Cast a Pale Shadow (29 page)

"Oh, I almost forgot! I brought you some candy, some of those wonderful sorbets from Crown's. I wanted to bring Mavrako's Chocolate but I was afraid that would be too naughty. Sour balls couldn't hurt anybody, could they? I know how awful this hospital food can be. These should kill the taste." She reached into the large purse she had slung over her shoulder and pulled out a white paper sack that she plunked into Cole's lap like a bag of gold nuggets. "And, oh well, I couldn't resist. Easter candy was half price. So I got you a dark chocolate bunny. Dark because it's got more vitamins and less sugar. But just a tiny bunny. Promise me you'll only nibble the ears first until you see if it agrees with you."

Cole nodded dumbly as she delivered the chocolate bunny into his hand.

"Now, if no one objects, I'm going to take this poor child home and tuck her in bed and make her stay there for at least twenty-four hours." She turned to shake a finger at Cole. "And you, you take advantage of that time to get well enough to come home. Everybody misses you but I told them they all couldn't come in here to visit. Hospitals are for recuperating, not socializing. Are you ready, Trissa, dear?"

"Yes, Augusta. Dr. Fitapaldi, will you come by this evening? I need to talk."

"I will."

"Come for dinner, Doctor," added Augusta. "About six-thirty?"

"Thank you. I believe I shall."

"Good night, Nicholas." Trissa hesitated, one arm half in her jacket sleeve. Then she dropped the jacket to the floor where she stood and walked lightly and swiftly toward Cole. He read her intent but expected no more than a peck and primed himself to receive it.

Trissa had more ambitious plans. She leaned over bracing her hands on the pillow on either side of his head, trapping him as effectively as the collar he wore around his neck. She made a slow circle of tiny kisses on his face, zeroing in on her mark. Cole's fingers flexed open and shut on the bed, poised either to push her away or delve into her hair and stroke down the back of her neck.

When the true kiss began, a muffled grumble of surprise or protest escaped from him but was quickly lost in his effort to continue breathing steadily. But not even Cole's thick, tested, glacial wall of indifference could withstand the sweet, melting onslaught of this girl's determined kiss. His hands did reach up and hold her at last, if only for dear life. When she finally pulled away with a heartfelt sigh, he felt swamped in a befuddled mix of wonder, desire, and dismay.

Suddenly, inexplicably shy and pink to the tips of her ears, Trissa glanced at her forgotten audience and stepped back to take the jacket Augusta held out to her. "Um, I'm sorry, Cole. It's just that I learned to kiss from a very good teacher, and I don't think he'd be happy if I let my skills lapse for want of practice." She flashed a winsome smile that held more than a trace of saucy mischief and was gone.

"Amazing," Fitapaldi said. "I have to admire her resiliency."

"A human roller coaster," muttered Cole, gingerly easing himself to the edge of the bed.

"Should you be getting up?"

"I have to. I feel like I've hit a brick wall."

"I think you have. There will be no budging that girl now that she's made up her mind."

"We'll see."

Fitapaldi lent a shoulder while Cole boosted himself to his feet and took a few shuffling steps across the floor. Using a chair and the windowsill to support himself, he looked out at the blank, blue sky. "I don't remember any of it. I don't remember her. I don't remember her father. Hell, I don't even know what city I'm in."

"St. Louis."

"Yeah, that's right. That's what the police said. Jesus Christ, the police. Duncan's son also rises. It's what I always feared. Should we plead insanity and get it over with? It should be easy enough to prove."

"You are assuming that you killed him. I don't think you did."

"Yes, Dr. Jeckyl may not have, but what about Mr. Hyde?"

"Do you really think that's how it is? You have a good side and an evil side and no conscience that bridges both?"

"I don't know."

"Would that girl have fallen in love with Mr. Hyde?"

Cole pressed his forehead against the cool windowpane. "I don't know. I don't know."

"I know. She would not have. There is no Mr. Hyde in you."

"Does she love him?" he asked, in a low, flat voice, devoid of emotion.

"Do you doubt it? She kissed you like that and you doubt it?"

"I have nothing for her."

"What do you think she expects from you? She wants to love you. That is all. Let her."

Cole's whole body sagged. "I can't." He slumped against the windowsill and Fitapaldi assisted him back to the bed. "There is a lesson in all of this, if you care to note it."

"What is that lesson, Cole?"

"Above all else, a man must strive to cast a pale shadow. Otherwise the shadow takes over. Tell me, Doctor, am I the shadow now, or is he?" He smiled grimly when he saw that Fitapaldi had no answer. "How did you track me down here? We did not exactly part with promises to stay in touch."

"You called me an ambulance chaser, I believe," Fitapaldi chuckled. "It's been a long, hard chase, but I finally caught up with you."

"How long?"

"Eight months. But you're wrong. You have kept in touch. And not all of your messages have been as cryptic as the last one." He withdrew a folded envelope from his pocket and handed it to Cole.

Cole examined the envelope turning it over in his hand. It was a prop from a dream he only foggily remembered. To see it and hold it filled him with dread. "It's my handwriting."

He opened it slowly, afraid of its contents, and what he read seemed to confirm his fear. "'I am not certain how long it has been since I've seen him. Maybe he is dead. Maybe I am. The day has grown so dark that I can barely see. Cole Baker'"

"Maybe you should hold on to this for the trial, Doctor. Tangible proof of insanity. What does it mean? 'Maybe he is dead. Maybe I am.' Or does raving have to mean anything?" Cole carefully refolded the letter and put it back in its envelope. "I don't even remember sending it. Except in a dream."

"You judge yourself too harshly. They are merely the words of a man trying to reach out from the darkness into the only light he remembers. You must have written it when your waking self still functioned as Nicholas."

"My waking self? What an innocuous way of putting it, Doctor. Aren't you glossing over the facts here? The fact that I have no recollection of half of my life, the fact that I can wake, eat, sleep, breathe, and perform any and every type of depraved act then conveniently wash the slate clean by forgetting all of it?"

"I have seen no evidence of depraved acts, Cole. Was one of those depraved acts saving a young woman's life? Not once but possibly twice?"

"What do you mean?"

"Trissa. You are kindred spirits, it seems. Her background is different only in degree from yours. From the bits of the story she has given me and those I got from a counselor who spoke with her here, you -- or rather, the evil Nicholas -- rescued that girl from a suicide attempt after her father had--"

"No. I don't want to hear it."

"Why not? This letter you wrote to me, from out of the grip of your Mr. Hyde, is postmarked the day after she was admitted to this hospital suffering from injuries caused by that attempt. And a few days ago, as far as we can judge, Nicholas struck again. You went in that girl's place to meet her father despite threats to your own life and you were beaten to near death for your trouble."

With some effort, Cole pulled his legs up from the floor and pushed himself back in the bed. His arm flung over his eyes to shield them, he shut himself away from Fitapaldi and any version of the truth that contradicted his own. "And maybe killed her father in the process. I'm very tired, Doctor. Could you crank down my bed and turn out the light as you leave?"

"Very well, Cole, I will leave you for now." Fitapaldi shoved his hands in his pockets. "But I'll be back. And so will she. You're almost in sight of life now, Cole. You can't cast yourself adrift from it forever. I won't let you. And neither will she."

"We'll see," was all Cole would say.

Chapter Seventeen

After a cordial dinner with Augusta and her housemates, Dr. Fitapaldi met with Trissa in the small, but charming second floor solarium. Her face felt puffy with sleep and her eyes still bleary from the time she had spent crying since he had last seen her. Still, she managed a welcoming smile, and when he stood and extended a hand to her, she tamed all but the slightest tremble in her grasp as he drew her in for a comforting hug.

When they settled in two armchairs on either side of a tea table Augusta had loaded with cake, sliced fruit, and chocolate mints, Fitapaldi took up the snifter of brandy Augusta had brought him and Trissa sipped a cup of tea.

"What must I do, Doctor?"

"It will be a long road. And I must admit, though it may seem cold to call it so, that your father's murder is an intrusive complication."

"It was never my father's way to make things easier for me. I could not expect him to change even in death."

"Then you do not blame Cole?"

She leaned forward to set her cup emphatically on the table. "Even if he did it, it would be a matter for rejoicing, not blame. Do you think me heartless?"

"Never heartless. Not after the heart you have shown me since I arrived. Your feelings toward your father are understandable."

"When I heard he was dead, it made me so lightheaded I fainted. I think it was the sudden lifting of the fear I've carried with me for so long. These tears of mine that never seem to dry -- not one of them is for my father. Not one."

"You mourn the loss of Nicholas. That's the source of your tears."

"Yes, but he's not gone so far away. Sometimes I think I see him just beyond the shadows in his eyes. And when he held me..." She hugged herself with the memory.

"He is there, Trissa. Cole and Nicholas are the same. What he must do is somehow find peace with that truth, to find a way to live with all his memories. You can help him do that."

"How? All I know how to do is to love him."

"In the end, that love will mean more than anything I or anybody can do. I would like to stay and help for a while, if you will consent. I don't know that Cole will agree. He has avoided my help in the past."

"It would give me such hope if you stayed. But...but I have no money to pay you."

"What help I can give would be small reparation for the damage my profession has done Cole." He grinned and swirled the brandy in the glass before taking one last sip. "Officially, let us say I am on vacation. Augusta has already graciously offered to provide for my accommodations."

*****

If Cole didn't know better, he could blame his throbbing headache on his injuries. It did seem to have its root behind his ear where, since the removal of the cervical collar, he could see the bruise was blackest. From there, it radiated across the back of his skull reaching down his spine to clutch at his stomach.

And yet, when the nurse arrived to ask with chirpy enthusiasm, "How are we doing this morning, Mr. Brewer? Any pain?" he had said no and sent her on her way without wielding her pain-deadening magic wand. He wanted nothing deadened. He wanted no surrendering of control to drugs, or sleep, or anything else. He welcomed the pain.

Better than breathing to let you know you're alive, he'd told the girl. Better than breathing and as familiar as an old pair of sneakers. He did not need a beating to introduce him to pain. It was an old friend, an old foul-weather friend who'd come creeping back when he'd awakened in the gray light of morning, alone.

Of course, he preferred to be alone, always had. He reminded himself of that when the girl wasn't there to smile her sad smile, to gaze at him with what might have been love, for all he knew of it, shining in her round, blue eyes, to brush her lips against his with a good morning, I love you, Nicholas kiss. It was best, he thought sternly, that the girl was not here, for Nicholas was not either, and there was no one at all to love. The party was over, all the guests gone home. Once again, Cole was left to sweep out the debris.

By ten o'clock, when she had not come and had not called and the pain had begun clanging the Anvil Chorus on his skull, he remembered how connections were such a nuisance and better cut cleanly and without delay. There would be a difficult week or two as he scraped away the barnacles Nicholas always let collect, but soon, he would be clear of all of it, the girl and everything.

He couldn't think how this might hurt her, better this small hurt now. She was young. She would heal. Or would she? Fitapaldi's words rasped against the clatter in his brain, "You are kindred spirits, it seems. Her background is different only in degree from yours."

No, he did not want to hear that. He did not want to know that. He danced on a thin wire strung high above the abyss. He had balance for no one else. There was no one else.

"Brewer." The name barked out by the huge and surly looking doctor who filled the doorway, served as greeting and address. Unable to see his nametag, Cole was forced to simply nod and frown in return, which the doctor took as permission to enter.

"A hand grenade. I've been thinking of it all night and a hand grenade is the precisely right description for you. A hand grenade in that spit of time between the removal of the pin and the throwing and the blast. That's the borrowed time I figure you've got."

"As long as that? Whole lives can be lived in that instant," Cole said sullenly. This was the part he hated most, sorting out and disposing of the friends Nicholas had accumulated. Most times, he could avoid them all together, just leave town without a trace. But he was trapped this time. He had to be able to walk out.

"You should know. You're either incredibly lucky or the fates are trying to prove by you that only the good die young. Just do us a favor and see that Trissa is well out of the way when you really do blow." He was close enough now so that Cole could read his tag, Dr. Bryant Edmonds.