Kill Me Again

“May I see the card you found on him?” Olivia asked.

Carrie pulled the business card from her breast pocket and handed it over. It was smudged with black.

“What’s all over it?” Olivia asked, wrinkling her nose.

“I had to dust it,” Bryan said. “No usable prints. It’s useless to us.”

Olivia flipped the smudged card over, saw her own handwriting on the back and nodded. “Well, this is the card I sent to Aaron Westhaven. I have no doubt about that.” She looked into the room again, and this time found the man staring back at her, his expression curious now that he’d noticed the three of them looking at him as if he were a specimen in a zoo.

“Maybe he knew this could happen,” Olivia said, very softly, almost speaking to herself. “Maybe that’s why he’s always been so private, because he knew someone might come after him if he were out in the open.”

Bryan met her eyes, and they shared a silent exchange. He knew that was how she felt. He knew there was someone who would probably kill her if he ever found out she was still alive. He knew she wasn’t even using her own name, and hadn’t been for the past sixteen years. And he probably thought she was projecting.

She shook her head. “So what do I do but convince him to come out into the open, and the minute he does, he gets shot. God, I feel terrible.”

“You didn’t convince him. You invited him. You didn’t even expect him to accept. And he was free to say no,” Bryan said.

Carrie nodded her agreement. “Will you talk to him, Olivia?” she asked. “He’s completely in the dark here, and none too friendly—though I don’t blame him, given his situation. Even if you’ve never met him, you know more about him than any of the rest of us do. It has to help a little.”

“Of course I’ll talk to him.” Olivia held the man’s steady gaze through the glass. “I’ve been waiting years for the chance to talk to him.” His eyes were fixed on hers, and they were intense. A little chill whispered up her spine. She should have known he would be beautiful. Anyone who could write the way he did had to be beautiful inside and out.

“All right, you go talk to him, then,” Bryan said. “Call me if anything comes up. Meanwhile, I’m going to get back to the station, make some calls, figure out who his publisher is, or his editor, or his whatever. There must be someone, somewhere, who knows this guy.”

“Wait.” Olivia turned to Bryan. “Am I right in assuming you didn’t catch the person who did this to him?”

Lowering his head, Bryan pushed a hand through his hair. “We don’t have a clue. Not even a bullet casing. The bastard took it with him.”

Olivia was worried by that. “Mr. Westhaven doesn’t want publicity about his visit here. And I can’t help but think it’s pretty obvious now that he has good reason for that. Can we keep this quiet, at least for now?”

Bryan nodded. “I think that’s probably best. I’ll talk to the chief, but I expect he’ll agree. Dr. Overton?”

“Confidentiality is what we do best around here, Officer Kendall. As far as I’m concerned, he’s still Patient John Doe.”

“Can I keep this?” Olivia asked, holding up the business card.

“Yeah. Go on in. I’ll call you later,” Bryan said.

“I’d like a word with you, Olivia, on your way out,” Carrie said.

Olivia nodded and turned to the patient-room door. Her heart was lodged in her throat—because how was she supposed to anticipate her first conversation with someone she’d admired so much for so long, especially under these conditions? She was nervous, not wanting to make things worse for him. But she supposed any information would be welcome, so she opened the door and walked into his room, then crossed to his bedside.

“Hi,” she said. “My name is Olivia. And I’m pretty sure yours is Aaron.”

2

Aaron.

He’d expected a rush of memory to flood into his brain once he knew his name. But it didn’t. There wasn’t even a mild sense of recognition. Not of the name she spoke. Not of the woman, either. And he didn’t see how any conscious, breathing male could forget a woman who looked like she did.

She was a classic beauty. Dark brown eyes and thick black lashes. Sun-kissed skin, sable hair, even if it was all bundled up. She had a slender body and luscious, full lips. And best of all, she didn’t even seem aware of her looks. She didn’t dress to show them off, that was for sure.

Beyond that, though, she was the first person who’d walked into this room that he felt glad to see. He was actually interested in talking to her. The others had been boring. Not one of them had any useful information to share, but they’d all been full of questions he couldn’t answer. Doctors, nurses, cops.

Damn, he hated cops.

He didn’t know how he knew that, or why he hated them, but he knew it was true. It had to be true, as uncomfortable as he’d been with the one who’d been in here grilling him.

Someone had shot him. Shot him. He closed his eyes and thought, yeah, that sort of thing would tend to make a lot of people ask a lot of questions. Personally, it made him feel sick.

And now there was this…Olivia. She wasn’t a medical professional—unless she was a shrink. And she wasn’t a cop. He knew that for sure, though again, how he knew was a mystery.

“Olivia,” he said, repeating her name and waiting to see how it felt on his tongue. Familiar? Sadly, no. “Are we…lovers?” he asked.

Her eyes widened, and the word no burst from her lips before she could give it any thought. A rush of heat suffused her cheeks, and she didn’t meet his eyes.

He lowered his head as if disappointed, and said, “So we’re just friends, then?”

She frowned at him, tipping her head to one side and searching his face as she finally caught on. “Are you teasing me? A man in your condition?”

“My condition isn’t all that bad. Doc Redhead out there tells me I’m fine. Aside from the fact that the only thing in my head right now is a massive ache, I actually feel pretty good for a guy who just took a bullet. And no, I wasn’t teasing. Not entirely. I was hoping to God they finally found someone who knows me. Intimately.” He sighed heavily, told himself to quit with the self-pity and get on with this. “So how do you know me, Olivia?”

“I don’t,” she said. “I’m sorry, but we’ve never actually met.”

Nodding, and trying not to literally deflate in disappointment, he said, “Figures. It’s just about in keeping with the way my day’s been going, I guess.”

He pursed his lips and reminded himself that this poor woman wasn’t the one who’d shot him. Then again, how could he even be sure of that much?

He looked at her again, and thought, no, she wasn’t the kind to put a bullet in a man. Not like that—not in the back of his head. She was stiff, kind of wary, maybe a little repressed, but not mean. Not a killer.

“Why don’t you sit down, Olivia, and tell me about myself?”

“I’ll try.” She moved to the chair beside the bed and adjusted it to a position she liked, a little closer, angled toward him so she could see his face. Then she sat down, her lithe frame folding itself into the chair in a smooth, easy motion. She crossed her legs at the ankles, leaned her knees to one side. “I didn’t expect you to be so…”

“What? Grouchy? Sarcastic? Getting shot in the head will do that to a guy. Sorry I’m not pouring on the charm.”

“I understand that,” she said. “It’s just that your books are so—”

“My books?”

She bit her lip, then nodded and shifted in the chair. “Maybe I’d better start at the beginning.”

“Maybe you’d better.” He sat up in the bed, though he’d been told not to.

“Okay.” Smoothing her skirt over her nicely shaped thighs, she seemed to organize her thoughts. “Okay,” she said again. “I’m Professor Olivia Dupree. I teach English over at the State University of Vermont’s Shadow Falls campus. Shadow Falls—that’s where you are now. I’ve been here for sixteen years, and I’ve been helping to plan this year’s summer fundraiser series for—”

“Excuse me.” He held up a hand, and she stopped speaking. “I really do want to know all about you at some point, Olivia, but right now, could you get to me?”

She held his gaze, and hers went stony. “Not if you keep interrupting.”

So, she had a bit of a temper. Good. He liked that. She wasn’t as tame as she appeared. Sighing, he felt around in the covers for the remote, then pressed a button to raise the bed so he could lean back without being entirely prone. His head felt loads better than when he’d been sitting upright, and he made a mental note that the redheaded doc had been right about that.

“Where was I?”

“Summer fundraiser for something or other,” he said.

“Short-term memory is all right, then?”

He met her eyes, saw the sarcasm, figured he had it coming. “I’ll try not to interrupt again.”

She nodded. “It’s all relevant, I promise.”

He nodded at her to continue.

“I’ve been reading Aaron Westhaven for years. He’s known to be very reclusive, very private. Still, I used to write to him once a year or so at a P.O. box that was listed in his first novel.”

“And you think I’m him?” he asked.

She lowered her head and lifted her brows at the same time, sending him a look that told him he’d interrupted her again.

“Sorry,” he said. “Continue.”

“I never heard back, and the address was missing from all the future books. But I kept writing. Every time a new book came out, I would read it and send a letter. I liked to think of him—you—getting my letters personally, not along with the piles through the publisher. I liked to think of…you reading them with the same eagerness I felt whenever I got the newest novel.”

He was frowning as he watched her go on. Her eyes actually lit up as she talked about a man she’d never even met. Until now. Maybe.

“I guess I should say thank you,” he said. “And, uh, maybe apologize for never writing back.”

She shrugged. “Don’t be silly. What celebrity answers his own fan mail?”

He shrugged. “A recluse can’t, by definition, be a celebrity, can he?”

“Of course he can.”

“Well, celebrity or not, it seems rude as hell to me.”

She smiled a little. “If you are him, you can apologize to me later.”

He was beginning to hope he was, so her doubt jabbed at him a little. “You’re not sure I’m him, then?”

“I’m fairly certain,” she said. “It’s just that Westhaven is so reclusive. No public appearances, no known photographs, even—”

“Damn,” he muttered, shaking his head.

“What?”

“Aaron Westhaven is an asshole, that’s what.”

Her eyes widened, and she’d risen from her chair before he’d stopped speaking. “He is—you are not!”

“If I’m him, I am. I mean, who do I think I am? Shakespeare? Where do I get off, anyway?”

“You are not an…an asshole,” she said, stumbling a bit over a word he was certain she’d never uttered in her life. “If you’ll let me finish my story, you’ll begin to see that.”

“Fine. Finish the story.”

She smoothed her hands over the seat of her skirt, forcing his eyes to follow, and sat down the way he imagined royalty would.

“All right. So, despite…your…understandable reluctance to answer what must have seemed like fan mail, I decided to write again, asking you to come and speak at the annual summer fundraiser lecture series for the English department. To my surprise, I received a response this time. An acceptance.”

“I said yes?” Then he rolled his eyes at his own question. “I guess I must have. I’m here.” Then he thought about it a bit further, because her explanation didn’t make a lot of sense. He wondered what reason she might have to lie to him, then wondered what reason anyone would have to execute him. And then he wondered if the two things were related.

He looked her up and down slowly. No. She really wasn’t the type.

“So if I’m famous and I agreed to come to town to speak, why didn’t anyone know who I was?”

“Your terms were explicit and a little extreme,” she said, averting her eyes. “We were only allowed to advertise a secret special guest speaker and had to promise not to tell anyone it was you. We had to make the event by invitation only, and we were told to invite only the top one hundred most generous contributors among our alumni. No more. So there’s been no press announcement or publicity around this at all. With it being limited to invited guests only, advertising wasn’t necessary.”

He was watching her, and it occurred to him that he was looking for signs she was lying and not finding any. And that was an odd thing to catch himself doing, wasn’t it? As if he was accustomed to being lied to, as if he knew what it looked like. “So I’m famous enough to get away with those kinds of bullshit demands?”

She shrugged. “The university agreed to all of it.”

“So that’s a yes, then.”

“I sent you my business card, with my unlisted number and home address handwritten on the back,” she said, pulling the card from her pocket and handing it to him.

“So you have my home address?” he asked quickly, a gusher of hope rising in his chest.

“No, I sent it to the P.O. box. That was the only return address on your reply to me. Sorry.”

He felt the disappointment but tried not to let it show by focusing on the card she’d handed him, turning it over as he checked it out. “Did they find any prints on it?”

“How did you know that was fingerprint dust?”

He shrugged, handing the card back to her. “Isn’t it?”

“Well, yes, but I didn’t know that. Neither did Dr. Overton.”

“The redhead?”

“Yes, the redhead,” she said.

She sounded a little exasperated with him, and he found that mildly amusing. She was so staid and tucked in, he found he enjoyed ruffling her a little bit.

But she was staring at him, awaiting an answer. He sighed. “I don’t know how I knew. I don’t know anything. Remember?”

She nodded, taking the card from him and setting it on the table beside his bed. Then she snatched a few tissues from the box there and used them to wipe the black smudges from her fingertips.

“So you’re sure that’s the card you sent me.”

“I certainly haven’t sent anyone else that information,” she replied.

That caught his attention, because it was such an adamant reply. As if it were ludicrous to think she might have given her personal info to anyone else.

Maybe it was. There was more to this woman than had been apparent at first, he thought.

She seemed to try to pull her focus back to the matter at hand. “To get back to the subject, Mr. Westhaven was due to arrive today.”

“Arrive where?” he asked.

“My house. He—you—were going to use my guest room. But he never arrived. And my card, the one I sent to him, was on you when the boys found you.”

“Along with the pocket watch and key ring they found on me, it’s the sum total of my worldly possessions at the moment.”

“Still, that’s why it’s fairly obvious that you’re him.”

He nodded. “If I am him, I still say I sound like a pompous prima donna. Making you people jump through all those hoops just to get me to visit for an afternoon.”

She shrugged, but her puzzled frown was genuine, he thought. “It seems clear that you have reasons to guard your privacy. Big reasons. Reasons that go way beyond just being a prima donna, Aaron.”

It was odd, being called by a name that didn’t feel like his own. It felt odder still, that her point sounded right on target.

“Most people who’ve heard of it probably think your reclusiveness is about privacy or shyness, or that it’s just a publicity stunt, a big-time author being eccentric and arrogant and getting away with it.”

She’d given this a lot of thought, he mused. She’d probably been justifying this ink-Nazi’s egomania ever since she’d decided to worship him from afar. “Uh-huh. And what do you think?”

She shrugged. “The first time you stuck your head out in the open, someone tried to blow it off. I’d say you knew that could happen, and that’s why you play the recluse. To keep yourself alive.”

He nodded slowly. “You know, I think you just might have a point there. Now, would you do me a favor and grab my clothes from the closet?” As he spoke, he shoved his covers back.

She frowned at him. “Why? What are you going to do?”

“Leave.”

She got up again. “You can’t just leave,” she said.

“No, what I can’t do is just stay here. Hand me my stuff, will you?”

She nodded, the motion jerky, and turned to open the closet. She pulled out a suit and held it out, looking it over. “Too bad,” she said.

“What?” He was reaching for the hanger, but she shook her head and put it back in the closet. “It’s an Armani, but it’s completely ruined. Blood, dirt. There’s no saving it.” Then she bent down. “Shoes look all right, though.”

He let his head hit the pillow and sighed. “I can’t stay here. It’s not defensible.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, someone just tried to take me out. I was shot in the back of the head, all my ID was taken and my body was dumped in the middle of nowhere. That was a hit. A professional hit.”

She stood very still for a long moment, and he watched her absorb that piece of information. Her only reaction was to close her eyes slowly, leave them that way for a few ticks and then open them just as slowly. “Some professional,” she said, moving again to close the closet door. “Seeing as you’re still alive.”

“Yeah, clearly he wasn’t Einstein, but a steel plate in the skull isn’t something most people would even think of. Still, even an amateur would know enough to verify the kill.” He smiled grimly.

“That was a mistake, but he won’t make another.” He looked at her, saw her looking at him as if for the first time. “What?” he asked. “Are you not getting it? The minute this guy figures out I’m in the hospital, he’ll be coming by to finish the job.”

“I thought of that already.”

She had? He went stone silent.

“I asked Bryan—Officer Kendall—to try to keep this out of the press for now, and he agreed it was for the best. No word of a gunshot victim being found and taken to the hospital will appear in the local newspapers. I guarantee it. The hospital staff are cooperating, too.”

He blinked at her, surprised she would have come up with that strategy on her own. “Thank you for that,” he said.

She nodded. “You’re welcome.”

“Even so,” he continued, “it won’t stay a secret for long. People talk. The boys will say something. Wives will tell their husbands. Husbands will tell their best pals. Those best pals will tell their wives, and so on.”

“It’ll only have to hold for a day or two,” she said. The odd way she’d been looking at him before—like a wary doe eyeing an armed hunter—had faded. “Bryan’s going to contact your publisher to see if someone there can identify you, or if they know of someone who can. From there, we should be able to find out where you live, who your relatives are, all the things you must be so eager to learn. As frustrating as I know this must be, it won’t take long to fill in the gaps. In the meantime, there’s no reason to let the killer know he didn’t succeed.”

Did she know how much better she was making him feel? he wondered. To think he would have all the answers in a day or two…

“But…the shooter probably expects to see something in the papers about a body being found. That would be big news in a town this size, wouldn’t it?”

She frowned at him. “How did you know Shadow Falls was a small town, not a city?”

He stopped short and wondered about that. “I don’t know. Bits of conversations pinned together, combined with the view outside my window, I guess.”

“Or because it’s something you knew before, and the knowledge is still there, in your memory, right where you left it. I think it’s a good sign, Aaron.”

He felt his worry lighten just a little. “I hope you’re right.”

She nodded. “I’m sure I am. But to answer your question, you were found along a back road that leads through a state forest. It’s dirt, not pavement, not even gravel. Just dirt, and hardly ever traveled. It’s near one of the spots where the high school kids go to party and underage couples go to have sex, when they aren’t out at the old abandoned Campbell farm or the vacant cheese factory. It’s perfectly believable that a body dumped out there might not be found for a few days.”

He frowned and looked her up and down yet again, taking in her pencil skirt, silky blouse and tightly wound hair. “You say you’re an English teacher?”

“Why do you ask it like that?”

“Because you think like a cop. Or a criminal.”

She looked away so quickly that he knew she had something to hide. Some deep, dark secrets of her own. And all of a sudden he was almost as curious about her past as he was about his own hidden history.

There was something fascinating about Professor Olivia Dupree, but the shadows in her eyes told him it wouldn’t be easy finding out what it was. He didn’t really believe she was a criminal, much less in league with a hit man. But there was definitely something hiding behind those intelligent brown eyes.

She met his curious gaze and stared right back. The tension, the attraction—oh, yeah, the feelings were there, and they were real—built. Finally, she looked away. “There’s a policeman guarding your room,” she told him. “That should reassure you.”

“Yeah, I just love cops,” he said, and he made his words as sarcastic as possible. “But having one outside the door is only going to make the gossip mill grind a little faster, isn’t it?”

She nodded and licked her lips, the motion of her tongue, quick and slight though it was, grabbing him by the testosterone and not letting go.

“I’ll phone Bryan,” she said. “I can ask him to send a plainclothes officer instead. You’re right, the uniform raises too many questions.”

“A plainclothes cop will be just as obvious.”

“To you and me, maybe. But not to anyone else.” She moved closer to the bed, leaned over him just a little, and her face softened. “You really do need to spend the night, Aaron. Dr. Overton wants to be sure she hasn’t missed anything, and you know how tricky head injuries can be. Your brain could swell later on and you could be dead—” she snapped her fingers “—just like that.”

“Did you just come in, or did you somehow miss that I already could have been dead—” he snapped his fingers “—just like that? I don’t like being in this hospital. I’m a sitting duck here.”

“I don’t think you have a choice.”

“You don’t know me very well, then.”

She thinned her lips, looked at him steadily. “I think it would be a bad idea for you to leave, but you’re an adult. You do what you want. I’m going to leave that card here.” She bent over it, picked up the nearby pen and scribbled something. “I put Bryan’s numbers on it, too. But I’m closer—only fifteen minutes away. If you need anything, feel free to call me, okay?”

“You’re going, then?” He almost tried to snatch the words back and wondered if he could have managed to sound any more like a disappointed four-year-old.

Her chocolate eyes melted. “I’m going out to talk to Dr. Overton. But I’ll come in and say goodbye before I leave.”

“No need. You’ve told me all you know.”

She moved close to the bed again, and for a second he thought she was going to touch him, put a hand on his shoulder or brow or some sappy thing like that. And while he didn’t think he would mind her putting her hands on him in the right circumstances, he definitely didn’t want it like that.

She didn’t, though. She said, “Aaron, your work has seen me through some…difficult times. It’s probably been more important to me than you can imagine. And if I can return the favor by helping you now, then that’s what I want to do. So if you need anything, call me. Okay?”

He frowned at her, finding this whole thing very strange. She was a fan. He had a fan. Images from the film of Stephen King’s Misery ran through his mind, along with a surge of frustration that he could recall old movies but not a damn thing about his old life.