Midnight Promises. Sherryl Woods

She’d been terrified of the passion he stirred in her when they’d first met. She hadn’t been ready to let herself fall so completely, head-over-heels in love, not when her experience with marriage had been so disastrous. She’d kept Elliott at arm’s length, had almost lost him because of it, in fact. In the end, though, it had been Frances who’d made her see that he was her second chance.

       She’d had a lot of second chances back then. Helen had negotiated one for her at Sullivan’s when Dana Sue had been about to fire her. Helen had also rushed to the rescue when stress had brought Karen close to an emotional breakdown that could have cost her the children. Helen had taken in Daisy and Mack, seen to it that Karen got the support she needed, then reunited them when the time came.

       Then, during that terrible time when she’d been at her absolute lowest, she’d met Elliott, a man not only strong, but quietly confident, persistent and with a generous, open heart. While he’d built up her physical strength during workouts at the spa—a gift from Helen, Dana Sue and Maddie—he’d also built up her battered ego whenever she’d let him.

       It had been so hard for her back then to trust that what he’d felt for her so quickly could be real. She hadn’t trusted her own feelings at all. And when his mother and sisters had objected strenuously to his involvement with a divorced woman, she’d seized it as the perfect excuse to run.

       Thank God, he hadn’t let her run far. Surprisingly, the love between them had given her the confidence to face down his mother, to win her over and make her, if not a friend, at least an ally.

       Now, lying beside him in bed, still warm from their lovemaking, she felt his gaze on her.

       “What’s on your mind, querida?” he asked, studying her intently as his hand rested on the curve of her hip. The touch was gentle, possessive.

       “Just thinking about how we got here,” she admitted. “How did you know we belonged together?”

       He smiled at the question. “The first time I saw you, you stole my heart,” he said simply. “You were in my blood.”

       “Why didn’t I know it that first instant, too?” she wondered. It had always bothered her that he’d been so sure, while she’d been so scared.

       “You did,” he corrected.

       “Absolutely not,” she argued.

       His smile spread. “People only run so hard when they’re afraid, querida. And they are only afraid of feelings so powerful they can’t control them.”

       She met his gaze, laughing. “Now, you’re just being smug.”

       “No, I am being smart and right,” he teased. “Admit it. You were at the very least in lust with me from that first day at the spa. You didn’t want to be, but you were.”

       Still chuckling, she nodded. “Okay, I’m like every other woman in there. Maybe I was just a little in lust.” She studied him. “But it was more than that for you, and I still can’t figure out why. What did you see in me? I was a wreck back then.”

       “You were like no wreck I’d ever seen before,” he said. “You were beautiful and vulnerable and I wanted to be a part of making you strong again.”

       She lifted an arm, flexed her biceps, then sighed. “Still not so strong.”

       He tapped her chest. “It’s your heart that’s strong again.”

       “You can say that after the way I freaked out today?”

       He smiled. “You stood up to me, didn’t you? You said your piece, insisted on answers. You didn’t back down.”

       “Not until you got me into this bed, anyway,” she said.

       “We’re not here just so I can distract you,” he said. “If you have more questions, I’ll answer them until you’re satisfied.”

       She grinned at that. “The questions can wait,” she told him. “I’d rather you satisfy me again the way you did a little while ago.”

       His eyes darkened at once. “With pleasure,” he murmured. “Always with pleasure.”

      3

      Frances could not for the life of her recall where she’d left her apartment keys. They weren’t on the hook by the kitchen door where she usually left them, or on the counter, none of the obvious places. If she was late getting to the senior center, Flo and Liz were going to worry. She’d always been the most punctual of all of her friends.

       She searched high and low, digging in the bottom of her purse, under the sofa cushions, checking in the bathroom, on her dresser. She eventually found them in, of all places, the freezer. She must have put them in there when she’d been getting her lasagna dinner out.

      Holding the ice-cold keys in her hand, she frowned. Didn’t they say that one of the first signs of Alzheimer’s was leaving things in odd places? Just the thought was enough to frighten her.

       “Stop it this minute,” she told herself sternly. “Don’t make a mountain out of a molehill. It’s not as if you do something crazy like this every day.”

       She tried to put the entire incident out of her mind, but over cards at the senior center, she mentioned it to Flo and Liz, forcing herself to laugh about her absentmindedness. To her shock, neither of them seemed to share her amusement. In fact, the look they exchanged was clearly worried.

       Liz, who was only a few years younger, reached for her hand. “Frances, I don’t want to alarm you, but maybe you should get this checked out.”

       Frances bristled. “How many times have you forgotten where you put your keys?”

       “Plenty,” Liz conceded. “But I haven’t once found them in the freezer, or anyplace else particularly odd, either.”

       Frances regarded her oldest and dearest friend with dismay. “What are you trying so hard not to say? This isn’t just about the keys, is it?”

       “No, it’s not,” Liz said. “You’ve said and done a few things lately that haven’t made a lot of sense. I’ve noticed. So has Flo.”

       Flo nodded.

       “And you’ve been talking about it behind my back?” Frances asked, knowing that her indignation was misplaced. They were her friends. Of course, they’d be concerned. Of course, they’d compare notes, rather than risk offending her by mentioning some incident that might mean nothing.

       “Neither of us was sure it amounted to enough to say anything to you,” Liz said gently. “We agreed just to keep a closer eye on you. Now that you’ve noticed yourself that something’s not quite right, well, maybe it would be best to see a doctor.”

       Frances felt as if the bottom of her world had just fallen out. Alzheimer’s? Not a one of them had mentioned the word, but it was clearly the elephant in the room. It was the cruelest of all diseases in so many ways. She’d seen it rob friends of their memories and, worse, take them away from their families long before they were physically gone. She’d always thought it heartbreaking.

       “Don’t panic,” Flo said, now holding tightly to Frances’s other hand. “We’ll go with you to the doctor. And I’ve been reading up on Alzheimer’s on the internet. There are new medicines that can help. That is, if you even have it. Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. We’re all getting more forgetful every day. Maybe this is nothing more than that.”

       “Absolutely,” Liz said, then gave Frances a sympathetic look. “Whatever you’re dealing with, we’re here for you. That’s a given, okay? You’re not in this alone.”

       “Will you promise me that whatever the diagnosis, you won’t say a word to anyone in my family?” Frances pleaded. “I’ll decide when the time is right for that. I don’t want them worrying unnecessarily or rushing over to Serenity to have me locked away in