Chapter 4

The wedding reception was at a chic downtown hotel.

Chandeliers dripped crystals, and champagne flowed.

Chloe, radiant in my wedding dress – though I didn't know it was mine anymore – clung to Ethan' s arm.

He looked strained, his smile not quite reaching his eyes.

Maya was beside me, a silent, simmering volcano.

I had a plane ticket in my purse. A one-way flight to San Francisco, to a research fellowship I' d apparently accepted weeks ago.

My memory of Ethan was now a complete blank. He was just the groom, the man marrying the frail, pretty woman. A stranger.

I felt a strange detachment, watching the scene unfold.

Like watching a movie.

They were toasting. Ethan raised his glass.

"To Chloe," he said, his voice a little too loud. "My beautiful bride."

Chloe giggled, preening.

That' s when Maya moved.

She stepped forward, her voice cutting through the polite applause.

"A toast! To the happy couple!"

All eyes turned to her.

"And to honesty in marriage. Or, in this case, the spectacular lack of it."

A murmur went through the crowd. Ethan paled. Chloe' s smile froze.

"Let's talk about Chloe's 'terminal illness'," Maya said, her voice ringing with contempt. "The one that conveniently requires a rushed wedding."

She held up her phone, displaying something on the screen.

"Funny thing about rare diseases, they usually show up in medical records. Chloe' s don' t. What they do show is a clean bill of health, apart from a mild case of narcissism."

Gasps rippled through the room. Chloe looked like she' d been slapped.

"And Evie," Maya continued, her gaze sweeping to me, then back to the stunned crowd. "The 'friend' with amnesia? She' s Dr. Evelyn Hayes. Ethan' s wife. Or was, until he convinced her to sign divorce papers and take a memory drug he thought was temporary."

Ethan looked like he was going to be sick.

"But here' s the kicker," Maya announced, her voice clear and strong. "Dr. Hayes developed that drug. And she knows something Ethan doesn't. It's permanent. Irreversible."

She looked directly at Ethan.

"Evie's memory of you, Ethan? It's gone. Completely. And so is she."

Maya gestured towards the exit. "Her flight left an hour ago."

That was my cue. I wasn't actually there. Maya was covering for my earlier, discreet departure.

The plan was for me to be long gone by the time Maya dropped the bomb.

I was already at the airport, walking towards the gate, a woman with no past and a future waiting to be written.

The name Ethan Cole meant nothing to me.