Promises to Keep
By
Rose Marie Ferris
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
She was running so fast, she seemed to be flying, her feet hardly touching the ground as she dodged the lacy foam. Breathlessly she sensed the approach of the man who was pursuing her, and her heart thumped wildly with expectation.
Then suddenly the scene shifted. She was in a roofless cave, submerged in the warmth of her lover's arms, drowning in the excitement of his kiss. But when she tried to look into his face, she awoke, terribly, frighteningly alone. Was it a beautiful dream or an ecstatic memory? Would she ever see that face? Recall his name? Would she ever find the man who possessed her past and haunted her dreams?
Dear Reader:
We hope you are enjoying our exciting and successful series, the Candlelight Ecstasy Romances. This month we are bringing you two new books—books for the kind of woman who knows how to respond to love, and to life. Women like you. They are:
Love Beyond Reason by Rachel Ryan (No 23)
Promises to Keep by Rose Marie Ferris (No 24)
And there are twenty-two titles already available:
Gentle Pirate by Jayne Castle (No 1)
The Passionate Touch by Bonnie Drake (No 2)
Leaves of Fire, Flame of Love by Susan Chatfield
(No 3)
The Tempestuous Lovers by Suzanne Simmons (No 4)
Surrender by Moonlight by Bonnie Drake (No 5)
Morgan Wade's Woman by Amii Lorin (No 6)
Ocean of Regrets by Noelle Berry McCue (No 7)
The Marriage Season by Sally Dubois (No 8)
The Heart's Awakening by Valerie Ferris (No 9)
Desperate Longings by Frances Flores (No 10)
Besieged by Love by Maryann Young (No 11)
Wagered Weekend by Jayne Castle (No 12)
Sweet Ember by Bonnie Drake (No 13)
The Face of Love by Anne N. Reisser (No 14)
Stolen Holiday by Marjorie Eatock (No 15)
Tender Yearnings by Elaine Raco Chase (No 16)
Love's Encore by Rachel Ryan (No 17)
Breeze off the Ocean by Amii Lorin (No 18)
Right of Possession by Jayne Castle (No 19)
The Captive Love by Anne N. Reisser (No 20)
Bargain with the Devil by Jayne Castle (No 21)
Stages of Love by Beverly Sommers (No 22)
Have you read these yet?
We will be bringing out more books in the series—every month. Watch out for them—look forward to them—and welcome to the warmth of Candlelight Ecstasy Romances!
Regards,
LAURA TURNER
Corgi Books
PROMISES TO KEEP
A CORGI BOOK 0 552 12231 9
First publication in Great Britain
PRINTING HISTORY
Corgi edition published 1983
Copyright © 1981 by Rose Marie Ferris
Chapter One
Sometimes it seemed as if the mist that clouded her memory was about to lift. Any number of things might trigger this suspenseful feeling. A certain slant of light, snatches of music overheard on another patient's radio, the sound of laughter—even the smell of newsprint or of rain-dampened wool or the scent of roses had caused it. It lasted for only a matter of seconds before, as quickly as it had begun, it was gone. Then the mist descended again, as impenetrable as ever.
Dr. Ziegler had counseled her simply to relax when it occurred. He said this would make it easier for her memories to surface, but so far this had proved to be impossible advice to follow. Inevitably, when the feeling waned, she was tense with the prospect of self-discovery; her forehead was dewed by perspiration, and she was weak and shaking from the strain of trying to remember.
By the beginning of her third week at the hospital, she had recovered enough from her injuries so that she was fully ambulatory. As her physical condition improved, her restlessness increased, leading her to spend a part of each day visiting the children in the pediatric ward. She read them stories or played games with them, and the overworked nurses were grateful to have the services of a volunteer who was willing to help entertain the youngsters.
It was among the toys in their playroom that she found the cowrie shell. She touched it with wondering fingers, thinking that it was a peculiar artifact to find in such a place; for Green River, Wyoming, was hundreds of miles inland and half a world away from tropical seas. When, in her turn, she held it to her ear, she heard the roar of the ocean that was forever trapped within the pearly prison of the shell, and this sound caused the past to glimmer more brightly than ever before through the dark veil of amnesia.
That night, for the first time since her admission to the hospital, her sleep was broken by a dream. At first it was lovely. She was racing along a beach beside an endless sea. The shore was dotted with bathers, the sand was fine and white, and the sky was a vast and cloudless blue, its purity marred only by the faint white ribbon of a single vapor-trail far, far above. She was running so fast, she seemed to be flying, and her feet seemed hardly to touch the ground as she dodged the lacy foam of the surf. As she ran she was laughing, though the sound of her joy was muted by the crash of the breakers. Now and again she glanced back over her shoulder but she knew that her reluctance to be overtaken by whoever was following her was only a pretense and that she really wanted to be caught.
Nevertheless she ran on and on, leaving the more crowded beach behind and finally rounding a rocky headland to duck behind an outcropping of boulders. In this secluded spot she paused, leaning against the roughness of the sun-drenched stone to catch her breath as the spray from the waves breaking on the rock washed over her. She sensed the approach of the man who pursued her, and her heart thumped wildly with expectation.
Suddenly the scene shifted. She was in a sort of roofless cave that was formed by the narrow cleft between two boulders and she was submerged in the warmth of her lover's arms, drowning in the excitement of his kiss. She was borne gently downward until she lay with him in the cool shadow of the rocks; so vivid was her dream that she could feel the grainy texture of the sand beneath her back. She felt the sand accommodating itself to the curve of her spine as he covered her body with the urgent weight of his.
She rejoiced in his closeness, in the strength and heat and hardness of his body, in the silky friction of his skin rubbing against hers as their limbs entwined. She threw her head back and opened her eyes to see a lone gull soaring overhead, its white wings arcing against the pristine blue backdrop of the sky, the sole witness to their loving.
But when she tried to look at her lover's face, she awoke. The dream was gone and he was gone, and she was terribly, frighteningly alone. Still trembling with the remnant of her passionate response to the anonymous man of her dream, she stared into the darkness of her room.
It had seemed so real. He had seemed so real— more real than the people she saw daily at the hospital. Was it possible he was someone from out of her past, or was he merely a phantom invented by her subconscious? Had she actually lived the events in the dream, or were they sheer fantasy?
Against her better judgment, because the dream had assumed such importance to her, she put these questions to Dr. Ziegler when she saw him later that day. He studied her, furrowing his brow and stroking his beard contemplatively for a few moments before he answered, giving her a typically ambi
guous reply.
"It's possible your dream has some basis in fact," he told her, and she felt a bubble of elation rise within her. Then he continued smugly, "Of course it's much more likely that your dream was pure sexual indulgence."
The bubble burst, but she allowed none of her disappointment to show. She suspected that Dr. Ziegler derived some kind of perverted pleasure from encouraging her to hope, only to shatter that hope once again. During her stay at the hospital she had learned that he was a self-styled proponent of Freudian theories and from her own sessions with him she knew he tended to ascribe sexual motives to any and every type of behavior, not because of any profound scientific persuasion but because he had a remarkably smutty mind.
With his carefully cultivated Vandyke and close-cropped hair, he even tried to resemble Freud. But for all this emulation of his idol, she thought he looked like nothing more than a distinctly unsavory cartoon character plucked straight from the pages of MAD magazine.
"At any rate," he added grudgingly, "the mystery of your identity may soon be solved, despite your lack of cooperation with me. The police believe they have located your relatives."
Though she pleaded with him to give her more details about this exhilarating possibility, he refused to do so.
Even with this rather cryptic warning, she experienced not the slightest flicker of recognition when she first saw Garth Falconer. He and Dr. Ziegler were on the far side of the solarium talking with Miss McKenna, the day nurse. Miss McKenna's cool blond prettiness was enlivened by uncharacteristic animation as she sparkled up at him, and her only reactions were curiosity and mild amusement over the nurse's openly flirtatious manner with the stranger.
He was perhaps a little less than six feet in height, but he was so slender that he appeared to be much taller than this. From the width of his shoulders beneath the expensive cut of the sport jacket he was wearing, she decided his leanness was deceptive and that he was probably quite muscular in a lithe, wiry way—like a dancer or a marathon runner. Even from a distance she could sense the raw vitality he exuded. It set him apart and made him seem glaringly out of place in the environment of the hospital.
His thick, springy hair was the rich color of mahogany and though she could not see what color they were, his eyes were large and wide-spaced beneath well-marked brows. There was an austerity about his cleanly chiseled features, and a self-confidence bordering on arrogance that stamped his patrician good looks with an air of unrelenting pride and authority. If he'd lived a few centuries ago, he might have been a crusader—or a conquistador. She could envision his eyes, whatever their color, burning with passionate conviction and she could easily imagine him choosing death before dishonor.
For some reason this idea caused her a vague uneasiness, but she shrugged it off, telling herself that the man was only a stranger after all, and his personal brand of ethics was no concern of hers. The warning ignored, she returned her straying attention to the elderly woman seated nearby.
"Now don't that beat all!" Mrs. Jenkins remarked as she, too, gazed in the direction of the nurse and the men with her. "Who'd have thought that young woman could ever so much as crack a smile? She can't be bothered to look halfway pleasant for the sake of the patients around here." She shook her head and pursed her lips thoughtfully. "It's such a shame," she lamented. "Miss McKenna is real pretty when she doesn't look like she just swallowed a mouthful of vinegar."
Mrs. Jenkins beckoned her to move closer and lowered her voice to a whisper. "You know who the younger man with her is, don't you? It's Garth Falconer. He used to be something of a celebrity on, the racing circuit. I recollect reading that his father died, and he left auto racing to take over the family business. As I recall, it had to do with heavy construction."
"Tsk, tsk! Gossiping again, Mrs. Jenkins?" Her doctor, a portly, well-barbered man who had just joined them, scolded her mockingly. Though he was wagging his head reproachfully, he smiled at the object of his teasing as she patted her blue-rinsed hair, assuring herself her marcelled waves were tucked into her hairnet. The lively octogenarian was recovering from surgery to repair a broken hip. She was something of a pet with the hospital staff and Dr. Forsythe was not immune to her appeal.
"Don't get on your high horse with me, Doc!" Mrs. Jenkins's currant-dark eyes twinkled coquettishly. "I was just thinking that for all their carrying on, youngsters nowadays don't know beans about enjoying themselves. If you ask me, things are backward to what they ought to be. Folks should start out as senior citizens and get younger every year. As it is, by the time a body learns how to have a good time, they're too old to put what they've learned into practice!"
"Ah, Mrs. Jenkins," Dr. Forsythe responded with a show of regretful gallantry, "if only I were twenty years older, I'd be very tempted to show you how wrong you are."
"Hogwash! If you were twenty years older, you young whippersnapper, you'd be too old for me!"
The doctor laughed heartily. "Since you prefaced your comment by calling me 'young,' I'll forgive you for the rest of that sentiment, Mrs. J." He surveyed her silently for a moment and nodded his approval. "I can tell by your sharp tongue and sharper wit that you're feeling much improved today. As a matter of fact, I think it's safe to predict you'll be ready to go home soon, but for the time being, how about coming back to your room so I can check you over?"
His manner was courtly as he helped his patient to her feet and offered his arm for her to lean on.
"See you later, kiddo," Mrs. Jenkins called back as the doctor escorted her from the room. "Keep your fingers crossed that I'll pass the physical so my grandson can spring me from this god-awful place tomorrow. As I always say, a hospital is no place for sick people!"
Smiling at the appearance the two of them presented—Dr. Forsythe so nattily dressed and stockily built, Mrs. Jenkins shrunken and birdlike, wearing a rumpsprung housecoat of faded blue chenille—she watched their slow departure from the solarium. Her preoccupation with this prevented her from detecting Garth Falconer's approach until he stood directly in front of her.
"Hello, Julie," he said softly.
She looked up at him slowly. If he'd been impressive seen from a distance, at this range his virile good looks were intimidating. Now that he was close, she could see that his eyes were a changeable gray-green with tawny flecks of gold that might sometimes warm their cool depths.
"I'm sorry," she apologized stiltedly after a tense silence had spun out between them. "Do I know you?"
"So it's true," he said grimly, apparently having decided she honestly had no recollection of ever having met him. "You really do have amnesia."
"I'm sorry," she repeated gently. "Do we know each other well?"
"Before you took off without bothering to say 'so long,' there was a time when I thought we did." He laughed and the quality of his laughter was ironical and mirthless. "You're my wife."
Her eyes widened incredulously as she studied his face, searching for a clue that this was some sort of practical joke, but his expression was totally serious. The only emotion he displayed was anger when a muscle leaped along the angle of his jaw.
She glanced swiftly down at her hands. They were fine-boned and narrow, with slender graceful fingers that at the moment were nervously clutching the rough folds of her hospital robe. She was wearing no rings; no jewelry of any kind.
The upholstery of the sofa gave beneath his weight as he sat beside her and she raised her eyes to see that he was holding one hand extended toward her. A broad wedding band with an antique filigree design lay in the palm of his hand.
"Take it," he directed harshly. "It's yours."
The ring seemed to swim before her eyes and all at once she felt disoriented and dizzy. The room tilted crazily about her and when she closed her eyes to try to stem the attack of vertigo, it increased in severity until she swayed weakly and her sense of equilibrium deserted her completely.
His hands were strong and sure as they forced her head down into the hard yet strangely comfortin
g hollow of his shoulder. He held her there while the room gradually righted itself and the earth settled on its axis once again.
"There must be some mistake," she protested in a small voice that was further muffled by the nubby fabric of his jacket. "I couldn't have forgotten such an important thing as being married."
"There's no mistake," he said evenly. "The authorities have been extremely careful to make a positive identification."
"But how—"
"They've checked your fingerprints against those on your driver's license."
"So it's true," she whispered.
A soft sigh escaped her as she moved away from him. He made no attempt to hold her against her will but allowed her to put some distance between them. She glanced up at him but found she was not pre-pared to confront the battery of his eyes and hurriedly averted her face. Concentrating on her hands, which were now clasped tightly in her lap, she sought to regain a semblance of composure.
"Your name is Julie Falconer," he said. "Your maiden name was Hastings. And I'm Garth Falconer."
"I know," she acknowledged flatly. "One of the patients recognized you and pointed you out to me."
She felt acutely self-conscious and raising one shaky hand, she pressed it to her temple to form a facsimile of a blinder to conceal herself from his view.
"Do you remember anything?" asked Garth.
She laughed and was startled by the bitter tone of it. "I remember many things—all of them impersonal. It's people and places I can't recall. I didn't even know my own name. They've been calling me Jane Smith here at the hospital."
"Do you remember the accident?"
The bluntness of the question took her breath away. She was stunned, and her eyes were shadowed and haunted when she turned toward him.
"Oh, yes," she replied brokenly. "I only wish I didn't."
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