Doranna Durgin - Survival Instinct

Karin let another sip of whiskey sit on her tongue, regarding him from beneath lowered brow. Too observant, this one.

Too engaging.

Too tempting.

And if she was going to hold herself together, to protect her new life…just plain too dangerous.

In the morning, Karin donned her dry underwear and her not-so-dry jeans and held back conversation in favor of ordering room-service breakfast. She had him worried, she knew; now he knew better than to take her for granted. And she caught him watching as she lingered over her spicy sausage and couldn’t believe herself when she flushed. Get a life, Sommers.

Of course, that was the whole point.

She knew he’d insist on escorting her back home, and he did, following her truck with the casual skill of a pro. She knew he’d insist on coming inside, and he did. She knew they’d have another conversation about the safe house and her memories and the boy…and she knew he was running out of time. One way or the other, he’d be headed back to Alexandria soon.

She hadn’t known he’d left his boxers on the floor of her bathroom. She tossed them at him and he caught them without comment, stuffing them into his overnight bag. Didn’t even blush, darn it. She picked up a crumpled towel-more evidence of his attempts to shake off the drug she’d given him.

She could also take it as evidence of his frantic reaction to her disappearance. Probably somewhat like Rumsey’s reaction…only she found she didn’t mind. Not this time.

She let Amy Lynn know she was home but that she wasn’t likely to stay, and she pointed Dave at the living room where he could make his phone calls. Then she went into her bedroom to peel off his sweatshirt-how could it still smell enticingly like him when it had clearly been freshly laundered?-and do what she’d been studiously not thinking about since her interminable night on the cliff.

She went up to the dormer.

To the storage off the dormer, where she’d carefully packed away Ellen’s most personal things.

Not before she’d had a good look at them, of course-the amnesia defense could only take her so far. The official stuff-bank information, old taxes, insurance papers…she’d kept those out in the file cabinet just as though they were hers. By default they were; she paid the bills and made decisions and signed Ellen’s carefully forged signature. But in storage…notes, old letters, photographs…

She’d taken a couple of ibuprofen, made herself a stiff cup of coffee, and disappeared upstairs.

“We have to talk-” Dave had said to her on the way by; she’d merely lifted a hand in acknowledgment. She’d told him she wanted to check her things, to try to jog her memory. Close enough to the truth. She figured she had until dinner to sort out what came next.

Dewey had followed her up the stairs; now he curled up beside her as she sat cross-legged beside the half-height door to the eaves storage. Ellen’s old letters had told her next to nothing; she wasn’t a woman who’d made close friendships and as Karin looked at the stack-a few holiday cards kept through the years, one wistful note from a former coworker and several of Karin’s quick missives from the years before e-mail and library Internet access-Karin suddenly felt awash in the sadness of such a solitary life.

And then she realized she had even less to show for herself, closed her eyes long enough for tears to form but not long enough for them to fall and set the letters aside. She flipped through Ellen’s photo album-scenic shots from a handful of vacations, several parties from work…And here were several captioned photos clipped from the society page, with Ellen on the arm of Barret Longsford. She was dressed more expensively than Karin ever would have guessed. Longsford must have provided those glittering gowns, that cocktail dress…

Karin ran her finger over a picture that showed Ellen in detail. Her makeup, flawless…the dress, formfitting. Like Karin, Ellen had a lean figure…lean unto boyish, Karin had always thought, but there was nothing boyish about Ellen in this dress. “Wow,” Karin whispered at her sister. “You look amazing.” And I never knew…

Beside her, Longsford had a publicity smile pasted on his face, his hand at Ellen’s elbow and the other hand giving a princely wave to the media. He wore a tux for this particular benefit event, his hair-blond or light brown, it was hard to tell in the black-and-white photo-conservatively styled, his teeth straight and white, and just enough smile lines at the corners of his eyes to look both dignified and a little dashing. She tapped the picture, tapped his face. “And do you really steal away little boys, Mr. Longsford? Do you kill them?”

And if he did…would Dave be able to prove it?

Stashed with the society clippings in the back of the album, loose photos sat unorganized and unsecured. More from the Longsford days. Exclusive resorts, a cruise ship, several outings that appeared to be more mundane trips to local parks.

A careful study of those photos revealed nothing of significance. Ellen and Longsford, his arm over her shoulder, a fountain behind them. Or a bandstand with band, or a sculpture…Karin would have guessed them to be events of political significance except for their dress…always casual, jeans and a polo shirt for Longsford, light sweaters and pretty shirts over slacks and jeans for Ellen. Longsford always had dark glasses on, always a cap of some sort.

But hey. Even an aspiring politician, son of a U.S. senator, and social gadfly needed some time to himself. Maybe that’s why Ellen had taken these pictures…reminders of her private time with a public man.

Still. They did nothing to prove Longsford was a monster. They did nothing to pinpoint where a small boy might be stashed.

“Crap,” Karin said into the quiet room. Dewey’s tail thumped twice on the carpet in response. “Crap,” she repeated, just so he’d do it again. Then she kissed him on the head and piled the albums, letters and loose photos away in their box, and pulled out the next one.

The old date book. Hmm, this could be promising. It had been on Ellen’s desk when Karin arrived to this unfamiliar house that was suddenly her home. At first she thumbed randomly through it. Plenty of days with Longsford’s name on them. Karin settled in to turn the pages, swiftly but in order. A doctor appointment, an office event…blah, blah, blah…and then a series of Realtor connections. The bank. The moving date. Long before then, Longsford’s name ceased to show up. Karin wasn’t sure if it reflected the assimilation of the man into Ellen’s life, or the breakup. If she’d spent enough time with him so she no longer noted it on the calendar, then there was no telling when they actually broke up.

Maybe it had been when she first talked to Dave Hunter. She had it in the book, right before the evidence of her intent to move.

And again, the day before she had left to meet Karin in California. Call Dave Hunter.

But she hadn’t. Karin had called her late the night before, asking for help.

So what had triggered her intent to contact Dave?

“I’m not meant for this,” she told Dewey, who of course thumped his tail at every word. “I’m meant for creating situations, not untangling them. What a good boy.” And he understood those last words as she’d meant him to, and offered up a flurry of wild thumps. Therapy dog.

Karin flipped through the remaining blank pages in frustration. Bad enough she’d had to look through all these things-to immerse herself, once more, in the loss she’d barely accepted.

A photo fluttered out.

“Hmm,” she muttered, reaching for it. “And why aren’t you with your little photo friends?”

The date on the back stamped it as being from one of the last batches, one of the park photos. And when Karin turned it over, she saw exactly why it had been pulled aside.