Sleeping Love (3 page)

‘What is going on? You’ve been acting strange with me since I arrived. Why are you asking me about a wedding ring? Let me go. I want to go home,’ Sabrina insisted.

‘You’re not going anywhere, Sabrina,’ he told her firmly transferring his hold to her wrists in an effort to stop her moving. ‘You belong here. This is your home, and I am never letting you leave again.’

‘What are you saying? Who are you? How do you know so much about me?’ she stopped struggling, more from shock than anything else.

‘You really don’t remember do you?’ he sounded disbelieving, dismayed, barely able to contain his frustrated anger. ‘You are my wife.’

Chapter Two

Sabrina instantly halted her struggle to escape Raoul’s hold, shocked to her core by his words.

‘Sabrina, it’s true. I’ve played this charade far enough.’ There was an impatient brewing storm in his tone. ‘I know the doctors told me to be careful with you, but you are my wife. I have been without you for too long.’

The butler brought in a lit candelabrum, momentarily ceasing their conversation. He sat it on the middle of the table without speaking and quickly left. Raoul’s face came back into view. It was filled with love. Sabrina began to struggle again, desperate to free herself from his grasp.

‘What the hell are you talking about? Let go of me. I’ve never been married. You heard about my lost memory didn’t you? Maybe you thought it would be fun to make me think I was your wife. Perhaps you can replace those memories I lost with ones of your own for your own amusement,’ she shouted. ‘Maybe someone bet you to do it for a laugh?’

There was a shake to her voice she fought hard to control.

You sound crazy. Why would he even bother to do that? What the hell is happening here?

She felt exposed, vulnerable. She’d lost seven years of her life, lost her family, lost her identity. When she’d woken up in that hospital in London, nobody knew who she was. No one came to claim her. She had to make up a new name for herself and find the will to carry on. Afraid and alone, she managed to set up a new life for herself, going to University to study history, afterwards a PhD. Then she became a lecturer and wrote a book, gaining a reputation in the academic field. She’d given up trying to find her family. They didn’t appear to want to know her.

‘Sabrina, don’t say those things. I love you, you are my wife,’ Raoul insisted holding her in a tight grip against him.

‘You’re lying. My family have made no effort to find me. Why would my husband want to claim me as his own now, after all these years? He would be remarried by now . . . This is a cruel, sick joke . . .’

Sabrina’s eyes filled with angry tears.

‘Enough. I won’t listen to this. I will prove it to you,’ Raoul snapped, reaching down to scoop the candelabrum off the table.

He tightened his hold on her wrist with a grip that would have been better suited to a vice, making her squeal. He led her out of the room. Sabrina made every effort to drag her heels, pulling at his hand to force him to let go. Raoul only tightened his hold further and dragged her along.

Sabrina’s eyes could see nothing but what the candles allowed her to see. They travelled through the dark rooms, the wooden floors creaking and groaning with centuries of use under their feet, highly audible in the ghostly silence that settled on the house. Finally, they reached a room that she presumed was Raoul’s study by the elaborate desk and leather chair he dragged her behind. He came to a stop in front of a large framed canvas and raised the candelabrum, directing her to look at it.

Sabrina gasped out loud. There was no mistaking her own image. She was seated in a chair in a black velvet ball gown cut away seductively across the breast. Raoul stood tall, proud and possessive at the side of the chair. Her hair was longer, and her eyes twinkled with a happiness. Sabrina couldn’t remember looking that happy or even feeling that way in the last seven years. It was breath-taking and a shock to the system. She tried to take a step back and found herself half falling to the floor, half fainting with shock. Raoul caught her waist skilfully and pulled her up close to him. It was then that the lights came back on.

‘Now do you believe me, Sabrina?’ Raoul demanded, a note of triumph and vindication in his voice.

She glanced around the room. The place was littered with photographs of herself and Raoul very much in love. The room began to spin with a carousel of broken memories, a hundred swirling images that were there in a second and gone in a heartbeat. She didn’t know what to believe anymore. Her body began to sway alarmingly as she looked up at the canvas again. Raoul slipped his arm under her legs and swept her up into his arms to deposit her onto a chair. He quickly moved away and poured her a glass of cognac from the drinks cabinet.

‘I know you don’t like cognac, Sabrina, but you will drink it. You need it for the shock you have just experienced. Now drink.’

He was right. She didn’t like it. She wasn’t keen on alcohol apart from wine. Sabrina obediently took the glass, too dazed and confused to pass comment on his correct knowledge. But her trembling hands made her clumsy, and he took control holding the glass to her lips, instructing her to sip slowly. She coughed as the fiery liquid hit the back of her throat and tried to push the glass away, but he was firm, giving her no choice but to continue drinking. He watched her anxiously when frustrated tears gathered in her eyes once more.

‘You have been using your middle name, Sabrina. Your first name is Melissa,’ he gave a small laugh. ‘You hate it, so you use Sabrina. Michaels is your maiden name. You’ve been using them without even knowing.’

‘No there isn’t. It was just a ruse to get you here. You disappeared from the Chateau on the night of a ball I held for your birthday party, seven years ago. I knew I wouldn’t be able to get you to believe me until I brought you home. I saw the way you looked at the Chateau. You remembered it. I knew you would. You love this place.’ He smiled at her again. There was relief in his eyes. ‘This is going to be difficult for you, Sabrina. I am a stranger to you at the moment, but in time I hope I can help you remember our life together.’

‘I don’t know what’s happening. I just want to leave,’ she heard herself say before she could even think. ‘I’m confused. I can’t trust all of this . . . I . . .’

He sighed.

‘You’re afraid. I understand that. It’s a lot to take in, but I can’t let you leave. You are my wife, you belong here, and I am never going to part with you again, whatever the outcome.’

‘I would hardly call you a prisoner, in your own home, Sabrina,’ he told her with affront. But there was something in his tone that made her believe that if she pushed him with her threats to leave, he would keep her a prisoner.

Raoul’s seductive black eyes narrowed a fraction, as a frown burrowed in his forehead. Sabrina found herself holding her breath as he captured her face in his hands once more. There was no mistaking his resolve or his authority when he spoke in a low soft velvet voice.

‘You have amnesia, Sabrina. That makes you unwell. A doctor might say that you were unable to make decisions for yourself, and I as your husband should make them for you. A court of law would most likely see it the same way. . .’

‘You wouldn’t dare . . .’ she was outraged.

She watched him study her trembling lips with longing, then look up at her with dark possessive eyes. She heard herself take a quick breath overpowered by their intensity. There was no doubt in her mind that he would never let her leave. Somewhere deep inside a treacherous part of her loved him for it.

‘I will go as far as I have to. You are my wife. It’s time I reminded you of your wedding vows.’

Chapter Three

Sabrina glared at Raoul and moved to stand up from her chair in a temper. She pushed her way past him, ignoring his demand for her to remain seated in case she fell to the floor again. She shook her head and looked up at the painting.

‘I don’t believe this . . . it’s unreal. I don’t remember getting married. I don’t remember anything about our life together,’ she told him angrily.

Raoul frowned and straightened from his kneeling position, making Sabrina feel small and defenceless against his tall height. Afraid of what he might do, she took two steps back, but Raoul headed for the top drawer of his desk. Sabrina glanced back at the door wondering whether she should make a sudden break for freedom. She needed space, time to think. Her mind made up, she straightened and headed for the door deciding to leave and collect her thoughts. There was nothing he could do to keep her here. A doctor couldn’t just write her off as insane and have her committed. There were laws. She needed to think, to escape. Her whole world felt as though it was a whirl.

Nothing appeared safe or trustworthy. Leaving would give her some control back until she could decide what to do. Surely, Raoul would understand that. Frantically, she headed for the door and reached out for the handle with a shaking hand when she stopped dead, hearing the cracking whip of Raoul’s reprimand across the air.

‘It will do you no good,’ he told her softly. ‘They know that you are home and that your memory loss may have made you unstable. They are more than likely to advise hospital care if I can’t keep you under control, than help you leave.’

‘I knew you would be like this so I dug our wedding certificate out of my pile of personal papers last night.’ He unfolded the piece of paper he held in his hand and offered it to her. ‘Your signature will prove that this is not some elaborate hoax. You belong to me, Sabrina, and I am not letting you walk out of that door again.’

She glanced at the certificate and the signature that he pointed to.

It is definitely my writing.
Blind panic filled her mind. She didn’t know what to do.
What if Raoul is the man who beat me so badly I lost my memory? What if he really is the man who put me in the hospital seven years ago? Maybe I had tried to leave him, and he’d become violent. Too many questions. I need to get out.

‘Do what the hell you want, but I am still leaving, and there is nothing you can do,’ she shouted, wasting no more time in turning the door handle.

But to her dismay she was not to get very far. Raoul leaned over and raised his hand above her head, slamming the door shut hard. Sabrina gave a yelp of fear and turned around to face him, finding her back pressed against the door with no means of escape. Raoul’s dark eyes looked down at her threateningly. He closed the distance between them, sweeping his arm around her waist when she made a gesture to duck out from under the cage of his arm. He pushed her back against the door once more and restrained her there.

‘I am going to keep you here even if I have to tie you down. I want to know why you walked out on my life. We were in love. I have spent years wondering what happened. I never once thought you were dead. Did you leave me for another man? Your absence has tormented me. One moment we were happy and the next you were gone from my life. I didn’t know what to think. At first I thought you had left me. Then when I saw there had been a struggle in your study, I was terrified.’ Raoul’s tone grew more intense with anger, leaving Sabrina trembling.

‘The police believed you were murdered, and I was their main suspect. I was an obvious target after someone told them that they had heard us arguing that night. The police even dragged the lake on the grounds looking for your body. How the hell do you think that made me feel? Even our own friends began to suspect me, and the English press went out to get me. I spent two nights in a jail cell while the police questioned me. I thought I was going to lose my mind. The only thing that stopped them from charging me with your murder was the lack of a body and help from my old school friend in the police, who believed in my innocence. I lost friends. I nearly lost my business, but worst of all I had lost you. I hid myself away in this Chateau like some kind of recluse. Here I could be close to you. I wasn’t sure I was going to pull through, and I spent some dark nights alone wondering whether or not I should carry on life without you.’