Linda Castillo - A Hero To Hold

He just wished the nagging little voice in the back of his mind would stop telling him this time was going to be different.

Who was he trying to fool anyway? He was a lot more interested in this woman than he wanted to admit. A hell of a lot more than was wise. He understood the dynamics of high adrenaline and danger. Like so many other men like him, he lived for the high. Rescues could be simultaneously emotional and exhilarating and hair-raising. In the past he’d never felt anything more than the need to decompress afterward. A couple of beers with his teammates or a workout at the gym usually sufficed. But this time was different. He couldn’t explain it, but something had happened between him and this woman up on the mountain. Something that didn’t have anything to do with adrenaline or ego or even the fact that she appealed to him on a physical level. Somehow, and as unlikely as it seemed, he’d connected with her in a way that went against everything he’d ever believed about himself. The realization that he might be vulnerable to that curvy body and those bottomless brown eyes disturbed him almost as much as the words she’d just uttered.

As he gazed down at her, he realized he hadn’t driven all the way from Conifer to Lake County Hospital in six inches of snow just to check on her physical condition.

“Why would someone want to kill you?” In the back of his mind he thought about the pistol she’d shoved in his face and wondered if she remembered that little detail. Or if it had anything to do with what had happened to her.

“I’m not sure,” she said. “I mean, I don’t really have a clear memory of it. Just sort of vague…impressions.”

“What else do you remember?”

“I remember being afraid,” she said. “I remember running. Snow and darkness and cold. I think someone was chasing me.”

“Look, Red, I’m not discounting what you’re telling me, but I’ve seen a lot of concussions, and even more cases of hypothermia over the years. Both can cause mental confusion—”

“I’m not wrong about this.”

“Even moderate hypothermia has been known to cause hallucinations,” he said.

“I wasn’t hallucinating.”

“Were you hallucinating when you shoved that pistol in my face?”

Her gaze snapped to his, her expression stricken.

“I see you remember that part just fine,” he said dryly. “You could have taken my head off.”

“Oh my God.” Raising her bandaged hand, she pressed it to her mouth. “I wouldn’t have…hurt you.”

“You sure had me fooled. That .38 you were packing looked pretty deadly.”

“I’m sorry,” she said.

“Whose gun was it?”

“I don’t know.”

“Why did you have it?”

“I…don’t…remember.”

John studied her, annoyed with her because he couldn’t tell if she was lying, annoyed with himself because all he seemed to be noticing about her was the way that sexless hospital gown fell over curves that were anything but sexless. Curves he had absolutely no business noticing as a medical professional, even less as a man with his history. If he had an ounce of common sense, he’d get the hell out of there. But John knew his interest in her had moved beyond logic and into an area that was as foreign to him as the phenomenon of amnesia.

“Am I in trouble?” she asked. “I mean, with the police?”

Lowering his head, he pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed. “If my team leader had his way, you’d be on your way to a jail cell right now.”

A shiver rippled the length of her. “Why aren’t I?”

“Hopefully it’s not because I’m a fool.” John couldn’t tell her the truth, of course. He couldn’t tell her that even after they’d dropped her off at the hospital, he hadn’t been able to get her out of his mind. That he hadn’t been able to stop thinking about the way he’d responded when her body had been pressed against his and all that red hair had spread over his chest like an ocean of fragrant silk. For hours afterward, her scent had clung to him, as sweet and tantalizing as a first kiss.

Shoving the memory aside, he blew out a sigh. “Buzz filed a police report but he didn’t mention the gun.” He shot her a hard look. “I convinced him not to.”

John saw the question in her eyes. She wanted to know why they’d covered for her, but she didn’t voice it. He found himself relieved because he wasn’t sure he had an answer.

“You don’t think I’m some kind of…criminal, do you?” she asked.

“I think you’ve got some explaining to do.”

“I’m not sure how I can explain something I don’t remember.”

“That’s why we’re going to give the sheriff’s office a call.”

The color leached from her cheeks so quickly, he thought she would faint. “No police,” she whispered.

Suspicion fluttered like a big, gangly bird in the pit of his stomach. He hadn’t wanted to believe it, but she was obviously hiding something. Disappointed, he scrubbed a hand over his jaw. Terrific. His instincts were telling him one thing, his gut another—and the part of him that was a man didn’t necessarily give a damn about either.

“Why not?” he asked.

“I don’t know. I just…need some time to sort things out first. Please.”

John sighed again. He wasn’t sure how he was going to handle this. He wasn’t sure how he was going to handle her. Or what he was going to do about the way he was reacting to her.

“What else do you remember?” he pressed.

“Not much more than I’ve already told you. I remember running. Being…terrified. I remember…cold and snow. It was dark, and I couldn’t see…” Her gaze dropped to her bandaged hands. When she held them out, they trembled. “How is it that I can’t remember, yet I’m terrified? I don’t even know what I’m afraid of. I don’t even know my own name, for God’s sake. This is nuts.”

“The name thing bothers you a lot, doesn’t it?”

A humorless laugh escaped her. “I know this sounds strange, but not knowing my own name, not knowing who I am makes me feel like…I never existed.”

“What about the name on the note?”

“Hannah? What about it?”

“I like it a hell of a lot better than Jane Doe.”

“Hannah.” A tentative smile touched the corners of her mouth. “Yeah, I like it. I mean, temporarily.”

“Even if it’s not your name, chances are it was at least familiar to you.”

“Maybe if I hear it often enough, it will shake loose a memory and help me remember.”

“There you go.”

Something went liquid and warm in John’s chest at her smile. It was an unfamiliar sensation he normally would have shied away from, but didn’t this time. As long as he stayed in control of the situation, he’d be all right, he assured himself. If the balance shifted, he’d know when to walk away. John had a sixth sense when it came to knowing when to walk away. It had never failed him; it wouldn’t now.

But the knowledge gave him little solace, considering those incredible eyes of hers knocked him for a loop every time he looked at her.

“I know this must sound crazy, but I can’t shake the feeling that I was in trouble up on that mountain,” she said. “I’m not wrong about this. Someone was trying to…hurt me.”

He didn’t like the sound of that. Not about her memory loss. He sure as hell didn’t like the possibility that someone might have been trying to hurt her. But it would explain the gun. And the bruises on her arms and throat. The rest of her body had been so battered in the fall, they hadn’t been able to tell if the other bruises were suspicious or not.

John tried to stomp the outrage that rolled slowly through him at the thought of a man hurting her. Nothing gave a man the right to hurt a woman. He knew all too well the devastation that kind of violence wreaked on someone’s life. He’d walked away from it thirteen years ago, only to realize a man couldn’t ever outrun his roots.