Well, at least he was open about it.
She felt the frown line forming between her eyebrows. “I hope you’re not the kind of man to be unduly influenced by appearances.”
He smiled directly at her frown. “I think you’d be safe in assuming I’m not.”
He had an inviting, disarming smile—the kind that made one instinctively trust him. Kay did not allow herself to succumb to any such instinct. She rested her hands on her desk and launched into the well-rehearsed litany of her professional credits.
“I’ve been a practicing attorney for six years, the last five at this firm. I was made a full partner fifteen months ago. Mr. Justice told me that your case involves an unusual civil matter. I’ve handled many civil matters for this firm, some of which have been most unusual. I’ve gone to trial on thirty cases and won twenty-nine.”
“Adam mentioned you had an impressive trial record.”
Kay’s forward momentum immediately swerved to this interesting side road. “Adam? I didn’t realize you were on a first-name basis with our firm’s senior partner. How do you know Adam?”
“We met a few years back.”
“Where?”
“Around.”
“You’re friends?”
“We know each other.”
His sentence dropped into a definite and deliberate period. Kay’s brief hope of finding out something more personal about Adam Justice took a nosedive. It seemed Dr. Damian Steele was as good at playing mysterious as her firm’s senior partner. Yes, that impenetrable glint in those deep green eyes was undoubtedly a warning—this was a man who kept secrets and kept them well.
“I’m glad Adam told you about my trial record. However, he may not have mentioned that I’ve also negotiated equitable settlements on as many cases that never went to tri—”
“I’m not interested in settling.”
The easy smile had quickly left Damian Steele’s face. His smooth, deep voice had developed a rough, sharp edge. There was a menacing feel to the glint that now flashed in his eyes. And that’s when Kay knew that, charming smile and civilized dress notwithstanding, this man could be dangerous. A half chill, half thrill shot up her spine.
“All right, Dr. Steele, I hear you. You don’t want to settle your case.”
“Damian, remember?”
The smile was suddenly back, as charming as ever.
“Of course, Damian,” she repeated casually. But the sound of his first name passing between her lips set off a warm hum inside her mouth that made her curiously self-conscious.
There was certainly an intriguing mercurial quality to Dr. Damian Steele—open and thoroughly enticing one instant, mysteriously closed and darkly dangerous the next.
Kay cleared her throat and gave herself a moment to whisk away her strangely contrasting and singularly unsettling reactions to this man. She steadied her hands on her desk as she determinedly brought her attention back to the issue at hand.
“Why don’t you tell me about your situation? From the beginning, if you please.”
He watched her a long moment before leaning back in his chair. Despite his initial surprise at her appearance, he wasn’t running for the door. Yet. She followed his lead and relaxed in her chair.
“I’m a psychologist in private practice. Five and a half years ago, a man named Lee Nye came to me plagued by troubling blackouts. In the course of my therapy with Lee, I discovered that living inside him, he had another separate and distinct personality named Roy.”
Kay instantly shot forward in her chair. “You mean he’s one of those multiple-personality people?”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t he just tell you that?”
“He didn’t know. Neither of his personalities was aware of the other.”
Kay leaned back again, taking a moment to consider his words. Multiple personalities were the latest of the legal hot spots. She’d followed several recent cases with interest.
In those cases, defendants with the disorder claimed that since only one of their multiple personalities committed a crime, their other personalities were blameless and shouldn’t be punished. It had become a very sticky legal issue, no doubt about it.
Kay believed that most of these defendants were only doing what defendants had done since the beginning of the trial-by-jury system—latching on to the newest legal loophole that would allow them to get out of taking responsibility for their actions.
She carefully kept the cynicism out of her tone.
“I confess I know very little about this condition. How is it possible for a man to possess two personalities inside him and not know it?”
Damian Steele had been watching her intently with that open face and those secretive eyes. She knew it was impossible, but she had the uncanny feeling that he had been reading her thoughts as easily as a highway sign warning of a divided road ahead.
He raised his hands off the arms of his chair and slowly brought them together. His fingers moved as though to interlace, but instead butted up against one another.
“The two Nye personalities had been living separate mental lives and saw themselves as separate identities. When each personality started to seek control over the consciousness, their identities began to clash.”
She leaned forward slightly. “You describe these personalities as having separate identities. Is this multiple-personality phenomenon an intense, extended form of role playing? Like an actor throwing himself into a part so thoroughly, he forgets he’s acting?”
“No, Kay. There is no conscious intent to role-play. The divergent and distinct personalities are absolutely real to that person. That’s why a clash resulted when these two both sought control over the consciousness.”
“How were these personalities able to coexist before without a clash?”
“Lee—the personality I treated—had been submerged for many years while Roy held control over the consciousness. Then Lee began to lay claim to the consciousness approximately six years ago. Lee’s emergence caused each of the separate personalities to experience memory blackouts during the time the other took control. After one of these blackouts, Lee would suddenly come to awareness and find himself in a place he didn’t recognize, with people he didn’t know and with absolutely no memory of the intervening hours, days or maybe even longer periods of time.”
“A kind of recurring amnesia.”
“Yes.”
“And you say the clash between the two personalities began about six years ago because this Lee personality that was subordinated started to come out?”
“Yes.”
“Why
