Fade To Black

MAKING UP FOR LOST TIME…

Pierce Kincaid couldn’t understand why his wife nearly fainted when he came home from the store—or why she is no longer pregnant…until a five-year-old boy asks Mommy who the stranger is. Terror-filled nightmares slowly reveal that the ex-secret agent had been kidnapped, his memory wiped clean.

Pierce knows that Jessica still loves him. But if he wants a second chance at the life he lost, he’ll need to discover the truth behind his abduction and take down the kidnappers targeting his family—before death truly does part them.

Previously published.

Fade to Black

Amanda Stevens

www.millsandboon.co.uk

MILLS & BOON

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Contents

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Prologue

“And if it’s a boy, I think we should name him Max.”

“You know I hate that name,” Jessica Kincaid complained as she pressed down a loose corner of the circus-motif wallpaper in the newly redecorated nursery. “Besides, what makes you so sure it’s a boy?”

“Well, Maxine then,” Pierce teased her, stretching to paste the last of the glittering stars to the ceiling. Suddenly the ladder he stood on teetered, and Pierce grabbed for a handhold. His arms flailed wide as the ladder toppled and crashed to the floor. Jessica cried out in alarm, but as usual Pierce landed on his feet.

Jessica’s hand went to her heart. “Are you all right?”

“Right as rain, sweetheart.” Pierce bent to drop a light kiss on the top of her head. “Don’t you know by now I have nine lives?”

“By my count, you’re getting dangerously close to the last one,” Jessica remarked dryly, referring to her husband’s penchant for adventure and excitement. Whether it was snow skiing or parasailing, driving a car or riding a motorcycle, nothing ever seemed quite fast enough for Pierce Kincaid. He seemed to relish living on the edge, and he often left Jessica breathless in more ways than one.

Why he had ever been attracted to someone as shy and hopelessly introverted as she, Jessica still couldn’t understand, but their marriage had already survived two wonderful years. Not only survived, but flourished. And now with the baby on the way, everything in her life seemed like a dream come true. A dream she prayed would never end.

She reached up and caressed Pierce’s cheek with her fingertips. “I wouldn’t be able to bear it if anything ever happened to you. You’re my whole life, Pierce. I love you so much.”

He touched the teardrop on her cheek in wonder. “What’s this?” he asked gently. “Why the tears?”

“Hormones,” she whispered, but it was more than that. Sometimes when Jessica looked at Pierce, she still couldn’t believe how happy they were. Sometimes in the dead of night, with Pierce sleeping peacefully beside her, she would wake up, certain that something would happen to take it all away from her. Just like it had when she was a little girl.

Sensing her need, Pierce took her in his arms. “I’ll always be here, Jesse. For you and the baby. We’re a real family now. Nothing can change that.”

He kissed her again, then turned and, in typical fashion, quickly changed the mood and the subject. But he kept one arm protectively around her shoulders. “I think a celebration is definitely in order here. We’ve finally remodeled one room in this monstrosity we optimistically call a house, business is picking up at the shop, and Max here will be making his debut in another couple of months. So what do you say, my love? Dinner and dancing tonight? A movie? Or shall we turn in early and celebrate in bed? And I might add that I’m particularly fond of the third choice.” His dark eyes teased her as his head lowered to kiss her again, but the phone in the hallway rang, interrupting them. He nuzzled her neck. “Hold that thought,” he murmured, then turned and left the room.

Moments later when he came back, his smile was missing. The glint in his eyes had disappeared. It wasn’t the first time Jessica had noticed his troubled look, but he would never let on to her that anything was wrong. In spite of what he’d said earlier, she couldn’t help wondering if he might be having problems with the business.

“Pierce, is something wrong?” she asked anxiously, touching his arm.

His expression instantly altered as he smiled down at her. “Everything’s fine. Now, where were we?” He reached for her, pulling her into his arms and holding her close, as if he could somehow protect her from the outside world. Or, from whatever might be troubling him. “Have you decided what you’re in the mood for tonight?”

“Actually…” Jessica trailed off, trying to shake the dark premonition stealing over her. Her own expression turned coy as she skimmed one finger down the front of his shirt. “I have this irresistible urge for…”

Pierce’s voice deepened. “For what? For once, tell me exactly what you want, Jesse.”

“I want…some ice cream,” she admitted. “I’m dying for butter pecan ice cream.”

He groaned. “That’s all?”

“Well…for starters.”

“In that case, I’d better get to the store.” He paused at the door and looked back, lifting his brows suggestively. “Need anything else? Whipped cream? Jell-O?”

“I’m seven months pregnant, Pierce,” Jessica reminded him, but the look he gave her had her heart racing just the same.

“And sexier than ever,” he added with a wink. “I’ll be back in a flash.”

By Jessica’s calculations, it should have taken Pierce no more than ten minutes to walk to the store, no more than ten minutes inside, no more than ten minutes to get back home.

When he’d been gone an hour, she started to worry.

When he’d been gone two hours, she drove to the store and looked for him, but no one remembered seeing him.

When he’d been gone three hours, she called her brother, Jay Greene, who was a naval officer at the Pentagon in nearby Washington, D.C.

When Pierce had been gone four hours, she called the area hospitals while Jay searched the streets.

At midnight, when he’d been gone ten hours, Jessica sat in the darkened nursery, hugging a teddy bear to her chest as she rocked back and forth, her dry eyes burning with grief. A star had fallen from the ceiling and lay shimmering on the floor near her feet.

It seemed like an omen to Jessica, that fallen star. Like a symbol of all her lost dreams, her hopeless prayers, her unshed tears.

Because Pierce Kincaid, her beloved husband, had vanished in broad daylight without a trace.

Chapter One

Five years later…

Where in the world was he?

Jessica glanced at her watch for the umpteenth time as she gave the chocolate batter the requisite fifty stirs. Sundays were the only full days she had to spend with her son, and she’d promised him this morning they’d make brownies together. She’d been out of eggs, though, so she’d sent Max next door to borrow one from her best friend, Sharon McReynolds.

“That was your first mistake,” she muttered. Sharon’s daughter, Allie, had just acquired a new kitten, a white fluff ball named Snowflake, that attracted five-year-old Max like metal to a magnet.

Jessica grimaced, envisioning the conversation that would ensue with her son as soon as he returned. “Allie’s not even as old as I am, Mom, and she has a pet. Why can’t I have one?”

Jessica knew the routine by heart because they’d been through it every afternoon for the past four days, ever since Sharon had taken Allie to the animal shelter to pick out a kitten. Explaining to Max that Allie’s mom didn’t work outside the home and, therefore, had more time than Jessica did to help take care of a pet did no good.

She knew Max already felt cheated because he had to go to the baby-sitter’s after morning kindergarten while Allie got to go home and spend the afternoon with her mom. Jessica knew Max thought it also unfair that Allie had a daddy to take her to the zoo on Saturday mornings and work on special projects with her on Sunday afternoons.

Allie had a real family, with a mother and a father. Max didn’t.

Jessica suspected her son’s penchant for superheroes was his own way of trying to make up for the lack of a male role model in his life. Superman and all the other comic-book characters that Max loved and tried to emulate were substitutes for the father he’d never had.

Sometimes Max pretended that his own father was a superhero, off fighting bad guys. That’s why he couldn’t be here with them now. In spite of the fact that Jessica had told Max his father was dead, she knew that deep down, her son had never really believed it.

Sighing deeply, Jessica wiped a stray lock of hair from her forehead with the back of her hand as she stared out the window, trying to catch a glimpse of Max’s red cape as he came through the hedge. Wiping her hands on a dish towel, she reached for the phone just as she heard the screen door on the back porch slam shut. Without turning, Jessica picked up the spoon and began stirring the brownie mix again.

“What took you so long, sweetie?” she asked over her shoulder, trying to hide her impatience. She knew full well what Max’s explanation would be.

“You’ll never believe what happened.”

The deep, masculine voice that responded shocked Jessica to the core. A chill shot up her spine. She whirled to see a tall, dark stranger emptying a bag of groceries into her freezer.

Scream! she commanded. But to Jessica’s horror, not a sound escaped her throat.

Run! she ordered, but her feet remained rooted to the floor.

The man stood with his back to her, but even in her terror, Jessica saw that he was tall and lean with dark, unkempt hair. The blue jeans he wore looked old and threadbare, and the cotton shirt was shredded at the hem, as if it had been caught on something sharp.

“It was the weirdest thing, Jesse.” He closed the freezer door and opened the refrigerator. “Have you ever arrived somewhere without knowing how you got there? I mean, I left the house, and the next thing I know I’m in front of the ice-cream freezer at Crandall’s, and I have no idea how I got there.” He chuckled softly as he shook his head. “Anyway, once I finally found the ice cream, I remembered we were out of milk, and then I saw the grapes, and one thing led to another. I forgot the whipped cream, though.”

He folded the sack and turned, smiling.

Jessica’s knees threatened to buckle. “Dear God.” Her hand flew to her mouth. It couldn’t be! It couldn’t be possible! She clutched the counter for support as she stared at the man, at the darkly handsome face that seemed so familiar and yet so strange.

The brown eyes stared back at her in confusion. “What the devil’s the matter with you? You look like you’ve just seen a ghost.”

“You are a ghost,” Jessica whispered in horror. “You must be.”

He started toward her, but she shrank away, her hands still frantically gripping the edge of the counter. “Don’t touch me,” she pleaded. Then he seemed to look at her, really look at her, for the first time, and he stopped dead in his tracks, as if he’d just been struck by lightning.

For one breathless moment, they eyed each other in utter disbelief.

“Jesse?” His voice was a hushed question. The confusion in his eyes deepened to horror as he continued to stare at her. His gaze roamed over her long black hair, scrutinized her face, studied her slender figure. Then lingered on her flat stomach. “What…what’s going on here? Your hair…your face…dear God, the baby….” His voice trailed off as he scrubbed his eyes with his hands. “I must be dreaming,” he muttered.

Jessica cowered away from the apparition before her, denied the vision that stood not four feet away. It couldn’t be him. It wasn’t possible. Not after five years. Five years!

She’d long ago resigned herself to the possibility that her husband had met some tragic death because the other alternative—that Pierce had simply tired of their life together and walked away—would have been, in many ways, harder for her to accept. She’d had so many losses in her life. So many abandonments.

But if Pierce had died all those years ago, there was absolutely no explanation for the specter that stood before her now. No earthly explanation.

Jessica had the slightly hysterical notion that if she reached out and touched him, her hand would pass right through him. A shiver crawled up her spine as the hair on the back of her neck stood on end. Almost reluctantly she let her gaze move over him.

Whether ghost or man, something about him was different, she realized. He looked older and leaner and…hurt. There were lines on his face she didn’t remember, but the scars were the worst. Pierce’s face had been so handsome, so perfect. This man was a dark, frightening stranger.

That’s it! she thought suddenly. This man was a stranger. A stranger who was a dead ringer for Pierce. A new wave of fear washed over her as she stared at him. She began edging toward the door.

“Who are you?” she demanded, but her voice trembled with terror.

He looked at her incredulously. “For God’s sake, stop it. You’re scaring the hell out of me, Jesse. Is this some kind of sick joke? How can you look so different?” He paused, letting his gaze roam over her again as his eyes clouded in confusion. “My God, I hardly recognize you, but how can that be? How the hell can that be? I’ve only been gone half an hour.”

Jessica could feel the color draining from her face. “Half an hour? My husband has been missing for five years,” she whispered.

“Five years?” He gaped at her in horror. “What are you talking about?”

Jessica put trembling hands to her face. “Who are you?”

“You know who I am.”

“Please tell me your name,” she begged. “I have to hear you say it.”

Slowly he crossed the tile floor toward her. The knees of his jeans were ripped and his ragged tennis shoes were muddy. A long, jagged scar creased his right forearm, drawing Jessica’s gaze for a second longer before she lifted her eyes to his.

The brown eyes were shuttered now, completely unreadable. She didn’t know him. He was a complete stranger to her.

He said slowly, “My name is Pierce Kincaid. Now kindly tell me who the hell you are. And where is my wife?”

* * *

A stunned hush fell over the room.

It was the kind of silence that always follows some mind-boggling revelation. But why that should be, Pierce couldn’t imagine. Why his appearance in his own home should shock anyone was beyond him, but he had the oddest feeling that he’d walked into the last few minutes of a movie, and though the climax was exciting, he had no idea what the hell was going on.

The woman standing before him—face ashen, eyes wide with shock—looked like Jesse, except…different. Her hair was the color of Jesse’s, but instead of the short bob of curls with which he was so familiar, it cascaded down the woman’s back in gleaming, luscious waves. The wide silver eyes, fringed with thick black lashes, were colder and harder than his wife’s. And where Jesse’s figure was thin, almost frail-looking, this woman’s body was gently rounded with womanly curves.

Pierce felt something stir within him, and he frowned in disgust. He hadn’t so much as looked at another woman since he and Jesse were married, and yet this stranger elicited a response from him that seemed disturbingly familiar.

Who was she? A relative? That would explain the overwhelming resemblance. He’d never met any of Jesse’s family except for her brother. She rarely talked about her, but Pierce knew Jesse had a sister somewhere. Maybe the woman had simply shown up at their doorstep while he’d been out.

He tried to temper his own shock with a tentative smile. “Are you Jesse’s sister?” he asked as he took another step toward her. The woman flinched away, but the coldness in her eyes warmed for a moment with a flash of anger. Doggedly he held out his hand to her. “I’m Jessica’s husband.”

He watched the last shred of fear fade away from her eyes as a sort of horrified realization dawned in those magnetic gray depths. With an almost visible struggle for control, she pulled herself up straight. She faced him squarely, her eyes dropping to his outstretched hand, then returning to meet his gaze. “Why, you arrogant son of a bitch. What kind of fool do you think I am?”

Her hand swept upward so quickly it seemed to surprise them both. It connected with his cheek, and the stinging sensation triggered an automatic reaction from Pierce. He grabbed her, shoved her up against the edge of the counter and pinned her arms behind her back with one hand while his other hand fastened around her throat.

For one heart-pounding moment, brown eyes stared into gray.

Her face swam before his eyes, a hazy image from a dark dream. Pierce was no stranger to fear. He knew what it looked like, what it smelled like, what it felt like. He could see fear in her eyes again. Could feel her flesh tremble beneath his fingers. For one brief moment, it gave him an almost perverse sense of gratification to be the one to inflict it.

Then the mists cleared, and the face before him was once again a sweet, lovely, familiar face—a face far removed from the blackness, from the explosion of pain behind his eyes. As abruptly as he’d seized her, Pierce released her. He backed away, shocked and sickened by his own reaction.

“My God—” His hands moved to his eyes, as if he could rub away the searing pain in his head. Black it out, he mentally instructed himself. Fade to black.

The pain subsided, but his stomach still roiled in sickening waves. What the hell was the matter with him? He could easily have hurt her, and he didn’t even understand why. He was beginning to think he didn’t understand anything. The whole scene seemed so disjointed, like a nightmare fragmented into bits and pieces he couldn’t seem to fit together in any way that made sense.

“I don’t know why I did that,” he mumbled.

She didn’t say a word, just stood there looking at him like an animal trapped in a corner. He wished she’d say something, do something to help him understand, to help him put the puzzle together. “Can you…just tell me your name?” he asked with a desperate edge to his voice.

Her fingers were at her throat, massaging the vicious red mark left by his hand. She moistened her lips with the tip of her tongue, “I think you already know,” she said, as the quiver in her voice shook Pierce anew. He felt his muscles tighten with awareness, with anticipation, as if preparing for a situation fraught with danger.

Their gazes clung for one electric moment, and then she whispered into the silence, “I’m Jesse.”

* * *

Jessica thought for a moment he would collapse. He staggered backward, supporting himself against the counter much as she’d done earlier. Her own knees were shaking so badly she could hardly stand. The sound of her heartbeat seemed to echo through the silence.

Pierce had come back. Somehow, some way, her husband had found his way back to her. But why had he left? Where had he been? And, dear God, why was he here now after all this time? The questions exploded in her head, mirroring the confusion and shock in Pierce’s brown eyes.

She closed her eyes, trying to shut him out, but the man standing before her drew her gaze against her will. He looked at once so dear and familiar, and yet so strange and frightening. His once handsome face was haggard and deeply lined. His body, once powerful and athletic, had thinned to gauntness. A narrow white scar sliced the left side of his face, marring what had once been a perfect jawline.

She reached a trembling hand up to touch it. “What happened to you?” she whispered. “Where in God’s name have you been?”

He recoiled from her touch, and Jessica instantly drew her hand back, nursing it against her heart as if to hide the bitterness of his rejection. His brown eyes were bleak, distant now. The eyes of a stranger.

“I don’t know,” he said numbly.

“You don’t know what happened to you?” She knew her voice sounded disbelieving, but Jessica couldn’t help it. The whole situation was unbelievable. Incredible, but terrifyingly real. “You don’t know where you’ve been for five years? Were you in an accident? Is that how you got those scars?”

Pierce put an unsteady hand to his temple. “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he said.

“Are you saying…you don’t remember anything?”

He shook his head. “I don’t know. I remember leaving here to go get ice cream. The next thing I know, I’m standing in front of the freezer in the store. I get the ice cream, I walk back here, and in the space of half an hour, everything has changed. It’s like…a nightmare. Am I going crazy, Jesse?”

At that moment, Jessica wasn’t completely sure of her own sanity. Her heart was beating against her chest so quickly and so hard that for a second she thought she might actually pass out. She took a deep breath, trying to calm herself. “You walked out that door five years ago,” she said shakily, “and until you walked back in a few minutes ago, I hadn’t seen or heard from you in all that time. I thought you were dead.”

If he noticed the faint note of betrayal in her voice, he chose to ignore it, concentrating instead on her words. “Five years? That’s impossible!”

“Look at me,” she said desperately. “You said yourself I look different. I am different. I’m five years older.”

His proprietary gaze raked over her, stirring something in Jessica she thought had long since died. She struggled to keep her expression calm, composed, but her mind reeled in confusion. The dark gaze probed her face, making her only too aware of the changes five years had wrought in her appearance.

“If what you say is true, then that must mean—” he trailed off as his gaze dropped to her flat stomach once again “—that must mean…you’ve had the baby.”

In the last few minutes, Jessica’s emotions had run the gamut—terror, shock, disbelief, anger and maybe even a glimmer of joy. But the emotion she felt now overwhelmed all the others. The fierce protectiveness for her child settled around her like an impenetrable shield.

Max was hers. She’d given birth to him all alone. She’d raised him single-handedly. She’d made the sacrifices, she’d worked the endless hours to provide for a child she loved more than life itself. No one would take that away from her. Max was the one thing in her life she had ever been able to count on.

She opened her mouth—to say what, she was never quite sure—but suddenly the back door slammed, and both of them jumped. In unison, Jessica and Pierce whirled toward the kitchen doorway where five-year-old Max, clad in jeans, a T-shirt and a shiny red Superman cape, stood staring up at them.

The dark hair, the huge brown eyes, the stubborn set of his jaw and chin—all were identical to the stranger who stared back at him.

The very air quivered with emotion. Max’s solemn little eyes took the stranger’s measure and seemed to find him lacking. His gaze shifted to Jessica then back to Pierce. He squinted his eyes. “Who are you, mister?” he demanded suspiciously.

Jessica’s own gaze was locked on Pierce’s white face. She could see a muscle throb in his cheek, saw emotion after emotion sweep across his features. There was no mistaking Max’s identity. He looked exactly like his father. Pierce took a tentative step toward him.

The slight movement roused Jessica. She made an involuntary sound of protest which drew both pairs of male eyes. She knelt and opened her arms, and Max flew across the room to her. She hugged him tightly against her as both of them stared up at Pierce.

“My God,” he said woodenly as he gazed at mother and son across the room, “I don’t even know if I’m dead or alive.”

He didn’t wait for a response but turned and walked through the swinging door of the kitchen. Jessica wanted to go after him but found that her heart was suddenly pulling her in two different directions as Max’s little arms caught around her neck and held on for dear life.

“That man’s scary, Mom,” he whispered, clinging to her. “Is he going to hurt us?”

“No, darling, he won’t hurt us,” Jessica soothed, hugging him. But even as she gave voice to her denial, she could feel the tender flesh of her neck where Pierce’s hand—a real, flesh-and-blood hand—had pressed.

A warning pounded in her brain. He’s a stranger, she thought. The man somewhere in her house was not the Pierce she had known and loved. Wherever he had been, whatever he’d gone through in the past five years had changed him. She only had to look into those haunted eyes to know that.

Maybe she’d never known him, she thought with a jolt. She’d shared her life with him, shared his bed, but had she ever really known him?

She thought now, as she’d done for those five years, of all the times he’d been away during their marriage. So many of the trips had been unexpected it seemed now in retrospect. Sometimes when he’d been gone, she hadn’t heard from him for days at a time, but the answer to that had seemed very plausible. Many of the remote areas he traveled to in Europe and Asia, looking for treasures for The Lost Attic, his antique shop, didn’t have easily accessible telephones. In fact, Jessica had been to some of those off-the-beaten-track places with him.

Back then, it had never occurred to her to question Pierce’s absences, the lack of phone calls. She’d simply accepted it. But maybe she should have questioned Pierce. Maybe she wouldn’t have gone through the hell she’d gone through the past five years if she’d taken the time to know Pierce Kincaid a little better.

She’d believed what she’d wanted to believe, she realized now, because she’d wanted a home and family so badly. Someone to love her.

Jessica untangled Max’s arms from her neck and stood. “Come on, honey. Let’s go back over to Sharon’s house. You’d like to play with Allie and Snowflake for a little while longer, wouldn’t you?”

Max stared up at her with rounded brown eyes. “Are you coming back here?”

“Yes.”

“To talk to him?”

“Yes.”

Max clung to her hand. “I want to stay with you, Mom. I don’t think I like him. I don’t want him to hurt you.”

She bent and smoothed the dark hair from his forehead. “You don’t have to worry about me, Max. I’ll be fine. Now, come on. I’ll walk you over.”

As she and Max stepped outside, Jessica thought how normal everything looked, how perfectly ordinary a spring morning it was. The blue morning glory blossoms that climbed the trellis walls of the summerhouse were opened wide to the early sun. A mild breeze rippled through the trees, stirring the scent of roses and mimosa, and somewhere down the street a lawn mower droned.

Everything was the same, and yet nothing was. Five years ago, when Pierce disappeared, Jessica had thought her life was over. For the first few months, all she’d hoped and prayed for was that he would one day come back to her. As long as no trace of him was found, she couldn’t let go of the hope that he was still alive.

But the first time she’d held her tiny son in her arms, the realization had finally hit her. Pierce wasn’t coming back. She’d counted on him for everything, depended on him to take care of her, but he was gone. Suddenly she had no one to rely on but herself.

Max had given her life new purpose. Not only had she been both mother and father to her son, but she’d taken over Pierce’s antique business, learned everything about it there was to learn, and it had continued to grow into a thriving concern.

She’d accomplished a lot in the past five years, but those accomplishments had demanded restitution. She’d changed, so much so that sometimes when she stared at her reflection in the mirror, she hardly recognized herself. There wasn’t a trace of the old, dependent Jesse. She didn’t need anyone anymore. Certainly not a man who had walked out on her five years ago. For whatever reason.

Her hand tightened on Max’s. She felt his fingers squeeze hers back in response, and Jessica’s heart melted with love. She would do anything, anything to protect her little boy.

Together they slipped through the opening in the thick hedge that divided the two properties. Sharon sat on the back porch steps, watching Allie and Snowflake romp in the shady grass beneath an elm tree.

“I knew you couldn’t keep Max away,” Sharon called gaily. “Might as well come have a cup of coffee while the two of them torment poor Snowflake up a tree.”

“Max, come watch!” Allie squealed as she enticed the kitten with a ball of twine. Her squeaky laughter peeled across the yard, an irresistible invitation, but still Max hung back, hugging his mother’s leg.

“Go play, Max,” Jessica urged.

He looked up at her. “I want to stay with you,” he insisted.

Sharon reached over and ruffled his hair. “What’s the matter, Superman? How come so shy all of a sudden?”