“Thank you, Finn. And it’s nice to meet you too.” Chase asked what grade Finn would be in come fall, and Finn proudly said he’d be a sixth grader in middle school. His friends called to him, and when he walked away, Chase asked, “Katy, what kind of car does Mateo drive?”
“A black Mercedes.”
“If I gave you a tracker, do you think you could put it on his car or preferably Franco’s white Mercedes without being caught?”
“Yes. With pleasure.”
As the jazz music stopped, the tuba-playing statue and his dog vanished into their base. Like Jade, the magic was gone without a trace.
CHAPTERTWENTY-THREE
“But it’s been such a pleasure having you here with us.” Franco’s voice sounded strained.
“As a therapist, I know I need to find answers about my lapse of memory.”
“I told you the lapse was caused by the trauma. An unspeakable one,” Franco said.
The sun had long since gone down on Lusso Lane. They sat in lawn chairs placed side by side on a patio outside the sliding glass door to the alcove where they’d had breakfast. Jade had a fleeting recollection of sitting in a lagoon oasis beside a sparkling pool. But here, where a pool could have been, garden lights illuminated ghostly statues among a maze of hedges.
“I need to remember the trauma,” Jade said. “I believe my memory will return more quickly and effectively in familiar surroundings.”
“Best to let sleeping dogs lie as they say, my dear.”
“With all due respect, I disagree. I’m the therapist. You’re a plastic surgeon.” Jade warned herself to tread carefully. At the moment, she had no way off this deserted mountaintop. She wished she hadn’t become so woozy at the office earlier. She would have been more insistent on being taken to the Foote house. Maybe she could find answers there because none of the situation here was adding up. “I’m certainly well enough to return to work, Franco.”
“You know your calendar was cleared for the rest of the week. So you’ll stay here through the weekend. You can see clients next Monday. You have clothes in your closet.”
“Oh?” She inwardly rebelled at being told where and when she would stay and work but bit her tongue. “How is it that I have clothes here?”
“You asked me to have them brought here after theincident,” he said. “You requested work clothes only.” With that irritating titter, he touched his narrow lips and added, “No undergarments. Evidently, you sleep in the nude, my dear, so no sleepwears either.” He swung a hand toward one of the eerie statues. “Like a naked goddess.”
Jade’s first impulse was to say that wasn’t true. But had she slept in the nude? Once? Recently? Cutting off her line of thought, Greta showed up, setting tea and dessert on a small table between their chairs.
“Dr. Spatafore, as you requested, valerian tea with tiramisu.”
“Thank you, Greta,” Franco said.
“Doesn’t my contract prohibit sweets?” Jade asked after Greta was gone.
“I thought a bit of tiramisu might sweeten your attitude,” Franco replied. He ran the back of his index finger along her upper arm, which caused her skin to crawl. “I can be so much more to you than the brother of your boss.”
“As you have often stated at the house on Foote,” Jade replied. Whenever he’d made such leading comments, she always showed him the door.
“I could give you the world,” Franco said. “We could go anywhere, do anything.”
“Such as…” Almost as if her life was flashing before her eyes, Jade saw snippets of adventures with—who? “Horseback riding? Dancing?” Darn her splintered memory! “Motorcycle riding? Boating?”
“No, of course not.” A creepy smile on Franco’s face warped into a wrinkled glower. “Why? Have you done any of those things? Lately?”
“I don’t know,” she admitted.
“Because that would be a breach of your contract with me.”
Her brain whispered, Condom, pill, or both?Talk about a breach of contract. “What about children, Franco?” She turned her head to look directly at him. “I want to have a baby someday. But each time you’ve seen me with a child at the office, you cringe and disappear.”
“Why would you abuse your flawless body with the horrendous effects of a pregnancy?” Franco appeared appalled as he turned to fully face her as well. Splaying his hands, he spat, “Why would I want to attend some brat’s high school graduation when I’m seventy-five?”
“Seventy-five?” Jade gasped. She concentrated, studying his features. “That would make you, what now? Fifty-six, fifty-seven?” Franco coughed, appearing flustered. “At your office birthday party a couple of months ago, you and Mateo complained about being prematurely gray as you turnedforty. How old are you, Franco?”
