Page 8 of Please Remember

"Not even a little bit."

Chapter Four

Jax

The moment Karla burst into the room with her dramatic hysterics has me all but growling. The doctor told Allie to trust her instincts, and I pray to God her instincts are fully intact when it comes to her psycho mother.

Noel, her father, looks relieved. No matter how I may feel about Allie's mother, I know how much her father loves his daughter. He's the one person who rivals the love I feel for Allie. When she disappeared, he was the only one who had any idea how badly I ached. The pain that just would never subside. I know a father's love is different, but it doesn't mean it doesn't run just as deep.

Her mother's over-the-top display to garner sympathy from anyone watching doesn't seem to fool a soul in the room. Even Detective Parsons seems a bit annoyed. Everyone knows how difficult of a relationship Karla and Allie had, so her histrionics won’t work here.

"You're alive," Noel gasps, his rust-colored hair much grayer than the last time I saw him.

He's not overly tall, but he can be commanding if he needs to be. Noting the bags under his eyes, it's clear the loss of his daughter has taken its toll on him. Knowing him as I do, I'm sure he didn't want to let himself hope Allie was really here and alive until he saw her for himself. Over the years, we've had a couple of leads that went nowhere, and I have to agree that the disappointment after hope hurts just as badly as losing her the first time. Sometimes worse.

It's strange to see Noel on the verge of tears like he is now. Even when Allie disappeared, he never showed his emotions around me. Not to this extent. We haven't officially seen each other since the police told him I was a very likely suspect despite my alibi and eyewitnesses. Karla certainly never let something as silly as an air-tight alibi change her mind on whether or not I had any part in harming Allie.

"Oh, baby," Karla says, cupping her daughter’s face. 'You look so ghastly."

"Because her appearance after being held captive for seven years should be the top of her list of concerns," I say, unable to hold back my snark. “Not, you know, getting free and being... alive?"

Allie's looks have always been a topic of conversation with Karla. She's always criticizing something or another, and it took me years to get Allie to see herself as beautiful. She's a remarkably attractive woman, but her mother helped destroy her self-esteem to the point of feeling worthless. It's one of the reasons Karla despises me. I stand up to her when she starts tearing Allie down.

Noel walks over and takes Allie's hand. "Are you okay?"

"They say I am," Allie says, looking down at their joined hands. "I mean, I feel like I've always felt. Well, I feel like I remember feeling."

"What do you mean?"

Detective Parsons rests a large hand on Noel’s shoulder. "She doesn't remember anything prior to waking up wherever she was being held."

"Oh my God," Noel gasps. "You don't know who I am, do you?"

Shaking her head, Allie shrugs. "I'm guessing you're my parents."

"We are.” Noel turns to the doctor with a concerned frown. “Is this permanent?"

"We're not sure. Her scans show she sustained a head injury, which is likely what's contributing to the memory loss. Other than that, she's malnourished, but overall, she has very minor injuries. She's really lucky," Dr. Westmore says.

"Well, we'll take care of that just as soon as we get you home," Karla says.

I jump up from the seat I was forced to sit in when Karla pushed me aside to look at her daughter, my gaze locking with hers. "Home?"

"Yes. She's obviously coming home with us. She has no memory, and we're her parents, Jackson."

"Absolutely not. She lives with me, in our house. The one she loves," I say with more bite than I probably should have in my tone.

Glaring at me, the older woman's impeccable chocolate brown hair doesn't even move as she shakes her head. "You are not her mother. In fact, aren't you engaged to someone else? You're about to marry another woman, so I think the last place my daughter should be is living with her former boyfriend and his fiancée. That's a ludicrous suggestion."

"Laura and I don't live together," I say, my teeth clenched, "and Allie coming home changes everything."

"Does it? Your love is just fickle by nature, huh?"

"I still live in the last house Allie did. You moved away a year after she disappeared."

She makes a sound that I think is supposed to be a chuckle but sounds more like a cackle to me. "It was too painful."

My fists clench at my sides as I try to keep my temper in check. This woman can't seriously think she's going to take Allie away from me now. Not after I've waited over seven years for her to return to me. "No, you gave up on her!"

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