The Lady Vanishes by Nicole Camden

session, though Regina supposed they could hardly be called sessions when Rose-Lindsey didn’t actually work as a counselor any longer and Regina didn’t pay her. The rest of Regina’s friends had abandoned her when her father had stolen all that money and disappeared. Some people had stayed loyal, but none more so than Rose-Lindsey, who’d been her counselor at sixteen and had remained a good friend, even after Regina no longer had any money and was struggling through medical school, even after she’d quit counseling and opened up a shop that sold knitwear and beautiful sweaters.
    They met at Rose-Lindsey’s home in Back Bay, a tidy one-story in an older neighborhood, where she lived with her longtime partner, an artistic woman named Leena.
    She frowned a little, thinking about how long they’d known each other. “Rose-Lindsey, why have you kept seeing me all these years?”
    Rose-Lindsey blinked at the abrupt change of topic. After a moment, she gathered her knitting from the basket at her side. “I don’t know that I ever actually thought about it,” she mused. “Before your father disappeared with all that money, you were a fairly normal teenager. A little intense at times, as your father could be, but so charming that I don’t think most people even noticed.”
    Regina’s frown deepened. “I was charming?”
    Pursing her lips, Rose-Lindsey nodded. “But then the Feds were at the door, your mom abdicated all responsibility for you or your sister, and you just changed. I’ve never seen anyone adapt so quickly or so abruptly to complete and utter devastation, but you did. Suddenly, you were serious, almost grim.”
    Regina grimaced. That had not exactly been her favorite moment in life. She barely remembered it, actually. She’d just done what had to be done to take care of her mother and her sister.
    “Everyone dumped us,” Regina muttered. “Our attorneys, the accountants, everyone. I’ve never felt so ashamed or so low in my life. And then that man who attacked me. I’d never been hit before, not like that.”
    “I know.” Rose-Lindsey nodded.
    “He just kept yelling at me, ‘Where is your father?’ ”
    “Do you still have the dreams?”
    Regina shook her head. “No, not in at least a year.”
    “Good. You’re a lot tougher than you were then. At the time, I thought you’d quit and find a man to take care of you. You were as beautiful then as you are now.”
    Scowling, Regina stood up to pace. “You thought that about me?”
    The needles clacked rhythmically in time to Rose-Lindsey’s answer. “At the time I did—you were sixteen and spoiled—but when you didn’t give in, I found myself wanting to make sure you made it.”
    She had helped, Regina realized. She wasn’t sure she would have been able to handle the stress of it all if it hadn’t been for Rose-Lindsey’s support.
    “I’m grateful,” she said finally.
    “Oh, it’s been my pleasure,” Rose-Lindsey protested, her voice gruff, “especially now that I get to hear juicy stories about handsome billionaires.”
    “God,” Regina said, sitting abruptly on the floral couch. “Here’s the thing . . . I look at him, even when he’s acting like a magician—and I can just see the kink, you know? He looks at me and I just know he’s thinking about tying me up, or making me stand on stage while he sticks swords through me.”
    “Hee-hee,” Rose-Lindsey chuckled. “I bet that’s not all he wants to stick in you.”
    Regina scowled at her. “He’s so weird, though. A billionaire, and he’s running around the children’s hospital. He’s abrupt and doesn’t seem to know how to take no for an answer.”
    “Are you afraid of him?” Rose-Lindsey paused in her knitting, a frown line between her eyes.
    Regina thought about Milton Shaw, about the look in his eyes when he spoke to her, admiration mixed with lust, and knew that she wasn’t afraid of him, but she kind of liked that he didn’t want to take no for an