Christmas with Her Lost-and-Found Lover

by Ann Mcintosh

  The wood slid forward, just as someone outside the tunnel shone a flashlight in, giving Rohan some light to work with. He moved back and lifted again.

  “Push.”

  Just as he said it, the sound of the rotors got louder, and there was a long, low creak, followed by a loud crash from within the barn. Instinctively Rohan ducked his head, thinking the tunnel was about to come down on them.

  Thankfully it didn’t.

  “Everyone okay in there?”

  Rohan lifted up onto his elbows to see over the dog, and met a wide, terrified stare. Elise’s face was pallid, her lips pulled back in a grimace of fear and perhaps pain.

  “Are you hurt?” She didn’t reply. Didn’t even blink. “Elise, are you hurt?”

  As though being released from a trance, she shook her head, but the terror in her eyes didn’t subside. It made him want to hold her, reassure her everything would be fine, but there was no way and no time for that. Getting out was imperative.

  Rohan got his fingers back under the board and growled, “Then push, dammit.”

  She did.

  It felt like an eternity before they were all safely on the other side of the tunnel. By then, the medical personnel were running toward them from the helicopter. Rohan held out a hand and helped the still-pale Elise to her feet. He couldn’t help noticing the tremors running through her fingers, but her voice was calm and sure as she relayed to the EMTs her findings regarding the injured man.

  Nathan and Trevor picked up the board with the husky and, on Rohan’s request, headed off to the veterinarian center with it, while Jan made her way beside the litter to the helicopter.

  At that point it was just the two of them left at the site of destruction, watching as Ben was loaded into the helicopter, Janice jumping in after him. The aircraft took off, and they watched it turn, heading for Banff.

  Elise sighed. “That’s that.”

  Rohan looked at her profile, able to truly study it for the first time.

  Hers was a strong face—square of jaw, with high cheekbones and a prominent nose and chin—but it was also intriguingly feminine. As he watched, she reached up and pulled off her toque, revealing straight, light brown hair, up in a ponytail on the top of her head.

  A few wisps had escaped the hair tie and fell along her cheek. Rohan had the ridiculous urge to tuck them back behind her ear. She did it herself, with an impatient brush of her fingers, and a warm shock of desire startled him so much he had to look away.

  The sound of the rotors faded, and nearby, a raven croaked.

  He cleared his throat before looking back at her, saying, “I should go to the vet center to see what I can do for that dog, but before I go, I realize we haven’t been introduced properly. I’m Rohan. Rohan—”

  “Khan,” she finished for him, before slapping him, seemingly with all the force she could muster, across the face.

  CHAPTER THREE

  SHE’D HIT HIM as hard as she could, but nowhere as hard as she would have liked. Besides the thermal gloves she was wearing, Elise was shaking from a combination of adrenaline and rage.

  Even so, seeing his head snap to the side was highly satisfying.

  The shock on his face was even more so.

  “What...?” Rohan’s voice faded as he raised a hand to his face, his dark eyes wide and gleaming with a mixture of surprise and anger. “Why did you hit me?”

  Elise drew herself up to her full height and tilted her head back so she could look down her nose at him. “That was for the twenty-seven years I thought you were dead, you worm.”

  Then, before he could respond, she grabbed her bags and marched off toward her snowmobile, surprised that the icy drifts she went through didn’t melt with the heat of her rage.

  “Wait,” he called. She heard the crunch of his boots behind her and sped up. “Wait!”

  That was what he’d said, just before he’d left her to go to Trinidad all those years ago:

  “Wait for me, please? I’ll only be gone for a couple of weeks, and then I’ll be back, before Christmas.”

  Yet, even as she agreed she’d be there for him when he got back, a part of her was already braced for heartache.

  She’d had no faith in his protestations of love, or the likelihood he’d return.

  Life had already taught her how quickly and easily others could disappear, especially, it seemed, around the Christmas season.

  And Rohan hadn’t come back. Instead, she was told he’d died in a car crash, just days after getting to Trinidad.

  And she’d believed it to be true all these years.

  “What an idiot I was,” she muttered to herself, just as he caught up to her near the snowmobile.

  “What are you talking about?” It was clear he was trying to stay calm, but the words were little better than a growl, and when she spun around to face him, she could see the anger simmering in his eyes. “Do you know me?”

  “Once upon a time, long ago, I thought I did. But that was before you and your family lied to me. My sister tried to warn me, before I took off with you that summer, but I wouldn’t listen.”

  “But—”

  In no mood to hear any more lies, Elise cut him off. “And now, now, you have the nerve to pretend you don’t even know who I am? Or worse, actually don’t remember me? You’re a stinking rat.”

  “Just hold on a minute.” His voice rose and Elise stiffened, giving him a narrow-eyed glare. “Will you stop haranguing me and give me a chance to speak?”

  “Why, so you can spin some new lies?”

  “No! So I can explain, or at least try to.”

  “What possible explanation could you give me that will make any damn sense?” The effects of temper and rapidly diminishing adrenaline were getting to her, and Elise’s anger peaked as she realized the backs of her eyes were stinging with tears. “You and your family lied, and for twenty-seven years I’ve thought you were dead. End of story. Full stop. There’s no way to spin that to make yourself look anything but a liar and a rat.”

  Rohan held up his hand, and it gave her a brief moment of pleasure when she realized it was shaking. “Listen to me. In December, twenty-seven years ago, I was in a car crash and I suffered a traumatic brain injury and subsequent retrograde amnesia. When I woke up, I couldn’t remember anything after the Victoria Day celebrations in May. I was shocked when they told me it was the end of the year, not the middle.”

  She didn’t believe him—didn’t want to believe him—until he put his hand to his face to briefly finger the scars there.

  Then she realized why it had been so simple to dismiss the thought that it might actually be Rohan. What she’d thought of as differences were actually the end result of the accident—the changes brought on by scar tissue and reconstructive surgery.

  As the anger waned and the adrenaline dump took hold, Elise swallowed against a rush of nausea and lowered herself to rest against the snowmobile seat, her legs suddenly turning to jelly.

  “Are you okay?” he asked, reaching to steady her as her foot slipped and she grabbed the handlebar for balance.

  The sensation of his fingers, so strong on her arm, made her shiver despite her inner turmoil. She pulled away.

  “Those months, between June and December, were when we were together. We met two weeks before Canada Day.”

  They stared at each other, a strange current running between them. Elise’s mind conjured memories, many of which she’d tried to forget but still crept their way into her head at the strangest times. Or sometimes invaded her dreams.

  She’d held back from him then, even though they’d had a whirlwind summer romance that stretched into autumn and, he’d said, would last forever. He’d made it plain he was in love with her—said he loved her—and wanted to be with her, no matter the cost.

  But Elise hadn’t believed in everlasting love ba
ck then, and wouldn’t commit to more than waiting to see what would come of it when he got back to Canada.

  Rohan’s face was pale. He once more touched his cheek, rubbing at it this time, as though talking about the past had awakened sensations in his flesh that had to be erased.

  He swallowed, then asked, “What were we doing during that time? I tried to find out, but my roommate was working as an assistant at the Ridgetown vet school campus, and other friends said they hardly saw me, so they couldn’t give me any information.”

  Heat warmed her cheeks as she recalled the hours spent making love with him, the sense of abandon she’d never experienced before then, and hadn’t since. But that wasn’t something she was willing to share, so she fell back on the mundane.

  “We traveled mostly—to the Maritime provinces in summer, and up into Algonquin Park in fall. We’d decided to take some time off before you job-hunted and I started my residency. We went to places we’d always wanted to see and hadn’t got to yet.”

  He nodded slowly, and she wondered what he was thinking. The Rohan of old had been very much an open book, willing to express every emotion as it surfaced. This was a different person. One who was more contained and closed off than she remembered.

  “Who told you I had died?”

  From his tone you’d think they were discussing the weather, or he was asking for the time. It was so at odds with the vibrant, sometimes fiery young man she’d once known that the entire conversation felt surreal. She was talking to someone who spoke and looked like the Rohan she’d once cared for, but was, to all intents and purposes, a stranger.

  “Your father. And your cousin Chandi confirmed it.”

  That got a reaction. A flash of anger tautened his face, and his fingers clenched and flexed.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, clearly back under control. His voice was bland, but she heard the sincerity in his words. “They had no right to deceive you that way.”

  Then he looked away, his lips tight, a frown wrinkling his brow. She thought perhaps he was going to elaborate, and they could talk through what had happened, but when he next spoke, it was to say, “I... I have to go and check on the husky that was injured. I’m really sorry.”

  And before she could answer, he turned and strode away.

  For a moment all she could do was watch him go, stunned at his abrupt departure.

  She still felt weak and confused, and in no condition to run after him. Nor did she want to. What she really wanted was a little time by herself to figure out what to do. Because if Rohan Khan thought their conversation was over, he was in for a huge surprise.

  It really had only begun.

  * * *

  Rohan tried to maintain his composure, but inside he seethed, embarrassed and unsettled by the conversation he’d just had.

  His cheek still stung slightly from the slap Elise had given him, but he didn’t blame her for it. Not at all. She’d been deceived horribly, and had acted out of anger and shock.

  Here was another instance of his father interfering in ways that hurt others, and doing so without a care for the consequences.

  He’d always been like that—a controlling bully who did whatever he could to get his way. All his life Rohan had fought for his own autonomy, refusing to cede to his father’s expectations, or give in when told he would never be good enough. Had the old man lied to Elise out of sheer malice, or as a way to get his son under his control?

  There was no way to know, since his father now suffered from advanced dementia, and could provide no answer or explanations.

  But Chandi probably could.

  He had the urge to call her right away but knew he needed to cool down before he did. Chandi wasn’t the kind to give up any information if she felt she was under attack, and once her back was up, she’d clam up out of spite.

  Besides, he had the husky to see to, and he was glad of that.

  Work, and interacting with the animals, always lowered Rohan’s stress levels.

  His affinity with animals was another thing his father never understood and had tried to interfere with.

  “Study medicine,” Dada had said incessantly.

  “I plan to,” was Rohan’s standard reply as a teenager, knowing exactly what his father meant. “Animal medicine.”

  There had been threats to cut his oldest son off, refuse to pay for school or anything else. Rohan had almost given in, worn down by his father’s bullying, but his grandfather, Baba, had stepped in, saying he would fund Rohan’s education. Since the old man was the only person Rohan’s father deferred to, it had thankfully worked out.

  Rohan liked to think he would have taken his chances on his own if Baba hadn’t paid for vet school, since caring for animals gave him a sense of purpose and satisfaction unlike anything else. Nothing in his life had ever given him the pleasure working with the animals did.

  At least that he remembered.

  The hole in his memory banks, which he thought he’d grown accustomed to and didn’t matter anymore, suddenly gaped wide again. A blank space he knew had changed the trajectory of his life in ways he had never really understood, even as it had caused untold pain to himself and others.

  Like Elise van Hagan.

  He opened the door to the small clinic on the property, used by the vets that often traveled with the dogsled teams. Taking a deep breath of the antiseptic smell lowered his heart rate. Nathan and Trevor looked up and nodded a greeting. They already had the husky on an examination table, both standing alongside it, making sure the animal stayed put and kept calm.

  Rohan nodded in return, turning his back to take off his jacket, trying to maintain an air of calm even as his stomach pitched and rolled like a dinghy at sea.

  If he could just force himself to concentrate on the dog, on repairing whatever damage it had sustained, his insides would settle.

  Yet the image of furious gray eyes, set in that startlingly lovely face, haunted him.

  Should he try to contact her again, or leave well enough alone? As he hung up his coat, he pushed the question away, unwilling to dwell on it just then.

  As Rohan began a more comprehensive examination of the husky, Trevor said, “Neither of us are vet techs, but we can help, if you need it.”

  “I think I’ll be okay,” Rohan replied, just as the door to the clinic opened and Elise walked in with her bags, followed by Baxter, again leading the second husky by its makeshift leash.

  “I wasn’t sure what to do with this girl,” she said, her tone brisk. “Could one of you take charge of her for me, please?”

  The dog on the table yelped as Rohan examined the hind leg, and Nathan and Trevor exchanged glances, as though asking each other who should let go of the animal to do as Elise asked.

  To Rohan’s surprise, Elise continued, “I also thought you might need a hand if you have to operate, Dr. Khan, since Janice is the only certified vet tech here. What have you found?”

  She took off her gloves as she spoke, then shucked her hat, coat and scarf, moving with the fluid efficiency he was beginning to think was habitual.

  Taken aback, as he thought she would have been on her way after their conversation, Rohan replied, “A couple of lacerations and a suspected broken rib. Plus, it feels like his cranial cruciate ligament is torn.”

  “So X-rays first, then,” she said, walking over to the sink. “And then you’ll know for sure.”

  “Yes,” he replied, still shocked by her calm demeanor and willingness to help.

  Perhaps it was his imagination, but the atmosphere in the room seemed to heat and thicken. He wasn’t surprised at the alacrity with which Nathan and Trevor moved, and once Elise had commanded Bax to drop the gauze tethering the two dogs together, they took off with the husky in tow.

  Leaving him alone with the woman Rohan was beginning to think was set on turning his calm, orderly life upside
down.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  ELISE FINISHED SCRUBBING her hands, and after drying them, reached for a pair of gloves. The silence in the room was broken only by the click of Baxter’s nails as he sniffed around, and the huffing breaths of the dog on the table.

  She’d gotten a little shock of surprise when she saw Rohan, now without his thick coat. She didn’t remember him being in such good shape when he was younger. But now, in jeans that hugged long, muscular legs, and a Henley shirt that displayed his wide chest to its best advantage, there was no denying he was downright toothsome.

  But she refused to let the thought linger in her head.

  She couldn’t afford to be sidetracked by something as mundane as how well he’d aged.

  “Will you sedate him before you x-ray?” she asked, avoiding looking at him. It had taken all her courage just to come after him, and using the dogs as an excuse seemed silly and transparent now.

  Surely he must realize there was something else she had in mind?

  But his voice was almost annoyingly calm when he replied, “Yes. It’ll stop him from struggling and potentially hurting himself even more. Dealing with half-wild dogs like this is very different from the average family pet, although those can get testy, too.”

  “Okay. Just tell me what you need, and let’s get to it.”

  When she turned, she found herself under the kind of intense scrutiny that made the hair on the back of her neck stir, and reminded her why she’d fallen for him all those years before.

  He had the type of gaze that seemed able to see into and through you, sussing out all your deepest secrets. That hadn’t changed in the slightest, although now it was solemn, serious, where before there had always been a little spark of laughter in his eyes. As though, no matter what he saw, he’d always be nonjudgmental and forgiving.

  Loving.

  That was definitely missing. But even without it, something stirred in her chest, and she tore her gaze away, examining the supplies, familiarizing herself with the clinic’s layout, so as to not have to look at him anymore.