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“Jase, please don’t do this.”
“I’ve told you a million times not to call me that. My name is Jason. You’re so stupid.”
Jack held very still. He didn’t know where he was, who was talking, or why his head hurt so badly. He also wasn’t sure why he didn’t just sit up and open his eyes to find out what was going on…but something deep down inside told him to wait. To listen.
“Sorry.”
“You’re doing this, Maisy. I don’t want to hear any more about it. And if you don’t…”
The man’s voice trailed off, and even though Jack didn’t know either of them, he didn’t like the implied threat.
He probably should’ve kept his eyes shut, but he couldn’t stay silent any longer. He didn’t like the way the man was treating the woman.
Shifting on the bed, he opened his eyes. Or tried to. The light in the room was extremely bright, and he winced and immediately closed his eyelids once more.
“He’s waking up!” the woman exclaimed.
Jack braced against the pain of a killer headache, and when it subsided slightly, he risked opening his eyes once more. This time going slower and squinting. Everything was blurry as he struggled to sit up.
He felt a hand tug on his arm and resisted the urge to sigh. It was her. The woman with the soft voice. Given the size of her hand, it wasn’t as if she could actually move him, but Jack did his best to sit up on the bed anyway. Wanting to see the face that went with the soothing voice, Jack turned his head to look at her.
His breath hitched.
Her light brown hair was tussled and, to his untrained eye, looked as if it needed a trim. She had spots of deep pink on her cheeks and her chestnut-brown eyes met his without hesitation. She was a bit too thin, but he still thought she was very pretty.
“Easy,” she said in that melodic voice.
“Glad to see you awake,” the man said. His voice grated on Jack’s nerves. His eyes had adjusted to the light and he glanced at the man, instinctively knowing he was the one in the room he needed to be concerned about.
“Do I know you?” Jack asked a little gruffly. He felt off-kilter, his head was throbbing, and he had no idea where he was.
“Name’s Jason Feldman.”
The man didn’t hold out a hand for Jack to shake, and it felt as if the guy was assessing the situation, being careful not to say too much too soon. How he knew that, Jack had no idea. Bringing a hand up, he massaged his temple, attempting to alleviate the radiating pain in his head. “Where am I? What happened?”
“What do you mean, what happened?” asked the woman—who Jack remembered had been called Maisy. She was hovering next to the bed, looking at him in concern. He liked that. A lot. Had he ever had anyone seem that concerned about him before?
But at the simple question, his mind blanked. He wasn’t sure what he meant. He looked into Maisy’s eyes. “I don’t know.”
“What don’t you
you know?” she asked gently.
“Anything,” Jack blurted. “I mean…I know my name is Jack, but that’s about it. Why does my head hurt? Where am I? Who are you? What happened to me?”
An almost delighted snort sounded from Jason on the other side of the bed, and Jack quickly turned his attention to him.
“Sorry, I just…I didn’t expect this,” the man said.
Jack’s eyes narrowed as he took him in. If he wasn’t mistaken, the man was trying to hold back a smile. But that couldn’t be right. Why would he be happy that Jack couldn’t remember anything?
“As I said, my name’s Jason Feldman. You’re at my house in Seattle, Washington. You were in an accident and hit your head.” He nodded to the woman. “That’s my sister, Maisy. And you’re Jack Smith—my brother-in-law.”
Jack’s head spun. The only thing sticking him was the brother-in-law thing. That meant…
He turned to look back at Maisy.
She was staring at her brother with what Jack could only call a stricken expression on her face. But that emotion wiped clean when she looked down at him.
“Hi,” she said weirdly.
“We’re married? You’re my wife?” Jack blurted, frantically searching his mind for the tiniest memory of this woman…and coming up blank.
But instead of Maisy answering, it was her brother who said, “Of course she is. You two have been married for a couple years. You were out hiking together and you fell. Were out for hours. The doctor said you’d be fine, but we’ve been extremely worried…you don’t remember anything?”
Jack slowly shook his head. Everything was a complete blank. His breathing sped up as alarm spread through his body. But then he felt a light touch on his arm. Maisy.
“It’s okay…you’re okay,” she said urgently.
“Well, shit. Guess that means the vow renewal ceremony you’ve been planning is off,” Jason said.
Maisy bit her lip as her head shot up and she stared at her brother.
“What?” Jack asked.
“You two lovebirds were planning to renew your vows. The ceremony was supposed to be this weekend. Then you got hurt. And my darling sister, who’s spent a ton of time working on the details, was so excited.
I guess we’ll have to postpone…although we could simply downsize things. Instead of the hundred guests Maisy invited, we could do a smaller ceremony, stick to just family.”
“Jase,” Maisy protested weakly.
“Jason,” he corrected immediately. He looked down at Jack. “She can never remember that I hate that stupid nickname from childhood.”
“Maybe we should give him time to get his memory back,” Maisy suggested.
“Are you going to stand there and tell me that you don’t want to do this?” Jason asked his sister.
Jack could feel tension in the air between the siblings, but he couldn’t begin to understand why.
Jason didn’t give Maisy time to respond before continuing. “You two love each other more than any couple I’ve ever met. You were both so excited about this. We’ll scale it down. I’ve got a friend who’s ordained, we can bring him in. It’s your new start. You know Mom and Dad would want this.”
The color leeched from Maisy’s face at the mention of her parents.
Frustration swam through Jack. He hated not knowing what was going on.
“Our folks died in a carjacking years ago. Maisy was their baby. Spoiled rotten. She was lost without them. Had to drop out of high school because she couldn’t handle losing them. I moved back here to the family home to help her out, and we’ve been here ever since.”
“How long have we been married?” Jack asked Maisy in a gentle tone. He felt terrible for her. He didn’t know if his own parents were still alive or not, but he imagined losing your parents had to be awful, and if it happened while you were a minor, it must be even worse.
But again, her brother answered for her. “Only about two years, and things were rough between you for a while, but they’ve been a lot better recently. So you guys decided to recommit yourselves to each other. Hence the renewal of vows ceremony.”
Nothing Jason said rang a bell within Jack. In fact, it felt…wrong. If he was married to this woman, if he loved her as much as Jason insisted he did, surely he’d feel something deep down inside? Instead, it felt as if he was meeting two strangers. It was disorientating.
“Are you hungry?” Maisy asked softly.
“Starving,” Jack admitted.
“I’ll get Paige to make something and bring it up,” Jason said. “She’s our cook.” Then he looked at his sister as he said, “I’ll leave you two to bond…and I’ll call my friend about this weekend.”
“Jason, please,” Maisy said.
“It’s for the best,” Jason told her. “You know it is. I’ll take care of everything. You know how overwhelmed you get. The last thing we want is you having a relapse and for the doctor to have to come and sedate you. Relax, sis. I’ve got this.”
Once again, Jack felt as if he was in the dark. He didn’t understand what the hell Jason was talking about, and he hated it.
As soon as the man left the room, Jack turned to Maisy. “Relapse? Sedate you?”
Maisy licked her lips nervously. “I don’t deal well with stress.”
That didn’t really answer his question, but because she looked so uncomfortable, Jack let it drop. For now. His eyes swept the room, desperately willing himself to recognize something, but nothing about the somewhat austere space felt familiar.
“Can I have some water?” he asked, spying a jug on a small table on the other side of the room.
“Oh! Of course. I’m sorry, I should’ve gotten you some the second you woke up,” Maisy fretted as she turned to head toward the table.
“It’s okay. So…my last name is Smith?” Jack asked.
Maisy shot him an uneasy look before turning her back on him to pour a glass of water. “Yeah,” she said.
“Jack and Maisy Smith, huh?”
This time, she simply nodded.
Something wasn’t right about this situation, but Jack couldn’t figure it out. Not when his head was pounding so hard. He brought a hand up and felt the back of his head where the pain seemed to be coming from, wincing as he encountered a large lump.
“Does it hurt?”
The question came from his wife as she hovered next to his bed once more, this time with a glass of water in her hand.
“Like a bitch,” Jack said as he reached for the water.
Their fingers brushed as he took the glass from her, and she gasped slightly.
Jack inhaled sharply as well when a jolt of what felt like electricity shot down his arm. Without thought, he reached out with his free hand as Maisy pulled away. His fingers grasped her wrist, and she froze.
Jack ran his thumb over the racing pulse in her wrist. Her skin was soft and felt a little chilly to him. But he couldn’t deny touching her felt right. The only thing that had felt right since waking up in this room. Would he feel like this with a stranger? No way. At least he didn’t think so. He hadn’t been sure he’d believed the story Jason was feeding him, but as he watched pink blossom in Maisy’s cheeks at his touch, satisfaction filled him.
This woman was his wife. He might not remember anything about his life, but he knew without a doubt this woman was his.
Suddenly, he was as anxious as she apparently was about their vow renewal ceremony.
“I don’t remember getting married,” he said gently after taking a sip of water and putting the glass on the table next to the bed.
“It was a spur-of-the-moment thing. We didn’t have a big ceremony.”
“I’m not surprised.”
She frowned. “Not surprised about what?”
“That I was too anxious to make you mine to wait for you to plan a big shindig.”
Her blush deepened.
“I’ll do it,” Jack told her.
“Do what?”
“Marry you again this weekend. I don’t remember our first ceremony, and this will be a new start for us, like your brother said.”
She stared at him for a long moment. “We don’t have to,” she whispered.
“I don’t remember you, or the life we had, but deep down I know you’re mine. My soul recognizes you. Not knowing who I am or anything about my life sucks. But for some reason, simply having you here makes the blackness in my brain not seem so scary. I know you, Maisy Smith, and it would be my honor to marry you…again.”
Tears filled her eyes and dripped down her cheeks. “Jack,” she whispered.
“Too much?” he asked as he gently tugged on her hand and brought it toward him.
He kissed her knuckles.
“I just…this is all so overwhelming,” she said.
“Will you sit with me? I want you to tell me everything about yourself. What your likes and dislikes are, your dreams…hell, I don’t even know how old you are.”
“I’m twenty-eight.”
Jack opened his mouth, then sighed as he closed it.
“What? Too young?” she asked.
He chuckled, but it wasn’t a humorous sound. “Not at all, I was just going to make a joke about my age, but then I realized I don’t know my own birthday. How old am I, love?”
She stilled, her eyes wide as she stared at him.
The door opened, and a woman walked in carrying a large tray. She was around the same height as Maisy, in what he figured to be her sixties, and had black hair she’d pulled back into a messy bun at the back of her head. She was slender and regal looking, and he thought he saw a bit of Native American in her features. She looked at Maisy with a small frown as she juggled the tray in her hands. Jack couldn’t interpret the look, and the confusion and uneasiness he felt when he first woke up once more swept over him.
Maisy tugged her hand out of his and hurried over to help with the food.
Jack didn’t understand the tension between the two women. Paige looked concerned and he wasn’t sure why. He was no threat to his wife. And why did Maisy clearly not want to tell him how old he was? Was he much younger than her? Older? He didn’t feel as if he was in his twenties, but he didn’t feel as if he was in his forties either.
“I made you some hearty vegetable soup. You’ll feel better once your belly is full,” Paige told him after she put the tray down on the table next to the bed.
“Thank you. It smells wonderful,” Jack told her.
“Oh, I almost forgot. Here,” Maisy said.
Jack saw she was holding out a pair of glasses. He automatically reached for them and put them on. He didn’t even remember that he wore glasses, but as soon as they were on his face, he relaxed a little. Yeah, his sight wasn’t awful, but everything was much clearer now.
He stared at his wife and willed himself to remember, but he still had no memories
before waking up, other than his first name.
“I hear we’re having a wedding this weekend?” Paige asked tentatively.
Maisy bit her bottom lip and turned to Jack.
“We are,” he said firmly.
He didn’t understand the look Paige gave Maisy, but she said, “Great. I’ll start planning a menu.”
“Nothing big,” Maisy warned the older woman. “It’s just going to be family.”
“I understand,” Paige said.
Again, there were undercurrents to the conversation that were way above Jack’s head, and he was so confused. Before he could ask questions, Paige turned and left the room without saying anything else.
“I should go,” Maisy said uncertainly.
“Stay,” Jack insisted. The thought of her leaving made his heart rate speed up. If he didn’t know better, he’d think he was having a panic attack. But that didn’t make sense. He wasn’t the kind of man who panicked at the slightest provocation…was he? Then again, he couldn’t really know that for certain.
“Are you sure?” Maisy asked. “I just thought maybe you’d want some privacy.”
“You’re my wife, I don’t need privacy from you. You know me better than anyone. Have seen me at my worst and best, I assume. Stay.”
It took several seconds before she nodded.
“While I’m eating, you can tell me more about our lives together. What we do for a living, about your brother, your mom and dad, and anything else you can think of.” When she remained silent, he gently clasped her hand. “Maisy?”
“Yes?”
“I might not remember you or our marriage…but I’m looking forward to getting the chance to fall in love with you all over again.”
Her eyes filled with tears. “I don’t deserve you, Jack.”
“Of course you do," he told her. “We deserve each other.”
Maisy stared at Jack as he slept. The last hour or so was absolutely horrible. Every word out of her mouth was a lie. She wasn’t his wife. She’d never even met the man before Jason dragged him into her room and dumped him on the bed.
Her brother was awful. Terrifying. Nothing like the boy she’d looked up to when they were growing up. Somewhere along the way, he’d changed from the protective older brother to the monster he was today. And she was trapped.
It was true that their parents had been killed when she was only fifteen years old, and that her brother had moved in to care for her because she was a minor. Also, because she’d been out of her mind with grief.
Somehow, one year had turned into two, into five, into ten. And now, thirteen years later, she was still living in the house she’d grown up in with a brother who hated her.
For the most part, it was just the two of them all those years, with Paige and a few other daily staff members on the payroll. Though Jason did get married five years ago…but his wife had mysteriously disappeared just four months after she and Jason were married. Her brother claimed Martha had left him without a word, but Maisy wasn’t convinced. She’d spent the night before Martha’s disappearance with her sister-in-law, and she’d seemed…okay. Not super happy, as she’d admitted she and Jason were having some issues, but Martha was determined to work through them. She’d genuinely loved Maisy’s brother, which made her disappearance all the more confusing.
As for Jason, instead of seeming heartbroken, he’d appeared…satisfied.
That was when Maisy’s suspicions really started. She hadn’t wanted to think Jason had anything to do with his wife’s disappearance…but how could she not?
For years, she’d kept silent about what she’d seen the night Martha had supposedly left…but if she truly believed Jason’s story, that he’d gone to bed next to his wife and when he’d woken up, she was just gone…
Then how did she explain his behavior that night?
Why had she kept the pictures she’d taken all those years ago, still carefully hidden?
Just in the last several months, as the drugs she’d been on for over a decade started to clear from her system, allowing her to think clearly for the first time in years…she’d begun to wonder about her parents’ deaths, as well.
Jason had received a hefty life insurance payout after their parents died. Money he seemed to go through rather quickly. Then, three months after getting married, he’d finally been able to access additional money their parents had left to him in a trust.
Now that money was apparently long gone, as well. It was a pretty hefty sum, yet he’d managed to spend it all. If she had to guess, she’d say he ran through the last of his inheritance close to a year ago…around the time he started to ween Maisy off her meds. Started encouraging her to find a boyfriend.
But apparently his patience was wearing thin. Just two months ago, Jason
began outright insisting she needed to get married. Of course, because she was old, fat, and ugly, he was going to find her a husband.
She hadn’t expected him to literally drag in a stranger off the streets.
Maisy didn’t know what her brother had done, or where he’d found Jack, but it seemed to be a stroke of unbelievably good luck for Jason that Jack had amnesia. The man didn’t even know his last name wasn’t Smith.
Her brother was smart; the story about them planning to renew their vows was ingenious. Maisy had no idea how Jason had planned to get Jack to marry her if he hadn’t lost his memory, but because he had…it made things much easier.
Jason wanted her inheritance. The money her parents had left for her, sitting safely in a trust since their passing. She received a stipend every month—which her brother took—but he wanted the rest, and unfortunately for him, it had the same stipulation as Jason’s own inheritance.
She couldn’t access the money unless she was married.
It was why Jason had married Martha, she now realized. Maisy had learned there was a three-month waiting period after the marriage was official before the money could be released, and it hadn’t been too long after that when poor Martha had supposedly “left.”
Maisy had already come to the realization that her brother would have skipped her sham marriage to a stranger, and she’d probably be dead right now, if it wasn’t for the fact that upon her death, her inheritance wouldn’t go to her brother—it would go to charity. Her parents had been eccentric, but also very clear in their wishes as far as distribution of their assets. They knew that money could make people do terrible things.
But Maisy didn’t think they’d ever believe it could make their own son do such awful things to get his hands on their millions.
Now Jason was forcing her to get married so he could gain access to her money.
Maisy wanted to stand up to him. Wanted to go to the police with her suspicions. But her brother terrified her. He had a lot of nefarious friends. People who wouldn’t hesitate to break the law. People he’d probably hired to kill Martha…and maybe even their parents. People who’d probably kidnapped poor Jack.
Jason was a greedy asshole, and Maisy had no idea how to get out from under his thumb.
She had no college education, no friends, no driver’s license or money of her own—no way of escaping his clutches. No matter where she went, he’d find her. And the second she signed her name on a marriage certificate, the clock was ticking for her poor husband…and probably for her too.
Three months. That’s how long she had before every cent her parents had left her would be under Jason’s control.
And she’d be expendable.
As would Jack.
Turning her attention back to the man resting on the bed, Maisy studied him. He was exceptionally good-looking. She guessed he was in his thirties. Built. His stubble enhanced his square jawline rather than hiding it. And the glasses? She was a sucker for a man who wore them as well as Jack did. Back in high school, the last time she’d had any interest in boys, she’d always been drawn to the smart, nerdy-looking guys. Not that Jack looked like a nerd. Far from it. But the glasses took him from handsome to crazy hot. She’d also caught a glimpse of a tattoo on his right shoulder.
In short, he was way out of her league, and there was no way a man like him would tie himself to a woman like her if he didn’t already think they were married.
Which brought up another issue…her lack of sexual experience. Thank God she wasn’t a virgin. That would be impossible to explain away when they’d supposedly been married for two years.
She’d had sex exactly once, not long before her parents had died. She’d been young, too young, and sneaking around had felt liberating. She’d felt so grown up at the time. But the experience had been awful. Was over in minutes and had hurt horribly.
Then her parents had been killed and her brother moved back into their family home and before she’d realized what was happening, ...
