They slowed to a stop for a red light. He looked at her and nodded. “Yeah. It’s not the most pleasant job in the world at times, but I help people. I make a difference. Sometimes I save lives. The one life I save makes up for all the times I get puked or peed or shit on by a drunk.” He smiled. “And if I hadn’t stuck to my guns, I never would have met you. And I wouldn’t give you up for anything.”

* * *

Det. Thomas was parked in front of her condo when they arrived. He stepped out of his car when Rob parked next to him.

Laura studied the complex from behind the safety of the windshield while Rob walked around and opened the door for her.

Nothing. It felt familiar, but beyond that, no memories.

Thomas walked over. “How are you feeling?”

She slowly nodded, her eyes on the building. “I’m okay.”

The men stood there until she realized they were waiting on her to get out. She unfastened her seatbelt and slowly turned, both men reaching out to help her from the SUV.

Rob kept a steadying, comforting grip on her arm. “If it’s too upsetting, you tell me immediately, okay?”

She nodded but didn’t reply.

He led her toward the door, the unit in the middle of two others. After Rob handed the key to Thomas to unlock the door, she closed her eyes as the detective let the door swing open.

“Are you okay, honey?” Rob asked.

Laura nodded again before opening her eyes. In front of her lay the spot where she almost died.

Thomas walked in first and turned on the lights in the living room as well as opened the blinds. She hesitated at the door and steadied herself on the doorjamb. Then, after taking a deep breath, she carefully stepped through.

Bright sunlight filled the room while Laura stood in the front hall and looked around as if in a stranger’s house.

Then again, I am a stranger.

But she recognized it. It was the living room she saw in her dream the night before.

Pictures lined the entry wall. Going from one to another, Laura touched each one in turn, whispering names to herself she’d learned while in the hospital. There was a picture of her and Bill standing in front of his airplane.

“That was taken when you flew out to visit him shortly after your parents’ funeral,” Rod softly explained.

It was obvious they were siblings, almost twins in appearance. He was two years older than her. According to Carol, they grew up with almost no sibling rivalry. She paused in front of it for a moment and caressed the outline of the plane.

Rob gently touched her arm. “Shayla went to the store for you and stocked your fridge. She got you everything we could think of that you like.”

“Thanks.” Laura focused on the rest of the living room. She let out a little laugh. “Laura. Loren. Leah.” She turned to him. “How do you all keep us straight?”

He smiled. “We manage.”

Her decorating taste ran to tropical pastels, corals and mints and light yellows. Her couch was upholstered in these colors, and the end and coffee tables were white with flecks of color.

“Everyone came over yesterday,” Rob said. “They cleaned it up. They reframed a couple of the pictures that fell and broke. And…” She turned to him as his voice choked. “They got the blood cleaned up,” he softly said.

She returned her focus to the pictures for a moment, trying to absorb everything. No hard and fast memories returned, but more static swirled around the abyss, as if pieces wanted to lock themselves into place and just couldn’t quite fit.

After a few minutes she took a deep breath and turned to Thomas. “Please tell me what happened.”

The men exchanged an uneasy glance before the detective spoke up. “We think you either knew, or recognized, or didn’t feel threatened by the guy, at first. It looks like you opened your door for him.

“Your next-door neighbor said he heard yelling before he heard screaming. It looks like once the guy went after you, you fought back tooth and nail. We think maybe he hit you from behind and stunned you, but you had a lot of defensive injuries and fought back.”

He pointed to her hands. “You peeled some of your nails down to the quick. That’s why we think he ended up trying to strangle you first instead of raping you. You got in a few licks of you own. He probably wasn’t expecting you to fight like that.”

She looked at her hands, examining them while he continued talking. “We were able to get scrapings from under some of your nails for DNA evidence. Your neighbor heard the fight and came over, found the door unlocked, and rushed in. It surprised the attacker and he took off out the back door.”

He pointed down the hallway. “We think since he knew you had a back door, he probably scoped out the place beforehand.”

“Why would he attack me if I have neighbors?”

“He might have thought all your neighbors were either gone or wouldn’t hear anything. The neighbor on the other side is a snowbird. They’re not here. And Tom Edwards and his wife were gone for two weeks and returned that Friday morning.”

She stared at her hands, the implication slamming into her. “I would have died,” she whispered. “I would have died if they hadn’t come home.”

Rob protectively draped an arm around her shoulders. “Laura—”

“No, it’s okay.” She stared up at him. “I need to hear all of this. It happened. Not hearing it won’t help me.” She returned her focus to Thomas. “You think he came around before he attacked me. He thought I’d be alone.”

Thomas nodded. “Likely. According to Rob, neither of you noticed any suspicious activity. If the guy knows where your shop is, he might have followed you home, watched for a day or two for patterns, and then struck when he thought you were alone.”

“Wouldn’t he see their car was back?” she asked.

“They said they took an airport limo home.”

“Oh.” She had a thought. “Is my car out there?”

“Yes, it’s the Toyota,” Rob said. “The truck. On the other side of where I parked.”

She disengaged from his arm, went to the door, and opened it. There, next to Rob’s Explorer, sat a silver Toyota Tundra with a double cab and a matching topper on back.

“That’s mine?”

“Yeah.”

She felt no recognition.

Disappointed, she closed the door and turned to them. “I don’t remember anything.”

* * *

Rob struggled to keep his own emotions in check as he watched Laura walk over to her bookcase and study the contents. They were filled, floor to ceiling, with DVDs, CDs, and books. “You’ve got several boxes of books in storage that you didn’t have room for.”

When her parents had died in a car wreck a little over a year earlier, Rob had suggested she move in with him. She’d politely refused, not because she didn’t want to, but because she said she was afraid of making the decision out of grief.

She was always strong and independent, two of the many things he loved about her. There was never any ego involved in their relationship. They were as comfortable together as they were secure apart.

She trailed her fingers over some of the spines. “I like a lot of different authors, huh?”

“That’s an understatement.” Her taste in books was as eclectic as her taste in music. She loved everything from Stephen King to Charles Dickens, and from Mozart to Meat Loaf. Her movies ranged from Dirty Dancing to Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and Alien.

She was, before, unpredictable and indescribably unique. Willing to try almost anything once, both in their vanilla and kinky lives.

She stopped in front of a picture of the two of them with Doogie. “You said he’s okay?”

“I decided to leave Doogie at my place. He’s still a puppy, but he’s a moose. I was afraid he might hurt you and didn’t want to distract you right now.”

“He’s definitely a moose,” Thomas said. “I’ve met him.”

She stared at the picture. “In case it distracted me from maybe remembering something about the attack.” She glanced at him.

He nodded.

Doogie was definitely a momma’s boy and missed her terribly. Any time Rob mentioned her name, Doogie’s ears perked up and he would run to the door, looking for his mom.

After a couple of minutes, Laura sat on the sofa and looked around. She sat like that for a while before speaking. “I can’t remember any of it. Only what I already told you.”

“That’s okay,” Thomas assured her. “If it comes back, it comes back.”

“But you need me to testify.”

“Believe me, we’ve got enough physical evidence, we can make a DNA conviction stick with no problem.”

“If you find him.”

“We will find him. There has to be someone out there who knows who he is. You put up a hard fight. He took a hurtin’.”

“I didn’t fight hard enough, apparently.”

Rob walked over and knelt in front of her, taking her hands in his. “You are not to blame here. I want you to stop thinking like that.”

“But I let the guy in, didn’t I?”

“Laura,” Thomas said, stepping closer, “we don’t know who he is. He might have been someone you know. He might have worn a disguise, like a pizza man. It doesn’t matter why you opened the door because he was here on a mission.”

She took a deep, shuddering breath and let Rob help her to her feet. “Can you show me the rest of the place?” she asked.

It broke his heart how she sounded. Tentative, afraid. Weary.

Defeated.

“Yeah, sweetie.”

It took her half an hour to make her way through the entire three-bedroom condo. One bedroom was her office.