Last Summer(80)

Ella squeezes his hands reassuringly. “Same. I want to experience raising a family with you. You don’t have to give me a baby. Adopt one with me. We can foster a child or get a donation from a sperm bank. We have so many options, Damien. I don’t care what we decide, as long as we decide together and that we stay together.”

“You’d do that for me . . . adopt?”

She frowns slightly. “I’m not Anna. Whatever child we bring into our family will be ours.” Ella slowly smiles. She cups her hand over his damp cheek. “So yes, Damien. I’d do that for you. I’d do it for us.”

He briefly closes his eyes. “I can’t tell you what this means to me.”

“Hopefully it means you forgive me. For cheating on you and for getting into the car accident. For losing Simon and forgetting about him.”

“Losing Simon isn’t your fault. Neither is the accident.”

She isn’t so sure about that, but she needs to hear the words from him. “Please forgive me,” she whispers.

“I do,” he says without hesitation. “But can you forgive me? I should have told you I was sterile. There were so many times I wanted to tell you, but I thought if I did . . .” He shrugs.

“It wouldn’t have changed my mind about marrying you and staying with you if you did.”

“Speaking of minds. Do you want your memories back? You mentioned last week you didn’t.”

Ella thinks for a moment, tapping her lips. “Let me see if I have this straight. We go to the Maldives and I tell you that I want to start a family. But you don’t tell me you’re sterile, only that you still don’t want kids. Right?” She waits for Damien’s confirmation and, when he nods, says, “We return home, I go on assignment with Nathan, and you fly to London. I meet up with you two weeks later and several weeks after that realize I’m pregnant. I believe Simon is yours, and you let me think that. Then, for whatever reason—guilt maybe?—you tell me you’re sterile, that you’re not Simon’s father, and that you know I had an affair. This happens on the day of my accident. After dinner, I guess. So far, so good?” He nods again. “We then argue. Upset, I leave the condo, where I call Nathan, presumably to tell him about Simon, but I never get the chance. A truck hits me. And, well . . . we know what happens next.”

Damien’s jaw ticks.

“Did I get it right?” She looks at him expectantly. His expression is tight and his eyes reflect all the pain she’s caused them. But he nods.

“Yes, that’s how it happened.”

“Then, no. I don’t want my memories.” She’ll miss not having the opportunity to experience the maternal connection with Simon, but she doesn’t want to remember her affair with Nathan, the first one, or the hurt she inflicted on Damien.

The pain recedes in his eyes and he smiles, a wide satisfied grin. Ella would say his smile almost looks calculating, but that wouldn’t make sense. Her vision is blurry through her tears and distorting everything in the room. Damien’s just happy. Super happy they’ve worked through everything, because he pulls her into his arms and kisses her deeply.

“I love you,” he murmurs against her lips. “I love you so much.”

When he lifts his head and smiles adoringly at her, she catches the time on the clock. It’s almost six o’clock.

“You have to get to the airport,” she says, sad he has to leave.

“Or”—he grabs her wrist when she moves toward the door—“I can cancel my flight. And tomorrow’s meeting. There’s a big bed here, just waiting.” He smiles that sexy, wide grin that always makes her breath catch.

“You’d do that for me? Cancel your meeting?”

Damien draws her to him until their bodies are flush. He brushes his lips over hers. “I’d do anything to keep you happy, Ella.”





CHAPTER 35





INTERVIEW TRANSCRIPT EXCERPT


August 18, 2018

Fairmont Hotel, San Francisco, CA Interviewer: Ella Skye, Senior Features Writer, Luxe Avenue magazine Interviewee: Amira Silvers, Academy Award–winning Actress [Continuation of Recording]



Ella: For the record, you’ve agreed to share with Luxe Avenue’s readers what you were going to tell me a moment ago. You said that you know how to forget your husband. So let’s pick up where we left off. What do you mean by that? How do you forget Harry? Are you saying you can completely wipe him from your mind? Is that even possible?

Amira: Have you heard of a Dr. Irwin Whitely?

Ella: No.

Amira: He’s a cognitive scientist. He’s conducting research on memory retrieval and suppression. Specifically, motivated forgetting.

Ella: What’s that?

Amira: It’s the deliberate suppression of memories. Dr. Sigmund Freud theorized it. Dr. Whitely has discovered how to do it.

Ella: Really? Sounds fascinating.

Amira: Quite. He’s looking for more test subjects. I met with him last week. He offered to work with me.

Ella: Are you going to?

Amira: I think so. What about you, Ella? If you could intentionally forget someone, would you?

Ella: Umm . . . I’m not sure.

Amira: What if the person had harmed you?

[Pause]