A Husband's Revenge

“I am your husband, you know. ” About the Author Dedication Title Page CHAPTER ONE CHAPTER TWO CHAPTER THREE CHAPTER FOUR CHAPTER FIVE CHAPTER SIX CHAPTER SEVEN CHAPTER EIGHT CHAPTER NINE CHAPTER TEN Copyright

“I am your husband, you know. ”

But that was just it, she thought, she didn’t know. As far as she was concerned he was a stranger. “I just get the feeling you don’t like me very much,” she said, before she could stop herself.

“Liking is such a bloodless, insipid emotion. It has nothing to do with what I feel for you.”

LEE WILKINSON lives with her husband in England, in a three-hundred-year-old stone cottage in a Derbyshire village, which most winters gets cut off by snow. They both enjoy travel, and recently, joining forces with their daughter and son-in-law, spent a year going around the world “on a shoestring” while their son looked after Kelly, their much-loved German shepherd dog. Lee’s hobbies are reading and gardening and holding impromptu barbecues for her long-suffering family and friends.

Lee Wilkinson writes romances with strong heroes

and a gripping emotional suspense that will keep you

hooked to the very last page!

A Husband’s Revenge

Lee Wilkinson

www.millsandboon.co.uk

CHAPTER ONE

SHE opened her eyes to a strange, underwater world of light and shade. After a moment her blurred vision cleared and she found herself looking at a bare, impersonal room, little more than a cubicle.

The walls and ceiling were painted sickly green; the floor covering was grey rubberised tiles. A metal locker and a wheeled trolley stood next to a white porcelain sink, where a tap dripped with monotonous regularity.

There were no curtains at the window, and bright sunshine slanted in. It was the only cheerful thing in the room. A panacea. Something to be filtered in between the fear and the smell of disinfectant.

She was wearing a much washed blue cotton gown that fastened down the back with tapes and lying on a hard, narrow bed. A hospital bed. It made no sense. Too tired to try and think, she closed her eyes once more.

The next time she awoke the sunshine had gone and dusk had taken its place. Shadows gathered in the room like a menacing crowd. Her throat was dry, her mouth parched. The tap was still dripping, and there was a red plastic beaker on the sink.

Pushing herself up on one elbow, she swung her bare feet to the floor. But when she straightened and attempted to take a step her head swam, and she was forced to hang onto the metal bar at the top of the bed.

At the same instant the door opened to admit a young and pretty dark-haired nurse, who hurried over and, after helping her patient back into the high bed, scolded, ‘You shouldn’t be trying to get out on your own.’

‘I’m thirsty.’ The words were just a croak.

‘Well, stay where you are and I’ll get you some nice cool orange juice.’ She plumped up the thin pillows and switched on a harsh overhead light. ‘The doctor will be pleased you’re awake at last.’

Awake... Yes, she was awake. Yet it was as if her brain was still asleep. She was conscious of physical things—her head ached dully and her throat felt as if it was full of hot shards of glass—but she was dazed and disorientated, her mind a curious blank.

The nurse returned and handed her the promised glass of orange juice. While she drank eagerly there was a flurry of footsteps, and a short sandy-haired man hurried in. He wore a white coat, steel-rimmed glasses and an air of harassed self-importance.

Pulling a pencil-torch from his pocket, he shone it into her eyes before taking her pulse. Then, sitting down on the bed, he informed her, ‘My name’s Hauser. I’m the doctor in charge.’

His complexion was pasty, and he appeared so effete that he would have made a better patient, she decided wryly, and asked, ‘In charge of what?’

Judging from his look of disapproval, he thought she was being facetious.

‘I mean, what is this place?’ Her voice was husky.

‘The accident and emergency wing of the charity hospital.’

‘Have I had an accident?’

‘You were brought in earlier today by a cabby. He says you stepped off the sidewalk in front of him. His fender caught you and you fell and hit your head. As far as we can tell, you have no injuries other than minor bruising and slight concussion. Unfortunately you weren’t carrying any means of identification, so we were unable to notify your next of kin.’

He made it sound as if she’d planned the whole thing just to annoy and inconvenience both him and the nursing staff.

‘This is a very busy hospital, and it gets busier late at night. Especially at the weekend.’ Having made that point, he headed for the door, saying over his shoulder, ‘If you’ll give the nurse details of who you are and where you live, we’ll contact your family so someone can come and collect you.’

‘But I don’t know where I live...’

The forlorn statement brought him back.

‘You’ve had a shock. Try and think. Are you a tourist?’

‘A tourist? I don’t know.’

‘Do you remember your name?’

‘No... I don’t remember anything... Oh, dear God!’

‘Don’t worry.’ He became a little more human. ‘Temporary amnesia isn’t uncommon after your kind of accident. It just means you’ll have to stay.’ His frown made it clear that this wasn’t a popular option. ‘Until either you regain your memory or someone misses you and checks the hospitals.’

Temporary amnesia. As the door closed behind him and the nurse began to make notes on her chart she did her best to cling to that thought, but a rising panic fought its way to the surface. ‘I don’t know if there’s anyone to make enquiries... I don’t know if I’ve got any family...’

A terrible sense of desolation swept over her. She covered her face with her hands. Her skin felt too tight for her bones, her cheeks and jaw all angles and sharp lines. ‘I don’t even know what I look like.’

Opening the locker, the nurse brought out a grubby, finger-marked mirror and handed it to her. ‘Well, at least that should cheer you up.’

A pale, heart-shaped face surrounded by a cloud of dark silky hair stared back at her. There was an ugly purple bruise spreading over her right temple. Almond-shaped eyes, a short, straight nose, high, slanting cheekbones and a disproportionately wide mouth, the lips of which looked bloodless, did little to cheer her.

The blue eyes, so deep they looked violet, and the fine, clear skin, seemed to be her best features. Well, my girl, you’re no beauty, she told herself silently as she handed back the mirror.

Looking down at her hands, she saw they were slim and shapely, the oval nails free of polish, the fingers bare of rings.

She felt a peculiar relief.

When the nurse had rinsed the glass and refilled it with tap water, she said, ‘It looks as if you’ll be here for the night at least, so would you like a little supper?’

‘No, thank you. I’m not hungry.’

‘Then get some sleep. Perhaps by morning your memory will have come back.’ Switching off the light, the nurse departed.

Oh, if only! It was terrifying, this feeling of being lost, isolated in a black void. She lay for what seemed hours, trying fruitlessly to shed some light on who she was and where she’d come from, before finally falling asleep.

Some time later she woke with a start, hugging her pillow in a death grip.

Someone was just closing the door. Failing to latch, it swung open a few inches, letting a crack of light spill into the room from the corridor.

‘I’ve no intention of waiting until morning.’ Just outside the door a masculine voice spoke clearly, decisively.

Sounding flustered, the nurse said, ‘We don’t normally release patients this late.’

‘I’m sure you could make an exception.’

‘Well, you’d have to speak to Dr Hauser.’

‘Very well.’

They began to move away.

‘I couldn’t let her go without his permission, and I’m not sure if... Oh, here he is...’

Though she could still hear the murmur of conversation, the actual words were no longer clear. After a minute or two the voices came closer, apparently returning.

Dr Hauser was saying, ‘We certainly need the bed, but I’m afraid I can’t allow—’

That authoritative voice cut in crisply. ‘I want her out of this place. Now!’

Stiffly, the doctor said, ‘I have my patient’s welfare to consider, and I really don’t think—’

‘Look—’ this time the tone was more moderate, the impatience curbed—I’m aware you do some very good work here. I’m also well aware that this kind of charity hospital is always drastically underfunded...’

There was a pause and a rustle. ‘Here’s a cheque made out to the hospital. It’s blank at the moment. If you’ll make the necessary arrangements for her immediate release, I’ll be happy to make a substantial contribution towards the hospital’s running costs.’

Sounding mollified, the doctor said, ‘Will you step into my office for a moment?’ and three pairs of footsteps moved away.

Sitting up against her pillows, torn between hope and anxiety, she waited. Was this someone come for her? If it was, and please God it was, surely a familiar face would bring her memory back?

It seemed an age before one set of footsteps returned and the door swung wider. ‘Ah, you’re awake. Good.’

The doctor switched on the shaded night-light. ‘Have you remembered anything?’

Her throat moved as she swallowed. ‘No.’

He came to sit on the edge of the bed. ‘Well, you’ll be pleased to know you’ve been identified as Clare Saunders...’

The name meant nothing to her.

‘And you’re English. That accounts for the accent’

Of course she was English. Yet both the nurse and doctor had American accents. That fact hadn’t really registered until now, almost as if subconsciously she’d expected to hear American accents... ‘But I’ve never been to the States.’ She spoke the thought aloud.

‘You mean until you came to live here?’

‘I live in England.’ Of that she was sure.

‘At the moment you’re living here in New York.’

‘New York! No, I can’t possibly be living in New York.’ For some reason the idea scared her witless. ‘You must have got the wrong person.’

He shook his head. ‘You’re Mrs Clare Saunders. Your husband has given us definite proof of your identity.’

‘My husband! But I haven’t got a husband!’ That was something else she was sure of. ‘I’m not married!’

Reacting to the note of rising hysteria in her voice, Dr Hauser said sharply, ‘Now, try to stay calm. Amnesia can be extremely upsetting, but it should only be a matter of time before your memory returns in full.’

‘What if it doesn’t?’

‘In the vast majority of cases it does,’ he said a shade irritably. ‘Believe me, Mrs Saunders, you have nothing to fear. We are quite sadsned—both with your husband’s identity and with yours. We’re prepared to let you leave at once, and as soon as Mr Saunders has signed the papers that release you into his care, he’ll be here.’

What would have been good news a short time ago was all at once terrifying. If only she didn’t have to go tonight. By tomorrow her memory might have returned.

She caught at the doctor’s arm. ‘Oh, please, can’t I stay until morning?’ But even as she begged she sensed there was no help to be had from that quarter.

‘Do you know where this hospital is situated?’

‘No.’ It was just a whisper.

‘This downtown area is rough,’ he told her. ‘Late at night we get a lot of drunks and people injured in brawls. You obviously don’t belong in a place like this, and I can’t blame your husband for wanting to take you home without delay.’

He patted her hand. ‘Don’t forget, all your doubts will be set at rest if you recognise him.’

And if she didn’t?

But the doctor was satisfied, and that was all there was to it. If he hadn’t been, despite the contribution to the hospital’s funds—she closed her mind to the word ‘bribe’—he wouldn’t have released her.

Or would he?

The door swung open and a tall, dark-haired, broad-shouldered man strode in. He was very well dressed, but it was his easy air of power and authority, his natural arrogance, that proclaimed him top of the heap.

As if by right he took the doctor’s place on the edge of the bed. He appeared to be in his early thirties, his face was lean and tough, and his handsome blackpupilled eyes were a light, clear green beneath curved brows.

He was a complete stranger.

As though mesmerised, she found herself staring at his mouth. The upper lip was thin, the lower fuller, and with a slight dip in the centre that echoed the cleft in his chin. It was an austere, yet sensual mouth—a mouth that was at once beautiful and ruthless.

Suddenly she shivered.

Those brilliant eyes searched her face, apparently looking for some sign of recognition. When he found none, his own face hardened, as though with anger, but his voice was soft as he said, ‘Clare, darling...I’ve been nearly frantic.’

Then, as without conscious volition she shrank away, he said, ‘It’s Jos... Surely you remember me? I’m your husband.’

If he was, why did she feel this instinctive fear of him? And why did she get the impression that he was cloaking his displeasure, playing the part of a loving husband to satisfy Dr Hauser?

He took her hand.

In a reflex action she snatched it away, cradling it against her chest as though he’d hurt it.

‘You’re not my husband! I know you’re not.’ Turning to the doctor, she cried desperately, ‘I’ve never seen him before!’ She held out her left hand. ‘Look, I’m not even wearing a ring.’

The man who called himself Jos felt in his pocket and produced a wide band of chased gold and a huge diamond solitaire. ‘You took your rings off when you showered this morning and forgot to put them back.’

No, she didn’t believe him. Somehow she knew she wasn’t the kind of woman who would lightly remove her wedding ring.

As she began to shake her head he caught her hand, and, holding it with delicate cruelty when she would have pulled it free, slipped both rings onto her slender finger. ‘See? A perfect fit.’

He gave her a cool, implacable stare, which sent a quiver of apprehension through her, before lifting her hand to his lips and kissing the palm. ‘And if you want further proof that we’re married...’ Removing a marriage certificate and a couple of snapshots from his wallet, he held them out to her.

A marriage certificate might be anyone’s, so she didn’t even bother to look at it, but photographs couldn’t lie. Afraid of what she might see, she forced herself to take the Polaroid pictures and look at them.

The first one had been taken in what appeared to be a cottage garden. She was smiling up at a tall, dark-haired attractive man. His arm was around her waist and she looked radiantly happy.

‘That was the day we got engaged...and that was our wedding day.’

The second picture showed a couple just emerging from the stone porch of a village church. Dressed in an ivory satin bridal gown and holding a spray of pale pink rosebuds, she was on the arm of the same man, who now wore a well-cut grey suit with a white carnation in his buttonhole.

A man who was undoubtedly Jos.

‘Do you still believe we’re not married?’

She couldn’t deny the evidence of her own eyes, but she knew that no matter what the picture suggested she didn’t want to be married to this man.

‘Well, Clare?’

‘No.’ It was just a whisper.

Standing in the background, Dr Hauser nodded his approval just as his bleeper summoned him. ‘I must go. Try not to worry, Mrs Saunders. I’m sure your loss of memory will prove to be only temporary.’

The door had hardly closed behind him when there was a bump and it swung open again to admit the nurse, pushing a shabby wheelchair. ‘Well, isn’t this good news?’ she asked her patient cheerfully. ‘As soon as you’re dressed, you can go home.’

Taking a small pile of clothing from the locker, she pulled back the bed-sheet and the single greyish cellular blanket. ‘Shall I give you a hand with the gown? Or would you prefer your husband to help you?’

Jos eyed the hospital gown with distaste, and raised an enquiring brow.

Agitated, because she was naked beneath the faded cotton and he knew it, Clare folded her arms across her chest and hugged herself defensively. ‘No, I...I don’t need any help.’

He rose to his feet in one lithe movement and said smoothly, ‘Then I’ll wait outside.’

‘You didn’t remember him?’ the nurse queried, unfastening the tapes.

Clare shook her head mutely.

‘So I guess you’re entitled to be shy. Though I’d have thought a man like that would have been impossible to forget. He’s really something...’

Seeing nothing else for it, Clare swung her legs off the bed and stood up. Moving slowly, carefully, wincing as she touched her bruised ribs, she began to get dressed in clothes she didn’t even recognise as hers.

The undies were pretty and delicate, the silky suit and sandals well-chosen and smart, but all of them appeared to be relatively cheap. Which didn’t seem to tie in with his expensive clothes.

Her tongue loosened, the nurse was chattering on. ‘I must say I envy you. It’s so thrilling and exciting. Like meeting for the first time and falling in love all over again...’

Clare wished she could see things in such a romantic light. Caught between an unknown future with a man who was a stranger to her and a blank past, all she could feel was alarm and dread.

All too soon she was dressed. With no further excuse for dawdling she took a few steps and, feeling weak, found herself glad to sink into the wheelchair the nurse was holding for her.

Standing at ease, showing no sign of impatience now, Jos was waiting in the bare corridor. He was very tall, six feet three or four, with wide shoulders and narrow hips.

He looked hard and handsome. And somehow dangerous.

Though he was so big, when he came towards them she saw he moved with the grace and agility of a man perfectly in control of his body.

‘Shall I come down with you?’ the nurse asked.

Anxious to put off the time when she’d be left alone with him, Clare was about to accept the offer when he said pleasantly, ‘Thank you, but there’s really no need. I’m sure I can handle a wheelchair.’

The smile accompanying his words held such devastating charm that the nurse almost swooned. She was still standing staring after them when they reached the lift.

It came promptly at his summons.

It probably didn’t dare do anything else, Clare found herself thinking as the doors slid open. Then she was trapped with him in a small steel box. It was a relief when it stopped a few floors down and a hospital porter got in pushing a trolley.

As the doctor had predicted, things were hotting up. The main concourse was busy and bustling, with people and staff milling about.

At the reception desk a hard-pressed woman was trying to cope with a growing queue. A large calendar with a picture of Cape Cod on it proclaimed the month was June.

When they reached an area close to the entrance, where a straggling row of shabby wheelchairs jostled each other, Jos asked, ‘Can you manage to walk from here?’ His deep, incisive voice startled her. ‘Or shall I carry you?’

The idea of being held against that broad chest startled her even more. Sharply, she said, ‘Of course I can walk.’ They were foolhardy words that she was soon to regret.

Struggling out of the chair, ignoring the hand he held out, she added, ‘I’ve only lost my memory, not the use of my legs,’ and saw his lips tighten ominously.

Once on her feet, Clare swayed a little, and he put a steady arm around her waist. As soon as she regained her balance she pulled away, leaving a good foot of space between them.

His face cold and aloof, he walked by her side, making no further attempt to touch her.

Somehow she managed to keep her chin high and her spine ramrod-straight, but, legs trembling, head curiously light and hot, just to put one foot in front of the other took a tremendous effort of will.

His car was quite close, parked in a ‘Doctors Only’ area. A sleek silvery grey, it had that unmistakable air of luxury possessed only by the most expensive of vehicles.

By the time he’d unlocked and opened the passenger door she was enveloped in a cold sweat and her head had started to whirl. Eyes closed, she leaned against the car.

Muttering, ‘Stubborn little fool!’ he caught her beneath the arms and lowered her into the seat. A moment later he slid in beside her and leaned over to fasten her safety belt.

‘Have you had anything to eat?’ he demanded.

As soon as she was sitting down the faintness began to pass and the world stopped spinning. Lifting her head, she answered, ‘I wasn’t hungry.’

‘No wonder you look like a ghost!’

Knowing it was as much emotional exhaustion as physical, she said helplessly, ‘It’s not just that. It’s everything.’

He started the car and drove to the entrance, giving way to a small ambulance with blue flashing lights before turning uptown.

The dashboard clock told her it was two-thirty in the morning, and, apart from the ubiquitous yellow cabs and a few late revellers, the streets of New York were relatively quiet though as bright as day.

Above the streetlamps and the lighted shop windows, by contrast it looked black—black towers of glass and concrete rising into a black sky.

It was totally strange. Alien.

As though sensing her shiver, he remarked more moderately, ‘Waking up with amnesia must be distressing.’

‘It is,’ she said simply. ‘Not to know who you are, where you are, where you’re going—and I mean know rather than just being told—is truly terrifying.’

‘I can imagine.’ He sounded almost sympathetic.

‘At first you just seemed to be... angry...’ She struggled to put her earlier impression into words. ‘As if you blamed me in some way...’

‘It’s been rather a fraught day... And I wasn’t convinced your loss of memory was genuine.’

‘You thought I was making it up! Why on earth should I do a thing like that?’

‘Why does a woman do anything?’ he asked bitterly.

It appeared that he didn’t think much of women in general and her in particular.

‘But I would have had to have some reason, surely?’

After a slight hesitation, he said evasively, ‘It’s irrelevant as you have lost your memory.’

‘What makes you believe it now when you didn’t earlier?’

They stopped at a red light and he turned his head to study her. ‘Because you have a kind of poignant, lost look that would be almost impossible to fake.’

‘I still don’t understand why you think I’d want to fake it.’

He gave her a cool glance. ‘Perhaps to get a little of your own back.’ Then, as if conceding that some further explanation was needed, he went on, ‘We’d quarrelled. I had to go out. When I came back I found you’d gone off in a huff.’

Instinctively she glanced down at her left hand.

‘Yes—’ his eyes followed hers ‘—that was why you weren’t wearing your rings.’

It must have been some quarrel to make her take her wedding ring off. She racked her brains, trying to remember.

Nothing.

Giving up the attempt, she asked, ‘What did we quarrel about?’

For an instant he looked discomposed, then, as the lights turned to green and the car moved smoothly forward, he replied, ‘As with most quarrels, it began over something comparatively unimportant. But somehow it escalated.’