Fade To Black

Jessica’s own gaze was locked on Pierce’s white face. She could see a muscle throb in his cheek, saw emotion after emotion sweep across his features. There was no mistaking Max’s identity. He looked exactly like his father. Pierce took a tentative step toward him.

The slight movement roused Jessica. She made an involuntary sound of protest which drew both pairs of male eyes. She knelt and opened her arms, and Max flew across the room to her. She hugged him tightly against her as both of them stared up at Pierce.

“My God,” he said woodenly as he gazed at mother and son across the room, “I don’t even know if I’m dead or alive.”

He didn’t wait for a response but turned and walked through the swinging door of the kitchen. Jessica wanted to go after him but found that her heart was suddenly pulling her in two different directions as Max’s little arms caught around her neck and held on for dear life.

“That man’s scary, Mom,” he whispered, clinging to her. “Is he going to hurt us?”

“No, darling, he won’t hurt us,” Jessica soothed, hugging him. But even as she gave voice to her denial, she could feel the tender flesh of her neck where Pierce’s hand—a real, flesh-and-blood hand—had pressed.

A warning pounded in her brain. He’s a stranger, she thought. The man somewhere in her house was not the Pierce she had known and loved. Wherever he had been, whatever he’d gone through in the past five years had changed him. She only had to look into those haunted eyes to know that.

Maybe she’d never known him, she thought with a jolt. She’d shared her life with him, shared his bed, but had she ever really known him?

She thought now, as she’d done for those five years, of all the times he’d been away during their marriage. So many of the trips had been unexpected it seemed now in retrospect. Sometimes when he’d been gone, she hadn’t heard from him for days at a time, but the answer to that had seemed very plausible. Many of the remote areas he traveled to in Europe and Asia, looking for treasures for The Lost Attic, his antique shop, didn’t have easily accessible telephones. In fact, Jessica had been to some of those off-the-beaten-track places with him.

Back then, it had never occurred to her to question Pierce’s absences, the lack of phone calls. She’d simply accepted it. But maybe she should have questioned Pierce. Maybe she wouldn’t have gone through the hell she’d gone through the past five years if she’d taken the time to know Pierce Kincaid a little better.

She’d believed what she’d wanted to believe, she realized now, because she’d wanted a home and family so badly. Someone to love her.

Jessica untangled Max’s arms from her neck and stood. “Come on, honey. Let’s go back over to Sharon’s house. You’d like to play with Allie and Snowflake for a little while longer, wouldn’t you?”

Max stared up at her with rounded brown eyes. “Are you coming back here?”

“Yes.”

“To talk to him?”

“Yes.”

Max clung to her hand. “I want to stay with you, Mom. I don’t think I like him. I don’t want him to hurt you.”

She bent and smoothed the dark hair from his forehead. “You don’t have to worry about me, Max. I’ll be fine. Now, come on. I’ll walk you over.”

As she and Max stepped outside, Jessica thought how normal everything looked, how perfectly ordinary a spring morning it was. The blue morning glory blossoms that climbed the trellis walls of the summerhouse were opened wide to the early sun. A mild breeze rippled through the trees, stirring the scent of roses and mimosa, and somewhere down the street a lawn mower droned.

Everything was the same, and yet nothing was. Five years ago, when Pierce disappeared, Jessica had thought her life was over. For the first few months, all she’d hoped and prayed for was that he would one day come back to her. As long as no trace of him was found, she couldn’t let go of the hope that he was still alive.

But the first time she’d held her tiny son in her arms, the realization had finally hit her. Pierce wasn’t coming back. She’d counted on him for everything, depended on him to take care of her, but he was gone. Suddenly she had no one to rely on but herself.

Max had given her life new purpose. Not only had she been both mother and father to her son, but she’d taken over Pierce’s antique business, learned everything about it there was to learn, and it had continued to grow into a thriving concern.

She’d accomplished a lot in the past five years, but those accomplishments had demanded restitution. She’d changed, so much so that sometimes when she stared at her reflection in the mirror, she hardly recognized herself. There wasn’t a trace of the old, dependent Jesse. She didn’t need anyone anymore. Certainly not a man who had walked out on her five years ago. For whatever reason.

Her hand tightened on Max’s. She felt his fingers squeeze hers back in response, and Jessica’s heart melted with love. She would do anything, anything to protect her little boy.

Together they slipped through the opening in the thick hedge that divided the two properties. Sharon sat on the back porch steps, watching Allie and Snowflake romp in the shady grass beneath an elm tree.

“I knew you couldn’t keep Max away,” Sharon called gaily. “Might as well come have a cup of coffee while the two of them torment poor Snowflake up a tree.”

“Max, come watch!” Allie squealed as she enticed the kitten with a ball of twine. Her squeaky laughter peeled across the yard, an irresistible invitation, but still Max hung back, hugging his mother’s leg.

“Go play, Max,” Jessica urged.

He looked up at her. “I want to stay with you,” he insisted.

Sharon reached over and ruffled his hair. “What’s the matter, Superman? How come so shy all of a sudden?”

“There’s a strange man at our house,” Max announced solemnly, as if that explained everything.

Sharon’s cornflower eyes widened as she lifted her gaze to Jessica’s. One brow lifted. “How interesting.”

Jessica could see the curiosity in her friend’s eyes, but didn’t bother to explain. How could she, when she didn’t understand it herself? “Can Max stay over here for a little while, Sharon? It’s really important.”

“Well, of course. You know he’s always welcome.” She turned to Max and grinned. “Allie’s been trying to teach Snowflake a new trick. I think she could use a few pointers from Superman.”

That did it. Sharon knew exactly how to appeal to Max’s male pride. He took off toward Allie and the kitten, his red cape billowing in the wind.

Sharon returned her curious gaze to Jessica. “You want to tell me what’s going on?”

Jessica sighed. “I’m not even sure I know. I just need some time to deal with…a problem.”

Sharon shrugged. “You know where to find me if you need me,” she said, and Jessica knew her friend wouldn’t pry any further. Sharon had learned a long time ago that Jessica wouldn’t talk about anything until she was ready.

Jessica turned back toward her house, stopping for a moment to take one last look at her son. Sharon had joined the kids, and all three of them were shrieking with laughter as the kitten rolled and tumbled and became hopelessly entangled with string.

As Jessica stood watching them, she had to fight the overwhelming urge to join them, to try to return her world to the nice, sane place it had been that morning when she’d gotten out of bed. But there in her friend’s backyard, with the sound of children’s laughter filling the air and the scent of spring flowers drifting on the breeze, the realization hit her full force.

Her world would never be the same again.

* * *

“Pierce?” Jessica called tentatively, feeling the strangeness of the name on her tongue. She felt a ripple of anxiety in the pit of her stomach, as if saying his name provided irrefutable proof that the stranger in her house was indeed her dead husband.

Jessica shoved open the swinging door to the dining room and stepped through, then went on into the living room. The room had been completely renovated nearly three years ago. The dark paneling Jessica had always hated had been replaced by Sheetrock painted a cool robin’s-egg blue and decorated with Allenburg watercolors she’d acquired through the shop.

Light from the French doors gleamed on the hardwood floors and highlighted the thick Aubusson rug she’d splurged on just last month. A grouping of chintz-covered sofas and oversize chairs flanked the brick fireplace, and the carved oak mantel held dozens of photos of Max, all lovingly displayed in antique pewter frames.

The pictures looked rearranged, Jessica thought, as if someone had picked them up one by one and hadn’t bothered returning them to their original positions. Her eyes moved to the curved staircase, upward to the sunny landing and beyond. Her bedroom was at the top of the stairs, a huge suite which took up most of the second floor except for Max’s bedroom. The third floor contained only a converted attic, which Jessica was in the process of turning into a game room.

The hair at the back of her neck prickled with unease. Somewhere in this house a stranger roamed, looking at her things, touching them, laying claim to them.

When Pierce had left, the only room that had been remodeled in the fifty-plus-year-old Georgian-style house had been the nursery. That same room had long since been transformed to accommodate a growing boy’s tastes and interests. Was Pierce in there now?

The thought unsettled Jessica more than she cared to admit. Her eyes lit on the phone, and suddenly she wondered if she should call the police, her brother, someone to help her deal with this situation.

She closed her eyes and rested her head against the wall. No one could help her. No one could even comprehend what she was feeling at this moment. Even she didn’t understand. Because in spite of her fear, in spite of her questions and her doubts, one small part of her heart still rejoiced.

Pierce was alive!

The miracle she’d prayed for for so long had finally happened. She should be down on her knees giving thanks, except for one small detail. Jessica had given up believing in miracles a long time ago. Resolutely she opened her eyes and started toward the stairs, halting when she noticed the powder-room door off the foyer stood open.

“Pierce?” There was no answer, but still she crossed the hardwood floor and entered the small washroom, assuring herself that everything was intact. And then her eyes fastened on the mirror, saw her reflection, and she knew. Pierce wasn’t in there, but he had been. He’d gazed into that same mirror, saw his reflection, and he’d learned the awful truth about himself.

Jessica backed out of the bathroom, frantic now to find him.

“Pierce!” She called his name as she stood in the hallway. Colored light filtered through the leaded diamond panes in the front door and spilled onto the polished planks of the floor. The wavering, jewellike shadows drew Jessica’s gaze downward, then toward the source. The front door was closed, but the dead bolt had been drawn back, and now it was Jessica who had to face the truth.

Pierce Kincaid had walked out on her one more time.

Chapter Two

A little while later, Jessica sat on the window seat in the dining room and watched the street for her brother’s car. How long had it been since she’d cried? she wondered. Not since Max had been born. Not since she’d decided that never again would she depend on anyone but herself. Not since she’d vowed that she would never love again because everyone she’d ever loved had left her.

Except Max.

She drew up her knees and wrapped her arms around them, hugging them close. It was an instinctive response to her pain and confusion. For the first few days in every foster home she’d ever been assigned to, Jessica had similarly retreated into herself, had hugged herself tightly as though recalling the feel of her mother’s arms around her. Finally, though, after so many homes she’d lost count, she could no longer remember her mother’s face, much less the warmth of her arms.

The orphanage had been better because at least there she’d had Jay. The two of them had clung to each other those first few months after their older sister, Janet, had left them there. Their mother had died, their father had disappeared, and eighteen-year-old Janet hadn’t wanted to be saddled with two kids, so one cold December morning, she’d dropped Jessica and Jay at the state-run orphanage in Richmond.

After a year, twelve-year-old Jay had gotten lucky. He’d been adopted by an aging couple in Washington, D.C., who had always wanted a son and realized they were too old to begin raising an infant.

Jessica hadn’t been so fortunate. She’d been plain and skinny with unruly hair and eyes far too big and too sad for her ten-year-old face. She’d been shy and sickly and had never developed much of a personality. No one had wanted such an unattractive child.

After Jay left, Jessica had been sent to one foster home after another. She’d bonded fairly well with the first couple, but when the man’s job had forced them to move out of state, Jessica had been emotionally ripped apart again. After that, she kept herself aloof, sustaining herself on sparse letters from her brother and on the even sparser memories of her mother.

And then, years later, she’d met Pierce. It was the summer she’d graduated business school and moved to Edgewood, a suburb of D.C., to be close to Jay. Jessica had always sworn it was fate that caused her to answer the ad Jay showed her in a neighborhood newspaper about a bookkeeping position at an antique store not far from her new address. Fate, and perhaps a touch of desperation. She didn’t expect the job to pay much, but she’d been making the rounds at employment agencies for weeks with no luck.

Pierce Kincaid, the proprietor of The Lost Attic, had taken one look at her frail body, her faded blue dress, her scuffed shoes, and hired her on the spot.

Pity, she’d accused him later.

Love at first sight, he’d countered.

Jessica still remembered the exact moment when she first laid eyes on him. His assistant was about to turn her away when Pierce walked out of his office and changed her life with one heart-stealing smile.

“I’m Pierce Kincaid,” he said, dismissing the assistant with a curt nod of his head. “Welcome to The Lost Attic. What can I do for you?”

Jessica’s first thought was that he was the most handsome man she’d ever seen. He had longish dark hair that curled at the nape, and dark, penetrating eyes fringed with thick lashes. He was casually dressed in jeans, a white T-shirt and a gray sport coat, and as he leaned against the counter, he gave her another smile, one that managed to look both mysterious and openly inviting.

“I—I’ve come about the job,” Jessica stammered, her poise completely shattered by his attention.

“Wonderful. How soon would you be able to start?”

His enthusiasm caught her off guard. “Now. Immediately.”

“As in today?”

“Today? But I—”

“You said immediately,” he reminded her, a subtle gleam in his eyes. “I’m rarely here, you see, and I need someone I can depend on to handle things while I’m away. My previous bookkeeper up and quit without notice. Financial statements are due, tax payments are late, the bank is screaming about overdrafts, and I’m due in Copenhagen tomorrow morning. Frankly, I’m desperate. So can you start today, Ms….?”

“Greene. Jessica Greene. And yes I can,” she added quickly, before he could change his mind.

He grinned. “Great. Let me show you your office then.”

“But don’t you even want to see my résumé?” She’d worked so hard on it, had even splurged on a rental typewriter.

He shook his head. “I know a good thing when I see it.”

Nonplussed, Jessica gazed around the shop, admiring the treasures. “You have a wonderful store,” she murmured.

“Do you know anything about antiques?”

“No. But I know a lot about bookkeeping.”

He smiled, and Jessica felt a tingle all the way to her toes. “That’s fine. I tell you what, Jessica. You teach me enough bookkeeping so that I know my way around a ledger, and I’ll teach you everything I know about antiques. And then some. How does that sound?”

It sounded wonderful. Too good to be true, in fact. Within days, Jessica had settled into the routine of her new job. When she’d been working for Pierce for three months, true to his word, he began teaching her about antiques.

“This is a Lowell,” he’d say as he showed her an exquisite glass sculpture. “See the marking on the bottom? Lowells aren’t as famous as Steubens, of course, but the designs are original and highly detailed. Andrew Lowell died so young, there aren’t many of his pieces around and most of the ones that are documented are in private collections. But I found this in a little shop on the outskirts of Paris. The owner didn’t realize what he had.”

Jessica was like a sponge. She drank in every word Pierce uttered, exclaimed over the beauty of each and every piece he brought back from his treasure hunts. She loved being surrounded by beautiful things with fascinating histories, possibly because her own past was so dismal. She adored having Pierce spend hours talking to her, devoting his time solely to her. She’d never had so much attention before.

When she’d been working for him for six months, he gave her a raise and added responsibilities. He began leaving her in charge when he went on his regular jaunts overseas. When he returned, he’d tell her intriguing stories about the places he’d been to and the people he’d met as they pored over his findings.

“Pop quiz today, Jessica. Tell me how we can be certain this is an authentic Allenburg watercolor?” he would ask, a teasing glint in his dark eyes as he and Jessica unwrapped the paintings.

With a magnifying glass, Jessica would locate the tiny hidden water lily which identified the artist’s work, and Pierce would smile his approval. “Excellent. Perhaps you deserve a reward,” he would say, with that mysterious, sexy smile that always sent her heart racing. And then he’d take her out to lunch at some little out-of-the-way place, which would have both excellent service and scrumptious food. And for the rest of the day, Jessica would feel special and pampered.

When she’d been with Pierce a year, he began taking her on buying trips with him occasionally. Slowly but surely, under Pierce’s expert tutelage, Jessica began to blossom, to come out of her self-imposed exile. And slowly but surely she was falling madly, passionately, desperately in love with her boss.

When she’d been with Pierce fifteen months, he asked her to marry him. They were in Paris, and at first Jessica convinced herself that the romantic ambiance of the city of light, the effusive flow of champagne at the Cochon d’or had made Pierce impulsive.

“If I were impulsive,” he explained, staring at her over the flickering candle on their discreetly located table, “I would have proposed to you the first time I laid eyes on you. Because I knew even then that you and I were meant to be, Jesse. You knew it, too, didn’t you?”

“Yes,” she whispered. “I knew it.”

“Then say you’ll marry me,” he demanded, his eyes glowing with triumph.

“I’ll marry you,” she said, and then he lifted her hand and slipped a beautiful antique diamond and garnet ring onto her finger.

“You won’t regret it. I’ll make you so happy you’ll forget all about the past.”

“I already have,” she vowed.

Weeks later, they were married and settled into their home in a lovely neighborhood only a few miles from the shop. Edgewood, located a few miles from Langley, Virginia, and across the river from Washington, D.C., was home to a lot of government and military employees. Though not as pricey as Georgetown or Alexandria, it still boasted many of the same attractions: tree-shaded sidewalks, cobblestone streets, elegant old Federal and Georgian homes, as well as a close proximity to the nation’s capital.

Jessica loved her job at the shop, but she gladly gave it up to concentrate on remodeling and redecorating their home. She had no higher aspiration than to be the perfect wife and mother. She loved Pierce dearly, needed him desperately.

How could she have known back then that the one person she held most dear, loved more than life itself, would eventually leave her just like all the others had?

Jessica rested her forehead against her knees as she closed her eyes, trying to push away the memories. Why? she asked herself over and over.

Why had Pierce left her?

And why had he come back?

How could he not remember five years of his life? And yet that was exactly what he’d told her. What had been five years of grief and loneliness, struggle and frustration for Jessica had only been a mere thirty minutes in time to him. What could have happened to him?

He’d been hurt. She could tell that by the scars on his face and arm. It made her shudder to think what he might have gone through. There was only a shadow remaining of the man she’d known, loved, adored. But was that shadow merely a mirage? Was there anything left of the man from her past?

At that moment, Jessica wasn’t sure she could handle the truth—whatever it turned out to be.

* * *

Pierce walked the streets. By force of sheer will, his tired legs carried him farther and farther away from that house. From his home. From his wife. From his son.

The image of those huge dark eyes in that solemn little face brought stinging tears to his own eyes. He rubbed the back of his hand across them, trying to erase the vision as he wiped away the moisture. He had a son. Dear god, a five-year-old boy he didn’t even know.

And Jesse. Sweet, lovely, fragile Jesse. She seemed so cold, so hard, so suspicious. But five years had elapsed, she’d said. Five years! How could that be? How the hell could that be? Pierce asked himself desperately.

Just a moment in time for him had been five years of limbo for her. One glance in the mirror had told him she wasn’t lying—not that Jesse ever would. Not his Jesse, he thought as his fingers moved to touch the scar on his face.

But the woman back there, the cold-eyed, beautiful stranger was not his wife. He felt something of the loss and betrayal now that she must have felt so long ago when he hadn’t come back, and he despaired for them both.

A car horn blasted in his ear, and Pierce jumped back from the curb, startled to alertness. The driver shook his fist at him as the car zoomed through the intersection.

Pierce paid him scant attention. Automatically he waited for the traffic light to change, then walked aimlessly across the street. A bright red Coca-Cola sign flashed in the morning sun over a corner café, reminding him rather urgently that he was hungry. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d eaten. He couldn’t remember anything, in fact, beyond two hours ago.

That wasn’t exactly true, he realized. Ever since he’d seen Jesse’s shocked face, he’d been experiencing certain…impressions. Impressions of darkness and pain, of wandering around hopelessly lost but knowing all the while there was some place he should be, had to be. That certainty had driven him relentlessly through the mists until, almost as if he’d awakened from a long, deep sleep, he’d found himself at the grocery store and everything had clicked back into place.

For Pierce, the world had stopped for five years, then started back up again in exactly the same place. But why? And how?

He gazed at the scar on his left arm. What the hell had happened to him?

Checking his pockets, he pulled out the bills and change he’d gotten back from the twenty he’d used at the grocery store earlier. He had no idea where the money had come from. Someone must have given it to him….

Suddenly the street noises faded. His surroundings disappeared. For just a flash of time, Pierce was back on an island, standing on the beach, staring at the sky. A bird soared high overhead, silhouetted in the brilliant sunlight. It was an image that instantly brought back feelings of anger and betrayal. A nagging premonition of danger. And then a man’s voice at his shoulder. “You’ll need money. Here’s all I can spare. Go home now. Find your family and protect them.”