Forget Me Not (4 page)

He shrugged, looking suddenly uncomfortable. "I'm thinner than I've ever been. I've got a few scars." He curled his left hand into a fist, hiding the stunted fingernails she'd already glimpsed.

Thinking of what he'd been through made her stomach queasy. But he prided himself on his independence, so she held her words of consolation in check.

Leaving them with nothing to talk about.

They both looked at Mallory, who was staring at Gabe with her heart in her eyes. Mallory who'd hugged her dad for the first time in years.

"So what grade are you in?" Gabe asked, surprising Helen with his interest.

"It's summer vacation," Mallory explained. "I'm going to go to high school in a month." This was said in a very adult manner.

"Wow," said Gabe. He looked at her intently. "So you're what, fourteen?"

"Almost. I have a late birthday, September second."

"Mine's in July. I remember turning thirty-three but not thirty-six. Pretty weird, huh?"

Helen couldn't remember the last time Gabe and Mallory had chatted so casually. A lump of regret clogged her throat.

"That's exactly how long we've known you," Mallory added. "Three years."

Gabe glanced at Helen. "I figured that," he said.

Helen experienced an undertow of attraction. If she had to do it all over again, she'd still have trouble resisting him. He was a modern-day Pied Piper. Even now, sitting there half-starved and stripped of his memory, he commanded their full attention.

"Listen," she interrupted, "I have to go and make some phone calls. I need to arrange to take the day off tomorrow so I can pick you up in the morning."

Gabe nodded, looking away. "Sure," he said. "Sorry about the hassle."

"No, it's all right." She felt a blush creep up her neck. "We'll see you in the morning, then," she added. "And... uh... try not to worry. You'll get your memory back." She hiked her purse strap higher onto her shoulder.

What now? Should she kiss him, embrace him, or just walk out?

She settled for a quick smile and a wave. "See you in the morning. C'mon, Mal." She practically ran for the door.

Mallory followed with obvious reluctance. "It'll be all right," Helen heard her say.

Oh, no, it wouldn't, Helen realized. There were way too many variables in this equation for things to turn out right.

G
abe's eyes sprang open. Save for a soft line of light under the door, he was surrounded by darkness.
Where am I?
His sluggish brain would not supply an answer. He knew only that he'd heard something. Danger was coming, as it always did in the darkest part of night.

There it was again: the sound that had wakened him. A faint creak, like the sound of leather being stretched.

God, no.
Not another flaying. Not an endless round of searing strips laid across his back. He couldn't go through that torture again, nor the hours following as he rode on waves of feverish agony.

Gabe grappled for a weapon, anything to fend off his captors, to dissuade them from taking him.

The creaking came again, louder this time. Gabe's fingers closed over the handle of an object. It felt like a pitcher, a pitcher full of liquid. He had no idea where it came from, but as it was the only object within reach he hefted it.

As a dark shadow loomed over his prone body, Gabe tossed the contents of the pitcher directly at the enemy. With a startled exclamation, the shadow jumped back. Gabe hurled the empty pitcher for good measure and scrambled out of the strange contraption he was in, putting distance between him and his muttering attacker.

"Madre de Dios!"
the man exclaimed, snapping on the bedside lamp. "Jaguar, it's me," he added. "What the hell are you trying to do? Drown me?'

At the sight of his master chief, Gabe sucked in a breath of disbelief. He reached for the wall for something solid to hold on to. A few darting glances corroborated where he was: not in some dark cell with faceless captors, but in the Portsmouth Naval Medical Center facing his beloved master chief, who'd apparently just risen from the leather armchair by Gabe's bed. "Sebastian," he whispered in dismay.

Sebastian León looked exactly the same. Tall and slim, he regarded Gabe through eyes slightly lighter than his coal-black hair. "You're okay," Sebastian said, falling back upon his usual imperturbability. He rounded the bed slowly, coming to stand within a foot of his lieutenant. "I didn't mean to startle you," he apologized, giving him a searching look.

Gabe took note of Sebastian's rough appearance. In complete contrast to Lovitt, he looked like he'd spent the last six weeks aboard the coastal patrol craft. His hair was overlong and curly, his chin in need of shaving. He wore an odiferous battle-dress uniform, with the jacket cast aside. The green T-shirt, drenched from the water Gabe had just thrown at him, looked stretched and stained with sweat.

Gabe had never seen a more familiar sight in his life. He knew a startling urge to throw himself into Sebastian's arms. He also wanted to die with shame for having demonstrated the pitiful state of his jittery nerves.

"You're still half-asleep," Sebastian said, offering an excuse. "Go in the bathroom and splash water on your face."

As an officer, Gabe outranked his master chief, but he obeyed all the same, thankful for a moment to pull himself together.

Dousing his whole head in cold water, Gabe sought to shake off the dulling effects of his sleeping pills. He rubbed his face briskly with a towel, and with his composure tacked back into place, he carried the towel out to his master chief.

Sebastian dabbed his chest with it. Draping the towel over his neck, he put a hand on Gabe's shoulders and turned him toward the bathroom light. His expression of tenderness put an immediate lump in Gabe's throat.

"Am I looking at a ghost?" Sebastian asked him.

Gabe laughed. "Yeah, maybe. I feel like I've been resurrected."

To his astonishment, Sebastian pulled him into a wet embrace. The tremor in his arms, the firmness in his grasp, made his heart swell. Sebastian's eyes glittered with tears as he put him at arm's length again. "I thought I would never see your ugly face again," the man admitted. "How can you be alive? The warehouse exploded with you in it."

Gabe tried to remember. He shook his head. "I don't know. I can't remember the mission at all. I don't even know my wife," he added, not bothering to conceal his dismay.

Sebastian tugged the towel loose and rubbed his shirt again. "It'll come back to you," he reassured him.

"Maybe." Gabe stepped away, assailed by uncertainty. "There was some damage to the front of my brain," he added, grappling with the frightful possibility. "I may never get my memory back."

"Never?" Sebastian scoffed, tossing down the towel. "I didn't think you knew that word, sir," he challenged. "Remember Kirkuk, when I was held by the Iraqis for two weeks before you liberated me?"

Gabe searched his memory, pleased when a crisp memory of that mission returned to him. He savored it, right down to the feel of sand between his teeth. "Yeah," he said. "I remember."

"It took me a year to recall those two weeks."

"You're shitting me."

"No." Sebastian shook his head in that very Latin manner of his.

"But you were debriefed and put right back on active duty."

"I lied," the master chief admitted. "I remembered small pieces at a time, mostly in my dreams. One day I woke up and it was all there. The same thing will happen to you."

"I can't lie about three years," Gabe said, dragging his hands through his hair. "Lovitt has all but dropped me from the team."

"Wrong," Sebastian retorted. "The CO wants you back as much as I do. He knows you, that's all. He knows you respond best to a challenge."

"I have to be a SEAL, Sebastian," Gabe grated as a shudder shook his body. "I have to get my memories back," He gripped the cold metal bar on his bed with the urge to shake it.

Master Chief nodded solemnly. "It'll happen, Jaguar. Just give it time. You need your rest," he added. "Get back to bed. I might as well use your shower," he added, turning toward the bathroom.

"Why aren't you at home?" Gabe asked him, tossing aside a wet pillow.

The master chief threw him an enigmatic look. "I have to sign papers before they release you," he explained.

"Disability papers," Gabe guessed.

"Permission for medical leave," the man clarified. He went into the bathroom and shut the door.

Clambering back into his bed, Gabe muttered self-directed curses.

Alone in the adjoining room, Sebastian let the shock of Gabe's appearance overtake him. Leaning heavily on the sink, he stared into the mirror, recalling the slight disfigurations on Jaguar's face, lingering traces of his torture. But the most telling of ail was his startled reaction to an unknown presence.

Gabe had been severely traumatized.

Peeling off his sodden T-shirt, Sebastian remembered the last time he'd seen the lieutenant alive. Standing on a launch pad, he'd been watching men from Echo Platoon board a UH-60 Black Hawk, en route to the carrier in the Pacific. As Jaguar ducked into the chopper, followed by Miller, the executive officer, Sebastian had suffered a strange foreboding. When word came that the lieutenant had perished on the mission, his premonition had seemed a psychic revelation.

But Jaguar was alive. Never in his wildest dreams had Sebastian considered he might have escaped what the men had described as an inferno. He'd mourned the lieutenant for months. Hell, he was still mourning him, only Jaguar had returned from the darkness—crippled but still kicking.

Strangely, the uneasy feeling Sebastian had experienced a year ago was back, stirring the hairs at the base of his neck. His friend's reappearance was a miracle,
gracias a Dios.
But it was also a puzzle, a puzzle that raised some troublesome questions.

If Jaguar had survived the explosion, then what about the missile they had failed to interdict?

And there were other questions that demanded answers: like why Jaguar had stayed behind when the other SEALs left the building; who were the mysterious shooters who had driven the SEALs back? The only man who'd yet to testify was Jaguar himself, a man whose memory had retracted into darkness, driven there by unrelenting horror.

A surge of protectiveness shuddered through him. Sebastian twisted the knob on the shower to hot. If he'd listened to his premonitions a year ago, Jaguar might have been spared the nightmare of his captivity. His instincts warned him now to remain vigilant. The loose ends in this case left him more than a little perturbed.

"See if you can guess which house is ours," Mallory challenged from the backseat of the Jaguar—the car Helen wasn't supposed to drive. Gabe had paused with satisfaction to see his automobile again, which he clearly recognized, having purchased it five years ago in California. He didn't act the least bit upset that Helen had made it hers.

It was nearly noon. It had taken two hours to sign the release papers at the hospital. It might have taken longer if Master Chief hadn't been there to expedite matters, bullying and cajoling the hospital staff without once raising his voice. Helen had always liked Sebastian. His even temper complemented Gabe's more mercurial temperament. They had always paired up well together.

This morning, though, Gabe had been surprisingly patient, considering they'd waited more than an hour for his prescriptions to be filled. Maybe he was too depressed or too high on drugs to care. The Navy had relegated him to disabled status, meaning he was completely at loose ends until his memory came back. That could take anywhere from a day to a year, according to Commander Shafer. He hadn't wanted to give her such disheartening news yesterday.

Her freedom would have to wait, it seemed. And if it wasn't enough to have Gabe around for God-knew-how-long, Helen had also agreed to escort him to and from his clinic appointments, as he was not allowed to drive.

By the time she'd signed her life away, filled Gabe's prescriptions, and stuffed him into the passenger seat, her goodwill was running dry. They'd still had a half hour's drive to get home, and with three years of Gabe's memory missing, she didn't know what to say to him. Mallory did most of the talking while Gabe looked out the window.

They were nearly home now, having turned onto Sandfiddler Drive, where the Atlantic Ocean rushed onto the nearby shore. It was a weekday, but the beach crawled with summer tourists who'd rented out the wooden castles at the edge of the sea for their week of freedom.

Their own home was in less peril of being swept away by hurricanes, positioned as it was, a hundred yards from shore where the road curved inland, nudging the back gate of Dam Neck Naval Base.

"This one?" Gabe asked, picking up Mallory's game. He gestured at the fairy-tale structure, complete with turrets and towers.

Mallory laughed. "No, not that one."

Helen tried not to look at him. Was he playing this game with Mallory because he had nothing better to do? He used to be preoccupied all the time, his thoughts a thousand miles away.

"Oh, I know," he said, sounding confident this time. "It's coming up now. It's this one on the left." He pointed out a high-tech structure that might have been a museum for modern art.

"No-ho," Mallory hooted, enjoying herself.

Helen flicked a look in the mirror. She'd thought her daughter had been happier without Gabe around. Apparently she wasn't. Her green eyes were dancing in a way they hadn't danced for months.

With too much to think about, Helen guided the Jaguar around the bend and pulled into their driveway, beside the Jeep that didn't run.

Theirs was a modest, wooden contemporary perched atop a dozen fat pilings. It was two stories high, with the laundry room, shower, and workshop on the ground level. Steps zigzagged up to the front door. A balcony hugged the entire right side, overlooking a yard in the front and the Atlantic Ocean at the rear. Wildflowers splashed color onto the beige sand, creating an effect like a Monet painting. Helen had invested a lot of energy into getting the valerian, chicory, and black-eyed Susans to grow. She glanced at Gabe to gauge his response.