Lost Identity Read online

  He opened his eyes, wanting, above all else, to watch the changing expression on her beautiful face as their lovemaking moved towards its zenith. But as he opened his eyes, he found his vision was blurry, wavering; he couldn’t see her clearly. What was going on? He closed his eyes tight shut and opened them again, trying to shake free of the trance-like veil which had enveloped him. As his vision began to clear, his heart skipped a beat. In an instant, the heat of sexual desire had vanished, to be replaced by a whirlwind of shattering confusion.

  Where were those beautiful, azure blue eyes? The eyes which now locked onto his were a deep brown colour. And her long, blonde hair was now jet black. Her skin tone was no longer pale and porcelain-like: it was the colour of mahogany. What the hell was happening?

  Her face moved closer to his once more. Through a swirling haze, he saw her lips move. Everything seemed to be in slow motion as he heard the words, distant and echoing, as though through a long tunnel.

  ‘Are you OK? Can you hear me?’ The accent sounded South American or, perhaps, Spanish.

  But as he struggled to make sense of what was happening, the vision of her face began to fade, gradually becoming subsumed in a grey mist.

  Her voice became fainter. ‘Stay with me … wake up … they’ll be here soon … try to …’

  But she was gone.

  ***

  Beep … beep … beep …

  The regular, insistent sound was gradually becoming louder, intruding into the warm, private cocoon which he occupied.

  Beep … beep … beep …

  Go away, will you?

  Beep … BEEP … BEEP … BEEP …

  He could ignore it no longer. He tried to open his eyes, but his eyelids refused to respond to his brain’s instruction – they were resolutely glued shut.

  He tried to call for help, but his parched tongue clung to the roof of his mouth.

  He tried again. ‘P-please … c-c-can somebody help me?’

  A few seconds later, he felt a hand on his cheek.

  A female voice intruded. ‘Sir … are you awake? Can you hear me?’

  ‘Y-yes … I c-can hear you.’

  He tried once more to open his eyes; finally, his eyelids freed themselves and flickered open. At first, all he could see were blurry shapes of light and dark but, as he blinked to try to clear his vision, the female face which he dimly remembered from his dream began to materialise once more.

  Except it wasn’t the same face …

  This face was more rounded and the complexion paler. Her hair was short and dark, styled in a bob. When she spoke, the accent was different, too – now it sounded American Deep South.

  ‘Doctor Holt … Doctor Holt … he’s coming around!’ she cried, rushing away, leaving him dazed and bewildered.

  He tried to lift his head, but the stabbing pain which shot through it made him slump back into the pillow. As he raised his hand to try to determine the source of the pain he could feel the texture of some kind of fabric, realising, eventually, that his head had been bandaged. With a considerable effort, he managed to turn his head to one side, wincing as the pain lanced through his skull once more. Alongside him was a screen showing several green, glowing, horizontal lines punctuated by sharp peaks pulsing at regular intervals.

  He felt a hand on his shoulder and heard another voice – male this time.

  ‘Sir, can you see me … and hear me?’

  Tentatively, he swivelled his head towards the sound. The man leaning over him was middle-aged, thin-faced, with a neatly-trimmed beard. His pale grey eyes radiated kindness and warmth.

  ‘Yes … where am I?’

  ‘You’re in hospital. I’m a doctor … my name is Alan Holt.’

  ‘But why am I here? What happened?’

  ‘You have suffered a severe head wound. You have been in a coma for three days.’

  As he tried to sit up, the spear of pain in the back of his head forced him back down; the man laid a gentle restraining hand on his chest.

  ‘Don’t try to move just yet … you have a minor skull fracture.’

  ‘A skull fracture? Oh my God ... is it … well … am I going to be alright?’

  The doctor removed his hand. ‘There is no need to worry unduly. As far as we can ascertain it is not severe enough to have impinged on your brain, and we do not believe surgery will be necessary. Nevertheless, it will take some time to heal. We can give you something for the pain, but you must rest.’

  ‘But what happened to me? Was it an accident, or …?’ His words tailed off.

  ‘We don’t know for sure what happened,’ said the doctor. ‘It wasn’t an accident, though. We were rather hoping you would be able to tell us what happened.’

  ‘Well, I was just …’ As he struggled to recall what had happened he felt a sickening emptiness inside – he had absolutely no recollection of whatever had happened to put him in hospital.

  ‘Now, what do you remember about the incident?’ prompted the doctor.

  ‘I … I don’t remember anything.’

  The doctor’s face creased with concern. ‘Do you remember why you were in that alley?’

  ‘An alley … what alley? I don’t remember anything about any alley.’ He clutched at the doctor’s sleeve. ‘What’s happened to me? I can’t remember anything.’

  ‘OK …OK,’ soothed the doctor, ‘don’t worry – you’re going to be fine. It seems that the blow to your head has caused some memory loss, but it’s probably temporary. Having been in a coma for three days, you can’t expect everything to get back to normal immediately.’

  He let go of the doctor’s sleeve and sank back into the pillow as the enormity of the situation began to register. ‘But what did happen to me in this alley?’

  ‘As far as we can ascertain, you were the victim of an attack, in which you received a severe blow to the head. As for the motive, we have no idea. Do you know if anything was stolen from you?’

  He screwed his eyes tight shut, concentrating intensely as he tried to recall what had happened, but it was no use. ‘I don’t know,’ he muttered.

  ‘Alright, don’t stress about it. Hopefully the police will come up with something.’

  He shook his head in frustration. ‘How did I end up here … in hospital?’

  ‘The emergency services received a 911 call … fortunately very soon after the attack. If that hadn’t happened, the outcome might have been far worse – you were losing a lot of blood. Do you know who made the 911 call?’

  Once again, he trawled the depths of his brain for an answer but, once again, came up blank. He shook his head. ‘No … I don’t remember anything.’

  ‘Apparently the caller was a woman. Were you perhaps travelling with your wife … or a female business colleague … or—’

  ‘I told you,’ he snapped, exasperated, ‘I can’t remember anything.’ He immediately regretted the tone he had adopted with the doctor who, after all, was only trying to help him. ‘I … I’m sorry Doctor. It’s just so … well, frightening … being unable to remember anything.’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ said the doctor, his voice calm and reassuring, ‘I completely understand. Now then, let’s just take it step by step.’

  He nodded, breathing deeply as he tried to calm and compose himself. ‘OK, but sorry, anyway … for the outburst.’

  ‘No apology necessary,’ soothed the doctor. ‘Now then, when they brought you to us you had no I.D. on you. Can you tell me your name?’

  ‘My name? Yes, it’s … it’s …’ He groped for the words that should have tripped so easily from his tongue, but they eluded him.

  ‘Yes?’ prompted the doctor.

  But he wasn’t listening – he was concentrating on a superhuman effort to probe the deepest recesses of his own mind, searching, grasping. And then, at last, it came to him …

  ‘Stephen,’ he gasped. ‘Yes … definitely Stephen’.

  ‘Good,’ said the doctor, his face relaxing a little.

  ‘And what
about your surname?’

  He closed his eyes as he tried to revisit that elusive corner of his brain which had just given up this first shred of information.

  ‘Lewis … my name is Stephen Lewis.’

  It was the tiniest of steps forward, but a step forward nevertheless. Stephen Lewis allowed himself a small smile.

  ‘You see? Your memory is starting to return already. Now, from your accent, I assume you are English. Do you remember why you are in Miami?’

  ‘Miami? I’m in Miami … Florida?’

  The doctor nodded.

  The realisation that he didn’t even know what country he was in quickly dashed the brief sense of euphoria resulting from the recollection of his name. He screwed his eyes tight shut as he tried to recall what he was doing in Miami, but it was no use; he let out a noisy sigh of exasperation. ‘No … I’m sorry … I can’t remember.’

  ‘OK, don’t worry – it will probably come back to you soon. Anyway, at least we know your name now. We can check with the police whether anyone has been asking after you. Meanwhile, you need to rest. We’ll give you something for the pain, and a mild sedative to help you sleep. We’ll talk again tomorrow morning.’

  With that, the doctor left the room, leaving the nurse to administer the medication. She gave him a small plastic beaker with four capsules in it. She helped him raise his head a little and, one by one, he swallowed the capsules, taking sips of water from the cup she held to his lips.

  As he settled back and closed his eyes, he tried to make sense of his situation. Who was he? Why was he in Miami? Why would anyone want to attack him? His head swirled with a tangled maelstrom of disconnected thoughts. But none of it made any sense.

  Before long, he gave up; sleep overtook him.

  Chapter 2

  The distant drone of the engines suddenly changed in tone and he sensed the pace of the aircraft slacken slightly as he experienced the familiar weightlessness in his stomach: they were starting their gradual descent.

  He glanced across at his wife; she was still fast asleep, a strand of long, blonde hair draped carelessly across her cheek and over the corner of her mouth, where it fluttered rhythmically each time she exhaled. He leaned over and gently pulled the hair away from her finely-sculpted cheek. Her pretty, slightly-upturned nose twitched, and she emitted a sigh but did not wake. She looked so much younger than her thirty-seven years and, even after four years of marriage, he could still hardly believe that such a beautiful woman would have chosen him, an average-looking guy, five years her senior, to be her husband. There was no need to wake her just yet, so he set about gathering together the papers he had been studying and packing them away in his briefcase.

  ‘Can I take that for you sir?’ said a flight attendant, reaching out for the briefcase.

  ‘Thank you. I didn’t want to disturb my wife.’

  ‘Of course,’ she said, smiling. ‘But we’ll be arriving soon anyway. I’ll put your case in the overhead locker, right here.’

  As he reached over her to pass the case to the flight attendant, his wife shifted position, pulling her blanket up around her shoulders and letting out a sort of contented snuffling noise, but still she did not wake.

  He turned to gaze out of the window, where they were just about to descend into a cloud layer so dense that it looked more like a snow-covered field, gleaming in the bright sunshine. It was easy to imagine you could just get out and walk on it, kicking up the icy crystals as you passed.

  As they entered the cloud layer, the change in outlook was as abrupt as if someone had flipped an invisible light switch. All that could be seen, now, was an impenetrable, greyish-white miasma, rapidly flickering as the aircraft sped through areas of differing cloud density. And then, suddenly, they were through, and the vista laid out below could be clearly seen. Gone was the splendid isolation of the open skies, to be replaced by the expansive vista of southern Florida. The highways were choked with traffic, barely moving as it snaked between the swathes of concrete and glass and across the vast bridges which crossed the sparkling waters of Biscayne Bay. The intra-coastal waterway, with its many inlets and backwaters, was packed with boats, small and large.

  This network of inland waterways, and the substantial pockets of green space which had been preserved, lifted the whole scene from potentially depressing urban sprawl to inviting, semi-tropical retreat. He had never been to Miami before and was looking forward immensely to his stay.

  Having been awake for practically the whole journey, perversely, now that they were on their final approach, the desire to sleep became almost irresistible. He leant his head back and closed his eyes, just for a few moments …

  ***

  He heard distant voices: a man and a woman … no, perhaps two men and a woman. He was no longer in the aeroplane; he was back in his hospital bed. He tried to re-enter the pleasant world of his dream, which seemed a far more inviting place than the harsh reality which now threatened to intrude.

  It was no use: the harder he tried to drift back to that cosy place, sitting alongside his beautiful wife, the more he—

  Suddenly he was wide awake. He opened his eyes, blinking against the harsh glare of the overhead light.

  ‘Doctor! Nurse!’ he cried. Within seconds Doctor Holt appeared in the doorway.

  ‘What is it, Mr Lewis?’

  ‘My wife … I’m here with my wife.’

  ‘Your wife?’

  ‘Yes … I remember now.’

  ‘This is excellent news,’ declared the doctor.

  But Stephen Lewis didn’t share the doctor’s assessment. ‘Oh, my God! She’ll be worried sick. If she hasn’t heard from me in over three days, she’ll be—’

  The doctor raised a calming hand. ‘OK, OK. Just tell me what you remember.’

  ‘I was with her on a plane. She was asleep right beside me.’

  ‘And you think that plane was headed here … for Miami?’

  ‘I … yes, the view out of the window … the waterways. Yes, I think we were coming in to land in Miami.’

  ‘OK, very good. Now, can you tell me your wife’s name?’

  ‘Of course. It’s … it’s …’ But her name just wouldn’t come. He clenched his fists in frustration. ‘I … I can’t remember.’ He sighed, heavily.

  The doctor moved to calm him, making a sort of slow, downward, patting gesture in the air with his hand. ‘Please … don’t stress about that right now … I’m sure it will come back to you in due course.’

  ‘But I can describe her,’ breathed Stephen.

  ‘Go ahead,’ encouraged the doctor.

  ‘She’s tall; slim; blue eyes; long, blonde hair; and beautiful … she really is beautiful.’

  ‘Perhaps it was your wife who placed the 911 call,’ suggested the doctor.

  He considered this possibility for a moment but quickly rejected it. ‘No … if that were the case, surely she’d be here.’ He fixed the doctor with a penetrating stare. ‘What if she was with me when I was attacked? I have to find her … she may be hurt.’

  The doctor’s reply was delivered in a soft, calming tone. ‘Please don’t worry, Mr Lewis. I’m sure there’s no reason to suppose she’s hurt.’

  He tried to sit up, a spear of pain lancing through his skull. ‘But if she was with me when I was attacked, she could be—’

  The doctor placed a gentle restraining hand on his shoulder, easing him back down in his bed. ‘Look, let’s take it one step at a time. We can give your wife’s description to the police and they can check whether a lady matching that description has reported you missing.’

  ‘But what if she’s—’

  ‘Calm yourself, Mr Lewis. If she’s here in Miami, I’m sure the police will be able to find her.’

  Stephen’s head slumped back into the pillow. ‘I suppose so.’

  ‘Look, there are actually two police officers here right now. They’re waiting to interview you just as soon as you are able to answer questions. Do you feel up to it, or shall I t
ell them to come back tomorrow?’

  ‘No,’ he sighed, ‘let’s get it over with … though I’m not sure I can really tell them anything useful.’

  ‘Just tell them everything you can remember,’ said the doctor. ‘No-one can ask any more of you.’ He gave his patient a reassuring pat on the shoulder before leaving the room.

  Stephen closed his eyes and, as he did so, that delicious vision of his lovemaking, with the woman who he now realised was his wife, came flooding back. As he gazed into those deep blue eyes, it suddenly came to him …

  ‘Emma!’ he blurted, his eyes wide open now. ‘Her name is Emma.’ But there was no-one there to hear his cry.

  A few seconds later, however, the nurse from the previous day entered the room, followed by two police officers.

  ‘Ah, Stephen … these two gentlemen—’

  He sat bolt upright, interrupting her in his haste to share this latest flash of insight. ‘I remember her name: it’s Emma. My wife’s name is Emma. She’ll be trying to find out what’s happened to me. We have to find her.’

  ‘OK … that’s fantastic,’ said the nurse. ‘Your memory is gradually coming back. Now that we have a name and a description of your wife, I’m sure we can—’

  ‘Ahem …’ She was interrupted by one of the police officers reminding her of their presence.

  ‘Er, Stephen … these two gentlemen are police officers. They would like to ask you a few questions.’

  ‘And then we’ll get right on the case with finding your wife, sir,’ said the taller of the two.

  ‘OK,’ said Stephen, anxious to get this over with so that they could get on with the much more important business of locating Emma, ‘but I don’t think I’ll be able to tell you much.’

  ‘Twenty minutes maximum,’ scolded the nurse. ‘He’s still very weak.’

  ‘Officer Brooks,’ said the taller guy, stepping forward. ‘And this is Officer Rodriguez. Mind if we sit down?’

  They didn’t wait for a reply, both pulling up chairs alongside the bed. Rodriguez pulled out a notebook and pen, looking expectantly at his partner, who was evidently going to do the talking.