reaction, he continued.
The next envelope, the last, bore a name. His name, written in a hand he knew. For one stunned moment he thought it was a cruel hoax. Next he questioned how it could be. When he drew out two sheets of paper, he knew it wasn’t. The first was newspaper. The second a plain, white sheet torn raggedly from a tablet. One line was written across the sheet in the same familiar hand.
His own hand shaking, for longer than he knew, Jefferson stared down at it, tracing each letter, each word, with his startled gaze. Catching an unsteady breath, an unforgettable fragrance filling his lungs, touching his heart, he read the written words out loud. His own words, spoken just once, long ago.
If ever you need me…
A promise made. A promise to keep. But how?
The answer lay in the second sheet. A month-old newspaper article. “‘The search for the plane of Paulo Rei has been terminated,’” he read, then read again. “‘On board were Señor Rei, his wife, the former Marissa Claire Alexandre, and her parents.’”
There was more, a detailed description of the Reis and their lives. But Jefferson’s voice stumbled to a halt. Papers fluttered to the floor. As his gaze lifted to the portrait over the mantel, he recited the only line that mattered in a lifeless voice, “‘It has been determined there could be no survivors.’”
No survivors. The words were a cry in his mind. Words that made no sense. Trying to find sanity in it, he read his own words again. A promise only Marissa would know.
But a part of him couldn’t comprehend or separate truth from fiction. Was it a charade? A ghoulish trick? Or was it real?
If it was real, why was it assumed Marissa had been on the plane? If it wasn’t she who had sent the letter, then who?
His thoughts were a whirligig, going ’round and ’round, always ending in the same place, the same thought, the same denial. No one but Marissa could have sent the letter. It had to be. It must be. For, if she hadn’t, it would mean she was dead.
“No!” Jefferson refused to believe. “I would know. The world wouldn’t feel right without Marissa.”
But how could he be sure? How could he know he wasn’t persuading himself to believe what he needed to believe?
“Satan!” The name was spoken without thought or conscious volition. But as he heard it, Jefferson knew it was the way. Rigid as stone, the dog had watched. Now he came to attention, awaiting the command that always followed his name spoken in that tone. Jefferson smiled, a humorless tilt of his lips. Recognizing the stance, he gave the expected command. “Stay.”
Certain Satan would obey, he returned to his bedroom. Opening the drawer by the bedside table, he drew out a scarf. A square of silk filled with memories.
Marissa’s scarf. A memento of a day never forgotten.
How many times had he seen her wear it? How often had he thought how pretty the bright color was lying against her nape, holding back her dark hair? Why, when he wanted to so badly, had he never dared fling it away to wrap himself in the spill of silken locks?
How could her perfume linger so long, a reminder of the day he’d lived the dream he hadn’t dared?
“The day I made love to Marissa.”
As the floodgates opened, memories he’d never allowed himself to dwell on came rushing in wistful vignettes….
Marissa riding as only Marissa could, her body moving in perfect harmony with the horse.
Marissa with a rifle in her hand, the dedicated hunter who could track anything, but could never pull the trigger.
Marissa picking an orchid to celebrate sighting an eagle.
Marissa that last day. Sad, solemn, walking through sunlight and shadow to come to him. The wistful woman he’d loved for longer than he would admit, wanting him, as he’d wanted her.
Marissa, the innocent, teaching him what love should be. Wishing he couldn’t forget her, and that they would meet again. Leaving with a wish unspoken, a secret he would never know.
Marissa, her hand raised in farewell, disappearing in the blinding furor of a storm.
“Dear God.” Jefferson clutched the scarf. Every moment he’d locked away in the back of his mind was as fresh, as real as the day it happened. Though he truly couldn’t forget on a subconscious level, he’d thought time had eased the bittersweet ache of mingled pain and joy. Proof in point, the portrait of Marissa hanging over the cabin’s single fireplace.
The painting had been a satisfying exercise, one he believed had leeched away regrets, pain, longing.
“Fool.” It would never end. Cristal’s shot in the dark was more intuitive than he’d let himself admit. No matter the games he played, no matter how deeply he hid his head in the sand, what he felt for Marissa was too vibrant to tame into memory.
As the guilt that plagued him for his part in sending his brother Adams to prison, never truly eased. Guilt that ruled and changed his life. Because of his teenage folly and what it had taken from Adams, he was never quite at home with his own family. His peace and refuge was the swamp. Then came the hurt of losing Marissa, and even the swamp was no longer a place of peace.
“Losing her made it all too…” Jefferson didn’t have the right word. Nothing was quite enough. Lashes drifting briefly to his cheeks, he stood remembering regret, helplessness. Pain.
“Too much,” he whispered, understanding at last. He’d never analyzed the truth of why he’d fled the lowcountry the second time. He knew now it had been because of a morass of unresolved guilt and loss and grief. Arizona offered solitude, a different sort of peace. Here there was no one to hurt. No one to lose. No one he might fail. “Until now,” he said softly. “If this is Marissa.”
It was. He knew it in his very soul. But an expert second opinion wouldn’t hurt. “Come, Satan.”
With a surge of impatience, he barely waited for the dog to stand obediently by his side. Bending down, he held the scarf before the sensitive black nose. “Fetch.”
The Doberman bounded away. Jefferson had barely moved to the doorway, when Satan returned. The page from a tablet was clasped in his mouth. Taking it from the sharp teeth, praising the dog with a stroking touch, Jefferson knew Satan’s instincts, and his, had been vindicated. The scent that lingered on the scarf and the message was the same.
Marissa was alive.
Stunned, his mind a morass of grief and relief—relief that she was alive, grief for all she’d been through, all she’d lost—he couldn’t think. Like a sleepwalker, he returned to the table and sat down. How long he sat there, staring up at Marissa’s portrait, he would never know. Time had no meaning. Nothing mattered but that Marissa was alive.
“Why contact me, sweetheart? Why in such troubled times?” The sound of his own voice was a wake-up call. Suddenly, as with a man who lived by his wits, his mind was keen, perceptive, and considering each point and question. The most important was answered by his own promise. This was more than the call of grief.
If ever you need me… “I’ll come for you,” he finished.
