LITMIR.BIZ

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      Anna shook her head. “She still doesn’t remember anything since she left Wyoming two weeks ago.”

      Melanie’s eyelids fluttered open and she called out to Luke. “Hey, deputy.”

      Luke walked over to her. “How are you feeling?”

      “Sleepy.” She had bandages on one side of her head, and dark circles under her eyes. “Thank you,” she mumbled, giving him a half smile. “And please thank the event security man who found me.” Her smile started to falter and tears formed in the corners of her eyes. “Something happened to me,” she said, with confusion evident in her eyes. She reached her hand up to touch the bandages on her head and gave him a pleading look. “What happened to me?”

      “I’m going to do my best to find out.”

      Over the intercom, a voice announced the end of visiting hours.

      “I’ll talk to you again later,” Luke said to Melanie as he headed for the door. And then to Anna, he said, “Can I speak with you for a minute?”

      She followed him out into the hallway, calling back to Melanie that she wasn’t actually leaving for the night just yet.

      “Do you have any theories on who might have attacked her?” Luke asked. “Does she have an angry business partner? Maybe a boyfriend she broke up with?”

      “She has an ex-husband, Ben,” Anna said. “But he was the one who insisted on the divorce—told her he wanted to start a new life without her—so I wouldn’t suspect him. I really can’t think of anyone.”

      Luke glanced up and down the hallway, frustrated that he had no idea what the perpetrator looked like. “Do you know how long she’ll be in the hospital?”

      “There’s a good chance she’ll be able to leave tomorrow morning.”

      “Do the doctors have any idea how long it will take for her to regain her memory?”

      “They said it could happen as early as tomorrow morning. Or it could take a few weeks.” Anna’s eyes teared up. She looked away and blinked rapidly. “Or the memories of the past two weeks might be gone forever. So she’d never be able to remember who attacked her, and that criminal would get away with it.”

      Luke sighed. He could not let that happen.

      * * *

      “When you get home try to relax as much as you can,” the doctor said to Melanie as she tapped the information for Melanie’s prescription into an electronic tablet. “You need to heal from the emotional trauma, as well as the physical injury. So don’t try to force yourself to remember things. Otherwise you could end up right back here in the hospital again.” The doctor’s smile was kind, but she also managed to make it clear that she wasn’t kidding.

      Melanie remembered waking up in the woods last night. But prior to that, she still only remembered going to bed at the hotel in Wyoming. Not trying to remember what happened during those missing two weeks was difficult. Like trying not to scratch an itch.

      The doctor left and Melanie turned to Anna. “All right, cousin. Let’s roll.” Hospital protocol required Melanie to sit in a wheelchair and be pushed out to the parking lot, even though she felt like she could walk.

      “I need you to take me back to the fairgrounds, to get my truck and the trailer,” Melanie said as soon as they were in Anna’s sedan.

      Anna turned to her with a cheery smile. “No.” Despite the upbeat tone, Melanie could see the dark circles under her cousin’s eyes, and the paleness of her skin made the freckles scattered across her face stand out even more defiantly.

      Melanie wasn’t the only one suffering in the aftermath of this bizarre attack on her. Anna had already done so much for her. And she had a husband, Tyler, serving in the military, overseas. Anna had enough weight on her shoulders. She didn’t need anything added to that.

      “That deputy said your truck and trailer are securely stored at the fairgrounds,” Anna added as she turned the key and fired up the car’s engine. “The smart thing for you to do is to go back to the house and unwind. We’ll get your stuff later.”

      “Fine.” Actually, going back to Anna’s restored Victorian house, where Melanie rented a couple of rooms, one to use as a bedroom and the other for an office, sounded like a good idea. Closing the shades, lying in her bed and hiding from the world sounded like a great idea. Maybe she could numb her brain with mindless TV, as well. Because, although she was trying very hard to stay upbeat around Anna, her thoughts wanted to drift to some very dark places.

      Someone had tried to kill her. Apparently for money. She had come in contact with someone evil. How was it possible someone could be like that? And how safe was anyone, ever, when there were people like that in the world?

      Melanie began to tremble. A cold black wave of fear crashed over her, seemingly from out of nowhere. She couldn’t catch her breath, and she quickly rolled down her window for some fresh air.

      Anna glanced over at her. “You all right?”

      “Coffee,” Melanie said hoarsely. “Coffee would make me feel better.”

      “Sure.”

      Anna made the turn to take them to their favorite coffee shop. Melanie flipped down the sun visor and caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror. Pale. Bruised. Looking like someone who’d been attacked.

      The trembling got worse, and the midsize sedan suddenly seemed way too small. Melanie wanted to get out of the car. She wanted to jump up. She wanted to run. She needed to get away. It didn’t matter that she didn’t know why.

      The coffee shop didn’t have a drive-through. Anna pulled into a parking space behind it, near the back entrance, and Melanie threw open her door before the car was completely stopped.

      Anna gave her a questioning look.

      “I’ll take my usual,” Melanie said to her. She gestured toward the front of the store, where there was a strip of grass and a couple of picnic tables. “Let’s drink our coffee while we sit outside. In the sunshine. I’ll meet you over there.”

      Hiding in her bedroom seemed like a horrible idea now. She needed to be outside, where she could move. Where she could run. For a split second she had a flash of memory. Of being chased in the woods.

      The coffee shop was in an area with both businesses and residences. Moving down the alley, Melanie could see into people’s backyards. See the houses, where normal life was going on. Where people felt safe.

      Suddenly someone threw something over Melanie from behind her. A thick, heavy dark cloth that covered her head and shoulders and arms, down to her elbows. Before she could react, they wrenched it tight, pinning her arms to her sides, forcing the air out of her lungs. Then they started dragging her backward.

      She tried to scream, but the cloth was tight across her mouth and she couldn’t get enough air. Terror and panic set her heart racing. She fought again for a deep breath, but the cloth was pulled even tighter across her mouth.

      The world began to spin. The sounds around her were muffled, but she could hear a dog barking. She started to feel strangely detached from everything that was happening around her. After that, there was nothing.

       TWO

      “The guy who lives in the house next to the coffee shop, Jon Stoker, called the cops to report the attack on you,” Luke said to Melanie. “His dog wouldn’t stop barking. He came out to see what the problem was and saw someone with a blanket pulled over your head, dragging you across the parking lot.”

      Melanie touched her fingertips to her lower lip, grateful to be alive and appreciating more than ever the ability to take a deep breath.

      “When

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