In the park, people rode bikes, and the wind stirred up the fragrance of the freshly cut grass mixed with the dying leaves, the loamy scent of autumn from the nearby hills. Winter was coming and he’d seen himself maybe buying a little cabin…
“Just tell me…was I a good man?”
She stared at him, her chest rising and falling. Finally, she opened her mouth.
He cut her off. “Don’t bother. You’ve answered my question.”
Then he turned and walked away.
There he went, walking right out of her life.
And she was going to let him go.
RJ watched as York—no, not York. Not anymore. As Mack strode down the street, away from her, his hands clenched at his sides, not looking back.
Not even once.
Do you know me?
Maybe she should have said no, let him live in the fresh start he’d so craved.
The York she knew—and loved—had so many regrets they were slowly consuming him. Grief. Mistakes. Horrible choices.
He’d done wet work for the CIA. Although he hadn’t admitted it outright, she knew it by his personal grief.
And today, he’d let that all go and become a new man.
She wiped her face, then crossed the street to the B and B. A couple other patrons sat at the wicker tables overlooking the river—they’d probably seen the altercation as York had chased her across town. She kept her head down as she walked onto the porch and inside.
Darcy came out of the kitchen just as she hit the stairs. “Did you find the church okay?”
She’d asked Darcy for directions this morning. Not that she’d been entirely sure she would attend, but…
If York didn’t know who he was, then he wouldn’t know that an assassin was after him.
Someone needed to keep York alive.
At least that had been her working justification for sticking around after her panicked phone conversation with Coco four days ago after her first conversation with Raven.
After she’d realized that York was, well, York. Except not York.
When she first considered the fact that the man she loved had forgotten…everything.
“The woman said that he’s staying in town, starting over.”
“Take a breath, RJ,” Coco had said, probably getting up from her bedside vigil of her son. “Start at the beginning.”
“I found him. York. But he calls himself Mack, and he’s…he’s different. So different that I wasn’t even sure it was him, but this woman he works with—actually she said they were dating—”
“Dating? What—?”
“Yes, I know. I don’t know what’s going on, but she said he has a scar under his beard and that the other day he beat up some guy who’d tried to harass Raven—anyway, it’s York. For sure it’s York. But he…he acts like he doesn’t know me.”
She’d been standing in the Riverwalk Park, staring out at the blue water, watching a boat motor past, the wind in her hair, the smells of the nearby pizza store stirring her hunger.
She would have liked to join the group for pizza for dinner—a suggestion by Caleb, the young, handsome pastor. But frankly, her head was buzzing from watching York interact all day like he might be the local handyman or even the owner’s son that…shoot, she had to walk away.
Untangle her mind.
“What do you mean, doesn’t know you?”
“I spoke to him in Russian. I called myself Sydney, just in case he was undercover. Not a blip of recognition. I’m sorry—he’s good, but certainly, if I was somehow blowing his cover, he’d ask me to leave.”
Silence.
“Coco?”
“What if…and I know this sounds crazy, but what if he was so injured in the car accident that he lost his memory?”
And that’s when the idea had locked in. I think he was in the military, but he won’t talk about it.
Ding, ding, ding. “You think he has amnesia?” she’d voiced to Coco. “I know it sounds like something that only happens in soap operas, but I was reading this article about this guy in Arizona who fell in the bathroom and lost twenty years of his life. It happens. And often, from trauma.”
Amnesia.
Coco had nothing, so RJ had spent the night googling it and forming her own hypothesis, one that included a fall, probably hippocampal damage, retrograde amnesia, at least of the past few years, and finally nothing that offered a real cure.
Maybe with time, and perhaps exposure to past memories via smell or music or photographs, he might…
He might be York again.
But in some cases, it never resolved.
Which meant he might never know he was in danger.
So, she’d stuck around, showing up every day with her scrub brush and even joining the handful of helpers for lunch, not sure what to do.
At night, she’d stayed until he got into Raven’s car. And waited until they turned the corner before she let herself cry.
She’d even shown up at the baseball field yesterday, at loose ends with herself, standing in the shadows in case any Russian thugs showed up.
Sheesh, she’d turned into Tate, the bodyguard.
But it was just an excuse, a way to hang on because York was so very, very capable. He’d swatted a couple pitches into left field like he might be Babe Ruth. And when they put him in center field, he scooped up at least two fly balls, fielding the others.
The man did everything well.
Including sweat. He came onto the bench with a line of exertion down his back, pulled off his hat, and it left all that beautiful blond hair a mess of tangles. He hadn’t cut it in weeks, and now it lay longer than she’d ever seen it, golden and kissed by the sun. He still hadn’t shaved either, the sun picking up the bronze in his beard. He’d worn a shirt with cutoff sleeves and a pair of jeans and Converse tennis shoes and looked so utterly not York, it had made her realize what an all-around American kid he was at heart.
Or at least had wanted to be.
If he hadn’t grown up in Russia, witnessed the murder of his parents, and been raised by his grandparents in Wisconsin.
Probably he’d played baseball there—which of course he couldn’t remember—so seeing him play made her realize just how close York was to being the man he’d probably dreamed of being.
Before he joined the Marines.
Before he transferred to the security detail of the American ambassador to Russia.
Before he married the ambassador’s daughter on the sly.
Before he lost his job and started working for the CIA.
Before his wife and son were murdered.
Before he killed the man to blame.
And before he entered, as he put it, the “transportation” business.
Oh, yes, and that was before his girlfriend was killed by the same assassin who tried to frame RJ for murder.
But all of that would not have changed her answer, if he’d let her give it after he chased her down. After he forced the truth out of her.
Just tell me…was I a good man?
Yes. Absolutely.
The kind of man who deserved a fresh start.
So yes, York had a lot of reasons to want to forget his past and become Mack Jones, and if she loved him, really loved him, she’d let him.
Right?
“I really enjoy Caleb’s preaching. It always hits the mark.” Darcy’s comment brought her back to the moment, and RJ turned.