DISCLAIMER: Women's Murder Club and its characters are the property of James Patterson, 20th Century Fox Television and ABC. No infringement intended.
ARCHIVING: Only with the permission of the author.
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SERIES: Thunderstorm Series
The Cold Touch Of Memory
By Demeter
Lindsay flinches at the sound of the restaurant's door slamming. Observant as usual, I note the reaction and file it away together with the rage that's bubbling up inside me at any reminder of her ordeal. I must not go there. I'll have to remind myself that it's over, and we are moving on.
We actually go out for dinner these days. Claire and Jill know about it. No more hiding in the shadows, it must be a good sign.
I watch her sitting across from me, appearing relaxed and calm in the glow of the candlelight.
I know too much, and I know by far not enough of what happened. But the certainty that he's dead fills me with grim relief. I know it isn't right; I shouldn't be relieved about anybody's death, but I am. This man was purely evil.
I wish Lindsay had never met him. I want to believe that we'd still be here, right now.
When her eyes meet mine, her gaze is slightly unnverved, with herself, me, it's hard to tell. "Do you ever stop thinking about it?" she asks with a hint of frustration.
"Do you?"
Agent Lena Madison had been infiltrating the cell nearly a year ago, and now her cover was about to be blown. Lindsay going to Cambodia with Pete, contacting the agent and warning her had seemed like a brilliant idea; why would the man she was supposedly in love with, suspect her?
He didn't, at first, Lindsay recalls.
By the time she finally met Lena, it seemed too late, no way out for either of them. For Lindsay though, it had only been a couple of days. She could see her future in the beaten woman, and it scared her, a paralyzing, choking fear like nothing she had ever known.
She'd taken that once chance when it occurred, managed to escape and get Madison out. People had called her brave, but Lindsay honestly can't remember how they had made it other than driven by fear. She remembers collapsing at the gate of the US embassy, torn clothes, her feet bleeding because there wasn't enough time to go looking for shoes during their escape. Not one of her fondest memories.
She's heard that Lena is still on sick leave, but she hasn't once tried to contact the woman who was her fellow prisoner for two days. Lindsay is afraid to be drawn into the past when she's trying so hard, when all she wants is to be here in the present, with Cindy.
Cindy, with the warm, concerned gazes, the easy smiles, the curiosity. One day, she'll have to tell her.
"All the time," she says.
The End