by Judy Duarte
“Time for this little piggy to get ready for bed,” she said, as she carried him to the master bathroom.
Noah squealed in delight and anticipation. He loved his bath, just as much as Louanne loved watching him splash and play.
While the old, claw-foot tub filled, Louanne knelt upon the floor and rested her bottom on her feet. She couldn’t help her silly grin, as she watched him suck on a wet washcloth.
He smiled back at her, then dropped the cloth and slapped both chubby hands upon the water. A burst of droplets splattered into his face, and he sucked in a breath and blinked.
Louanne laughed, then turned off the spigot. She didn’t know how long she sat there, entranced by the child’s antics, but before he turned into a shriveled prune, she snatched him from the tub and wrapped him in a towel.
Noah shrieked in protest, until she handed him a rubber ducky to chew on.
Moments later, she had him slicked down with lotion and double diapered for the night. Then she dressed him in the brand-new cowboy jammies that Aggie had bought him for his first birthday.
His powdery, baby scent was a comfort to her, and she brushed a kiss across the downy soft hair on his head. “Sleep tight, little one. Mommy loves you.”
He fussed for just a moment, then slipped a thumb into his mouth.
In spite of the regret she felt at having become involved with his father, Louanne loved her son with all her heart. And she counted him as a precious gift and a heavenly blessing.
She whispered a crib-side prayer, before returning to the kitchen to wash the few dishes from their evening meal. She glanced at the pot of homemade chicken noodle soup on the stove.
Should she leave it out for Rowan or put it away?
Before she could decide, the pipes groaned and grumbled through the walls of the hundred-year-old ranch house. Someone—Rowan—had turned on the hot water.
Doc said the man needed bed rest, so she dropped the dish towel on the countertop and hurried down the hall to reprimand her patient.
When she knocked on the bathroom door, he opened it, wearing only a pair of faded jeans with the top button unsnapped. That’s how she’d left him, so she shouldn’t be taken aback, but he’d been lying down then. Weak and defenseless.
Now he stood more than six feet tall. And when he peered at her through the open door, those angel eyes nearly took her breath away.
“Is something wrong?” he asked.
Yes. No. Corded muscles, a golden brown tan. A sprinkle of dark hair on his chest that trailed down to his belly and beyond.
And she was gawking, for heaven’s sake.
But why not? She hadn’t seen a man without his shirt in what seemed like ages. And even then, the vision she remembered fell short of the benchmark Rowan Parks set.
“You’re supposed to be in bed,” she said, “taking it easy and resting.”
“I’m dirty. And I don’t like the way I smell. So I thought a shower would be a good idea.”
“Do you need any help?” The moment she blurted out the question, she wanted to reel it back in, but it was too late. “I mean…can I get you something?”
“I don’t suppose you have a razor or a change of clothes?”
Actually, she did. Her father’s shaving gear still rested in the master bathroom, and his clothing still hung in the closet.
“I’ll get them for you,” she said, before padding down the hall.
Moments later, she returned with a washrag and towel, a razor, shaving cream, boxer shorts, an undershirt and a pair of jeans she hoped would fit. When she handed them to him, their hands touched. She pulled away, but not before something warm and magnetic jolted her with sexual awareness.
Had he felt it, too?
She hoped not, but his gaze seemed to linger on her eyes, her face.
“You look familiar,” he said.
Her older sister’s picture had graced the cover of People magazine last month. Had he spotted the resemblance she had to Tallulah—minus the makeup and snazzy clothes, of course? Or was he just trying hard to recognize someone, something?
It would be sad to have amnesia—if one wasn’t striving for anonymity, like Louanne was.
“I’m sure your memory will return,” she said.
They stood rooted in the moment, caught up in something tangible. Something vibrant and stirring.
And Louanne, who’d felt like a hollow shell for so long, couldn’t seem to ignore the feeling of being alive again. She was aware of each heady breath she sucked into her lungs, each zippity-do-da beat of her heart.
He reached out and gently stroked her cheek with the back of his knuckles, sending her pulse skidding throughout her bloodstream.
She didn’t pull away, although she should have. What business did she have fantasizing again?
But as she studied the battered man with hair as black as a winter night and eyes as blue as the summer sky, she found it hard not to dream. To imagine.
Her tongue seemed to wallow in her throat, as she struggled not to speak, not to reveal her hope that Rowan would believe she was something more worldly, more exciting than she really was. She wanted to cling to the old fantasy, to imagine she wasn’t a woman with sun-dried skin and chapped hands. To pretend she was once again a graduate student in literature who enjoyed the arts and culture.
“What did you say your name was?” he asked.
It seemed as though his short-term memory had been affected, too, since she’d already told him the country-girl truth.
“You don’t remember?” she asked.
Rowan shook his head. No, he didn’t remember, damn it. Should he?
She’d asked him his name when she first brought him home, as though she didn’t know him. But had that been her way of assessing his injury?
Lord, she looked familiar to him. As though he’d known her for years. Was she someone special to him? A wife? A lover?
“My name is Louanne.”
It was a Southern name, one that should be enunciated with the charm of a twang or drawl. But she’d shed her accent, if she’d ever had one. And the melodic lilt of her voice lingered on his ears like the sound of a classical harp.
Yet the name didn’t mean anything. And for the life of him, he couldn’t seem to jump-start the part in his brain that would remind him who she was and what she meant to him.
Tall and lean, she was physically fit, but not from the gym or newfangled diets. The golden-brown tan and solid stance suggested she’d spent long days working in the sun. And she was dressed simply, in denim jeans and a blue plaid blouse. Nothing fancy or alluring.
Yet she had a womanly appeal that drew a man’s attention. His appreciation.
Rowan didn’t know why he suspected they’d meant something to each other.
The way she looked at him, he supposed. The way he felt drawn to her, her voice. Those golden brown eyes. The attraction they both felt.
The fact she hadn’t backed away when he touched her in a familiar way.
What kind of relationship did they have?
He could ask, he supposed. But the fact he hadn’t remembered her name seemed to bother her. So he let it ride, hoping the answer would surface—somehow—either in conversation or in the dark and empty abyss of his mind.
“Are you hungry?” she asked. “I have a pot of chicken noodle soup on the stove. It’s not as good as my mother used to make, but it’s tasty. And it’ll fill you up.”
“Thank you. I’d like a bowl, if you don’t mind.” He gripped the doorjamb and nodded toward the shower. “After I clean up.”
She nodded, then turned on her heel and padded down the hallway, the long, brown braid swishing down her back, keeping time with the gentle sway of her hips.
A wave of dizziness settled over him, but he didn’t call her back. Instead, he closed his eyes and willed the room to stop spinning.
And when he felt as though his legs wouldn’t give out on him, he slipped out of his pants and climbed under the hot, steaming spray.
&
nbsp; The old doctor had said not to get his wound wet, but Rowan didn’t much care.
For some reason, he didn’t think he was a man who adhered to the rules—only those he’d made for himself.
When he climbed from the shower and dried off, he glanced into the steamed-up mirror, then wiped the fog away with the frayed, yellow towel.
The dark-haired, blue-eyed image staring back at him didn’t look familiar.
Oh, God. He swore under his breath and willed himself to remember.
Who the hell was he?
His driver’s license said he lived in California. But if that were the case, what was he doing in Texas?
He didn’t have a clue.
But for some reason, he had a feeling the tall, attractive brunette seemed to hold the answer in the depths of those golden-brown eyes.
Chapter Three
“No!”
Heart pounding, pulse racing, Louanne jerked up in bed and scanned the darkened bedroom lit only by a child’s night-light in the hall.
It took a moment for her mind to clear, for her to realize Richard hadn’t found her, hadn’t slipped into her bedroom to carry out his threat in the dark of night.
“No,” the voice cried again. A sleep-graveled male voice. The wounded stranger in Lula’s room.
Rowan.
She threw off the covers, slipped out of bed and hurried past the Mother Goose night-light in the hall, pausing in the doorway of the guest room.
Rowan tossed his dark head from one side of the pillow to the other, but Louanne didn’t think he was awake.
Was he caught in the throes of a nightmare? Haunted by memories, as she sometimes was?
Or did the sedative he’d been given continue to linger in his subconscious?
She wasn’t sure, but she made her way to his bedside and reached for his arm. “Rowan?”
“Emily,” he muttered.
Emily? Was that his wife? Or maybe his lover?
She suspected so. There was no way a man like Rowan was wandering around unattached.
Yet, that’s exactly how she’d found him, wandering and lost. Again, his plight tweaked her sympathy. She lifted her hand, placed it softly upon his brow, upon the dark, rebellious locks of his hair. Felt the dampness of his nocturnal struggle for peace.
He was in need of a haircut, she supposed. But the style seemed to suit the vagabond image she held of him. The storyteller inside her soul longed to make sense of his plight, his journey, while the woman in her longed to touch him, to comfort him. To hold him to her breast.
“It’s all right,” she whispered. “I’m here.”
He seemed to settle, or at least the tension in his body eased. He’d shaved this afternoon, but he still bore a rugged, bad-boy aura. Even in sleep.
The romantic in her wanted to wake him, to stir a smile. A heated gaze. Maybe even a kiss.
Foolish woman. Thoughts of romance and candlelight had been her downfall, her Achilles’ heel. That and her naïveté, she supposed.
Still, she didn’t move away. Didn’t retreat back to her room where she belonged. She stayed at his bedside, uninvited but drawn to him.
She supposed there was no reason for her to sit here, like a motherly woman comforting a lost child. Any vulnerability and helplessness Rowan might have was only momentary and fleeting. A man like him didn’t need a woman like her, like who she’d become.
Yet there was something about the devilishly handsome man with the angelic eyes that stirred her soul the way literary works of fiction used to. The way movies on the silver screen had always enchanted her sister.
Louanne glanced at the posters that still graced the walls of Lula’s room. Gone with the Wind. Roman Holiday. Top Gun. The Breakfast Club. The ageless classics, as well as those starring the Brat Pack. Lula loved them all.
Now, Tallulah Brown was making her mark on Hollywood. And Louanne was happy for her.
As children, both girls had longed to escape what they’d thought was a boring life. Lula wanted to become a movie star, to wear evening gowns and see her name in marquee lights.
And Louanne, too, had dreamed of becoming one of the rich and famous, of being a New York Times bestselling author. She’d once hoped to morph into one of the vibrant, worldly characters she’d only read about.
“Hey.”
She glanced down at the man in Lula’s bed, saw him watching her. Felt his gaze study her. Saw a flicker of masculine interest in his eyes.
“You’re awake,” she said, her nerve endings alive and responsive. Her hormones soaring.
He nodded. “Yeah. What time is it?”
“I don’t know.” She glanced at the alarm clock on the scarred oak dresser. “About two o’clock, a little after. I…uh…heard you call out.”
“I’m sorry for waking you.”
She couldn’t actually see the vivid blue of his eyes, but the color was ingrained in her mind. She didn’t think she’d ever look at the summer sky again and not think of Rowan Parks. “It’s okay. I wanted to check on you anyway. Did you have a nightmare?”
“Yeah.” He ran a hand through the tousled, black locks, then grimaced when a finger hit the mended gash on his temple.
“Want to talk about it?”
“Not really. I was running. In the dark.”
“You called for someone named Emily,” she supplied, hoping it might give his mind a clue to work with.
His brow furrowed, then he shook his head. “I don’t know why.”
“Maybe she means something to you.”
A woman named Emily?
Nothing came to mind, no light in the middle of the darkness.
Rowan shrugged, then sat up in bed. Interestingly enough, the only thing that felt the least bit familiar was the brown-haired woman who sat beside his bed. And she appeared troubled.
Her eyes darted around the room, looking at everything but him.
Why? Did it hurt her to think he’d forgotten about her? About whatever they had together? Or that he’d called out another woman’s name?
He was afraid to ask, afraid to try and defend himself or explain without having any knowledge of his past.
She continued to avoid his gaze, so he glanced around the room lit by muted light, saw the old movie posters on the wall. Most of the flicks he’d seen somewhere. Sometime. But he didn’t know when or with whom.
“This room used to belong to my sister,” Louanne said.
Had he ever met the sister? He didn’t have a clue. In fact, the nothingness in his mind was beginning to bother him, more than he cared to admit. And the urge to cling to what felt right, stable and familiar grew steady and strong.
He reached out, took the work-roughened hand of the woman who cared enough to sit up with him. To worry about him. His thumb made a slow circle on her skin. Her lips parted, as though his touch affected her. As though she felt the same bond he felt.
She gave his hand a faint squeeze. Or was that only his imagination? Wishful thinking, maybe.
For some reason, he found the woman attractive, even wearing a worn, pink flannel gown. She had a simple beauty, a loveliness that drew him to her.
A man would look forward to coming home to a woman like her.
To come home?
Had he felt that way, prior to his injury? Had he been eager to see her?
He tried to tell himself that she was a stranger and no more familiar than this old house. That he’d never met her before. But for some reason, he felt on the verge of recognition each time he looked at her.
But in spite of the familiarity, the feeling of home and hearth, the earthly beauty, he also saw vulnerability in her eyes. Sadness. And he hoped he hadn’t been the cause of it.
He wanted to learn more about their relationship, whatever it might be, but didn’t want to admit his curiosity. So he skated around the question he really wanted to ask. “Tell me about you, Louanne.”
“There’s not much to tell.”
He had to have met her somewhere. If
he was from California, what was he doing in Texas? Had he chased after her? “Have you always lived here?”
Another wave of sadness darkened her eyes. “I left home after high school and went to college.”
Is that where they’d met? He’d gone to college, or at least it felt as though he had. But that’s as far as his mind would stretch.
So he asked, “Where’d you go to school?”
“Back east. A small liberal arts college.”
Nothing. Back to square one.
But he continued along the same path, the same line of questioning. “What was your major?”
“English.”
Still nothing.
“I’m really sorry.” And he was. How could he have forgotten her?
“Why are you sorry?” she asked.
“You look so familiar. But I can’t remember how we met, what we’ve been to each other.”
Before she could answer, an infant cried out. “Ma. Ma—ma.”
A baby? The woman had a child?
Another blank, but this one was more unsettling than the others. How in the hell could Rowan have forgotten something like that?
She must have read curiosity and remorse in his expression. “Excuse me. I have to go see about him.”
“Him?”
“Noah. My son.”
Her son?
“Is the baby mine?” he asked, unable to hold back the haunting question.
Her mouth parted, but then she recovered. “No, you’re not the father.”
As Rowan watched her disappear from sight, he wasn’t sure whether he was disappointed or not.
As soon as Louanne was sure Noah had fallen back to sleep, she slowly lifted her hand from his small, pajama-clad back and tiptoed from his bedside.
She probably ought to return to Rowan’s room and address the awkward question he’d asked her, the question that had come out of the blue and set her imagination soaring.
He’d looked at her as though she’d been an old lover he’d run into unexpectedly.
Is the baby mine?
She’d answered him, of course, but she hadn’t taken time to explain to the poor, confused man that they’d just met, that they didn’t have a past together. That she and he…well, that they hadn’t been involved sexually.
