Make Me Forget - Page 58

“He treated you?” Jacob asked slowly, recalling that her father was a psychiatrist.

She nodded.

“Isn’t that a little . . .” unethical, he thought. “Unusual? For a father to treat his daughter?” he asked, repulsed by the idea, for some reason. She stiffened.

“My father was one of the most respected psychiatrists in the country, not to mention arguably the most renowned expert in the world in the field of hypnotism. He was the ideal candidate to address my issues.”

“Hypnotism,” he repeated, stunned.

“Yes,” she said, eyeing him warily. “You don’t have to look like that. It’s not witchcraft, you know. What’s more, he was completely successful.”

“He cured you.”

Her gaze skated away from his. “That’s right. Don’t worry, I’m not contagious, Jacob.”

She flipped the comforter back in preparation to get up. He caught her forearm as she started to slide out of bed.

“You’re glad?” he demanded. “That your father was the one to treat you?”

“Of course I am! You have no idea how anxious I was, how shut off from my friends and a normal teenage existence. I was afraid constantly. I’m a different person today, because of my father’s help.”

Her face was pale and tense. It came to him in a rush, how his abrupt, tactless questions must have struck her. Yet his curiosity still prodded at him. Did her father’s treatment have anything to do with why she never mentioned her kidnapping or their flight from Emmitt Tharp? Is that why she didn’t recognize him? No, that couldn’t be the only reason. She didn’t recognize him primarily because he didn’t remotely resemble that skinny, helpless thirteen-year-old kid. Jacob had made sure of that.

Maybe Dr. McFadden had merely done what any father would have longed to do when presented with a traumatized daughter. Had his treatment psychologically distanced Harper from the frightening memory of her kidnapping and her assault at the hands of Emmitt Tharp? Or had he tried to totally erase that handful of days and nights from Harper’s childhood? Speculation and questions flooded his brain.

Until he focused on Harper’s anxious face again, anyway. He couldn’t badger her about it. Not now.

Besides, if she had forgotten, she was safe from the memories.

He was safe from her remembering.

He nodded once, his hold on her loosening. “I’m sorry. I think a little of your nightmare rubbed off on me. You looked really scared. I shouldn’t have asked so many questions.”

He saw the tension melt from her sloping shoulders and graceful back. “It’s okay. I’m sorry for freaking you out. I guess we all have nightmares, right?” she asked him uneasily.

He nodded, reaching to stroke her silky shoulder, reassuring her even as he reassured himself.

Yeah. Everyone had their nightmares. The truth was, Jacob had some that involved a knife, too. Not just any knife, either.

The exact same knife that apparently still haunted Harper’s dreams.

Twenty Years Ago

After they’d locked the sedated dogs in the barn, he’d furtively led Harper over a freshly mown lawn to the edge of the forest. He removed his backpack.

“Climb up onto my back,” he whispered.

“What?”

“Your walk leaves a trail. I’ll wipe it when I go back. Just do it, Harper. Get on my back.”

Even though she looked exasperated, she put her hands on his shoulders when he turned around. He draped his pack in the crook of his arm and hoisted her onto his back. Willfully ignoring the sensation of her hands fastened on his skinny muscles and her breasts pressing against his shoulder blades, he entered the forest. Fifty feet in, he set her down next to an ancient, branchy oak.

“The angle on the house is good here, see?” Jake said, pointing toward a clearing in the trees. “I’m going back for a few minutes to do something. You stay here. If you see my uncle come out, or any other man come onto the property, hide up there,” he said, pointing at the intersection of the trunk and seven gnarly, thick branches. “There’s a hole in the trunk up there. Just slide right in it. You’re little enough to fit. I hide there sometimes from Emmitt, so I know he doesn’t know about it. If I don’t come back to get you soon, wait until you’re sure the coast is clear, and head in that direction.” He pointed to the west. He noticed her alarmed expression. “I’ll be back in less than five minutes. I’m telling you this . . . just in case.”

She caught his arm, halting him as he started back toward Emmitt’s property.

“You’re crazy. Let’s go. What do you have to go back for?” she hissed.

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