  She was different. Her looks were different. Something inside her was different. There was something that didn’t seem quite right about the life she was living now, and the woman she remembered being.

  “Darling, are you all right?” Angelica’s voice came through the thin walls of the dressing room. Lilly could hear the concern, the confusion in her mother’s voice. But she also heard the forced patience and edge of irritation.

  “I’m fine, Mother. I’ll just be a moment,” Lilly told her.

  “Desmond is going to be utterly upset if you return to the house in jeans.” There was a note of amused affection in her mother’s voice when she spoke of her husband that had Lilly almost cringing in distaste. There was a warning there as well. “He may even fuss at you, dear.”

  Lilly stared at the denim, the boots, and the blouse. She stared back at herself in the mirror, then turned away. She loved it. She could move in this clothing. She could run, she could fight . . . who?

  Dark flashes surged through her mind, electric images of gunfire, blood and death flashed like vibrant lies amid a midnight landscape.

  Hurriedly stripping the new clothes from her body, Lilly pulled the dress back on, slid her feet into the heels that she knew she could never run in, then gathered up the articles she had tried on.

  Stepping from the dressing room, she gave her mother a careful, cool smile in response to the frown on Angelica’s face. She knew better than to upset her mother. At least, she had known better six years ago. There was a part of her now that balked at giving into another’s dictates or the threat of the consequences.

  “I’ll take these.” She handed the clothing to the saleslady, while trying to ignore the irritation in her mother’s eyes. Perhaps it was best that she remain the daughter Angelica thought she was, but another part of her demanded that she be something else, something more, and that she be prepared.

  She had to maintain the illusion, she thought. Survival depended upon blending into this life she was living now. Even the smartest prey understood the value of playing dumb. And a killer well understood the hunt.

  Lilly almost came to an abrupt halt at the thought. Shock was a bitter taste in her mouth as she fought not to sink into the shadows and the memories that were just out of reach.

  She wasn’t a killer! She was a social butterfly; a scheming little debutante, her father had once accused affectionately. She knew well how to blend into this life, she had learned at an early age. She wasn’t a killer. But the blood in her dreams indicated otherwise.

  She resisted the urge to stare at her hands, a part of her desperate to ensure no blood stained them.

  Who the hell was she and why did the memories of the past six years seem so elusive while the nightmares seemed more real?

  She was indeed Victoria Harrington. DNA had proven it. Her blood was a perfect match for the DNA that had been taken from the Harrington children a decade ago to ensure they could always be identified, no matter the circumstances.

  She knew who she was, yet she felt like an imposter. Whatever had happened in the past six years she had lost had changed her in ways she couldn’t explain. It had ensured she no longer fit in with her family, her friends, where once before she had blended into this life seamlessly.

  She had memories of her life up until the night before the car crash that had killed her father and left her struggling for life six years ago. The memories of the past six years eluded her, though.

  And why was she searching for a face in the crowd, anticipation surging through her at the thought of one brief glimpse of a man she didn’t know? A man who felt more familiar to her than her own face. The man she had caught watching her earlier.

  “You’re acting very strange, Victoria.” Angelica sighed as they left the shop and moved back to the tree-shaded sidewalk and the shops that Angelica insis
ted on visiting.

  Lilly could hear the edge of anger in her mother’s tone and she knew she should be wary of it. Angelica Harrington had a hard, sharp edge when angry. One that cut with brutal strength. And she had no problem slicing into one of her children if she felt the need.

  “I’m well, Mother.” She watched the crowd intently, careful to keep her mother’s body shielded as they continued the impromptu shopping spree they had decided on that morning.

  She couldn’t understand why she was doing that. Why did she suddenly know how to protect her mother, and what was she trying to protect her from?

  “I didn’t ask if you were well,” her mother said, exasperated. “I said you’re acting strange.”

  “So, I look strange and I feel strange, as well.” Lilly snorted. “And could you please just call me Lilly?”

  They both stopped.

  Lilly tried to look everywhere but at her mother, before she was finally forced to meet Angelica’s dark brown gaze. The anger was still there, but also a hint of fearful confusion. Lilly well understood. Perhaps Angelica truly had lost her daughter.

  “Lilly,” Angelica finally said softly then, staring back at her as though she saw more than even Lilly could guess at. “That’s what your grandmother called you, you know.”

  No, she hadn’t known that. Her grandmother had died when Lilly was no more than a child.

  As though by silent accord they turned and began moving down the sidewalk again. There was a silence between them now that wasn’t exactly comfortable.

  “I don’t remember her calling me Lilly,” she said, trying to calm her racing heart and to ease the tension.

  “You were very young,” her mother said. “It doesn’t surprise me that when you disappeared you chose that name to use. Your grandmother always claimed you were more a Lilly than a Victoria. But your father insisted on Victoria.”

  She had been Victoria six years before. She had been the belle of every ball. She had been powerful in her own right. She had had lunch with the Queen more than once, she’d known the Prime Minister, she had danced with many members of Parliament. She had conspired—

  The memory slammed shut, just that quickly. It was there, then gone as though it had never been. Frustration ate at her. The memories were there, just out of reach, haunting her, daring her to do what, she wasn’t certain.

  “You know, there’s the nicest little antiques store just ahead.” Her mother changed the subject with forced brightness as they passed a small café whose tempting scents wafted out to her. “I thought it would be nice to see what they have. I found several flatware pieces there the last time I visited. It was quite unique.”

  Coffee. She would kill for a cup of hot coffee.

  She would kill . . .

  For the barest second the sight and scent of blood filled her senses, and it wasn’t the first time. She didn’t freeze this time. She barely paused at the memory, and, like the first time, it disappeared just as quickly as it had come.

  She didn’t stumble, she continued walking, balancing perfectly on the high heels even as she thought that if she had to run, it would take precious seconds to shed the impractical footwear.

  “Desmond usually comes on these little forays with me.” Her mother continued chatting. “It’s too bad he had that meeting this afternoon in D.C. He could have accompanied us.”

  Lilly had breathed a sigh of relief when Desmond had announced he couldn’t take the trip with them. For some reason, she no longer felt as though she could trust the uncle she had once cherished. That feeling left her off balance as if she couldn’t trust anyone anymore.

  It was locked in her memories. All the answers she needed were locked behind the veil of shadows that had wiped out the past six years of her life.

  What had happened the night her father’s car had gone over that cliff with her in it? Had they argued? Had they been in danger? Why had they left the party that night without telling anyone or making their excuses?

  None of the explanations she had been given when she awoke in the hospital nearly four months ago made sense. She had lost more than just memories. Lilly felt as though she had lost herself as well.

  She had lost her life, her father. Her mother and uncle felt like strangers, and where was the brother who had always tried to protect her? When he had come to see her in the hospital, he had disowned her as a lying, scheming tramp attempting to steal his sister’s identity.

  And perhaps that hurt most of all. She had idolized Jared. To have him turn on her had broken her heart in ways she feared would never heal.

  “You’re too quiet, Lilly. How do you hope to ever acclimate if you refuse to try?” Her mother’s voice was hard now, censorious. “I still think you needed time to heal further. The clinic in France . . .”

  “Mother, really.” Lilly smiled gently, consolingly. “I’m acclimating fine. I’m just getting my bearings, I promise.”

  “And you would tell me if it were otherwise?” her mother questioned, concern softening the hardness in her tone.

  “I promise I will,” Lilly lied.

  “The dress becomes you.”

  Lilly froze at the sound of the voice at her ear, slightly husky, rich and dark, like the finest black velvet rubbing against the senses.

  She knew that voice. It sank inside her, caressed against memories that chafed beneath the shadows and eased a sense of fear that had been riding inside her for the past months.

  She hadn’t realized how frightened she had been until that clenched, tight part of her soul seemed to relax marginally.

  “I think I prefer the jeans, boots, and thigh holsters you wore in Afghanistan better, though.”

  She felt his cheek against her hair as her heart began to race, to pound erratically with fierce anticipation. Her body suddenly became too sensitive, too warm, as a distantly remembered heat began to flare inside her.

  “Et.” The halting sound delayed her attempt to turn around. “Stay still, no need to turn around yet.” There was an edge of darkness in his voice as he gripped her hip with one hand and held her in place.

  There were too many sensations racing through her body now, too much heat and too many pinpoints of emotion that she couldn’t make sense of.

  “Who are you?” she hissed as she gazed around desperately, wondering where her mother had gone off to, wondering what she would think of the man standing much too close to her daughter.

  “You don’t remember me?” There was an odd note in his tone, one she couldn’t decipher quickly. “As much trouble as we’ve instigated together? I think I’m offended, Belle.”

  A sense of vertigo assaulted her at the chiding tone.

  “Evidently I don’t.” She fought to still her racing heart, to ease the harshness of her breathing.

  “I heard you’d been wounded. Evidently the rumors of lost memories is true.” The comforting tone to his voice did nothing to still the alternating emotions that were suddenly tearing through her. “Trust me, baby, you know me.”

  She believed it. She knew it. She could feel that knowledge heating her body.

  “Then I can look at you.” She kept her voice low, as he did, her gaze continually scouring the interior of the shadowed store for anyone that could be watching or listening.

  “Not yet. Turn around and I won’t be able to help myself. Your mother would find you in a very compromising position. She doesn’t seem the type to look the other way if she caught her daughter being seduced in a back corner of an antiques store.”

  Her mother would be absolutely mortified. Furious.

  “Do you remember Friendly’s Sports Bar?” he asked then.

  She shook her head slowly, though a ghost of a memory surfaced. A large dim room, a jukebox playing, the crack of pool balls and spirited laughter.

  “The c
orner of Franklin and Walnut Street,” he told her.

  “We’ve met there before?” She heard the uncertainty in her voice, the neediness, the hunger for information. Finally a prayer had been answered. Someone who knew who she was rather than who she had been.

  “Several times,” he assured her. “Tell me, Belle, how severe is the amnesia?”

  She couldn’t decipher the underlying emotion in his voice. Part concern, part something else that had her wondering not just who this man was, but what he was to her.

  “The past six years are gone,” she answered truthfully, though she wasn’t certain why she had. This man had her guard up, yet a part of her was reaching out to him, desperate to trust him. “Did you know me well?”

  His hands tightened at her hips. “I’ll let you decide that. Meet me tonight at the tavern, alone. No mother, no driver. You could ride that racy little motorcycle you looked so good on. The one you keep in storage here in Hagerstown.”

  She rode a motorcycle? Since when did she ride a motorcycle?

  She shook her head almost instinctively, rejecting the idea that she would, that she could ride, even as she remembered the wind in her hair and the power pulsing between her thighs.

  “I’ll be there at eleven.” His fingers caressed her hips. “Will you be there, Lilly?”

  “I’ll be there.” The decision was made so quickly, so instinctively, that she almost called the words back.

  “Good girl.” Were those his lips brushing against the shell of her ear?

  Lilly shivered at the exquisite sensation of warmth, almost a kiss, as she took in a hard, shocked breath.

  “I’ve missed you, Lilly.” Was that a note of regret in his voice?

  Lilly fought the overwhelming urge to turn and confront him, to demand the answers she was certain he had. There was no doubt he had known her during those lost years. There was no doubt he may have possibly known her intimately.

  “Who am I?” The words slipped past her lips, the emotion in her voice undisguised, the fear that she fought to keep hidden revealing itself in the husky, plaintive tone of her voice.