Shirlee McCoy - Private Eye Protector

Probably.

But he didn’t.

Being a chaplain had hardwired him to be concerned for the sick and the struggling. Rayne was both.

He scowled, pacing back to the window as the doctor continued his examination of Rayne. Outside, sheets of ice fell from the charcoal sky, pinging off the ground and cars, shimmering on trees and bushes. A shadow shifted at the edge of the lot, merged with another shadow. Two figures standing in the icy downpour at midnight with the windchill dipping to twenty below?

Not something any sane person would do, but that didn’t mean anything sinister was going on.

Someone was in my room .

Rayne’s words drifted through his mind, and he couldn’t ignore them or the quicksilver shot of adrenaline that flooded his veins.

Maybe nothing was going on.

Probably nothing was.

But it wouldn’t hurt to check things out.

Dear Reader,

Rayne Sampson has three simple rules for heart-healthy living, and she has absolutely no intention of breaking them. A single mother, raising her best friend’s child, she knows how easy it is to fall in love with the wrong person, and she never intends to do it again. When a car accident steals her memories, and her life spins out of control, private detective Chance Richardson steps in to help. He’s strong, caring and dependable, his faith shining out and drawing Rayne in.

But she has her rules, and she can’t break them.

Or can she?

I hope you enjoy Rayne and Chance’s story. Like many of us, they are flawed and fickle, their hearts bruised from poor decisions and heartache. In the end, it is their faith in God and their love for each other that leads them through.

You are my hiding place; you will protect me from trouble and surround me with songs of deliverance.

— Psalms 32:7

Private Eye Protector

Shirlee McCoy

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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To my parents Edward and Shirley Porter who taught me what a lifetime of love looks like.

And to my husband Rodney, who shows me every day.

Someone stood in the open door of the room, his silence more compelling than the steady beep of machinery, more alarming than the agonizing pain that had tugged Rayne Sampson from the velvety darkness she’d floated in for …

How long?

She didn’t know.

Had no sense of time passing.

She shifted, the mechanized beep jumping with her pulse.

Pain.

In her head.

Her joints.

Someone watching. Time stalling. Nothing moving. Not Rayne. Not the figure standing near the door.

Get up .

Find Emma .

The command shot through her pain-racked head, and she swung her legs over the bed, trying desperately to figure out where she was, how she’d gotten there.

Where her daughter was.

Emma!

She had to find her, couldn’t fail her.

You don’t have what it takes to be a mother, Rayne. You’re too young. You need to grow up a little, be a wife first. Be my wife. Just like we planned .

Michael’s words drifted through her mind, filling her head so that it pounded even harder, throbbed more insistently.

When had he said those things?

A week ago?

A month ago?

She had no sense of time passing, and her heart thundered with the knowledge.

“Where’s my daughter?” she asked the man who watched, but the doorway was empty, the hall beyond brightly lit. The sound of footsteps and voices drifted into the room. People chatting and laughing, the sounds echoing through Rayne’s pounding skull.

Get up!

She pushed to her feet, nearly tripping over an IV pole.

A hospital.

She was in a hospital.

But she had no idea how she’d gotten there. No memory of an accident or an injury.

“Where’s Emma?” she spoke out loud, trying desperately to cling to the thought as darkness edged in and the floor slid away.

Cold sweat beaded her brow, her limbs trembling as she tried to hold on to consciousness.

You don’t have what it takes to be a mother .

“You’re wrong,” she muttered—not sure if she was in the moment or in the past—her voice raspy, her thoughts fuzzy.

Find her .

She took a step and fell into darkness.

Emma!

The name speared through the darkness, and she jerked back to the room, the endless mechanized beeping.

The pain.

Overwhelming, mind-searing pain. Cold tiles seeped through cotton and chilled her to the bone. On the floor, but she didn’t know how she’d gotten there.

Footsteps sounded on tile. Close. Coming closer.

The man returning?

She struggled to her hands and knees.

Get up .

Find Emma .

Hurry .

But, her movements were sluggish and uncoordinated, her efforts futile.

“Rayne? What are you doing?” A voice drifted into the darkness, light splashing across the floor, splashing into her eyes and blinding her, making her turn her head to the side, away from the glare.

She blinked, focused.

Boot-clad feet just inches away.

Hands wrapped around her waist, eased her to her feet.

Warm breath against her cheek, and she was being lifted off the ground, the machine beeping, her ear pressed against something warm and solid.

She let her eyes slide shut, relaxing against the touch that felt so safe.

Someone brushed strands of hair from her cheek.

Her brother or father?

Michael?

Couldn’t be Michael. She’d given back the ring, broken things off.

“Dad? Jonas?” She wanted to open her eyes, tried to open them, but they felt so heavy.

“Chance.”

She forced her eyes open, looked into a stranger’s face.

Dark hair, high cheekbones, pale eyes.

She knew those eyes.

Didn’t she?

“Who are you?”

“Chance Richardson.” He frowned, pressed a button on the bed rail. “We work for the same company. You rent an apartment from my mother. Don’t you remember?”

Did she remember?

She tried to pull the information from her mind, found nothing but emptiness and a cold, hard kernel of fear. “I live in Arizona. I work for a women’s shelter in Phoenix.”

“Do you know what day it is, Rayne?” He looked into her eyes, searching for something, but she had nothing to give. His eyes shimmered blue or green or gray, and she was sure she’d looked in them before.

When?

Where?

“I … No.”

“Do you know what city you’re in?”

A memory surfaced. Packing the U-Haul, strapping Emma into her car seat, leaving everything she knew to take a new job in a new place. “I remember packing to leave. That’s it.”

“Do you know where you are?” He pressed the button on the bed rail again, and she knew he was summoning a nurse. A nurse couldn’t help, though. All that could help was remembering, and that seemed to be impossible.