The Stranger and Tessa Jones. Christine Rimmer
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and it was acute, even with treatment, which he was not getting, he could die.
The book also said that, as she’d suspected, she shouln’t have moved him. She should have covered him and made him as comfortable as possible where he was and then waited for professional help. Too bad the book didn’t say what to do when you were stuck in a blizzard with the phone line down.
The phone. Maybe it had come on again.
She checked. Still dead.
He’s fine, she kept telling herself. He’s going to be fine.
And then she would stew over how he’d told her nothing about himself except that she should call him Bill. He hadn’t mentioned who might be worried for him, who might be wondering where he’d gone off to and if he was okay.
She had a feeling he didn’t know who he was.
Amnesia. It was one of the symptoms—along with headache, unconsciousness and mental confusion—of acute subdural hematoma. Amnesia. She reached for the medical guide again and looked up the scary word. The book said there were several different types of memory loss. It could happen from emotional trauma. Or head trauma—which it was obvious he’d had.
Then again, maybe he knew exactly who he was. Maybe he was just a closed-mouth kind of guy. Or maybe he had done something…bad. Something he was keeping—along with his identity—strictly to himself.
Maybe he had some other totally valid reason to keep who he really was a secret. She just couldn’t believe he had evil intent. He seemed a good man.
Didn’t he?
How could she tell? How could she know?
Look at Bill Toomey. Tessa groaned and shook her head. The tour bus driver had not been her first romantic disappointment. She had to admit that she wasn’t any great judge of male character. The Bill in her bedroom could be a bad man. Or a good one. He could be hiding something—or simply have forgotten who the heck he was.
Wait, she thought. Why think the worst? The man in her bedroom had been grateful and respectful. And polite. He’d done nothing to make her think ill of him. Until he did something out of line, she would believe in his basic decency and leave it at that.
She went in to check on him at 10:20. He was sleeping peacefully. She took her cell out with her when she left the room.
In the great room, she dialed her dad’s number. Nothing. Feeling slightly frantic, she tried the kitchen phone again. Silence.
She was alone with the stranger and she’d better get used to it. There was no need to panic. He was going to get well. After all, he had been sleeping normally when she checked on him—or at least, she thought he had.
No. Think positive. She knew he had. He was getting better. She was certain of that.
He started shouting at 10:45 p.m.
Chapter Four
A woman was screaming. “Ohmigod, ohmigod, we’re going to die! I can’t die. Somebody help me! Help me, Ash. Help me, please!”
Then a man’s voice shouted, “Sit still! Be calm!”
The shouting startled him to wakefulness. Only then did he realize that the shouting had come from his own mouth. “Wha…?”
A tall figure appeared in the doorway. He saw broad, shapely shoulders, a halo of golden hair. Was this the one who had screamed?
No. The screaming had only been inside his mind.
And then he remembered: This was the woman who had saved him…
He lifted his head, straining, off the sweat-drenched pillow, and whispered her name on a rough husk of breath, “Tessa,” as she came to him.
“It’s okay, it’s okay,” she promised in a gentle whisper.
He felt her cool hand on his sweaty brow, drank in her soothing voice. It wasn’t enough. He came up off the pillow again and grabbed for her, needing the feel of her, the living reality of her.
The warmth.
The softness and the strength. He wrapped his arms hard around her, buried his face against her sweet-smelling throat.
She didn’t resist him, didn’t try to pull away. She only stroked his back and let him hold her way too tight and whispered, again, “Okay. It’s okay…”
He was breathing like he’d just run a damn marathon, his sore ribs aching as he gulped in air. The sweat poured off him.
“You’re okay. You’re safe,” she whispered. “You’re here. In my house. Safe…” In spite of his powerful grip on her, she managed to reach out and turn on the lamp.
Still struggling to catch his breath, he blinked against the sudden brightness. But then, in no time, his breathing began to even out and his eyes adjusted to the light. He shifted his hold to her sweet face and cradled it between his palms. He stared hard into her beautiful eyes.
“It’s okay,” she promised him, meeting his gaze without wavering, seeming to will him to trust her. To believe. “It’s all right. All right…”
Slowly, he came back to himself—whoever that self was. He released her. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to grab you. So damn sorry…”
She only plumped the pillows against the headboard for him. And then she poured him fresh water from the pitcher. He drank. She took the glass when he was finished and set it back on the nightstand.
“Better?”
He nodded. “I was dreaming. It was a nightmare, that’s all.”
“A nightmare about…?”
He tried to remember, but it was pointless. “I have no idea. I heard a woman screaming. And then someone shouting. It woke me up, the shouting. Then I realized the shouting was coming from me.”
“What else?”
“Nothing. That’s it. That’s…all.”
She asked, so gently, “Who are you, really?”
Her question was the toughest one, the one that brought pain. He waited for the ice pick to go to work on his brain. But there was nothing. Only emptiness.
His own life was lost to him. He wished he had an answer for her. And for himself.
She prompted, “Do you know who you are?”
He opened his mouth to lie, to remind her that his name was Bill and yeah, damn right he knew who he was. But then he realized he couldn’t do it. It seemed…wrong, somehow. Disrespectful. To keep on trying to hide the truth from her. If not for her, he’d be curled up in a snowbank somewhere. Dead.
He confessed, “I have no clue who I am. Or where I came from.”
She made a low sound of sympathetic distress, a world of kindness and understanding shining in her eyes. “I’m so sorry.”
“Don’t be. You, of all people, have nothing to be sorry about.” He clasped her shoulder, thinking again how much he liked touching her. “Bill, okay? I’m serious. Let me be Bill. I’ll be a better Bill than that other fool. I swear it. I would never leave you at the altar.”
She frowned, clearly confused. “The altar? Bill Toomey didn’t leave me at the altar.”
Maybe it hurt her too much to admit it. He back-pedaled. “Well. Okay. I must have, er, misunderstood.”
“Misunderstood what?”
“Tessa. It doesn’t matter.”
“Well, yeah. It does. I want to know where you got the idea that Bill and I were engaged.”
“Out