Forget to Remember

top. It hit the wall behind her.
    There were two rooms on the second floor. Carol suddenly remembered that several of the floorboards in the first room were loose. She avoided them and went into the second room. There wasn’t any place to hide. She stood beside the doorway that had no door and turned off her flashlight, holding it so she could use it as a weapon.
    She heard Paul’s heavy footsteps below. He was still on the first floor.
    “Carol.”
    She didn’t move. There was silence for a few seconds. He must be intimidated by the layout. This wasn’t like climbing the stairs in his house.
    “You can’t hide from me.”
    Now who was mouthing clichés? Ivan must have heard the shots and would be coming as fast as he could. She hoped he didn’t trip on the rough ground as he navigated past the trees and bushes between the two houses in the dark. If she could just hang on for another two minutes…
    Carol heard several steps and then a loud yell. Paul had hit his head on the ceiling at the landing where she had. Silence for a few seconds. Had it put him out of commission? Her head was still aching.
    No, she could tell by the creaking sounds made by his feet on the old steps that he was carefully climbing the rest of the stairs. His flashlight beam came through the doorway into her room and shone on the opposite wall. That meant he was at the top of the stairs. She gripped her flashlight tighter. He knew she wasn’t in the first room by now. He would come across to the second one.
    She heard more footsteps and then a crash and a yell. He had stepped on a loose floorboard. She peeked around the doorway. Paul’s flashlight was lying out of his reach on the floor, still switched on, with the beam pointed away from both of them. Carol saw the dark shape that was Paul, apparently wedged in a hole in the floor. He was struggling to get out and cursing.
    Did he still have the gun? Carol didn’t want to turn on her flashlight and give away her position. He fired. The bullet smashed through the flimsy wall beside her. She ran to the far corner of the room and lay down flat on the floor. Another shot. She flinched. He was firing at random, hoping to get lucky. She could hear the bullets tear through the wall, threatening to bring the roof down on top of them.
    She tensed, waiting to feel the pain of a bullet hitting her. How many shots did he have? The firing stopped. Carol’s ears were ringing. Was he out of ammunition or was this a trick? She heard footsteps below.
    “Carol?”
    It was Ivan. Did she dare answer? She heard Paul yell and then a cracking of boards, followed by a thud from the first floor. She got up and went cautiously to the doorway, turning on her flashlight. Paul had disappeared, and there was a hole where he’d been. She went over to the hole and shone her flashlight through it.
    Paul was lying on the floor with Ivan standing over him, holding a gun, and a flashlight he had evidently borrowed from the guard.
    He looked up. “Are you all right?”
    “I’m fine now. A little shaky. Thanks for coming.”
    “It looks like you can take care of yourself. His legs were waving in the wind. All I did was pull him the rest of the way through the hole.” He looked down at the heap on the floor. “I didn’t know Paul was such a bastard. How am I going to collect my fee?”
    “Don’t worry about that. I’ll pay you—double.”
    “Then I’ll have to give half back to you for your assistance.”
    They both laughed.

    CHAPTER 40
    “Mrs. Horton—Grandma—helped me find my birth certificate. I’m also getting a replacement for my North Carolina driver’s license—the genuine one. I even know my Social Security number.” Carol was bubbling with excitement as she talked to Rigo on the phone.
    “Great. I’m glad you’re finally going legit. The IRS will be too. What’s the full name on your birth certificate?”
    “Cynthia Horton Sakai.”
    “Nice name. I guess I’ll have to call you Cindy from now on.”
    “You can call me Cynthia if you like, but not Cindy. It brings back bad memories of Michael. Speaking of memories, I’ve remembered a few things that helped me, such as the loose boards on the second floor of the old house. But I had to hit my head on the ceiling to do it. Maybe that’s what I needed.”
    “Another blow to the head? I never heard of that as a cure.”
    “Yeah, that sounds dubious. And painful. Guess what. I have a math degree from the University of