"You didn't have to do that."
His voice came from behind her. Tess turned to find him braced against the doorjamb, looking shaky and unwell. The dark smudges under his eyes stood out in stark contrast to the chalkiness of his skin.
She spread the comforter quickly over the bed. "You'd better lie down before you fall down."
He didn't even argue. For a moment, she feared his fever had risen again, but one touch of his forehead eased her mind. "It's going to take a few days before you're up to full speed again," she told him, tucking the comforter over his chest. "Are you hungry?"
He made a face. "No."
"Good, I'll be right back with some soup."
"I'm not hungry," he repeated.
She simply smiled at him and exited with the pile of sheets in her arms. Before he could fall asleep again, she was back with a steaming bowl of fragrant broth. He turned his head away.
She sighed. "You won't get stronger if you don't eat." He flashed an annoyed look at her. "You always this pushy?"
A smile crept to her mouth. "I think we've already established my stubborn streak."
Surrendering, he shoved himself up on his elbows so she could prop the pillows behind him. "I bet you always had to win at kick ball in third grade, too," he grumbled.
"Duck, duck, goose," she corrected. "But my real passion was Ping-Pong, I was a whiz at Ping-Pong."
"Ping-Pong?"
"Oh, yeah," she said, giving the hot broth a stir. "Table in the backyard, neighborhood championships, the whole nine yards. How 'bout you? You ever play?"
His smile faded. "That a trick question?"
"Not if you remember it." She watched the muscles in his jaw tighten as he stared out the window.
"I … remember how it's played, but … can't remember how I know. I can't remember doing it." Desperation shadowed his eyes as he looked back at her. "Put keys in my hand and I can drive a car, or bullets and I can load a gun, but I can't tell you how I know what I know."
She could have gone all day without the gun example. She offered him a spoonful of soup. "Eat."
"You don't need to feed me, for God's sake," he said. "Fine." She handed him the bowl and watched him try to balance it with his injured arm. The silver teaspoon rattled against the side of the bowl and he spilled the contents before it ever reached his mouth.
He swore and tried again. She held her breath as she watched him begin to sweat with the effort to control the spoon. The results were the same. Angry with himself, he shoved the bowl at her and admitted defeat. For a man who she suspected didn't lose gracefully or often, capitulation was harder to swallow than that soup.
She fed him a spoonful and watched his eyes slide shut as he focused on getting it down. "I don't think you realize what your body has been through. You have to give yourself time, Jack. You were very sick."
He didn't reply, just stared sullenly at the bowl as she dipped up another spoonful.
"Patience was never one of my virtues, either," she admitted. "But I have learned over the years that it's required for healing."
"I don't have time for patience."
"You're safe here. No one knows where we are." Even as she said it, she knew that was a lie. Gil knew. But she wouldn't tell Jack that.
"You can't know that," he said. "They found me once. They can do it again."
He was right, of course. Jack and she were here on borrowed time. Whoever they were, their resources were well beyond hers to protect him – protect them, she amended.
"Do you remember anything? Anything specific?"
Jack slid his eyes shut. "No," he said, but that wasn't entirely true. Memories flitted through his mind – of the jungle, the sting of insects and the heavy weight of the gun in his hands. And there was the desert and something about a dog. But those memories might as well be shifting sand. He couldn't pin them to anything, or be sure that they were memories at all. How much danger had he put her in, coming here with her, and more importantly, how long could he stay before she understood that fact?
What choice did he have? He had the stamina of a newly hatched chick, and he wasn't going anywhere on his own in the next day or so. Not till he got his strength back.
He took another spoonful of soup from her, watching her when she wasn't looking. The sweet, soapy fragrance of lavender still lingered on her. She'd changed into one of her friend's silky shirts. Her hair, pulled back in a neat ponytail, was still damp from the shower she must've taken while he was asleep. He studied the color of her hair as she bent her head over the bowl. No dark roots. A natural blonde. Why didn't that surprise him? A nononsense, no frills woman like her didn't take time for things like that.
He smiled inwardly. Not that she needed any. Without a speck of makeup, Dr. Tess Gordon had a face that could knock a man on his butt with a simple smile. Those eyes of hers, mink-brown shot through with gold, were the kind a man could get lost in. And her mouth…
Well, he'd better not think about her mouth.
He held up his hand when she tried to feed him yet another spoonful. She was a damned fine doctor, but he couldn't stomach another mouthful of her soup.
"I'm tired," he said, sliding down on the pillow. His head felt too heavy to hold up any longer.
"Just one more thing, Jack," she said, putting the bowl down on the table beside the bed. "Do the names Joe or … Benedict mean anything to you?"
Jack frowned as something frizzled along his nerves. The second name meant nothing, but the first … Joe. It seemed to touch off something in the back of his mind, which promptly disappeared. He looked up at Tess for an explanation.
"You said those names when you were out of your head with fever," she told him. "You called them out and said … well, some other things."
"What?" he demanded. That she knew more about him than he did made him feel even more helpless.
"It didn't make much sense, except that you seemed very angry with someone. You swore to kill him. But you were delirious. It could mean nothing."
"Yeah. Probably." Jack slid a look at the window, where a pine bough cast a shadow against the pane. His head ached and his body craved sleep. He couldn't sort it out now. His mind was a file cabinet whose contents had been thrown indiscriminately across a room. He couldn't retrieve anything, much less figure out where to look for it. He closed his eyes, deciding he'd think about who "Joe" was later. But before he could even finish the thought he was sound asleep.
* * *
Chapter 8
«^»
Long shadows spilled across the room by the time Jack woke again. His sleep had been dreamless and deep. The smell of food simmering in the other room drifted to him. Not the soup she'd fed him earlier. Something with more body to it. This time, surprisingly, the fragrant scent held a certain appeal.
He turned his head to listen for sounds in the house. He heard only silence. Was Tess asleep, too? Or maybe she'd gone out again.
Jack threw the covers off and eased himself up to a sitting position on the edge of the bed. The room swam for a minute and every aching muscle in his body protested the sudden movement. He stared down at the fading bruises across his ribs and touched the still-tender one that darkened the side of his face. It was healing, too, but not fast enough for him. He flexed his left hand and tried to lift his arm. The pain in his shoulder had faded to a dull ache, but he knew it would be days, maybe weeks before he'd have full use of his left arm again.
And his throat… Man, he thought, the Sahara had taken up residence there. He needed water. He got to his feet and made his way slowly to the bathroom, where he drank about a quart of water directly from the tap. His thirst slaked, he moved cautiously to explore the living room and find Tess.
What remained of a fire still glowed red in the fireplace. The smoky scent lingered in the air, reminding him of something. Some … memory. He knew that senses could trigger memory, like cinnamon and Christmas. Or pumpkin pie at Thanksgiving. He could remember those holidays, even recall the fee
lings those events evoked, but could not directly recall any details about them. Did he have a family? Did they gather together in rooms like this one to exchange Christmas gifts? Did they sing carols or string popcorn?
His gaze fell on a row of bookshelves against the far wall. A tapestry of books filled the shelves, from fiction to art and everything in between. His gaze drifted downward to the handful of framed pictures poised between two piles of art books. Moving forward, he lifted the one that caught his eye first.
Tess.
She and another woman – the dark-haired beauty who was in all the other photographs here – were standing on the slopes in ski clothes, laughing uproariously at something someone had said. Tess was pointing her pole at the camera with her nose wrinkled the way it did when she smiled. The cold air had put color in her cheeks.
He'd never heard her laugh, and wondered suddenly what it would sound like.
He put the picture down and picked up another – a group shot, with the brunette and Tess and two men. One of them, tall with dark brown cropped hair and a square jaw, had his arm possessively around Tess, whose head was resting against his shoulder. Jack searched the picture and found what he was looking for. A wedding ring on the man's left hand.
It staggered him. It hadn't occurred to him until that very moment that she could be married. That there was a Mr. Tess Gordon somewhere. How could he not have thought of it? He'd been so wrapped up in his own problems, he'd barely given a thought to hers. But she wore no ring, so maybe Mr. Gordon was past tense. He had to assume it or she wouldn't be here alone with him, would she?
He studied the picture. She looked different there with this man. He couldn't put his finger on it at first, but it came to him slowly. She looked … happy. It was something he didn't see in her eyes now. Then again, God knew what she'd risked for him, stealing him out of the hospital that way. Tess had good reason not to look happy.
Replacing the photo, he happened to glimpse something behind the stack of books. He reached out and his fingers closed around the ridged grip of a gun.
Jack smiled. So this was where she'd hidden it. He withdrew the weapon and studied it. It was a 9 mm, nickel-plated Heckler and Koch P7. An expensive gun, but one a woman could easily handle.
He blinked. How the hell did he know that? And how did he know that by pressing this button—
The clip ejected from the gun. Lifting it to eye level, he checked the load. Full. He hefted the weight in his hand. Good balance. He straightened his arm and peered down the sight. The motion felt as familiar as breathing to him.
Who the hell was he and what sort of a man had he been? Whoever was after him knew him better than he knew himself. The disadvantage was his, not to mention Tess's. The longer he stayed with her, the more danger he put her in. But he wasn't strong enough to leave just yet. Until then, he'd let her help him. And then he'd go.
The sound of footfalls on the porch jerked his attention to the door. Dammit! Someone was coming in. Instinctively, his hand tightened on the gun and he drew his left hand over the cocking mechanism. But through the shaded windows he saw a familiar shape pass by on the way to the door. Jack quickly slid the gun back into its hiding place and moved toward the kitchen.
The door thudded open and Tess, hidden behind an armload of wood, staggered into the room.
"Hi." Jack peeked around the corner with a guilty grin.
"Ohmigod!" she gasped. "You scared the hell out of me, Jack!" She slammed the door shut with her foot. "What are you doing out of bed?"
He shrugged. "I was thirsty."
She rolled her eyes. "You're supposed to be resting."
Jack couldn't help but notice that she'd thrown on a pair of old carpenter's jeans that were a hair too big for her. She'd cinched in the waist with a belt, which served only to emphasize the slenderness of that long stretch of legs beneath. "I was resting," he said. "And then I was thirsty. And you were—?"
"Replenishing the wood box. Obviously. You should have called me. You look terrible."
"Funny," he said, leaning his hip against the doorjamb. "I was just thinking the opposite about you."
Tess glanced up at him, ready to laugh, considering the worn flannel shirt and too-big jeans she had on. The impulse died as she took in the look in his eyes. His illness had done nothing to diminish the intensity in his sky-blue gaze or the utter maleness that oozed from every pore of his poster-boy body. "Are you … flirting with me?"
His gaze moved down her features one by one. "Flirting would imply untruth. And I meant what I said."
With an unconvinced smile, she began to unload the wood into the box. "Maybe I should take your temperature again. I think your fever's up."
"Can't take the truth, Doc?" he asked with a slow grin.
"No, I'm just immune to one-liners," she replied lightly. "They give you a book of them in medical school and tell you to watch out for charming patients."
His face brightened. "Charming?"
She sized him up thoughtfully. "You do have a certain charm, Jack. It just won't work on me."
"Because you're married?"
She felt the blood rush away from her face. "What?"
The teasing expression had vanished from his. "Are you?"
She didn't answer for a long moment. "No."
He pushed away from the doorway and took a few steps toward her. "Divorced then?"
Tess tossed the last of her burden into the wood box and stood. "No."
She followed his glance to the handful of framed pictures nestled among Cara's book collection. Tess didn't have to ask which one he'd been looking at. Her chest tightened.
"Not that it's any of your business, but I was married once," she told him. "That … that's Adam. He died two years ago… Anyway, you should go lie down. Do you need some help?"
"What, you're sending me off to bed? I'm not five years old, Tess. You can't get rid of me that easily." Jack's eyes had gone dark. "Look," he said, moving toward her even as she backed away. "I'm not trying to rattle any skeletons in your closet—"
"Then don't."
"—but it occurred to me as I looked at that picture of you that I've never seen you laugh. And I wondered who that guy was who'd wrestled one out of you."
"I don't talk about Adam, all right? With anyone. Not anymore."
"Why?" he persisted.
She twined her fingers together. "Because I chose to get on with my life. It was a choice. Do you understand?"
Jack frowned. "A choice to not talk about your dead husband? Was it a bad marriage?"
Tess rolled her eyes and braced her hands on the countertop with her back to Jack. "No."
"Did he hurt you?"
She heard the beginnings of anger in his voice. "No!" she answered, and for a moment she dared hope he'd finished the inquisition. He hadn't.
"Did you love him?"
"Yes," she said, staring out the kitchen window at the jay that had fluttered to the sill.
"Then I don't understand," he said flatly. "Because," she said slowly, "I killed him." She turned back to Jack as he was still trying to regain a neutral expression. "How's that for a skeleton?"
For a change, Jack didn't say anything. He just stared at her.
"Don't you want to know how?"
"Are you trying to shock me now? Because if you are, you should know that I'm pretty much beyond that, considering what rye been through. Tell me what happened, Tess. Nobody's judging you here."
Damn him for being so kind, she thought, if not for forcing her to talk about it for the first time in so long. She twisted her fingers together, again inhaling the stale scent of the wood smoke lingering in the warm morning air.
"Adam was a cop," she began haltingly. "We were married for eight years. We got married young. He put me through medical school on a beat cop's salary. It was hard. We were both so busy we rarely saw each other."
Tess moved to the island and braced two hands there, staring at the wood to avoid looking at Jack. "When I moved
into practice in the ER, he was offered a promotion – detective, robbery and homicide. We both wanted it. I thought he'd be safer there than dodging gang warfare bullets on the streets of L.A. He thought we'd see more of each other."
She started to pace. "Naturally, it didn't work out that way. We saw less and less of each other as our careers took off. Things started to get shaky. Talk of children all but stopped. But I think we both believed we'd have time to fix it later when things settled down. You know how it is? You think you're bulletproof, invincible – but you're not?"
Jack nodded silently, knowing only too well what she meant.
"One night, two years ago, we were short staffed at the hospital. It was, I don't know, flu season, and there was an hour when I was the only doctor on duty." She took a deep breath, leaning against the counter and folding her arms across her chest. "When they rolled him in, the staff immediately recognized him and called for backup. They tried to keep me away. But I knew as soon as I saw his partner who it was. And there was no one else. I had to do it. He'd taken a .38 in the chest – an inch or so lower than where the bullet caught you. He hadn't worn his Kevlar vest that night. He always hated that thing…" The rest choked in her throat and it was a moment before she could talk again.
"His lung was collapsed by the time he got to the hospital, and he'd lost an incredible amount of blood. And I … I couldn't save him. He was bleeding and bleeding and I tried to stop it. God, I…" Her eyes burned, but she didn't want to cry. "I couldn't stop his bleeding. He was dying right in my hands. And I couldn't do anything to stop it."
Suddenly, Jack was beside her, turning her and holding her against him. She didn't even try to resist leaning into him.
"Shh" he murmured. "It wasn't your fault."
She shook her head. "If I'd done something different. If I'd—"
"You aren't God. It was his time. That's all."
"I don't accept that. I can't accept that. I failed him."
He leaned back and looked down at her. "Is that why you gave up medicine? Because you aren't perfect?"
I'LL REMEMBER YOU Page 9
