Husbands and Other Strangers

“You’re not kidding?” He ground out each one of the words slowly, giving her every opportunity to recant. Praying she’d take it.

Because something deep inside her was suddenly afraid, afraid of what she couldn’t begin to understand, Gayle clung to temper.

“I’m bleeding. Why would I be kidding?” Why were her brothers doing this to her? Why were they putting her through this charade at a time like this? She looked from one to the other, silently asking them to stop. “Sam, Jake, what’s going on here? And how did I get here, on the boat, anyway?”

The three men looked at one another, not knowing whether they were all victims of an elaborate hoax and being played for fools—Gayle wasn’t above that—or if they should be seriously worried.

Gayle drew herself up to her knees, swaying just a little. “I said, what’s going on here?” She glanced from Sam to Jake, then her eyes came to rest on the stranger. Her brothers had played pranks on her before. It was a way of letting off steam that was a holdover from their childhood, when their father’s rigorous training would get to them. But this was going a little bit too far now.

“Jake, Sam, one of you tell me. I want to know. Just who is this man?”

Chapter Two

Jake was the oldest, and as such, he was apt to take things more seriously than his siblings. He looked at the woman he was fond of calling his baby sister, although it was not quite six years that separated them. There were times when Gayle had trouble knowing when to stop. He had no problem stepping in when it came to that.

“Okay, Gayle, quit fooling around now. You’ve had your joke and scared the hell out of the rest of us, including your husband.”

All she heard was one word. One frightening word. Was she going crazy? Or were they? Knowing her brothers, it was them. And she didn’t appreciate being the butt of the joke.

“Husband.” Gayle looked around angrily, deliberately not focusing on the stranger at her left. “What husband?” she demanded.

“That’s enough, Gayle.” Jake was using his police-detective voice. It masked his growing uneasiness. Gayle wasn’t normally such a good actress.

“My sentiments exactly,” she retorted, getting to her feet. The pounding in her head increased twofold, ushering in a dizziness that threatened to make her pass out. She mentally clung to her surroundings as she sank onto one of the four seats on the deck. “Now quit fooling around, guys.” She put her hand to her head, as if that could somehow contain the headache that was consuming her. “I don’t feel right.”

Doggedly refusing to step back, Taylor took a closer look at the woman who had been the bane of his existence as well as the center of his universe for the last eighteen months.

What he saw worried him.

He wasn’t comfortable in this frame of mind. Marriage had never been in the cards for him as far as he was concerned. Never close to either of his parents, he hadn’t wanted a family of his own.

Independent, handy, Taylor had stubbornly made his own way ever since he’d graduated from high school. He returned to college only when he felt that it might give him a leg up in the field that he’d finally chosen for himself: restoring, recreating or just plain overhauling houses that had long since seen their zenith. He took sows’ ears and albatrosses, turning them into things of modern beauty and functionality.

Blessed with vision, Taylor considered himself both a craftsman and an artist with a keen eye for detail. He liked working with his hands as well as his mind. Liked partying hard, too, when the occasion called for it. And always, always moving on whenever the next project called. Moving on alone.

Until he’d met Gayle Elliott.

It was, appropriately enough, at a party thrown by Rico Cimmaron, a professional football player. The party was at Rico’s house, a building Taylor had renovated for a sinfully exorbitant amount of money. Rico had said as much when he’d introduced him to the small, slender and incredibly sexy woman he was currently dating.

Looking back, Taylor thought everyone should have a moment where the rest of the world faded away as the focus zoomed in on one perfect individual. The way he found himself focusing on Rico’s date. Gayle Elliott. He quickly discovered that the golden blonde with the sea-green eyes had an attitude that both pushed him away and reeled him in. By the end of the party, he knew that Gayle was funny, outgoing, witty and as combative as hell when she thought she was right.

He also quickly saw that she was accustomed to being the center of attention, just like Rico. For all intents and purposes, they looked like a golden couple. He didn’t let that stand in his way.

Like Rico, she was a name in the world of sports. His knowledge of that world was cursory, but someone at the party obligingly filled him in about Gayle. She’d earned not one but nine gold medals over the course of the last three Summer Olympics, winning her first gold medal at the age of sixteen. After she’d announced her retirement at the close of the Olympic Games, Gayle turned her attention and all her incredible energy and exuberance to sports commentating.

Her enthusiasm for all sports made her a natural. So did her looks. She quickly found herself courted by a number of local news stations around the country. She chose to remain in Bedford because it was her hometown and took the offer from a Los Angeles affiliated station.

Ratings went up and her temporary stint turned into a permanent spot. John Alvarez, the man she’d subbed for, found himself moved to the morning broadcast.

It was to Gayle’s credit that Alvarez bore her no resentment. Taylor saw that men of all ages fell all over themselves in their attempt to be around Gayle and garner her favor. Which was precisely why he’d initially held back. That and because she was dating a former client.

He realized his reticence was what had attracted her to him in the first place. In his estimation, the pert, sassy and somewhat opinionated woman wanted to leave no man unconquered. He admitted to Sam, although not to her, that Gayle won him over fast enough. And it was difficult to keep his feelings to himself.

They’d had one hell of a courtship. He liked to think of it as two forces of nature coming together. There was no other explanation why a five-foot-three woman had suddenly taken such a dominant position in his life, when, from an early age on, he’d had his pick of any woman he wanted and had wanted none for the duration.

The way he’d wanted Gayle.

From the very beginning Gayle had turned his life upside down.

And had nearly brought it to a screeching stop just now, when he’d believed for several horrible moments that the waters through which she’d always negotiated her way like a mermaid had suddenly and finally claimed her.

His nerves were stretched to the very limit. Crouching beside her chair, Taylor took hold of his wife’s shoulders, pinning her against the teak back. Anger flashed across her face as she attempted to shrug him off. And failed.

She was weak, Taylor thought with concern. If she wasn’t, Gayle could have easily worked her way out of his grasp. She had an exorbitant amount of upper body strength.

“You don’t remember me,” he said, stunned by her statement.

What if it was true? a nagging voice whispered inside his head. What if, for some awful reason, she couldn’t remember him?

Gayle exhaled a ragged breath. What was going on here? And why did she feel as if someone had just shot holes through her every thought? She couldn’t remember how she got to this deck. Or even to Sam’s boat. She tried to think back to the last thing she could clearly remember. Everything felt murky in her head, as if it was submerged in a tank overgrown with algae.

Panic fueled impatience. She stared at the man crowding her. “No, I don’t remember you. Why would I lie?” she demanded.

“Because you’re good at it. Not lying,” Taylor amended, “just at being stubborn. At playing pranks. And being a pain in the butt,” he added, his own temper just about snapping. One minute he was afraid she was dead, now she was pretending not to recognize him. His emotions couldn’t handle this uneven roller-coaster ride. “This isn’t funny, Gayle.”

Anger was her only defense. Her face was deadly serious as she looked at this stranger who was intruding into her life with lead-soled combat boots.

“No,” Gayle agreed vehemently, “it’s not.” She looked to her brothers for help. Why were they humoring this character? Why weren’t they coming to her defense? Fun was fun, but this was beginning to be cruel.

“Gayle, you’ve had your fun—” Sam began, only to be waved back into silence by Taylor.

“I’ve known her to get pretty elaborate with her jokes, but even Gayle couldn’t fake that kind of pallor,” he pointed out.

She looked as white as a sheet, he thought with mounting anxiety. And there was something in her eyes that had him coming to the unwelcome realization that his wife wasn’t kidding around.

She didn’t remember him.

Moving closer, Jake looked at his brother-in-law. “You think she might have amnesia?”

Taylor rose to his feet. Before he could reply, Sam snorted in disgust. “Amnesia,” he repeated, scoffing at the notion. “You don’t just forget one person if you have amnesia. It’s not selective.”

Gayle tugged on the leg of Sam’s bathing suit. “Hey, guys, I’m right here. Don’t talk about me as if I were some inanimate object.”

Her tone was angry, but inside she was beginning to give way to fear. A large, overwhelming, all-encompassing fear because this was beginning to feel strange.

What made matters worse, tipping the scales in Sam and Jake’s favor, was that her brain really did feel as if there were holes running all through it.

She clenched her hands in her lap. No, not possible, she thought. Things like this didn’t happen. Not to her. Okay, so she couldn’t remember the events of this morning. Couldn’t remember how she came to be here, but those were just a few random events. And there were all those facts and figures crowding her brain. It was only natural to forget a few things along the way.