by Rebecca York
The newcomer’s face was set and his posture rigid. Finally, he turned abruptly and went back into the building, leaving Meg wondering who he was and why the other men were afraid of him.
The strain of keeping herself at the window ledge was making her muscles tremble. After cranking the window closed, she inched back down the wall. When she reached the shower floor she collapsed in a heap, breathing hard. Glancing up at the window, she shook her head. What was she in real life—a movie stuntwoman? Or had desperation given her strength?
With a snort, she pulled off the hospital gown, then suddenly stopped. She hadn’t even thought about the implications of the gown. Now she realized that while she’d been unconscious, someone had taken off her clothes and redressed her. She hadn’t seen any nurses around this medical center. That left Dr. Bridgman. Somehow she knew it had been him.
A little shiver traveled over her skin, making her nipples tighten as she imagined the feel of his hands on her body. For several seconds she stood without moving, then slowly pivoted toward the full-length mirror on the wall and looked at herself. The body that met her frankly curious gaze had high, generous breasts, a narrow waist, and long legs. Not model-thin, but a pretty good shape. No, be honest, she told herself. A very good shape. And in excellent physical condition, she added as she raised her arms and flexed her muscles, then turned to get a look at her firmly rounded rear. Either she worked out on a regular basis, or she had great genes.
Somehow she didn’t think Bridgman had kept his mind a blank when he’d undressed her. Or maybe she was projecting her own emotions onto him. Unwilling to examine those emotions too closely, she turned on the shower. After adjusting the temperature, she stepped under the water and tried to blank out everything but the feel of the hot spray beating against her skin.
TOMMY FAULKNER PUT DOWN the phone receiver and slumped against the pillows. This wasn’t one of his better days, and he’d been hoping that Meg would bring him dinner. But she didn’t answer her phone. She hadn’t returned his call yesterday, either. And now he was starting to think that she wasn’t home. Vaguely, he could remember her telling him something about her being away for a while. Or was he making that up? He used to be really sharp. These days, his mind was playing tricks on him, so that he couldn’t always tell the difference between reality and his imagination.
It meant he was getting sicker—with that disease the army wouldn’t admit he had.
He squeezed his eyes shut, trying not to think about the future. Instead, he uttered a silent prayer that Glenn Bridgman was going to come through for him and the rest of the guys. Glenn was working on a cure for this damn syndrome that was sucking the life out of him and his buddies. Any day now, he’d call to say they were going into clinical trials.
That was what he had to keep thinking, because it was his only hope for a normal life. Glenn had told him to hang on until it happened. Some days he still believed in getting well again. Other days, he was too tired to bring hope into focus. Today, he needed Meg. With Dad dead, she was his only relative—the only person who cared about him, except Glenn. But Glenn had a lot of other guys to worry about, too. Tommy couldn’t go pestering him every time he felt down.
Maybe he’d dialed Meg’s number wrong. No, that wasn’t it, because he’d gotten her machine and left a message. But she hadn’t answered. Maybe she was on one of her trips. He glanced at the corn-husk doll on his shelf. From—he paused and thought for a moment—from some place in the Andes where the Incas used to live. Next to it was a little cat statue from Egypt. Meg had brought those things to him.
Dad had trained his two kids in every outdoor skill known to man. Meg had never liked hunting, but she’d killed game to live on when they’d been wilderness camping. And she was good at fishing.
She’d gotten into adventure travel. She took people hiking and rock climbing and camping in neat places all over the world.
He looked at the phone again. Maybe he should call her office—Adventures in Travel down at Light Street. Or one of her other friends, like Erin Stone who ran that charity organization. She’d told him he could contact her for help anytime.
They were all a great bunch of people. They wouldn’t act like he was bothering them. But maybe he should wait until tomorrow. Yeah, he’d wait. No use letting them know that poor Tommy Faulkner was having trouble thinking straight.
BY THE TIME MEG HAD washed her hair, being careful of the stitches, she was feeling more human—but not exactly calm. Any way you looked at it, she was Bridgman’s captive. And the vivid image of him undressing her only made things worse.
After toweling her body dry, she pulled on the underwear she’d brought from the suitcase, noting that it fit perfectly. Then she used the hair dryer beside the sink and finished getting dressed. Again the clothing seemed to have been selected for her. Yet, none of it seemed at all familiar.
Experimenting with the makeup, she used a little blusher, eyebrow pencil and lipstick, and decided that she liked the effect. What would Bridgman think?
She wasn’t doing it for him, she assured herself; she was simply building her own confidence. Delaying her departure from the room, she studied the way she looked in her navy slacks and knit top, trying to decide whether the light blue of the top was good with her skin tone. But finally there were no more excuses. She had to face Bridgman again.
Her room was near the end of a short corridor with soft apricot-colored walls and recessed overhead fluorescent lights.
At the other end was an open area furnished with plastic sofas and chairs, kitchen appliances and several tables and chairs.
Bridgman was absorbed in a phone conversation, which gave her the perfect opportunity to study him. Dressed in a dark knit shirt and khaki pants, he was sitting at a wooden table, a folder spread in front of him as he talked with the receiver wedged between his ear and shoulder.
Not wanting to move into his field of vision, she strained to hear what he was saying, but his voice was too low for her to pick up more than a few scattered words.
Covertly, she studied his profile, his posture, using this unexpected opportunity to try and figure out what kind of man had rescued her from a car wreck and brought her to his castle. She guessed he was in his mid-thirties—and that responsibilities were weighing heavily on him. His face was strong, as if he’d learned several painful lessons in selfreliance. And yet, there was something about him that made her want to take him in her arms and rock him, give him the comfort he didn’t think he needed. That observation brought a little sound to her throat. For a woman whose past life was a blank, she was coming up with outrageous insights into someone else’s character.
Alerted to her presence, he looked up, stopped talking and stared at her, his gaze moving over her as if he were trying to reconcile the woman from the car wreck with the one who stood a few feet away. Then he seemed to recall the folder spread in front of him. After a quick look in her direction, he snapped it closed.
“GLENN?” BLAKE SAID through the phone receiver. “I’ve got her on the monitor. See how she reacts to temptation.”
“All right,” he muttered, not liking the idea of setting a trap. But his chief of security was right. They needed to find out more about Ms. Wexler’s motivation.
Hanging up, he stood, crossed to a sideboard, and stowed the folder in one of the top drawers.
“That grim expression you carry around. Were you born with it, or was it acquired?” she asked when he turned around again.
“I have a lot on my mind,” he answered.
“I can tell.”
She sounded sympathetic, and he didn’t want her sympathy. “How are you feeling?”
She considered the question. “The pain in my head is almost tolerable. My brain’s retrieval system is still blocked.”
“Don’t push yourself to remember. It will come,” he replied in the soothing tones of a physician reassuring an anxious patient. “I can give you an analgesic for the headache,” he added. “It’s in t
he dispensary. While I’m there, I’m going to make a couple of calls. So make yourself comfortable. There are magazines on the table.” He crossed to the door, leaving her alone as he hurried down the hall, punched in the security code, and pulled open the locked door.
Sixty seconds later, he had joined Blake, who was staring intently at a TV screen that showed the recreation room in the infirmary.
“Anything?”
“Not yet.”
Glenn went over to the monitor, which gave him a good view of Meg Wexler. She was still standing where he’d left her, but then glanced quickly over her shoulder. His heart started to thump in his chest as she moved toward the drawer where he’d left the folder containing her dossier.
Before she reached the drawer, however, she stopped. For several seconds, she stood facing the sideboard, then crossed to the opposite wall and began to riffle through the magazines on the end table. Sports Illustrated. Field and Stream. Playboy. Probably not her usual reading matter.
“She didn’t go for the bait,” he said, hearing the relief in his voice.
“She’s too smart,” Blake retorted.
“Or too honest.”
“Too bad we can’t prove anything by negative inference,” the security chief growled.
Meg’s hand went to the Field and Stream. Sitting down on the couch, she began leafing through the pages and stopped at an article on the reintroduction of wolves to the Yellowstone area, apparently absorbed in the material.
“I’ve got to get back. Turn off the camera.”
“I don’t think that’s a great idea.”
“I’ll be more spontaneous with her if I’m not being watched.”
“You don’t have to be spontaneous. You have to be on your toes.”
“Turn it off!”
After Blake complied, he exited before the other man could voice any further opinions.
On the way back he made a call to the kitchen and ordered some dinner. Entering the lounge, he came around to look over Meg’s shoulder at the magazine. “You’re interested in wolves?”
“This information is fascinating.”
He drew her a glass of water, then offered it to her, along with two pills. After she’d swallowed the medication, she remained sitting where she was, not making eye contact.
“Dinner’s on its way up.”
She nodded, but said nothing for long seconds. Finally she inquired, “Did you undress me?”
He felt color creep into his cheeks and thanked the Lord that he’d insisted on turning off the surveillance system. Keeping his voice brusque, he answered, “Yes. Somebody had to, since I couldn’t put you into a clean hospital bed in your clothes. Why are you bringing it up?”
She took another sip of water, then opened her palm in a helpless gesture. “I’ve lost control of my life. I don’t know where I came from. I don’t know who I am. I don’t know why I’m here. The things that have happened after the accident are the only information I’ve got.”
“I can appreciate the difficulty.”
“Can you? I doubt it. I don’t even know if you believe me about the memory loss. I don’t even—” She stopped, fixed her gaze somewhere above his left shoulder as her teeth clamped down on her lower lip.
“What?” he prompted.
“It looks like I don’t have much impulse control,” she blurted. “A thought comes into my mind, and it’s on my lips before I consider the consequences.”
He saw moisture film her eyes, saw her fighting hard against letting tears fall.
“A head injury will do that,” he said softly, reading the panic she was trying to hide. However you looked at it, she was in a hell of a fix, and he felt his heart contract as he tried to imagine what she must be feeling.
“Meg?”
She remained sitting there, huddled into herself. And he understood all too well how she felt. He had never lost his memory, but he knew what it felt like to be hemmed in by circumstances, frustrated, blocked from any effective course of action. He also knew it was imperative that he keep his perspective where she was concerned.
That didn’t stop all the dangerous emotions he’d been fighting against from surging inside him. Without making a conscious decision, he found himself crossing the distance between them and sitting down on the sofa. Once he was there, it was the most natural thing in the world to reach for her.
“Meg,” he said again, his voice thick as he turned her toward him. She felt delicate in his arms, fragile—but that was only on the surface. Below the vulnerable exterior was strength that drew him as much as the fragility. His arms came up to cradle her—first one and then the other—as he fought against surrendering to the tender impulse. He was lost when she let her head drift down to his shoulder; when she made a little noise halfway between a sob and a sigh.
MEG WONDERED IF HE KNEW how much she needed to be held, needed to know that someone was on her side. She couldn’t tell him, couldn’t speak. The sound of her anguish was wedged in her throat. He pulled her closer, held her gently. She kept her eyes closed, kept her face pressed against him, shutting out everything else as he began to rub his hand across her shoulders and over the tense cords at the back of her neck.
Don’t trust him, a voice in her head warned. Yet she was helpless to deny herself what he was offering.
Words welled from deep inside her, words she shouldn’t speak. “I feel so lost and helpless,” she whispered, breathing in the scent of his body, feeling the coiled strength of his muscles. In a world where nothing seemed real, he was as solid as the rocky promontories she’d seen through the window.
“That’s natural. But underneath you’re a strong woman.”
“How do you know?”
“Maybe the same way you know I’ve got a lot on my mind.”
She clung to that as he stroked her and murmured low, reassuring words. His voice soothed her as much as his hands, his tone a warm gentle caress that made her think everything had a chance of turning out all right Helpless to stop herself, she leaned into him and let her body melt against his.
She thought she felt his lips skim her hair, knew for sure when he found the tender edge of her temple.
Again she told herself she should take nothing from him, demand nothing. Yet she couldn’t block the inexplicable feeling that the two of them stood together against a hostile world, and that the only thing that would save them was the combining of their strengths.
As if to test that bond, she raised her face, bringing her lips close to his—oh, so close.
For an endless moment he didn’t move, and she regretted the forwardness of her invitation to the depths of her soul. She had let a tempting fantasy sweep her away—and now she must pay the cost of her folly.
Then, in one quick motion, his lips lowered to hers, and everything changed. With a groan deep in his throat, he took her mouth.
There was a moment when she could have wrenched herself away. She stayed right with him as he angled his head, slanting his lips over hers in an act that could only be taken for possession.
She might have been afraid, should have been afraid, but the wildness caught her, and she gave him what he demanded. Her mouth opened for him, tasting him, drawing on him as if he could satisfy all the hungers of the world.
At that moment, he was her world. She said his name, the syllable lost in the mingling of her breath with his. Her head spun as he combed through her hair, finding her skull and holding her still so that he could ravish her mouth. But there was no need to hold her with any force besides the potency of his lips on hers.
Then he pulled her more fully against his body so that her breasts were pressed against the hard wall of his chest. She moved against him, feeling the heat generated by the intimate contact, feeling frustration at the layers of fabric that separated his flesh from hers.
Before she could translate frustration to action, the heat was replaced by the cold air of the room. He had let go of her and slid over to the end of the couch.
; She sat swaying, staring up at him, trying to collect her scattered wits.
“I’m sorry,” he said in a gritty voice. “It was unforgivable, taking advantage of you that way.”
“You didn’t take advantage.” The breathy denial was about all she could manage.
“You know damn well I have no business kissing a woman who can’t remember her own name.” He ran his hand through his hair, shook his head as if to clear his thoughts.
She wanted to reach for him again, but she knew it was the wrong thing to do.
“It wasn’t your fault,” she whispered, determined to carry the blame. “I practically begged you to kiss me.”
When he didn’t answer, she touched his arm. “My major excuse is that I’m in a pretty needy situation—and you’re my only point of human contact.”
“All the more reason for me to control myself. It won’t happen again.”
She would rather not have heard the reassurance. But she could see that losing control had shaken him badly. They needed distance—something else to focus on besides each other. “Uh, did you say something about having a meal sent up?” she asked.
He looked both grateful and relieved that she’d remembered the food. Turning, he strode toward the doorway and disappeared into the hall. When he returned, he was pushing a cart holding several covered dishes.
One of the staff must have brought it. She hoped it had been sitting in the hall for a few minutes and that no one had looked in on them.
Pushing the cart beside a dining-room table, he uncovered the food. There was a basket of whole-grain breads and several kettles of soup. One looked like potatoes and cheese, but it gave off a strong Southwestern aroma. The other was blander—chicken soup for the invalid.
Well, she’d worked up too much of an appetite for bland. “Is it okay for me to have the one with cheese?” she asked.
“It’s one of the kitchen’s specialties. The guys like it hot So start with a little and see how your stomach reacts,” he advised.
