Housekeeper Under The Mistletoe. Cara Colter
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the combination of those names seemed to resonate within her, as if Anne and Beth belonged together. “I didn’t realize you— Everything’s kind of a blank, huh?”
Pretty much, but she hated to see this man so worried. Especially when he had his wife to worry about…although Beth must be all right by now, because otherwise her husband wouldn’t be here.
“No,” she assured him, “I remember having our tonsils out.” For some reason that memory was the clearest—maybe because this hospital smelled the same as that other one—but there were other images floating in her mind, as well. Playing with a dog, braiding each other’s hair, cutting out snowflakes… “Only it was a long time ago.”
“Yeah, I guess it was.” He gazed at her for a moment, as if the sight of her face offered some curious mixture of nostalgia and regret, then gave her an apologetic smile. “Look, maybe you just need to concentrate on getting some rest. There’s a lot of people praying for you.”
“Really?” For some reason, she couldn’t think of anyone who’d do that except her sister, who ought to be arriving any minute…because somehow she had the feeling there was no other family in her life. No parents, no grandparents, no one but her sister.
And this man. Rafe.
Her sister’s husband.
“Yeah, well, Jake Roth—the guy who pulled you off the train?” Rafe seemed to think that phrase might trigger a memory, but again nothing came to mind. “He and his wife have been calling. And everybody in Chicago.”
Chicago. That sounded vaguely familiar, and she had an impression of a city skyline. Maybe on a calendar, or a postcard. “Is that here?”
“No, right now you’re in Tucson.” He closed his eyes for a moment, then continued, “That’s where Beth and I lived…uh, live.” But the falter in his voice spoke more vividly than his show of calm, and she knew there was something terribly wrong. “You and Beth were on vacation, and—”
“Is she okay?”
He hesitated, and she felt a sinking sensation inside her even before he met her gaze and said quietly, “Beth is…she’s gone.”
Gone? As in—
She must have flinched, made some kind of whimper, because he swiftly reached for her hands. “Anne, I’m sorry,” he blurted, then continued in a rush as if the right words delivered quickly enough could somehow ease the shock. “Everybody said it must’ve happened really fast, before the fire. She never knew what hit her.”
But that meant—
“Beth…my sister? She’s dead?”
Still holding her hands, he nodded. Just once, without looking up.
“Oh, no.” That couldn’t be. “No, she’s not.” Only a moment ago they’d been playing in the tonsil hospital, arranging paper dolls on their beds, and— “Not my sister!”
But his expression didn’t change, and she felt a new jolt of pain that eclipsed any other sensation. Her other self, her longest companion, the sister she’d shared her life with was gone?
No, she couldn’t lose her sister.
“I can’t—” she began, then stopped. Crying now would only make the pain worse, and she couldn’t bear that right now. “Oh, Rafe…”
“I’m sorry,” he repeated, with a crack in his voice, and suddenly she realized that he must be hurting as much as herself. This ache, this sharp and hollow desolation, wasn’t solely her own…but how was anyone supposed to get through a loss like this?
She couldn’t think about it, that’s all. Surely the next time she woke up, her sister would be in the bed next to hers. All she had to do was sleep again, and everything would be fine.
Except somehow she knew it wouldn’t be. Maybe just because of his anguished expression, but—
Oh, dear God. Not only had she lost her sister, but this man had lost his wife.
“Are you okay?” she blurted.
The question seemed to startle him, because he let go of her hands and sat up straighter in his chair.
“I’ve had a while to get used to it,” he answered with such deliberate steadiness that she knew he wasn’t okay, but that he wasn’t about to say so. “Anyway, I know Beth would want me to make sure you’re all right.”
Which explained why he’d been coming every day for the past eight days. Beth must have wanted the certainty that her loved ones were taken care of.
“Anything you need,” Rafe continued. “The insurance and everything, I took care of that already. But anything else…I want to help.” And then, as if he knew at the same moment she did that nothing sounded better than sleep, he stood up and shoved his hands into his pockets. “I mean it, Anne. Whatever you need, I’m here for you.”
He did mean it, she knew, even before he rested a gentle hand on her shoulder and turned to move his chair away. And she knew why it mattered to him…which meant she must be remembering the essence of her sister.
“Someone has to be there for the people she loved,” Anne whispered. Because somehow she already knew that, even while Rafe was looking out for her, she needed to be there for him, as well. “That’s how Beth would want it.”
That’s how Beth would want it.
The phrase stayed with him over the next few days, promising a faint hope of making amends to his wife. If he could just continue taking care of Anne until she was back on her feet, he could take comfort in knowing Beth’s wish was coming true.
At least one wish.
“Feeling better?” he asked Anne each afternoon for the next week, and her responses grew gradually more coherent. To the point where he could finally tell her, “The nurse says you’ll be ready to leave, day after tomorrow.”
“I can’t wait to get out of here,” she said, shifting in bed with considerably more ease than she’d shown only a few days ago. “Back to…well, real life.”
But she looked uncertain about the prospect, which he suspected meant there were still some gaps in her memory.
“Look, don’t push yourself,” Rafe warned. He’d already phoned Dolls-Like-Me to warn everyone that Anne needed time to recover, and had accepted their condolences with the careful guard he’d perfected over the past two weeks. “If it takes a while for you to remember things, the doctor said that’s normal.”
“I know, but I hate not knowing things! Yesterday someone named Marc sent this strange letter saying he wants to give his marriage another try. Except I can’t believe I’d be dating a married man.”
He had no idea who this woman might date, but she seemed so disturbed that he hurried to offer the first reassurance he could think of. “Maybe the guy didn’t tell you he was married.”
Anne contradicted him with a rueful smile. “Or maybe I’m a really bad judge of character.”
No, that didn’t fit with what he knew of her. “Beth always said,” he offered over the knot that still rose in his throat whenever he spoke her name without preparing for it, “there was nobody in the world as smart as you.”
Without warning, he saw her eyes fill with tears. But unlike himself, she seemed to take such weakness for granted.
“More than anything,” Anne whispered, “I miss her. I don’t remember what we used to talk about, or even her phone number, but I remember having the other half of me. I can’t believe she’s gone!”
Losing someone you’d known since before birth, he realized, must be even more traumatic than losing your memory. And while time supposedly made every loss better, you sure couldn’t prove that by him.
But