The Penance of Black Betty (3 page)

              At the risk of being rude, she rolled onto her side facing the door, placing her back to the old woman. Her tightly wrapped ribcage felt like it was on fire, but there was only so much her aching, spinning head could take.

              Alistair appeared in the hallway, knocked lightly and strode into the room with a bouquet of tiger lilies. They’d always been her favorite lily. How did he know?

              Maybe he didn’t.

              “Aren’t you Alistair Ingram?” Bethany’s old roommate crowed, still sticking her head around the curtain.

              Disheveled and looking shaken, Alistair smiled and nodded. “I am. Nice of you to recognize me.”

              “Honey, I’d recognize you anywhere. You sexy young thing.” She clucked her tongue and laughed—cackled—before falling into another coughing fit.

              Alistair set the bouquet on the side table, lowered into a chair beside Bethany’s bed and whispered in her ear. “I asked for a private room. You should be transferred to one soon.”

              She gazed up at him, brows knit in confusion. “Why are you doing this for me? How do I know you? Why am I in Los Angeles?”

              Alistair reached out, like he was going to stroke her hair. She followed his hand with leery eyes. Why would he touch her with such familiarity? His hand faltered and he dropped it to the bed beside her.

              “Bethany, you were assaulted in a home break-in. You have some memory loss. I’ll do my best to fill in the blanks for you.”

              His eyes were haunted, like he couldn’t believe he had to do this, like he hid so many secrets and so much pain.

              “Please,” she whispered, her plea a ghost lingering between them.

              Alistair dropped his eyes for a moment, then raised them to hers, confident and determined. “It’s 2013. You’re in Los Angeles because it’s where you live. With me. We’ve been together for a while now. Your ex—Trent—the two of you divorced ten years ago.”

              “Ten years! I forgot ten years? I’m divorced? I live with you?” She rolled onto her back and stared up at the fluorescent overhead light while her heart tried to pound its way out of her chest and panic zinged through her limbs. “Oh my God. Oh My God. Oh my God.” It was all she could say.

              How could this happen? Ten years—gone.

              “Will I remember again?”

              Alistair opened his mouth to speak, but shut it again, like he was uncertain how to answer. Then he took her hand in his and rubbed his thumb across her knuckles. “It’s hard to say. That’s why I don’t want to tell you too much right now and influence what you might recall on your own. Let’s take this memory thing slowly, okay? The doctor thinks it’s best if you remember on your own terms, at your own pace.”

              How frustrating. Infuriating. “You can’t keep my life a secret from me. You have to tell me something!”

              One side of Alistair’s mouth hitched into half a grin and he took her other hand in his as well. “Okay. I’ll tell you a story about us.”

             
SIX

              He hated the way she looked at him. Hesitant trepidation. He’d seen that look on her face once in the past, right before the first time he made love to her. It was fleeting then, but now more a permanent fixture between them. He had to bring her back to him.

              “I was in need when I met you,” he began. “I had everything a man could want, but I needed something so badly, I could actually feel the emptiness of it. The problem was, I didn’t know what was missing.”

              Her eyes widened a little and she relaxed back into her pillow.

              “I was engaged to a woman—an actress—I didn’t love and had no intention of marrying. I agreed to the engagement for publicity reasons. I thought she had too, but it turned out she wanted to go through with it. I didn’t know how to break things off between us without hurting her or our careers.

              “I was stuck. My life wasn’t my own. I was owned by my manager, my producers, my agent, my fans. I was a puppet under their control. It wasn’t about what I wanted, my goals, what would make me happy. It was about what would make the most money. I was a brand. Still am I guess, but I’m free now. Because of you.”

              “How?” she whispered. “How because of me?”

              “Because you were what was missing. Once I met you, I took control of my life. I wasn’t going to let you go. I didn’t care what the press had to say about me ditching the actress and being with you. I didn’t care what the fans thought or any of my
handlers
. I didn’t care if my career ended. All that mattered—all that matters—is being with you.”

              She gently twisted one hand out of his grasp, but left the other. “Why would being with me end your career? I don’t understand.”

              Alistair prayed the old lady in the next bed behind the curtain didn’t butt into their conversation. He was treading into dangerous territory. He didn’t want to lie to her, but didn’t want to disclose the truth either. “You weren’t an actress,” he said, skirting the real answer. “You weren’t in the business. Actors even get grief sometimes for dating models instead of actresses. It’s bloody ridiculous, Bethany.”

              A hint of a smile touched her mouth. “What?” he asked.

              She shook her head. “Nothing. Just your accent came through a bit.”

              He knew she loved his British accent. He was accustomed to burying it for all his American roles, but it came out when he was agitated.

              “Where did we meet?” she asked.

             
Bloody fucking hell.
Using every ounce of his acting prowess, Alistair remained unaffected. “In a bar.” He chuckled. It sounded convincing. “It was actually the night of my bachelor party.”

              Undaunted, she dug for more. “Did you come up to me, or did I approach you?”

              He couldn’t help but grin remembering their first encounter at Dolls & Doms when she strutted off the stage and strode to him, whip at the ready. “You approached me. You worked there though, so it wasn’t like you were hitting on me.”

              “I worked there?”

              “Yes.” Alistair silently begged her to stop pressing for answers in that direction.

              “What happened that night? How did we end up together?”

              He coughed. “Um, well, that night—I was an asshole. You called me Pretty Boy and hated me. I persisted though. Showed up the next day and made you like me. Things progressed between us from there.”

              Master of evasion he was not. There was no way she’d stop prying for more information. Thank the Lord, a nurse breezed in and saved him. “Time to check your vitals,” she said. “Oh, what beautiful flowers!”

              “Thanks,” Bethany said, then turned her smile on Alistair. It wasn’t much, but at the same time, her smile was everything to him.

              His phone vibrated in his pocket as the nurse took Bethany’s blood pressure. He let the call go. He knew it was either Kent or Henry Wallace threatening to replace him. They were way behind the production schedule for Hues Of Black And Blue and relentless with their calls. He didn’t know what to tell them. He wasn’t leaving Bethany to go back to Seattle and film.

              A minute after his phone stopped vibrating, he felt another buzz alerting him to a voicemail.

              “We’re going to get you moved to a private room one floor up in a little bit,” the nurse said, tucking the white blanket back around Bethany and helping prop her pillows so she was comfortable. “If you need anything just press your button.”

              “Okay.” Bethany blinked her eyes slowly and kept them shut for a moment. She was tired. Alistair didn’t want to go—wanted to crawl in next to her and hold her close while she slept—but knew he had to let her rest.

              He stood and bent, pausing only for a second before pressing his lips to her forehead. Her eyes startled open. “I have some calls to return,” he said, “but I’ll be back before they move you.”

              She nodded, her eyes probing his for a hint of a memory. He wished he could play all of his memories of them for her like a movie. Then she’d know, she’d understand seeing it all play out. But, piece by piece without her remembering, her past wouldn’t be so easy to explain.

              With one look back at her fragile frame when he reached the door, Alistair made himself leave her room.

              Out in the waiting room, he dialed his voicemail.

              “Ingram, it’s Kent. If you want to destroy your career keep avoiding my fucking calls. I’ve talked Wallace into re-arranging the shooting schedule. They’re doing every scene you’re not in, but that only gives you a week tops. Get your shit together, Ingram. When this chick is gone, you’ll regret ending your career over her. Prioritize.”

              The call ended. Alistair’s hand was clenched around his phone so tight, his fingers ached. Fucking Kent. Bastard. Alistair resisted the knee-jerk reaction of calling him back and firing him. Kent had gotten Wallace to rearrange the schedule for him. Unfortunately, it didn’t look like a week would be enough time to earn Bethany’s trust and he wasn’t betting on her memory coming back so quickly either.

              Maybe giving up this part—the biggest of his career to date—was the only option.

             
SEVEN

              Bethany woke when two nurses’ aides came to move her to her private room. She was groggy and sore. Everything ached. It hurt to breathe. Her eyes were puffy. Her eyelashes touched the swollen, delicate skin below her eyes when she blinked.

              “Slowly,” the young man in blue scrubs said, taking her by the wrist to help her up and placing an arm around her back.

              “Ouch!” she cried. Her back was a mine-field. She could only imagine how it looked—full of black bruises.

              “Sorry,” he said, leading her down into a wheel chair.

              The other aide pushed her IV stand along beside them as they made their way down the hall toward the elevators.

              It was evening and when they got off the elevator on her new floor, carts of food trays were sitting outside the patient rooms. Bethany caught the scent of something rich that brought to mind a warm kitchen on a fall night and her stomach growled.

              “We’ll get you settled and order your dinner. The doctor put you on solid food.”

              “Good. I’m starving.”

              “That’s a good sign,” the aide pushing her chair said.

              Her room was the same size as the two-patient room she’d come from, but with one bed in the center and visitor chairs on both sides. A nurse came in as the aides were setting her IV up again. “There’s our star patient,” she said, writing her name—Barb—on the white board near the door. “I’ve seen your picture in celebrity magazines and on those gossip talk shows on T.V. It wasn’t fair how they treated you and Alistair Ingram.”

              Having been tossed a bone, Bethany grabbed it with both hands. She wasn’t about to let this opportunity to learn about her past go without getting as much info as she could. “I appreciate that,” she said, easing her way into the conversation. She didn’t want to jump on the topic of her and Alistair and scare the nurse into clamming up. “It wasn’t fair, was it? I mean, what did we do so wrong, you know?”

              “I know,” she said, batting a hand through the air. “It’s nobody’s business who he has a relationship with and it’s definitely nobody’s business what you do for a living.”

              What she did for a living?

              The nurse eyed her curiously. “I do want to ask you something though, if you don’t mind?”

              “No. I don’t mind.” Her pulse raced. What could she have to ask? Bethany knew she wouldn’t have an answer, only more questions of her own.

              “Were you really here in L.A. training Alistair for his role in Hues of Black and Blue? I know the papers said you came from that…lifestyle. I thought it was probably just put on for the stage.” Barb smiled, almost looking apologetic for asking.

              Lifestyle… The stage? “Um. Yes. That’s why I’m in L.A. working with Alistair. Training him, I mean.”

              “Well, you won’t get any judgment from me. And I won’t let the paparazzi or reporters anywhere near you.” She handed Bethany a menu. “I’ll be back to see what you want to eat.”