Michael woke up the next morning to the rays of sunlight coming in through the skylight windows. Stretching, he felt the heaviness on his body, and pulled it closer to him. The movement of his hand stopped as he became aware of what he was doing. Opening his eyes, he looked down at the tousled blonde hair spread over his chest and the small body under his arm, curled up on his body.

Shit.

Moving carefully so as not to wake her. Michael slid out from under her. He was out of the bed thisfast, and stood standing beside his bed looking down at her, taking in her features. The bruising and cuts on her face were looking green and purple, a full Technicolor array of hues from yellow to pink. Her hands were crossed in front of her, but it was her mouth that he kept coming back to over and over again. It was so damn near perfect. Then he saw her legs with his shirt riding upward.

Michael’s hands clenched, and he stepped back as he stopped himself from leaning down to kiss those lips. Running his fingers through his hair, he quickly turned away and grabbed some clean clothes and rushed to the bathroom to stand under a cold shower. He was used to waking up with a morning erection, just not used to waking up with someone in his bed at the same time.

Trouble. She was definitely trouble.

Michael stood under the shower lecturing himself on his life and the choices he made, or refused to make, while the cold water turned his skin slowly to blue. Standing with a towel around his waist, he stared in the mirror. His face needed shaving. It had been almost ten days and it was looking bad. Would Maria like him better with a beard or without? Probably without. Her face was sore enough, and… Michael growled at himself in contempt and tossed the razor down.

Picking up the dirty clothes in his bathroom, he picked up the discarded hospital gown. He should throw it away, but somehow he could see the pesky Special Agent Burns digging through his trash and finding it. Looked like a good day to build a fire. Bending down Michael picked up more clothes until his fingers touched something small and silky. Panties. Not just any panties. Nice ones. Silk, skimpy, and the color of iced green. Maria’s. That meant she was wearing his Metallica shirt without…that she slept in the bed with him all night without…Damn. Michael reached over and turned the cold shower back on.

Hours later, Maria woke up to the sound of Michael moving around. At the first moment of awareness, she smiled and then stretched, but the blank in her mind came rushing back, filling the void with nothing but fear. Sitting up quickly, and scrambling back on the bed, her wounded hands hit the mattress in a moment of blinding pain.

“What the hell!” Michael quickly came over to the bed, and lifted her to a sitting position looking at her hands. They were bleeding again. Cussing, he looked at her sternly. “Don’t move!”

Maria just sat there looking at her hands, and searching the room. He had cleaned. The place was picked up from the first time she saw it. She remained silent as he sat down next to her. She watched his hands move over hers, the way he gently unwrapped her hands and cussed when the gauze caught on spots of dried blood making her cry out again.

Her eyes filled with tears. The pain. It was almost tolerable. The humiliation of feeling weak? Not so.

Michael looked at her and saw the tears. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to...I’ll try to be more careful.”

She just nodded. Michael had to go get some water to soak away the dried spots. Maria quickly wiped away the tears that felt foreign to her. Get it together, you cry baby! You’re Teflon. Things don’t stick. Nothing sticks or matters except… Maria frowned. For a moment that memory touched, and then in a fluttering of thought it became fleeting.

She remained silent until Michael was done. Maria watched his every move, his every expression, and an instinct older than time told her that the ranging emotions across his face were unguarded and unusual. He hated hurting things.

“I should let you sit in a bath and soak, but I’m afraid that it’ll be bad for both your hands and feet. Maybe I should give you a sponge bath, then your wounds can stay…”

“No!” Maria cleared her throat. “That’s okay. I…can wait a little, until tonight since I just took a bath.”

He looked at her embarrassed face. “Sorry. Of course you wouldn’t want a stranger’s seeing you, and...”

Maria quickly denied it. “No! It’s not that! I…it's just that I hate being this burden to you. Oh god. A stranger? I’m a stranger to myself. You. You are the only thing that doesn’t feel strange in my life. You…I don’t know why, but you I trust.”

Michael looked down her body, noting her long lean legs barely covered in his shirt, the hands covered in gauze, just barely, but he knew them to be strong lean hands, beautiful and artistic, and her beautiful mouth and eyes.

“Don’t.”

Maria looked up at him. Don’t what?

The sparking of life in his eyes was unmistakable. Desire. She didn’t need her memory to recognize that look. Her heart beat in her throat and her breathing caught as he moved his head real close to hers. Their mouths almost touching, breathing each other's breath like it was their own. Maria looked down at his mouth so near to hers and closed her eyes, unable to watch. Automatically her tongue came out to lick her dry lips, trying to give it some moisture. He was watching her mouth closely, and unwilling his tongue did the same, mimicking her gesture. Their tongues touched for just a millisecond, and they both sat back from each other, their eyes opening wide.

Michael's voice came out rougher than he wanted.

“Don’t assume or trust anyone, not even me. Trust no one.”

Maria nodded at his advice, but didn’t agree. Too late. She trusted him. “You shaved,” she said.

The first thing that popped in her head trying to alleviate the tension in the room, and between her legs. He was so handsome, not in that chocolate candy box prettyboy way, but in something ingrained, masculine, with all the lines and angle of his face, the sweep of his long lashes on his cheek, the golden warmth of his eyes like drinking malt whiskey straight causing a burning sensation all the way down, his incredible hands, and his lips, oh god, his lips. Biting back a moan, she critically let her eyes roam over him, over his features, her artistic eyes building a mental picture that her ravaged hands desired to recreate. Her greatest challenge. Capturing raw masculine beauty.

Taken aback, he stood and unconsciously stroked his clean-shaven face. Rushing to a drawer he scavenged for something, anything to take her eyes off him. It didn’t work.

“How about a bubble bath? I don’t have anything really, but I can find some soap that will create a nice lather.”

Maria laughed softly, and he looked at her sharply. Laughter. Her laughter. He had never heard it before. Dammit. Michael tossed the clothes on the bed and fled the room. Stopping outside the door he just shook his head in confusion. What the hell?

Rushing downstairs he searched for something, anything. Stopping and resting his head between his arms as he bent over and leaned on the kitchen counter, he took long deep breaths. This wasn’t him. Not him. Alone too long. That was it. She made the house feel lived in, alive.

“I think this will work,” he said when he re-entered the room.

“So I take it I’m bathing right now?” Maria asked as she took in the bottle of dish soap in his hands. “I must smell bad.”

Michael just smirked. “Bad enough to drive me out of bed.”

“Really?” Maria started to smell herself when she saw a small lift to the corner of his mouth. She tilted her head and gave him a suspicious look. Michael just went into the bathroom and started a bath. He wanted her safely away from him for a little while, to give him some breathing space.

“If you bathe now, I can rewrap your hands and feet, and they should be set for the day.” Michael explained. Sounded reasonable.

Maria just nodded, and tried to stand up. Swearing, he picked her up before she could. She was trouble. Obviously used to doing things for herself.

Maria studied his face again as he carried her to the bathroom. His lashes were so incredibly long, and his eyes suddenly looked into hers.

“So how we going to do this?” She licked her lips, that suddenly were dry and gulped when she noticed his eyes watching the movement.

Michael set her down on the side of the bathtub. “I don’t know. I think your feet can get wet. They're just bruised and scraped, nothing too deep. It’s your hands I’m worried about.”

Maria nodded and swung her feet into the water cussing a nice string of obscenities as the water hit the cuts. She looked back at Michael and smiled.

“Obviously I know how to colorfully express myself in a full plethora of interesting phrases. I’m thinking sweet Ms. Sunshine, I’m not.”

“You don’t know that. Maybe Pollyanna was into smoking weed behind the gym.”

Maria laughed. “It’s possible. Okay, feet in, now what?”

She couldn’t support her weight on her hands to safely slide into the bath, so he’d have to do it. Maybe a shower would’ve been better. A shower with a chair in it to keep her off her feet.

“You could just take a bath leaving the shirt on?”

Maria seemed to think about it for a moment. That seemed to defeat the purpose of taking a bath unless you were trying to do the laundry at the same time.

“Or...you could just help me take it off and put me in the bath.” She moved her head to the side waiting for his response. Whatever or whoever she was, she didn’t think she had a problem with nudity or the human body in any form.

Michael looked at her. Great. The last thing he wanted. His imagination was already going crazy, but this would confirm it and give his lust files real details. His eyes narrowed when he noticed hers suddenly had a spark of a dare in them. He liked her better when she was confused and unconscious. Fine. Whatever.

Reaching over, he grabbed the bottom of his shirt to pull it over her head, but she was sitting on it. Rolling his eyes, he lifted her a little as her arms went around his neck and then sat her naked ass down on the cold porcelain tub. He smiled at her response in his ear. Served her right. She was an accident waiting to happen. How did she know he wasn’t a pervert, some deviate willing to abuse and rape her body? If she asked anyone they’d would tell her how they suspected he was capable of the filthiest of acts. He had her in his house, helpless, and no one knew she was here. He could…Michael swallowed the nasty images that invaded his mind. She definitely was a menace. She could have landed in anyone’s backyard, and the amount of immediate trust she showed him was just scaring the shit out of him. He was going to find her blasted people and find out why they unleashed this trusting child on the world unprepared and why they didn’t teach her reserve and caution.

She raised her arms as he pulled the shirt off her. He didn’t look. The hell he didn’t. He slowly moved his eyes from her pubic area noting the light brownish blonde curls almost missing. She shaved. Damn. He was in so much trouble.

Then upward to her stomach. Bellybutton ring. Pierced. She was pierced. His eyes found her breasts and that was it. They couldn’t move. She was wearing a skimpy sea green silk bra that was so sheer it almost wasn’t there. Tossing his shirt over his head, he just stared.

“It’s a front clasp. I showered in it yesterday because I couldn’t possibly unclasp it.”

“I know it’s a front clasp,” Michael said ignoring his raspy voice.

He wasn’t some frickin’ virgin. He had experience removing women’s clothes. This just felt different. She wasn’t just an easy lay that he was going to do, and then toss out of his space a few hours later. She was staying indefinitely, and somehow that made it harder.

Michael quickly unsnapped the front clasp and tossed the bra with the shirt. Reaching under her arms, he lifted her into the bath. Her arms came around his neck, and he bit back a moan. He refused to look at her now bared breasts. Okay. So he looked. They weren’t that great. He’d seen better. Okay so he’d have to think about where, but he was sure he did. They were small, well shaped, pert and high with a soft rosy aureole and the nipple was just begging to be…Michael quickly averted his eyes. He’d seen better.

Maria seemed unconcerned or unaware of his regard. She just held on to him as he settled her back into to bubbles watching them cover her breasts. It was the soft moan she gave in his ear when her body relaxed into the warm of the water that sent him fleeing the room.

“I’ll be right back.”

Dammit. Dammit. Dammit.

Michael leaned against the wall outside the room. It was decided. He had gone entirely too long since his last sexual encounter. When a woman with a bashed-in face, gauze mittens and amnesia to boot suddenly looked like a feast, it was time to think about seriously picking up a temporary barfly for relief.

Downstairs, Michael rutted around in his kitchen and found a good sized bowl. Loading a tray with some breakfast and coffee, he took it upstairs. Maria didn’t even open her eyes when he came back. The move from the bed to the tub must have taken more from her than he realized.

“I brought you some food and coffee.”

Maria looked up and opened her eyes. They were full of tears.

“What? Are you in pain?”

Maria nodded and turned her hands over. He hadn’t rewrapped them. She must have examined them while he was gone. They looked bad. Real bad. On her right hand, two of her fingers looked the worst. Almost black with bluing, and turning darker with every passing hour.

“I know.” Setting the tray down he sat on the side of the bathtub. “You want me to take you to the hospital?”

Maria shook her head no. The fear was creeping back into her eyes.

“Maria, realistically... Your hands... Damn. You could lose your fingers, or worse. It’s criminal for me not to take you somewhere. There has to be some severe damage to the major blood supply and the nerves.”

“No.” Maria looked at him and shook her head. “I know I’m a bother, and I’m sorry. I’m so sorry that I’m screwing with your life. But if they find me...”

“They? Who are they?”

face=Verdana> size=2> face=Verdana size=2>Maria looked at her hands. She couldn’t flex the fingers or close them. “I don’t know. I just know what I feel. I just know that if I’m found, I’m dead.”

Michael was silent for a moment. He could respect that. It was how he felt about the FBI and the government finding out what he was all his life. Fear. That creeping dread that started at the base of the spine and crept upwards to finally choke the very thought of breath from your body. It was paralyzing.

“Okay. I have this friend...”

She shook her head no emphatically.

“How about I take you out of state? Maybe Texas? Or Arizona? Maybe even Oklahoma or Colorado? I could tell them we were camping. It took a few days to walk out.”

Maria closed her eyes. “I’ll think about it.”

Michael understood. That meant no.

“Can I have some coffee?”

Michael helped her eat and drink the coffee. She still barely managed some toast, a little scramble eggs, and half a cup of coffee. She was barely eating enough to keep alive. Though she wasn’t complaining, the cuts on her hands had to be a lot more painful than she was indicating. It was robbing her of hunger.

Michael told her to move forward and he took a bath sponge and washed her back. Tattoo. One her back. Low. Michael swallowed the groan. He was not going to make a move on an injured woman, and especially not a woman that he couldn’t figure out how to get rid of. With his luck, ten years from now she’d remember her life while still hiding in his home.

Using the empty bowl he brought upstairs he washed her hair, using it to wet her hair before adding the shampoo. Maria just moaned and let him take care of her. She had few choices.

“I hate it.”

“What?” Michael frowned at a tiny scratch he had missed on the side of her neck. It was probably from the broken glass. It looked like it was healing.

“Being helpless. Weak. Beholden.” Maria looked up at him, and she saw understanding in his eyes. Yes. He understood how hard it was to feel that you’d owe someone a debt you could never repay.

Michael lifted her from the bath and set her on the side again, quickly wrapping first her and then her now-clean hair in a towel. Picking her up he took her back in the bedroom and took another t-shirt of his, pulling it over her head. Michael held up a pair of boxers for her inspection.

“Sexy!”

Michael just smiled slightly and lifted her to pull them over her hips. Too big. But they covered her. And as long as she didn’t try to walk or run in them, they should be okay.

“Do I have to stay in bed?”

“What? Did you have some place to go?”

Maria just shrugged. It made her feel like an invalid. “I don’t know. I’m willing to let you decide.”

Michael nodded and picked her up. “I’ll put you downstairs in my TV room. That way you can watch the news or other programs, and maybe something will look familiar. We’ll rewrap your hands down there.”

Michael had her all settled on the leather sofa with pillows and covered in an afghan with her hands rewrapped watching a rerun of Friends before he went back upstairs to clean the bathroom and remake the bed. Strange that he never cared about an overly clean house before, but with her cut hands all he could see were germs everywhere.

Stopping in the kitchen, he searched to decide what he should make for food. She really needed to eat. There was chicken soup left over and some bread. He had eaten a good portion of it the night before in a huge mega sandwich and a large bowl of soup. With The amount she had eaten so far, she wasn’t going to eat him out of house or home.

When he went downstairs, he started to ask her if she could handle soup. But stopped. She was asleep, her hands resting lightly in her lap. Going upstairs to the living room, and then down into his split unit to the office under his bedroom he gathered up some supplies he needed.

He took his work downstairs and sat in a large oversized leather chair with a light on turning off all others, but leaving the TV on low in case she woke again. He settled down to read and work on his next assignment. He hadn’t drunk a beer in almost twenty-four hours.

~~~

“Kyle, what are you doing here? I thought you were off for seventy-two hours.”

Kyle smiled at that. Like any of them were really ever off. “I am. Vicky took the boys with her mom to meet their new afternoon babysitter, and then they were going to the Community College to talk to a councilor. Dad called so I came in for a quick meet.

“Did you pick up the new lab reports on the DeLuca case?”

“Yeah, they’re in my inbox. What’s up, Hanson?”

Hanson just shrugged. “I don’t know. Sheriff wants to see the entire case file now, and both of us.”

Kyle nodded and grabbed what he had. It wasn’t unusual for Jim Valenti to keep his nose close to a case as high profile as the DeLuca case. The presence of the FBI just made it even more so. Kyle wasn’t surprised that Agent… Special Agent Burns was present in the Sheriff’s office.

Kyle leaned up against the window sill in his father’s office listening to the latest reports, and occasionally adding details. His entire attention was on Special Agent Burns. Instinct suggested that the man knew more than he was sharing. The mystery of Maria DeLuca was a mystery only because they didn’t have all the facts.

Burns looked up from the report he was reading. “This says that item 3-C was a silver medallion embossed with an emblem or something reminiscent of a religious icon. Where is the medallion?”

Jim frowned and checked the listing of physical evidence and belongings of the missing girl. “It is more than likely in the hands of the forensic department so they can run down the image. It's probably just St. Nicholas or ordinary religious jewelry.”

“I’d like to see it.”

Jim nodded. “I’ll run it down and get you a copy of the report when it comes back. Anything else Special Agent?”

Burns looked at the group of three men and shook his head no. It seemed worthless to badger the local cops. He might need them later.

“Good, then if you’ll excuse me and my men, we have other cases to work on besides this one.”

“Of course, Sheriff. I appreciate your time and your including me in the investigation.” Burns left the office and shut the door behind him, but not tightly.

“Hanson, what the hell is the deal on the light problems at Watson and 3rd?”

Hanson just placed his hands behind his back. “Pain in the ass, Jim. Seriously. The timing mechanism is malfunctioning or burned out. It's indicating red or green both ways at the same time. We had thirteen traffic accidents in one day. City planner’s physical plant department can’t figure out what's wrong, so a representative from the actual company that installed the lights will be down tomorrow from Albuquerque.”

“And until then?” The listening Special Agent Burns finally walked away.

“I installed an officer at the intersection to direct traffic.”

“Okay, for now. Have a unit install temporary four-way stops at the intersection and turn off that light. I can’t have manpower depleted for directing traffic at three in the morning.” Jim looked at Kyle and indicated the door. Kyle nodded and went to check.

“He’s gone.”

“Good.” Jim moved from behind his desk to sit on the corner of it. “Okay, where the hell is that medallion?”

Hanson shrugged. “It was there, Sheriff. I bagged it myself.”

Kyle searched the list of information. “No one had access to physical evidence outside of forensics, and it was back in the file. Forensics hadn’t had a chance to look at it.”

Jim rubbed his face. “That prick Burns is going to use this as a reason to have this case turned over to him. I wouldn’t be surprised if he pocketed it himself to give them the opportunity. The girl has just vanished. No one saw anything. Last known sightings were by the medical personnel at County and Michael Guerin . Needless to say, Guerin pretty much wiped his hands of her as fast as he could.”

Hanson checked his notes. “I checked with hospital personnel. The orderly personally saw Guerin out the locked security door. He was seen heading for his car, and the only way for him to get back in to get the girl would have been through the main ER entrance. He came to the PD directly as far as we can tell.”

“I was with him in the parking lot. There was no one in his car from what I could see, and other than his usual stand-offish manners and personality he didn’t appear to be in any hurry to leave. He stopped for groceries and to replace the medical supplies he used on the girl.” Kyle said.

“Maria DeLuca.” Jim Valenti smiled. “Amy DeLuca’s daughter. You probably don’t remember, Kyle, but you went to school with her through second grade, and then Amy took her and moved away after Jon DeLuca walked.”

“You knew her?” Kyle asked.

“I remember Maria as an incredibly brilliant young girl, a little pixie with an engaging smile and talking a mile a minute. Amy DeLuca I remember even better. I arrested her a few times when she was a teenager and a young adult. She was quite the moral crusader, highly opinionated and loud.” Jim’s eyes clouded over. “I don’t like to think of any young woman lost in my terri tory.”

“I already tried to pick up her trail.” Kyle said. “The credit card companies are unwilling to release information, but Judge Reynolds is pushing a court order for both that and her cell phone numbers for people she might have called in this area. I don’t expect anything until tomorrow or the next day at the earliest.”

Jim nodded. “And you, Hanson? How're your leads going?”

“About the same. I tracked down Amy DeLuca. She was very upset to hear of her daughter’s accident, and that she's missing. As far as she knew, Maria DeLuca was in Colorado to paint. Amy DeLuca called the resort where Maria was supposed to be staying and she missed her check-in by two days, so whatever she was doing here, she wasn’t staying long. The mother claims she has no enemies, and there is no reason that the FBI would be wanting to talk to her daughter. Actually the mother was very emphatic about that point.”

“She would be.” Jim smiled at the thought of the very precise and opinionated Amy DeLuca. Wonder if in all those years, eighteen to be precise, she was still the same bull terri er. “Okay, get back to work, and keep me apprised of anything new.”

Kyle paused. “Dad, I don’t trust Burns.”

Hanson had to agree. “Same. He’s off. Like he knows something and he’s not saying.”

Jim nodded. He was a strong man with years of experience beyond his two deputies. Hanson was a good man, but he’d never be anything more than Deputy. He had no real ambition to be anything more. All he needed was to finish a few core classes and take a special exam, but to date he remained happy where he was. So Kyle, who was younger by almost seven years, was more qualified to become the next Sheriff when Jim retired. But both men were good investigators, and good friends. And their instincts were telling them what Jim already suspected. Special Agent Burns was a loose cannon. A big unknown.

“Someone bring in Guerin tomorrow. I want to question him personally.” Kyle nodded. He’d get Michael. Hanson had enough problems with the streetlight dilemma.

~~~

Liz watched Max from where she sat on the bed painting her toenails. He had called Michael three times, but only got the answering machine.

“Just leave a message, Max.”

Max nodded. Looking at the clock, he realized he needed to get going. Stopping at ‘home’ during lunch was a dangerous pull on his work schedule. He and Liz usually ended up in bed, and then they sat and talked about how to shock his mother and Isabel into picking up the pace of their wedding plans. That made his half hour lunch stretch into over an hour, and Liz needed to get back downstairs to the Crashdown. Lunch was a busy hour.

Max picked up the phone again and left the message, “Michael, Max. Since you’re either home and ignoring the phone, or off somewhere, just a reminder that tomorrow, 10 a.m., you have a tux fitting. I promised my mom that you’d be there. She said that if you missed this one, she would find you herself. Forewarned, brother.”

Liz giggled. “That should get even Michael there.”

“I hope so. I didn’t just say it for blackmail. Mother really plans to track him down, probably armed with a homemade frittata or pie.”

Liz suddenly looked alarmed. “As long as it’s not her fruitcake.”

Max laughed. His mother’s cooking was notoriously bad. She haunted women’s magazines, such as Better Homes and Gardens trying all the recipes found inside, much to the dismay of her family and friends.

Liz joined in the laughter and quipped, “She’d terrorize all her grandchildren with those horrible jello things made to resemble fruit rollups.” Liz suddenly heard what she said, and stopped laughing abruptly, hoping it hadn’t registered with Max.

It had.

Grandchildren. Diane Evans would never have any.

Children were completely taboo for the podsters.

Max sat on the bed next to Liz where she was trying to finish getting dressed. Her dark head was bent, and she was refusing to look at him. They had discussed it too many times already. No children. Never. It was the first thing Max made clear when they got engaged.

“Liz, baby, listen...”

Liz never let him finish. She stood up abruptly, smiling overly bright and perky, but the smile never touched her eyes. She leaned down and kissed him. Max respected her need and want not to discuss it. Not now.

“I should feed you. You’re late.”

Max moved close to her, kissing her again, and in a low voice he whispered to her. “I thought you just did.”

Liz laughed at that and hugged him hard. Max. He was all she wanted. If it meant giving up things like children to be with him, then that was a choice she had to make. He was everything. Love. He was love. She hadn’t felt that for so long, not since her dad died.
~~~

Michael felt her eyes on him long before he bothered to look up. She was lying there watching him, watching him read and write, watching soundlessly with her eyes losing awareness as she seemed to drift off to some unknown world and then come back and watch him some more. She was quiet, almost too quiet. It offended him. Her voice had a golden tone, rich and alive. It was a voice that was meant to be spoken.

“You hungry?”

Maria shook her head no. She looked at the low-playing TV and then back to him. Michael went back to work, but he could still feel her eyes just watching him, searching his face almost like a touch. He looked up again.

“What are you doing, Michael?” She asked softly. “It’s Michael, right? Not Mike or Mikey, or anything else? Just Michael?”

“Yeah, just Michael.”

“It suits you.”

Michael frowned at that. No one had ever said that before. In college people had tried to call him Mike. This one girl Courtney, who was the campus sleep-around girl, called him Mikey G. He found it easy to avoid and ignore her. She was shifty-eyed with a slant, like she was searching for something. He suspected a disease, at the very least full-blown clap and at the most HIV. He hated the damn name Mikey. Hank used to call him that. That and other things. It shortened him, made him less, like his longer name wasn’t worthy of him. He only deserved a shortened name to denote his significance, or lack thereof. He clung to his given longer name. It was the only thing of worth ever given to him.

He must have been silent for too long, so she asked again, “So what are you doing?”

“Working.”

Maria tried to sit up from where she was lodged. She had slipped down while sleeping. Michael quickly went to help her, lifting her up. Her skin was hot and dry. He frowned. She had a fever, he was sure.

“I’ll be right back.”

Michael quickly went upstairs to the kitchen and filled a carafe with ice water, taking out two Diet Peach Snapples, and nuking her a small cup of chicken soup with a slice of fresh bread. She was going to eat if he had to force it down her throat. He went upstairs to the bathroom in his room and found the bottle of Tylenol. This was the first day he hadn’t used any for the daily headache he had started to get. Today, no headache. Who knew? He took out two Tylenol for her, and went downstairs to get the tray.

“Hi. I thought you ran away.”

Michael just snorted. His home. His place. He lived here. No more running from this place. It was his.

“Here, take these. They'll give you a little pain relief and help that fever I think you have.”

“Fever? Strange, I feel cold.”

“I'll build a fire after you finish this.” He had things he needed to burn anyway, the hospital gown and the used gauze from her hands. No trail. No mistakes.

Maria drank the water as if she was dying of thirst, but the soup she looked at skeptically. It was good, she knew that because she already tasted it before. But her stomach was strangely empty and nervous of the thought of food. No appetite. Maybe she was a bulimic? Oh just lovely. A chow-blowing mummy-handed freak with amnesia. Bet she got lots of dates.

“I’m not hungry.”

“Too bad. You’re eating.”

“Michael...”

“Maria.” They stared at each other, neither willing to back down.

“I’ll vomit. I kid you not.”

“I’ll get a bucket.”

Maria started to laugh. That sparked a memory. Monty Python. A movie. Bring me a bucket. “Why is this so important right now? Can’t I eat later?”

“No. You only ate a few bites of egg and a little toast for breakfast. You can’t heal and get strong on nothing. Your body needs help.” Michael went in for the jugular, the Achilles’ heel. “Once you’re strong enough we start looking for you and your people. Where you belong.”

“Looking?”

Michael nodded, spooning up some soup and holding it out for her to eat. “Lucky for you, that’s what I do. I investigate things.”

Maria swallowed with an effort. It was still good, but it felt funny in her stomach. She continued to eat anyway. “You’re an investigator? Like the FBI guy?”

Michael just grimaced. “Hardly. I’m a freelance writer, so I spend a lot of time investigating my subjects. No one wants to feel like an idiot when they go and do interviews, and stuff.”

“So I’m going to be your subject?” Maria looked at him critically. “Hmm, lots of leg work needed there, Mr. Michael. All those daffy chicks in the world named Maria.”

“DeLuca. Your name is Maria DeLuca.”

DeLuca. She ran it around her tongue and in her mind. Nothing. A void. It meant nothing to her. He knew her name. What else did he know?

“It doesn’t sound familiar to me. What else do you know? Why didn’t you tell me before?”

Michael just shrugged. “You were hardly in a condition for twenty questions in ‘What’s my Line.’ Plus,” Michael looked at her critically. Her cheeks were redder, but he didn’t think it was from exertion as much as fever. “I don’t know much about amnesia. It’s such a soap opera sort of thing, or a plot in cheap romance novels. From what I understand amnesia is unusual, especially complete amnesia. Most people with amnesia only lose a piece of their lives around an incident or an event like a trauma. It doesn’t have to be the result of a physical blow, but can be something mental.”

“You think I’m a headcase?”

“That seems understood.” Michael actually smiled when her mouth opened to retaliate. “But, I’m just saying I don’t know why you can only remember your first name and nothing more. I don’t know if it’s better to let you remember on your own, or force the issue. So I was practicing caution.”

Maria calmed down. Fine. His intentions weren’t too slanted. “So you’re not just keeping me here in the dark for your own nefarious needs?”

Michael actually laughed a real laugh at that. He loved that word. Nefarious. It was like reading an old comic book with evil villains and sweet virginal heroines.

“No. I thought I would fuck you later, once you didn’t look like a train wreck.”

“Good to know.” Maria looked like she was really thinking about the fucking part. “I suggest that you wait until I’m almost out your door, or…” She sat up a little real close to him, “...you might find I’m more dangerous than you know. I might trap you in my web, and you’ll never be free of me.”

“I've thought about that.” Michael looked down at her lips so close to his. “I figure you could consider it a ‘thank you’ fuck on your way out to reclaim your life.”

“Once we find what and where my life is?” Michael nodded. “Deal, Mr. Guerin . One long hard ‘thank you fuck’.”

Michael smiled at her tone. Like she was marking it down in a busy calendar. “No worries that there's someone out there you should be faithful to, like maybe a husband, boyfriend, or fiancée?”

“More than likely a lesbian love. Don’t worry. I’ll see if she's willing to let you in for a nice threesome.”

“Epic! Something to look forward to.”

Maria settled back, tired. He tried to force another spoonful of soup on her, but she had had enough. Michael gave up on the soup, but had her work on the Diet Peach Snapple. He really needed to buy some straws. She needed calories, so he’d have to see about getting Regular Snapple next time he was out and about.

They heard the phone ring upstairs. Michael hated his hockey games and other sports to be interrupted, so he had never put an extension downstairs in his game room.

“Phone.” Michael frowned at how she stiffened.

“I hear. The machine will pick it up.”

“It could be important.”

Michael just snorted and gathered the tray to take back upstairs, leaving the carafe of ice water and a glass on the end table. More than likely more important to the caller than to him.

“So what story are you working on now?”

Michael looked at her. “A story about the remaining virgin Pine Stands in the Northern U.S. and Canada.”

“I can see you as a writer. But maybe something not so people oriented. Interviews? I bet you hate them.”

Michael didn’t comment. She sure nailed that one. The most hated part of his job was having to interview people, making them trust him and tell him what he needed to know. It was a chore, and one he didn’t like.

“I can see you as a novelist in your house in the woods writing some tale of darkness, some tale of living that sends young readers to the brink of suicide, and older readers to despair re-evaluating their lives.”

“Oh yes, the classical writer who looks into their psyche and find everything for anyone who cares to read.”

Maria laughed at that and the expression on his face. And then it changed. Suddenly a flash of seriousness altered his looks.

“I’ve been writing a book since I was thirteen. The year I really started to speak.”

Maria bit back a smart remark, and asked softly, “So how’s it going?”

“Chapter one. Eternally chapter one. I’ve rewritten it a million times. And I can’t seem to get beyond that chapter.” Michael had said this more to himself than to her. He thought it a thousand times, but this was the first time he had ever said it aloud, much less to another person.

“You didn’t speak until you were thirteen?”

Michael shrugged. “Not much. I had nothing to say.”

That was the year that Hank almost beaten him to death. He spent three days bruised and bloody, hiding in a closet with a flashlight. He found an old box of books left by someone not Hank. He found James Joyce’s > Ulysses. He read it in that closet as he felt himself dying, and somehow the words gave him something. A will to survive. He found comfort in those words, a comfort that replaced all the nurturing he never had. In the starkness of the print there was an honesty, a sense of someone like him.

“So you wrote it.”

“I tried.” Regrets. Great and small. The words that saved his life were trapped inside him, screaming to get out, and for some reason he couldn’t find the outlet to set them free. To set himself free.

“I wonder what I am?”

Michael pulled himself back from his own thoughts. They were the vortex of darkness that pulled him into the despair.

“You’re a artist. A painter I think.”

Maria looked down at her mangled hands. She could barely feel anything in her right hand except pain. A painter. Her eyes filled with tears. She couldn’t hold a spoon to feed herself. Run, run, and run some more.

“Not anymore.”

Michael looked down at her hands. Max. Max could fix her. Max could fix her life. He couldn’t. He wasn’t good enough. He only knew how to destroy.

Self pity was a terri ble thing. Maria didn’t know who she was, but it didn’t settle well with her. It pained. The weakness. The fear. The feeling of the void. It was like a monster that sucked the very warmth from the bones. No more.

“May I read it?”

Michael looked at her confused. What?

“Your first chapter? I’m obviously not a critic or anything, but maybe I can help you move on to chapter two?”

No one even knew he was trying to write a novel. He doubted even Max or Isabel had ever read more than a few of his articles. Strangers were more aware of him than his own family. It was befitting that this stranger saw more of him than those who knew him his whole life.

“If you promise me one thing.”

“Never to tell?”

Michael smirked. “Okay two things. That, and to give me an honest opinion. I don’t mean about grammar and crap. That’s the work of a good editor. Any person can learn good grammar, or how to correctly string words together, but that doesn’t make them a writer. I mean the story. The intent.”

Maria nodded.

Michael went to get it. The chapter.

Michael settled Maria on the sofa, and made sure she could turn the pages. He took the tray back upstairs, and searched for something to cook. Meat. She needed protein. He took out a roast to thaw. He quickly cut up large chunks of vegetables and coated them in olive oil and a few fresh herbs and with a little parsley. He covered them and put them back in the refrigerator. They didn’t need to be added to the roast until the last half hour.

Michael made some coffee, and on his way back downstairs, he listened to his answering machine.

You have three messages….Thursday, 4:13pm…Michael, this is Sam. Did you think about the next assignment? I have another one as well, so you can have your choice, or even both. I expressed mailed it to your PO Box. So be a mean son-of-a-bitch and go terrorize the Postal Service woman to get your mail. Later….

Friday, 10:10am…Michael, Isabel. I met this great person today. Name is Jennifer. She came in looking for legal advice. I think you should let me set you up to meet her. It could be fun!

Michael reached out and hit a button.

Message deleted.

Friday, 1:23 pm… Michael, Max. Since you’re either home and ignoring the phone, or off somewhere, just a reminder that tomorrow, 10 a.m., you have a tux fitting. I promised my mom that you’d be there. She said that if you missed this one, she would find you herself. Forewarned, brother.

Dammit! Mrs. Evans at his home. On his doorstep. He didn’t even have mail delivered here. He didn’t like uninvited company on his property. But Mrs. Evans? Well, that thought just made his blood run cold. He could read her too well. She was a nice caring woman, who loved her children, but in all the years he hung around her house she was nice enough, but looked at him disapproving. Not good enough.

Michael decided that he needed to yank his phone from the wall and end his service. That damn thing never brought anything but bad news. Taking the coffee downstairs and a small bag full of things he needed to burn, he set the coffee down on a low table and went to build a fire in the fireplace. Maria was still reading, occasionally pausing to struggle with the turning of a page.

Michael took his seat again with a cup of hot coffee and went back to work, his mind half on what he was doing, the other half being divided between Maria and the terror of Mrs. Evans. He’d rather let some queer tuxfitter push pins into his body than have to confront Mrs. Evans.

Maria turned the last page and tried to neaten the small pile of papers of the manuscript. Well? He couldn’t say it. He couldn’t ask. She calmly lifted her eyes and met his.

“It’s crap.”

Michael got up and took the chapter from her hands and calmly walked over to the fireplace and tossed twelve years of anguish into the fiery inferno with her hospital gown and the bloodied gauze. Stirring the fire, he replaced the screen. Pouring a cup of coffee, he sat down next to her and helped her drink it.

“Good. It's good that you burned it. It was time to get it out of your life.” Maria nodded at the yellow legal pad he was using to make notes on as he read. “Now take a clean sheet of paper and write that novel you were born to write.”

Michael just stared at her. “You said it was crap.”

“No. You did. You said it in every word. Every line. I could see James Joyce, some Hemingway, Steinbeck, and so many others. Vonnegut. The only person I didn’t see was Guerin .”

“Explain.”

“Art has only one real audience. The artist. The writer. The poet. Art stops being art when it caters to an audience. Then it’s pop culture. A genre of form. You dig inside, deep, wrestle with words that will bleed your audience. You make them feel the pain of your characters, but it’s just a show. A guise. You can make them bleed with a baseball bat as well, or create a story so full of suffering that even the reader can’t finish it. Then you sold a series of words placed in well-thoughtout spaces, and years later the reader doesn’t remember a single phrase, just the pain. And that memory is enough to convince them they read something stark and true. Smoke and Mirrors.”

“And my chapter?”

“Was the same. The quest for that beautiful expression, the same beautiful expressions that made you feel alive as a child. Made you actually feel something, like someone understood what it was like to be you. The simplest of phrase that suddenly spoke the world in so few characters.”

“I thought you weren’t a critic.”

“I’m not. But I think I remember being an artist. The art of expression is your gift. Inside you lives a writer who wants his own voice. You’ve given him Vonnegut, Steinbeck, and Joyce, but you never let him have his own voice, his own expression, because you were afraid it wouldn’t be perfect. It wouldn’t be accepted by the critics and those who read so much they think they understand what is good. There is no good. There is just the story, the voice, and the writer.”

“I don’t know if I can.”

“Don’t tell me that you’re a writer. Don’t ask me how to become one. If you wake up every day and the only thing that you want to do is put words to paper, and that want is so strong, then you’re already a writer. Just close your eyes, and don’t be afraid of what you’ll see on that once blank piece of paper when you wake up. Don’t be afraid. Words hurt, but they can set you free.”

Michael wrote on his yellow legal pad late into the night. He didn’t stop, except to put in the roast and feed Maria. She was strangely silent. He would look up to find her asleep or just quietly watching TV. Occasionally he would see her staring at her hands.

All prisons started with boundaries. Four walls, a ceiling and a floor. The door was a taunt. A dare to leave, and courage was the most fleeting thing. He couldn’t remember hearing his voice in the last five years…

Finally he put the paper away and picked her up. The fire had died hours ago, and the TV channel had turned over to late night infomercials. Turning it off, he carried her upstairs to bed. Lying with her in the dark, his mind was still filled with the words, but they were no longer screaming at him. They were just running like children playing in the park in the sun. They'd keep for the next day. Haunted. She was right. He had spent twelve years haunted by a voice he was afraid of. His own voice.

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