Lisa Phillips - Sudden Recall

She’d ditched him for her job and then gone and gotten herself hurt. But his heart couldn’t get past waiting at that airport for her—and coming to terms with the fact that she wasn’t going to show up. She might need him, but she didn’t want him.

He pushed off the counter. “I’ll go, if that’s what you want me to do.”

Karen’s eyes widened, but Parker didn’t care if she was surprised by him. He was only doing what Sienna wanted.

He crossed the space between where he stood and Sienna. The phone on the counter rang. Parker swiped it up in frustration as he passed and barked out a “Hello?”

Sienna’s jaw dropped. In a cartoon, this would have been where smoke poured from her ears along with a whistling sound.

“Oh, great,” the woman said. “It’s you.”

“Excuse me?”

The female voice on the phone laughed. “The boy-wonder navy SEAL now a deputy-marshal-famous-fugitive-catcher. I did my homework. Don’t think I don’t know everything about you. And don’t underestimate me.”

Parker fought the urge to smile. “Is that supposed to be intimidating?”

“Just promise me you’re going to keep her safe.” The woman sighed. “If she won’t leave with me, then I need you to make sure she’s okay.”

Sienna was supposed to have left, to be protected by this woman? If Parker had to guess, he figured this must be Sienna’s best friend. He looked at Sienna then. She motioned frantically for him to give her the phone. She did look sort of guilty—about the fact that she’d considered ditching him and meeting up with her friend, maybe?

Parker didn’t give up the phone. “Tell me, why does Sienna need your help?”

If this woman had more information than what Karen had told him, then he wasn’t going to overlook her as a source. Or an ally. Too bad he couldn’t remember what her name was. Natalie... Nellie. Something like that.

The woman said, “They want whatever she hid from them. Karen wouldn’t tell me what it was, just that Sienna doesn’t remember anything, least of all where she hid it. They will try and abduct her again, and then they’ll torture her for its location before they kill her. But if she doesn’t even remember who she is, or what it is, then how can she tell them? I don’t even want to think what they’ll try in order to jog her memory. Last time, when the CIA found her, she was barely alive.”

“Understood.”

Sienna stepped closer. “Give me the phone, Parker.”

He shook his head and then turned away. “Can we trust you?”

“Are you willing to risk her life if I’m not telling the truth?”

“No.”

“Then yes, you can.”

Karen’s eyes narrowed. “Who are you talking to?”

Parker tucked the receiver under his chin. “I don’t know her, but she knows who I am.”

“Nina.” Karen didn’t seem to think much of this mystery caller.

He turned his attention back to the call. “Anything else I should know?” He wanted to ask this “Nina” about Karen, but not when she was in the room.

“Just don’t let anything happen to Sienna. I’ll help when I can.” She paused. “Give me your number.”

Parker rattled it off, happy to accept an ally in this. Even if he didn’t know her. Sienna had told him enough the first time they met.

“Got it.” Nina hung up.

“Stay in touch.” Parker set the phone back on its stand. Karen didn’t look happy, but then she likely wanted to reprimand Nina and couldn’t. Right now, Sienna thought Karen was only her aunt. She didn’t know Karen had been her CIA handler.

“What was that?”

Parker shifted to Sienna. “You should know. After all, you were planning to leave with her so she could protect you. She was making sure you’ll be all right.”

Karen gasped. “You absolutely cannot leave.”

Sienna set her hands on her hips. “I’m not a prisoner. So far as I know. That means I can leave if I want to, which I hadn’t actually decided on yet.”

Karen shot her a look. “You’ve stayed alive all the time you’ve been here, haven’t you? Why leave now?”

“Things have changed.”

Sienna strode out of the kitchen. Parker waved off Karen and followed her out. He caught her at the bottom of the stairs, stalling her with his hand around her wrist. He could snap her bones if he gripped too tight. Sienna was delicate, but she was also strong.

She looked at his hand, then up at his face. “Aren’t you leaving?”

“I do have to get back to work. There’s paperwork that needs to be done on the guy we arrested.”

She didn’t say anything. Her eyes surveyed his face, but aside from that she was completely still.

“Will you at least call me if you decide to leave?” She had to know he cared about her.

“I’ll put your number in my phone. Call me, Sienna, so I have yours.” Hopefully he didn’t sound desperate, but Parker wanted to be able to contact her.

Her lips curled up in a small smile. “You have to let me go now, Parker.”

His fingers loosened, but he shook his head. She had to know he wasn’t going to just walk away when she was in danger. There may not be anything between them, given her memory loss and the unanswered question of why she’d never met him at the airport. But that didn’t mean he was willing to risk not being around if she needed him.

* * *

Sienna knelt and pulled the shoebox from under the bed. Outside, she heard Parker’s truck start and the engine rev as he drove away.

A cold settled in her stomach as she realized she was here without him. Some part of her seemed to recognize him, as much as she didn’t want that to be the case. The last thing she needed was a man she had no memory of expecting her to say a particular thing or act a particular way.

That kind of pressure—wondering if she was still the woman he’d known and who that was—would drive her crazy. Sienna felt crazed enough already. The CIA? It was enough to send her running out the door. With no memory, she was more than in over her head; she was drowning. Those men had tried to kidnap her, and she’d had no way to fight them off beyond the basic self-defense techniques she’d learned at the gym.

Sienna removed the rubber bands that secured the box and sat back on her heels. She flipped the lid onto the floor to reveal the contents.

A collection of photos with curled edges had been fastened with a rusty paper clip. The one on top was a country house and barn. Underneath the stack was an old movie ticket stub, two postcards from European cities that were blank on the back and enough space for the Bible Sienna had removed when she’d woken from her coma.

Nothing new. Nothing that made her remember what she was supposed to be doing. Or anything about who she was.

Did Nina really think Sienna hadn’t looked in the shoebox before? And what in here made Nina believe Sienna would leave her aunt?

The Bible had been a solace to her in the months she’d tried to get her memory back. Sienna had scoured its pages, reading and rereading passages she had highlighted in her forgotten past. Notes she had made in the margins where it had spoken to her in one way or another. But none of that meant anything to her now—she had no frame of reference for it. She had read it as though for the very first time, soaked up the hope and peace found in those pages when so much of her life was upside down.

Sienna flicked through the photos, but there wasn’t anything tucked between them. She only saw images of people she didn’t recognize in places she’d never been.

With a cry of frustration she dumped the shoebox over. She wanted to smash the thing, but then she’d have nowhere to store the secret treasures of a woman who didn’t exist anymore. Maybe she never would.