I sat on my bed staring at that broken phone for forever. Sebastian's words kept spinning in my head: "This is the fourth time."
Fourth time what? Fourth time I died? Fourth time I came back? Fourth time he tried to forget me?
None of this crap made any sense. I was Dr. Evira Grey. Twenty-seven years old. Lived alone in this shitty apartment on Maple Street and spent my days cutting bad memories out of rich people's brains. That was my life. That was me.
Except now I was sitting in the middle of wedding pictures showing me married to some guy I'd just met.
I grabbed one of the photos from my nightstand. Me in a white dress that probably cost more than my yearly salary. I was laughing at something Sebastian said, my hand on his chest, looking at him like he hung the moon. The woman in the picture looked happy. Like, really truly happy in a way I wasn't sure I'd ever felt.
But I had zero memory of this picture. Couldn't remember that dress. Couldn't remember being that happy.
I flipped the frame over and pulled off the back. Maybe there'd be a date or something to help me figure this mess out. But what I found made my hands shake again.
More pictures hidden behind the first one. Tons of them. Me and Sebastian on what looked like a honeymoon. At the beach, fancy restaurants, hotel rooms. In some shots I had different clothes, different hair. Like they were taken at totally different times.
Different lives.
At the bottom was a picture that stopped my heart cold. Me lying in a hospital bed, pale and skinny, with tubes and wires all over my body. Sebastian sat next to me holding my hand, looking like he hadn't slept in weeks. Someone wrote on the back in that same handwriting:
"The first time we lost you. I swore I'd never let it happen again. -S"
The first time.
I dropped those pictures like they were poisonous and backed away from the bed. This was crazy. This was impossible. People don't just die and come back. They don't get multiple lives. They don't forget their own marriages and wake up as totally different people.
But the proof was everywhere. Pictures on every wall, stuffed in every drawer, tucked behind every frame. Pictures of a life I couldn't remember with a man I supposedly loved.
A man who kept losing me over and over.
My busted phone started buzzing. Another call from that same number. Sebastian.
I stared at it, not sure if I wanted to answer. Part of me wanted answers. Part of me was scared as hell about what those answers might be.
It stopped buzzing, then started right back up. He wasn't giving up.
Third try, I picked up.
"Evira," Sebastian's voice was rough, like he'd been crying. "You still there?"
"Yeah, I'm here," I said, though I wasn't sure where "here" was anymore.
"I know this is crazy. I know you've got questions."
"Questions?" I laughed, but it came out bitter. "Try a million questions. Starting with who the hell I really am."
"You're my wife," Sebastian said, simple as that. "You're the woman I've loved for eight years. The person I've lost four times and found four times. You're Evira Black, not Grey."
Black. Not Grey.
"That's impossible," I said, but even I could hear how weak I sounded.
"Look at your left hand."
I looked down. My ring finger was bare, like always. But now that I really looked, I could see a faint mark. A thin line of pale skin where a ring might've sat for years.
"You always take it off before surgery," Sebastian said, like he could see through the phone. "You hide it from yourself. But your body remembers."
I touched that mark on my finger. It was real. Faded, but real.
"This doesn't make sense," I whispered.
"I know. But I'm coming over. I've got your ring. Your real ID. Proof of everything I'm telling you."
"No," I said fast. "Don't come here. I need time to think."
"Evira, please. You said the exact same thing the last three times. You always need time to think, and then something happens. Someone takes you away from me."
"What do you mean someone takes me?"
"The people who don't want you to remember. The ones who benefit from keeping you lost."
Ice ran down my spine. "What people?"
"I'll explain when I see you. But right now you're not safe. That black car outside? Those aren't my guys."
I ran to the window and looked down. The black car was still there, but now there was a second one. Two men in dark suits stood next to it, looking up at my building.
"Oh shit," I breathed.
"Pack a bag," Sebastian said, voice urgent now. "Right now. Whatever you need for a few days. I'm coming."
"I don't understand what's happening."
"I know, baby. But trust me. Just for tonight. Tomorrow I'll show you everything. Help you remember."
Baby. He said it so natural, like he'd said it a thousand times. And something deep in my chest recognized it. Responded to it.
"Hurry," Sebastian said. "Ten minutes."
The line went dead.
I stood there frozen, confused and scared out of my mind. Then I heard footsteps in the hall outside my apartment. Heavy ones. Multiple sets.
Moving fast.
I grabbed a duffel bag and started throwing clothes in it. I had no clue what I was doing or why, but every instinct screamed at me to get out. Run.
The footsteps stopped outside my door.
I froze, holding a sweater halfway to the bag.
Someone knocked. Three hard raps.
"Dr. Grey? Building security. We need to talk to you about a disturbance."
I didn't know that voice. And I'd lived here three years - I knew all the security guys.
I tiptoed to the door and looked through the peephole. Two men in dark suits stood in the hallway. Same guys from the street.
Not building security.
"Dr. Grey?" Another knock, harder. "We know you're in there."
I backed away from the door, heart pounding so loud they probably could hear it. I finished packing as quietly as I could, threw on a jacket, and went to the window.
Four floors up. No fire escape I could see. No way out except through the front door where those guys were waiting.
I was screwed.
My phone buzzed. Text message.
"Fire escape on the back side. Climb down to third floor, go through apartment 3B. Door's unlocked. Move now. -S"
How did Sebastian know about a fire escape I didn't even know existed? How did he know about 3B?
Another knock, even harder.
"Dr. Grey, we're coming in."
No time to think. I grabbed my bag, climbed out the window, and looked around the side of the building. Sure enough - fire escape I'd somehow never noticed in three years.
I climbed over just as I heard my front door crash open.
The fire escape was old and rusty, creaking like crazy as I climbed down. At the third floor, I tried the window to 3B. Unlocked, just like Sebastian said.
I climbed through into a dark apartment that smelled like nobody had lived there in months. But there was a clear path to the front door, like someone had planned this route.
I made it to the lobby just as Sebastian's car pulled up outside. Sleek black Mercedes, nothing like those beat-up sedans following me. He jumped out and ran toward the building, and when he saw me, his whole face changed.
Relief. Love. Desperation.
He looked at me like I was the most precious thing in the world. Like I was someone worth dying for.
"Evira," he said, and then I was in his arms.
Weirdest thing happened. My body knew him. My arms went around his neck like they'd done it a thousand times. My face fit perfect in the curve of his shoulder. His smell - expensive cologne mixed with something uniquely him - felt familiar in a way that made my chest hurt.
"We gotta go," he said, but didn't let go. Held me tighter. "They're already upstairs."
"Who are they?"
"Later. Right now we need to get you safe."
He led me to his car and helped me into the passenger seat. As we drove away, I looked back at my building. The two suit guys were at my fourth-floor window - looking down at the street.
Looking for me.
"Where are we going?" I asked.
"Home," Sebastian said. "Your real home."
"I thought that was my real home."
Sebastian glanced at me, green eyes sad. "That apartment was never yours, Evira. It was a cover story. A fake life to keep you hidden while you got better."
"Got better from what?"
"From dying."
That word hung in the air like a bomb. I stared at Sebastian's profile as he drove through the city. He was handsome in an expensive way - perfect hair, designer clothes, a watch that probably cost more than most people made in a year. But there were lines around his eyes that screamed years of worry. Of loss.
Of grief.
"Tell me about the ring," I said suddenly.
Sebastian smiled for the first time since I'd met him. It changed his whole face. "Which time?"
"What do you mean, which time?"
"I've proposed to you five times. You said yes four times. The fifth time... we didn't get that far."
He reached into his jacket and pulled out a small velvet box. Handed it to me without taking his eyes off the road.
I opened it with shaky hands.
Inside was the most gorgeous ring I'd ever seen. A diamond so perfect it seemed to glow, surrounded by smaller stones that caught the streetlights as we drove. But it wasn't the beauty that made me gasp.
It was how familiar it felt.
I knew this ring. My finger remembered how heavy it was. My hand remembered wearing it.
"First time I proposed, we were on a beach in Santorini," Sebastian said, voice soft with memory. "You cried for an hour because you thought it was too expensive. Second time, I proposed at midnight on New Year's Eve in Times Square. You said yes before I could even get the words out."
I slipped the ring on my finger. Perfect fit.
"Third time you were in the hospital. You'd been in a coma for two weeks. I proposed while you were unconscious because I was scared you'd die without knowing how much I loved you."
"And the fourth?"
"Six months ago. You'd been back for almost three years, living as Dr. Evira Grey. You started remembering stuff - little things at first. How you liked your coffee. That you hated horror movies. How you hummed when you were happy."
I did hum when I was happy. Always wondered where that came from.
"You found some of our old pictures," Sebastian said. "Started asking questions. So I told you everything, then proposed again."
"What did I say?"
Sebastian's hands tightened on the steering wheel. "You said yes. We planned a wedding. We were happy for three months. Then you disappeared."
"How?"
"You went to work one morning and never came home. Found your car in the parking garage at the Crystal Tower, but you were gone. No note, no explanation. Just gone."
We'd been driving for twenty minutes, leaving downtown and heading toward the hills. Houses got bigger, driveways longer. Memory Hills. Where the rich folks lived.
"I looked for you for two months," Sebastian said. "Hired investigators, called in favors, even offered a million-dollar reward. Nothing. Then six weeks ago, you showed up at the Crystal Tower again. Dr. Evira Grey, memory surgeon. Like the previous three years never happened."
"But you knew it was me."
"I always know it's you. Even when you don't know yourself."
We pulled through massive iron gates and up a circular driveway to a house that looked more like a castle. Three stories of glass and stone, with gardens that probably cost more to keep up than most people's salaries.
"This is where we lived?" I asked.
"This is where we live," Sebastian corrected. "Your stuff's still here. Clothes, books, jewelry. Even your coffee mug in the kitchen sink."
He parked and came around to open my door. As I stepped out, I looked up at the house and something inside me stirred. Not memory exactly, but something.
"The master bedroom's on the second floor," I said suddenly. "Third window from the left. And there's a reading spot by the stairs with a view of the garden."
Sebastian stared at me. "You remember."
"No," I said. "I don't remember. But I know."
He took my hand and led me to the front door. Deep blue paint with a brass knocker shaped like a lion's head. Sebastian pulled out a key, but before he could use it, I reached out and pressed my thumb to a small scanner next to the door.
Click. Door opened.
"Biometric lock," I said, surprised. "I programmed it myself."
Sebastian's face lit up with hope. "What else do you know?"
I closed my eyes and tried to feel through the knowledge buried in my bones. "Security code is our wedding date. The first one. And there's a safe behind the painting in your study. The combination is..."
I opened my eyes. "Can't remember the combination."
"It's okay," Sebastian said. "You're starting to remember. That's more than ever before."
He led me through the front door into a foyer bigger than my entire apartment had been. Crystal chandelier hanging from a ceiling two stories high, throwing rainbow patterns on marble floors that gleamed like mirrors.
"Welcome home, Mrs. Black," Sebastian said softly.
Mrs. Black.
The name felt right in a way Evira Grey never had.
"Show me our bedroom," I said.
Sebastian looked surprised. "You sure? Sometimes it's easier to take it slow."
"I need to see it."
He led me up a curved staircase to the second floor, down a hallway lined with paintings that probably belonged in museums. He stopped at a door at the end and looked at me.
"This might be a lot," he warned.
"Show me."
He opened the door.
The bedroom was huge, with a four-poster bed and white curtains. But it wasn't the size that made me gasp. It was all the photos.
Every surface covered with pictures of us. Wedding photos, vacation shots, candid pictures of us laughing and kissing and just being together. Years and years of happiness in frame after frame.
On the nightstand was a picture of me sleeping, hair spread across a pillow, looking peaceful and loved. Next to it sat a man's watch - expensive, elegant, engraved on the back.
I picked up the watch and read: "To my husband, who gave me time. All my love, E."
"I gave you that for our first anniversary," Sebastian said. "You said time was the most precious gift because it was the only thing we couldn't buy more of."
I set the watch down and looked around. Vanity table covered with makeup and jewelry. Walk-in closet bigger than most bedrooms. Reading chair by the window with a book still open on the armrest.
"What book was I reading?"
Sebastian walked over and picked it up. "Jane Eyre. You've read it maybe twenty times."
Jane Eyre. A woman who lost her memory and had to figure out who she was. The irony wasn't lost on me.
"Sebastian," I said. "I need you to tell me the truth about something."
"Anything."
"Do you really love me? Or do you love the woman I used to be?"
He sat down on the edge of the bed, suddenly looking older than thirty-two.
"That's the question that scares me every time you come back," he said. "Because I don't know if the woman I love still exists, or if she died the first time and everything since has been an echo."
Not the answer I expected. I thought he'd tell me of course he loved me, all of me.
But his honesty made me trust him more than any pretty lie.
"What do you think?" I asked.
"I think you're still you," Sebastian said carefully. "Changed by what happened, but still you. Every time you come back, you're a little different. But the core of who you are - your kindness, your strength, your terrible taste in movies - that never changes."
I laughed despite everything. "I have terrible taste in movies?"
"The worst. You cry at action movies and laugh at horror films. It's adorable and completely wrong."
For the first time since this nightmare started, I felt almost normal. Almost like the woman in all those pictures.
"I want to sleep here tonight," I said. "In our bed."
Sebastian's face went through about six emotions. "Evira, you don't have to. I can sleep in the guest room. Don't want you to feel pressured."
"I'm not feeling pressured. I'm feeling... curious."
I walked to the dresser and started looking through clothes. Everything expensive, elegant, exactly my size. In the back of one drawer, I found silk pajamas with a note pinned to them.
"For the nights when you can't sleep. These always helped before. -S"
"You have trouble sleeping," I said.
"Every version of you has," Sebastian said. "Nightmares. About drowning, usually."
Drowning. Like in the memory I saw during surgery. Like in Sebastian's memories of his dead wife.
Like in my memories of dying.
"Sebastian," I said slowly. "How exactly did I die the first time?"
He was quiet for a long moment. When he spoke, his voice was barely a whisper.
"You drowned. In the pool behind this house. It was ruled an accident."
"But you don't think it was."
"No. I don't."
I felt cold suddenly, like someone opened a window and let winter in. "You think someone killed me."
"I think someone has been killing you. Every time you start to remember who you really are. Every time you get close to the truth."
"What truth?"
Sebastian looked at me with eyes full of pain and secrets.
"That's what we need to figure out before it happens again."
Outside, I could hear cars pulling into the driveway. Multiple cars.
Sebastian heard them too. He went to the window and looked out, and his face went pale.
"They found us."
"Who?"
"The people who don't want you to remember." Sebastian grabbed my hand and pulled me toward the door. "We gotta go. Now."
"Go where?"
"Somewhere safe. Somewhere they can't find us."
We ran down the hall and down the stairs, but as we hit the front door, it burst open.
Three men in dark suits, just like the ones at my apartment. But these guys had guns.
"Mr. Black," the first one said. "Step away from the woman."
"Like hell," Sebastian said, moving in front of me.
"We're not here to hurt anyone. We just need to take Dr. Grey back where she belongs."
"She belongs with me."
"No, sir. She belongs in our care. Where she's safe."
"Safe from what?"
The man smiled, but it wasn't nice. "Safe from remembering things that would be dangerous for everyone."
"And if I don't want to go?" I asked, stepping out from behind Sebastian.
"I'm afraid that's not an option, Dr. Grey."
"It's Mrs. Black," I said, holding up my left hand to show the ring.
The man's smile died. "You're not supposed to have that."
"Well, I do. And I'm not going anywhere."
The man sighed like he was dealing with a difficult kid. "Mrs. Black, you've been through this before. Every time you remember, every time you try to piece together your past, bad things happen. People get hurt."
"What people?"
"The people you love," he said, looking at Sebastian. "Starting with your husband."
Fear shot through me like ice water. "You're threatening him?"
"I'm stating facts. Every time you remember, Mr. Black's life becomes... complicated."
"What's that mean?"
"It means," Sebastian said grimly, "that the last three times you started remembering, I ended up in the hospital."
The man nodded. "Accidents, of course. Car crash, a mugging gone wrong, gas leak in his office. Terrible coincidences."
"You hurt him to get to me."
"We protect everyone by keeping you where you belong. In your nice little life as Dr. Evira Grey, helping people with their memory problems. It's what you're good at. What you're meant to do."
"And if I refuse?"
The man's face hardened. "Then Mr. Black will have another accident. And this time, it might not be survivable."
I looked at Sebastian, saw the resignation on his face. This had happened before. Multiple times. These people used his life to control me, and it worked.
But not this time.
"You're right about one thing," I said to the man. "I am good at memory problems."
"Then you'll come with us?"
"No. I'm going to solve mine."
And before anyone could stop me, I reached out and pressed my hand against the nearest man's forehead.
I'd never tried to absorb memories from a living person before. Only did it with deleted memories during surgery. But desperation made me bold.
The man's memories hit me like a freight train. Images, sensations, knowledge I shouldn't have. I saw myself through his eyes - not as Dr. Evira Grey, but as someone else entirely. Someone dangerous. Someone they'd been hunting for years.
I saw Sebastian getting beaten in an alley. I saw a car being sabotaged. I saw a woman who looked exactly like me being held underwater until she stopped struggling.
I saw the truth.
And it was so much worse than I'd imagined.