“He doesn’t remember a thing. Not about Amanda’s death or who he was. We kept it all quiet and out of the media because, well, we were pretty freaked out.” She looks me right in the eyes, an offering of her sincerity. “There’s no way anyone could have survived under the ice for more than a few minutes.”
“Maybe he didn’t go in.” There has to be a logical explanation.
“I saw it with my own eyes. We all did.”
“With the commotion, he probably got to shore and wandered off. Someone found him and took him.”
“Trust me, my family and I have been through all the options, and none of us can explain it. All we know is that the man who used to be Mason died that day. The guy who came back in my brother’s body is someone completely different. He’s…” She tilts her head toward my ceiling and shakes it. “He’s like the exact opposite. Except that he’s still a genius when it comes to making money. The first thing he did after he turned up was ask for cash. A million dollars.”
“For what?”
“When he was found, we had him tested by three different specialists, one of whom told Mason about the life he didn’t remember.”
“So they told him he was a greedy asshole.”
“Yes,” she replies. “And when Mason heard everything he’d done to me and our family, how Amanda died running from him, he decided that Mason McMillan needed to stay dead forever. The money was to buy a new identity and start over.”
“Marus Prospero,” I conclude.
“Yeah. Can’t tell you where he came up with the name, but I can tell you that Marus is obsessed with giving money away.”
My mind is spinning with a thousand thoughts as to why Mason would recreate himself, consciously or subconsciously, as this other person. “Maybe he’s after redemption,” like that man Olivia told me about, “and wants to give the money away because he made it while stabbing you all in the back.”
“That money is in the family trust now. He can’t touch it. My parents gave him money to start a new life somewhere quiet. Then he took that money and invested it. He made a killing in the stock market. Then he turned that into more, and he keeps doing it. I’m telling you, Ginnie, he is not the same person. He knows when the wind is about to shift. He can look at a person and figure out what they’re thinking. It’s like he can see things we can’t.”
I exhale, trying to let it all sink in. I have no reason to distrust her. Nevertheless, her story doesn’t quite add up. In fact, it directly conflicts with my interactions with him. “Do you really believe he can’t remember his old life?”
“I’ve asked myself that question a thousand times, and all I can tell you is I just don’t care. He’s not my brother anymore, and I thank God for it every day. The world is a better place. And if Mason never regains his memory, then fine by me.” She exhales. “Which is why you need to stay away from him.”
So that’s why she’s telling me all this.
She adds, “Lately, he’s been acting strange and asking questions about his old life.”
“You think he’s starting to remember.” I could understand why she’d be worried.
“Maybe.”
“I don’t see how I have anything to do with that.”
“I’m not sure, but ever since he bought that piece of yours, he’s been talking about it. It’s of some guy standing on a frozen beach.”
My jaw drops. It’s a framed, two-by-three mosaic mounted on a little stand to allow the light to shine through both sides of the glass for effect. It depicts a man standing at the edge of a lake.
A frozen lake.
Holy crap!
The other day, I was thinking about the dream that inspired it. It was the night Greg left a few months ago. I spent hours crying alone, too ashamed to tell anyone what’d happened—he cheated on me, took my money, and left me in debt. I didn’t know how I’d ever pick myself up. That night, I dreamed of a man dressed in black, standing with his back to me while he gazed across a frozen lake, pointing up at the gray sky. “What are you looking at?” I kept asking. Then I noticed one of the clouds. It was veined with fiery reds and oranges, and the moment I looked, it began glowing brighter, like it was on fire and I was the fuel. I woke up drenched in sweat, thinking about that news article I’d read months earlier at my grandma’s house.
“The title is Broken Man,” I mumble in disbelief. “I sold it a couple of weeks ago online to some guy named Ryan.” Right after I found the bottle.