But she would have to. There was only one explanation she could think of to account for the dreams, one thing that made a certain kind of sense to her, and if what she suspected was true, then those dreams, that connection she felt so vividly between her and Kane Macgregor, were yet another thing someone else had given her. Not hers at all.
She had no sense of herself, and it was terrifying.
He introduced Noah Bishop as his friend, and she vaguely recognized him as the man who had been with Kane on television. The angry scar down his left cheek didn't bother her, but his pale, watchful eyes made her uneasy; they were more silver than gray, and peculiarly reflective. She had the disturbing notion that he could see all the way to her soul.
"Some security building you've got here," Bishop said dryly to Kane.
"It's just electronic security on the front door at night," Kane replied. "Easy enough to get into the building if one of the neighbors is buzzing in a visitor."
"That's how I came in," Faith confessed, not needing to explain that she'd been unsure of her welcome.
Bishop sighed. "An armed guard or two would probably be a good idea."
"I'll add that to my list of things to do," Kane said.
"Sit down, Faith."
She did, at one end of the couch, grateful to be off her feet. She still tired easily, and just getting up the nerve to come here had been exhausting.
Kane frowned down at her. "You're frozen. How do you take your coffee?"
She had no idea, and tried to choke back the bubble hysterical laughter trying to escape her throat. "I... just any way. It doesn't matter."
At least he'd misread her shaking and her flushed cheeks, assuming both to be due to the chilly evening.
"I'll get it," Bishop said, and went around the corner into the kitchen.
Kane joined her on the couch, no more than a foot away and half-turning so he could watch her.
"I'm glad you came, Faith." He added almost apologetically, "Do you mind my using your first name? It's the way Dinah spoke of you, and..."
Faith shook her head. "No, I don't mind."
Maybe it'll start to sound familiar.
"Good. Thank you. I'm Kane. As for my friend, most people call him Bishop."
"Everybody but you," Bishop called from the kitchen, proving that either he had very good ears or the walls were thin.
Kane smiled slightly, then repeated to Faith, "I am glad you came. We wanted to talk to you, even though Dr. Burnett said you couldn't remember anything."
There was the faintest questioning lift to the statement.
"Nothing of my life," she confessed. "Nothing ... personal. Not who I am or where I came from. I'm still not used to the name, the face I see in the mirror. It's ... disconcerting."
"I'd think it would be scary as hell," he said bluntly.
"That too."
Bishop returned to the room with coffee and handed her a cup. Their hands touched as she accepted it, and she was suddenly conscious of a moment of intense stillness. His eyes seemed to bore into hers, and she was acutely aware of his warm fingers touching hers. The connection was so powerful, it was as if he held her physically in an inescapable grip.
Then, even as she became aware of it, the moment passed. His fingers drew away and he straightened, his gaze calm and cool once more. Shaken, Faith sipped the coffee and tried to think only of the drink. He had fixed it with plenty of cream and sugar, and since it tasted pleasant she assumed this was indeed how she took her coffee.
"Thank you."
He nodded and chose a chair across from the couch. Very conscious that he was watching her closely, she turned to Kane.
"I was obviously Dinah's friend," she said to him. "I didn't know you?"
"We never met. I... went to the hospital after Dinah disappeared, to talk to the staff about her visits, and saw you briefly, but that was all."
She was afraid her hands would shake and betray her growing weariness and fear, so she set her cup on the coffee table and laced the fingers together in her lap. "Do you have any idea how long I'd known Dinah, or where we'd met? Anything like that?"
He shook his head. "Dinah and I didn't meet until about seven months ago. I know a lot about her, but certainly not everything. And if you were in any way connected with her work, I'd be even less likely to know about you."
Bishop said quietly, "Were you connected with her work?"
"From what I gathered from news reports, she's a journalist?"
"Right."
"Then I don't see how. According to the pay stubs I found in my apartment," she said wryly, "I worked for the city. I called and spoke to my supervisor. Apparently, I was a small cog in a very big wheel. I did routine office work."
"Which office?" Kane asked.
"Building Inspections and Zoning." She grimaced. "About which I know nothing. Or at least nothing I remember. My job involved typing and filing." She considered for a moment. "I think I know how to type."
There was something forlorn in her voice, and Kane acted instinctively.He reached over and covered her tightly clasped hands with one of his own.
"The doctor said your memory will eventually come back to you, Faith. You have to believe that."
She looked down at his hand, her eyes wide; and Bishop, watching her, was reminded of a deer frozen in a car's headlights, paralyzed and unable to save itself from certain death.
In a constricted voice, she said, "Something has been coming to me, but... not my memories. I thought they were at first, but now I see they weren't mine at all."
Kane released her hands and leaned back, frowning. "What do you mean?"
"They started when I was still in the hospital. just dreams, but maybe memories too, I thought. Dreams like ... like little vignettes, brief scenes of someone's life."
"Whose life?" Kane asked slowly.
She drew a breath. "Yours. And... and Dinah's."
Out of the coma.
Christ. From everything he'd been able to find out, that was the last thing he'd expected, that she'd wake up. Ever.
He paced for a few minutes, then went to the phone and called a familiar number. Barely waiting for the answer at the other end, he said, "Faith Parker is out of the hospital."
"What?"
"You heard me."
There was a long silence, and then, "It doesn't have to change anything. Even if she remembers what happened before the accident, the drug would've scrambled everything, left her confused at the very least and possibly psychotic."
"After so many weeks?"
"Look, don't panic, all right?"
"Dammit, I told you we shouldn't have stopped looking. I told you we needed to find it..."
"I said don't panic. The first thing we have to do is find out if she's even a threat."
"And if she is?"
"Then we'll take care of it."
"You dreamed about us?" Faith winced at the disbelief in Kane's voice.
"Oh, I know it sounds absurd. I've told myself that. But the dreams were too vivid, too real, to be something my own imagination conjured up. I think..." She swallowed hard. "The only answer I can think of is that somehow, in some way I can't explain and don't understand, I've ... tapped in to Dinah's memories."
Coolly matter-of-fact, Bishop said, "How is that possible?"
"I don't know. Maybe I was psychic before the accident." Her hands lifted and fell in a brief, helpless gesture. "Or maybe I am now because of the accident. I went to the library yesterday and looked up coma. According to what I read, a few people have come out of comas demonstrating unusual abilities — especially if there was a head injury involved."
She reached up and pushed her hair off her forehead, showing them a small square of adhesive bandage.