Stop it. You’re a trained professional. Act like one. Focus on the facts.
She wasn’t completely helpless. She had a real sense of who she was, a cop—not a murderer. If she’d killed Jackson, she must have done so in self-defense. But even as a cop, she’d never had cause to pull her gun.
Still, a lot could have changed in two years. Perhaps she’d made detective or gone into undercover work.
While she remained silent, Sean McCabe stared at her as if waiting for her to admit she’d lied about the partial amnesia. His acute stare told her he was taking her lack of memory personally, and like a dog gnawing a juicy steak bone, he wasn’t about to let her go until he was satisfied.
She wished she could lie, because that would mean she was in possession of her full memory. All her recent recollections were gone—more than twenty-four months’ worth. Trying to force a memory only made her head ache worse. Gingerly she touched the knot. Perhaps when the swelling receded, her memories would return.
Her partial amnesia could have been worse. After all, she remembered her name, her childhood and her parents. She had a job with the police department, a family that loved her and many friends. All she needed to do was find a phone, and even if her memories never returned, they could fill her in.
Slowly her speeding heart calmed. She was alive, and at the moment her accuser didn’t seem inclined to hurt her. She wasn’t even sure if she was being held hostage, but if so, perhaps she could escape.
If his intentions were honorable, if he thought she’d murdered his friend, why hadn’t he called the police? She stared back into the darkened eyes surveying her with a mixture of pity and bridled anger and wondered if revealing her memory loss had been a mistake.
His tone was low, harsh. “Tell me what you remember.”
“About what?” she asked, vowing to give him nothing he could use against her.
“About…us.”
“Us?” That one word rocked her, hinting at a former and possibly a current personal relationship. Although his mountain-man ruggedness was attractive, she was positive they couldn’t be lovers. She felt no connection to him, could dredge up no past feelings about him one way or the other. And yet, a certain awareness zinged through her every time she looked at him. She noticed the way his eyes softened around the edges every time she winced in pain, the way he jutted his jaw at a certain angle when he didn’t get the answers that he sought, the way he held his back to Jackson’s body, as if keeping the man out of sight would lessen the pain of his loss. But as for real memory, for all she knew, she’d never met Sean McCabe before she’d awakened and told him her name was Carlie Brandon.
Thoughts swirling in a muddy haze of confusion, she’d never felt at such a disadvantage. Her lack of knowledge undermined her normal confidence. Confused and hurting, she wanted to close her eyes and sleep until the pain receded.
“Do you remember fighting with Jackson?” he asked softly, too softly, more than a hint of menace and resolve in his tone.
She rubbed her pounding temple, wishing she didn’t feel so vulnerable, wishing for her gun. “I don’t remember fighting with anyone.”
“And no one else is here with you?”
She forced her eyes to stay open. At least Sean was considering the possibility that someone else may have killed Jackson. While thankful for his ability to focus on facts, what she really wanted was his trust. She sensed that once this man made up his mind, he would pursue his goal no matter how difficult the challenge.
She wanted him on her side and decided to use every ounce of her persuasive abilities to prove her innocence. Right now, it would be wonderful if he believed her, but she’d settle for what she could get. “The first thing I remember is you asking how my head felt. I don’t know where I am or how I got here.”
“You’re in Alaska.”
“Alaska!” She sat up abruptly and pain sliced down her neck.
“Easy.” With a big hand on each of her shoulders, he steadied her.
He smelled of cedar and a hint of wood smoke. For a moment she thought he might insist she lie back down. Instead he held her until she stopped swaying and she took comfort in his support. In her injured state, the last thing she needed was to crack her head again. She accepted his help, and yet she sensed the crackling tension in him. Obviously he wanted to find answers to Jackson’s murder as badly as she did.
While she couldn’t be certain whether to trust him, she’d come to the conclusion Sean McCabe would not act with haste. No matter how deep his feelings, he was a man with unusual self-control.
“I don’t remember how I got here. I’m from Florida.”
Her head spun. Her stomach refused to settle. And she wished he’d stop staring at her as if she were an exotic animal in a zoo. “How do we know each other?”
Before he answered, voices and several dog barks from outside the cave interrupted. A new voice echoed through the cave. “Sean! You want us to bring the sleds into the mine or leave them out—”
Three men entered the cave. The first man was huge as a grizzly bear and looked as if he’d never used a razor. His black beard must have been a foot long. He towered over a slender youth who wore neon-green ski gear, goggles on his forehead and five earrings in his left ear. The third man looked ordinary enough, except when he scowled at her, she spotted a gold front tooth.
From somewhere in her mind came a saying about women searching for husbands in a state where men outnumbered women eight to one. The odds were good but the goods were odd. Even with the knot on her head she couldn’t have dreamed up an odder assortment of men.
All three visitors took in Jackson’s body beneath the blanket and then their hostile gazes settled on her. At the anger and accusations in their faces, she wanted to lie back down and close her eyes, but she forced herself to remain sitting upright.
The man with the long beard pointed at her and spoke with a harsh growl. “Marvin said my brother killed his murderer.”
No wonder the man eyed her with such hostility. He was Jackson’s brother. Automatically, she looked for a similarity in features—but she had no idea what the man she’d supposedly killed looked like.
As if sympathetic to her plight, Sean placed himself between her and the intruders and sat on a crate by the camp stove. “I was mistaken, Roger.”
“Hell of a mistake,” chided the man with the gold tooth. “We could have all walked into a trap.”
Carlie kept quiet, her gaze flickering from the other men to Sean, who’d clearly taken charge. He had a stillness about him, a calm that spread outward from his center, which reassured her.
But Roger, Jackson’s brother, was clearly incensed. And while the gold-toothed fellow seemed to find her predicament diverting, the twenty-something kid in the ski clothes looked none too happy with her, either.
The kid tossed his goggles to the ground and unzipped his ski jacket. “Want me to call—”
“Why bring in outsiders?” Roger muttered through his beard as he peered at her with a scowl. “We should string her up right now.”
The man with the gold front tooth turned his head and spit out a stream of tobacco juice. “I’m not hanging no female.”
“There will be no vigilante justice on this mountain,” Sean said with an authority that sliced through the argument and had the men looking at their feet. “If she killed Jackson, she’ll get the justice she deserves.”
The men settled around the stove, forming a circle that closed her out, their argument swirling around her like a tornado. Amid the shouts, an aura of great stillness surrounded Sean. He did not shout. He did not shift from foot to foot or clench