Free Deceptions of the Heart by Denise Moncrief Page A

but his motive. He grunted at me. Lifted one hand and dropped it. I licked my lips before I tried again to defend myself. “I didn’t know what she was giving me.”
    “If you didn’t acquire these drugs, then that means Sudha got them for you.” His eyes strayed as if recalling some faraway scene. “Actually, considering what she said when she left…” He sighed. “The barbiturate isn’t hard to get if you know where to look. But the anticonvulsant? That’s not a street drug. Someone had to write the script. Whitaker’s name is on the bottle.” He looked at me for the answer to his unspoken question. Did Whitaker prescribe the drug or not?
    “I don’t think he wrote it.”
    “Then who did?” he asked.
    “I don’t know.” Another glimmer of suspicion hit me. The doubt just kept coming at me.
    Isn’t Jackson Prentiss a drug rep? A customer of Cristobal Pharmaceuticals and maybe other manufacturers, as well?
    “This could have killed you. You know that, don’t you?” He stuffed the bottles in his pants pocket. My upper teeth grabbed my bottom lip. I was glad I’d said nothing of the two pills I’d kept just in case.
    “I’m well aware of that,” I replied, careful not to accuse him of neglect. “I don’t want to die, Anson.” This perhaps explained the emergence of Rhonda. She didn’t want to die. Neither did Jennifer.
    “No, I don’t suppose you do.” He smiled and dropped onto a barstool. “So did you find out what you wanted to know in California?”
    I sat next to him, glad to get off my aching feet. “I learned nothing that would make a difference, but I found out some things I didn’t want to know.” I waited for a reaction, but he remained quiet. “I met with Dr. Crane.”
    He raised his eyebrows. “And?”
    “I’ve had trouble with my memory. I thought maybe the problem was related to my heart. I did some research on the internet—”
    “That’s what got you into trouble last time.”
    I pushed a wayward bunch of hair from my face and ignored his pointed comment. “He refused to believe my memory lapses were connected to my surgery. He suggested I see a shrink.”
    “Maybe you should.” His response was sincere. I expected him to be facetious.
    “That seems to be the prevailing opinion.”
    “You couldn’t tell me this was the problem before you left?” A note of injured pride crept into his voice.
    I looked down at my feet. No, I couldn’t. And I couldn’t bring myself to say it aloud and to his face.
    “I thought you went back to find the donor’s family again. Looking for some sort of connection—”
    “No, not exactly.”
    A puzzled frown creased his brow. “So you didn’t locate her family?”
    I ran my tongue over my teeth. “Actually…”
    “You did, didn’t you?”
    “I met her husband.”
    “Did that help?” he asked.
    “No. I learned some things about him I didn’t want to know. He was…uh…cheating on his wife when she died. I didn’t need to know that. Some things should remain in the ground with the dead.” I inspected a dark spot on the countertop, not willing to meet Anson’s eyes while I talked of my humiliation at Alex’s hands. “I met his new wife and…they have nothing I need. I won’t be going back there again.” The bite in my words revealed my disappointment. The bitterness of Alex’s betrayal stung.
    “You said that the last time. You promised me you wouldn’t go back.” His hurt was unmistakable.
    “I don’t remember the last time.”
    “Oh? Part of the memory loss?”
    I didn’t want to tell him how deep my memory problems were. They were the size and depth of canyons. “I suppose. Anyway, my life is here.” Resignation permeated my declaration. His brows drew together across his forehead. My comments appeared to confuse him, so I rushed to explain. “Look, I know I’ve done some awful things. To you. To others. I think I’ve been manipulative and selfish. Spiteful. Maybe even cruel. I wanted what I