He shut the door and got in the driver’s seat. Drew looked at her to see her reaction. “Then why do you have an appointment in your day planner that says ‘pool’?”
Bethany looked at him in shock.
“Pools generally have water in them. People who are scared of water tend to stay away from pools,” Drew waited for her response.
“You went through my purse,” she was stunned. It was the first time anyone had ever invaded her privacy like that.
“Yes,” Drew started the truck. “Care to explain about the pool?”
Bethany decided to revise her opinion of the man beside her. He was rude and surly. He wasn’t handsome like Max Ramesly at all. Just because he’d rescued her on the boat, carried her and caused little flutterings in her stomach didn’t mean she was attracted to him in the least. She turned her face away from him to look out the window. “Not particularly.”
He pulled out of the parking lot and into traffic, past her taxi who was still waiting for her. Bethany almost said something but one look at his face had her changing her mind. He didn’t look happy at all.
“Bethany, you need to tell me about the pool. You are involved in an investigation of a local gang. You stumbled onto our sting operation and I need to confirm that you have nothing to do with the gang. Otherwise, I’m going to have to arrest you,” Drew gritted his teeth. He didn’t care for her talking to him in that snooty little tone of hers, ‘not particularly’. It made him feel like some scum she’d found on the bottom of her shoe.
What would she think when she found out he was the illegitimate son of David Ramesly?
Drew firmly told his inner voice to go away. First, she might not run in those circles of society, although he doubted it since she knew Max Ramesly. Second, he was just going to get her statement and send her on her way back to crazy town. He never had to see her again.
He never again had to see her blue eyes look at him in gratitude like he’d just saved her entire world and become her hero for carrying her from a stupid boat.
“Then I should have a lawyer,” Bethany knew that much. If he was going to threaten to arrest her, whatever for she really didn’t understand, but she knew she could get a lawyer. Maybe she could even get her father to sue and get this arrogant man dismissed from his job.
“Or you could just tell me, and we could both save a lot of time,” Drew waited at a red light. “I don’t think you’d like waiting in jail with other people in a cell.”
She wouldn’t, Bethany knew that instinctively. She was half afraid of her own shadow some days. Bethany had no desire to share accommodations with people of criminal activity. She sighed. “I had an appointment with Dr. Urshman at a local pool to try to trigger my reclusive memories.”
“Dr. Urshman is your shrink?” Drew asked to confirm his earlier suspicions. He’d had practice at spotting crazy. There was a reason his mother’s nickname was Wacko Margo.
“Psychiatrist,” Bethany clarified a little curtly.
Whatever, same difference in his mind. Drew laid on the gas and cut down an alleyway to avoid traffic. “How did it go?”
“It was frustrating,” Bethany admitted. “I didn’t learn much. That’s why I thought I would come to the marina and try again.”
“What did you learn?” Drew kept up with the questions.
Bethany sighed. “I learned the water had a white film on it. I learned his hand wasn’t on my face. It was in my hair as he pushed my head under the water in the bathtub.”
“Say again?” Drew frowned fiercely as he parked the truck in the police lot. He did not like the imagery of what she’d just described. “Start from the beginning.”
“I’ve been having nightmares since I was a child. They’ve gotten worse lately,” Bethany explained. “I dream that I’m a child. I’m at a marina where there are lots of boats. I know the area and feel perfectly safe even though I’m not supposed to be out there by myself. I’m searching for a particular boat, but I always get on the wrong one. I hear voices that I know. There are two men on the boat and I know I’ll get in trouble if they find me, so I hide from them…”
Bethany’s voice trailed away as she remembered, her face pale and her hands trembled as she pushed an errant strand of hair out of her face.
“One of them finds you,” Drew surmised from her previous comments.
“Yes,” she swallowed hard. “He’s drowning me in this ugly little tub. The water has a white film on it. I can hear him telling me that I didn’t see anything…. No wait, that’s wrong.”
Bethany bit her lip, closed her eyes and tried to remember. It was teasing her, at the edge of her mind. If she could only grab it. If she could only remember…
Drew patiently waited. She was struggling with something. He wondered whether he should believe this story about a memory that she was trying to find. Then again, it wasn’t his experience that normal people made up stories about getting drowned in a tub.
Of course, he wasn’t particularly certain of Bethany’s sanity just yet.
“It’s gone,” Bethany sighed in disappointment as she opened her eyes. “I can’t remember it properly.”
“Why don’t we go inside,” Drew said gently. “I’ll take your statement, call your psychiatrist for verification and you can be on your way.”
