Last Summer(24)

“A show? Damien, I don’t remember anything about Nathan Donovan. He didn’t exist to me until Rebecca called about him this morning. I spent a week or so with this guy and I don’t remember any of it. Thanks for the invite, but no, I can’t go to London, not now. I need to meet with Nathan and find out what’s going on with me.”

“What if I asked you not to take the assignment?”

She balks. “Why would you do that?”

“Answer the question, Ella.”

“No! This is my job we’re talking about. I don’t tell you what companies to pitch.” She flings her arm at the client files. Damien just stands there. “What is it about this guy that bothers you?”

Damien puts his files and laptop back in the case. Tosses his keys on top. A flash of red catches her attention. The drives on the ring. Two of them. Those are new. Postmiscarriage new, that is. She doesn’t have the chance to think of asking about them, let alone ask. Damien slams the case closed.

Keys.

“What if Nathan’s the key to fix my head?”

“Why him?”

Ella sets down the wine bottle a little too hard. “Nothing I’ve done has triggered my memories, no thanks to you. Why not give this Nathan guy a try? What’ve I got to lose?” The assignment probably. Ella inwardly cringes. Hopefully Nathan will be understanding. She also hopes he’ll be more forthcoming than her husband. God, what’s with him? She really doesn’t understand why he’s being so difficult.

Damien rubs some of the tension out of his face, then sighs. “You’re right. Go. It’s your job,” he says.

Damn right it is, she wants to snap. But she grinds her teeth, willing herself to calm down.

“What do you know about my interview with him last summer?”

“Not much.”

Ella sighs, frustrated. “I want to remember Simon,” she says, wishing Damien would finally talk to her, really talk to her about all they’ve been through.

He slides his hands into his pant pockets. He looks at his shoes, nodding, thinking to himself. “Do me a favor,” he says after a moment. “Think before you go. Ask yourself if you really want to remember.”

She frowns. “Of course I want to. Why wouldn’t I?”

He shrugs. His expression looks pained, uncertain. There’s a reason he’s been holding back. But for the first time in months, his reluctance gives her pause. What if whatever it is he’s hiding from her—and she’s sure there’s something—is powerful enough to destroy their marriage?

Is she willing to lose him just to remember a baby they never planned to have?

She considers what might have happened before the accident and her gut feeling only grows stronger. They’d been arguing moments before. About what?

Or more to the point, considering his reaction to Nathan, about whom?





CHAPTER 10

Three and a Half Years Ago

Four months after they married, Ella spent one Sunday afternoon with Damien on the couch watching the Bills decimate the 49ers. On the third play into the second quarter, Kaepernick got sacked, again, and Damien kicked the coffee table, shouting at the flat screen. His beer toppled, spoiling the nachos Ella had just prepared.

“Damien!” Ella blotted the table with the few napkins before beer spilled on the area rug.

“He holds the ball too long in the pocket,” Damien fumed, oblivious of the mess he made.

“You ruined the nachos.” Ella got a towel from the kitchen and wiped the table dry.

“Sorry, hon.” He patted her thigh, watching the replay.

Ella tossed the wadded, wet napkins on the food and took the platter into the kitchen. She dumped the nachos into the trash and dropped the platter in the sink. The earthenware cracked in two.

“Shit.” That had been Aunt Kathy’s.

“Everything all right?” Damien called from the great room.

“Fine,” she snapped.

She picked up the pieces from the sink and blinked back tears. It had been the only dishware she’d kept of her aunt’s. Maybe she could superglue the pieces together.

Later, she thought. She wasn’t in the mood now. She wasn’t in the mood for football either.

“I’m going to write,” she announced.

“Don’t you want to watch the game with me?”

The Niners were losing. They sucked this season. And her mood, for reasons she couldn’t pinpoint, was foul.

“No. I have a deadline tomorrow. Watch without me. Let me know if they score.” Doubtful they would.

Ella set aside the broken platter and retreated to her office. But she didn’t wake up her laptop. She just sat at her desk and stared blankly at the black screen, feeling irritable and edgy. Everything Damien did today set her off. He’d sneeze and she mothered him to cover his mouth. He blew his nose and she snapped at him to wash his hands before he touched her. He’d wanted to give her a kiss. Then he had to go and ruin their nachos. If he hadn’t, she wouldn’t have broken Aunt Kathy’s platter, the one Aunt Kathy used to serve dinner when they had company. The same one her aunt had served homemade mac and cheese on the last time Ella had had her best friend Grace spend the night.

Grace.

Ella jiggled her mouse, waking up her laptop, and looked at the date. October fourteenth. The day Grace had died.