Carla Cassidy - Enigma

He leaned back in the chair and cast his gaze out her window, where spring flowers bloomed in lush colors. Although too thin and still pale from his convalescence, there was a simmering energy about him that caused a similar energy inside her.

He turned back to look at her. You know part of what you need to know about me. The words were as clear in her head as if he’d spoken, but his lips hadn’t moved.

“How do you do that?” she asked.

“It’s a gift …or a curse, depending on how you look at it. Mental telepathy.”

“So you can read my mind?” The idea was both intriguing and appalling.

He smiled and nodded. “Your thoughts are what got me through the past six months. Your desire for me to live became my own.”

She stared at him and tried to remember every thought that had entered her head during the past six months. Most of them had probably been boring, but some of them had been intensely personal and not intended for anyone else to know.

“Are you doing it now?” she asked warily. She began a mental litany of the presidents of the United States, something she’d learned in sixth grade and somehow had never forgotten. Washington. Adams. Jefferson. Madison. Monroe.

He laughed and the sound of it was so deep and so sexy that a wave of heat swept through her. “That’s an effective way to block me. I promise I won’t get into your head anymore without your permission unless it’s absolutely necessary.”

The promise gave her a little comfort. “Who are the men who are after you?”

Her question instantly doused the light of the smile that had lit his features. “Men who want to hurt me. That’s all you need to know about them.”

She could tell by the shuttered darkness of his eyes that he would tell her no more about the men who were looking for him. “Before we do anything you need something to eat,” she said and got up from the table. “I’ll fix you a scrambled egg and a dry piece of toast. You have to go easy because you aren’t used to solid foods.”

It took her only minutes to fix the breakfast. He was silent as she worked, his gaze once again out the window. She wished she could read his mind, be privy to his innermost thoughts as he’d been with hers.

What was his plan? Where was he going from here and where was he from? He really hadn’t answered any of her questions to her satisfaction.

She was shocked by the sadness that filled her as she realized it was possible within hours he could be gone from her home, from her life.

He’d been her life for the past six months. He’d been the first thing she’d thought of when waking in the morning and the last thing she’d thought of before she closed her eyes to sleep at night. He’d helped the loneliness that had plagued her since she’d moved to Grand Forks.

She wanted him well, she told herself as she placed the plate with the scrambled egg and the piece of toast in front of him. She wanted him well and on his way back to his life. But she’d hoped for a little time to get to know him before she sent him on his way.

She realized that in the past six months she’d done the unthinkable for a nurse, she’d become personally involved with a patient.

“Won’t your parents be worried about you?” she asked as he ate.

He shook his head. “They died when my brother and I were five.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” she said.

He gave her a quick smile. “Yeah, me, too.” He finished the last of the toast and then pushed his plate aside. “Could I use your computer now?” Once again there was an intensity in his eyes, a thrum of energy in the air that felt urgent and desperate.

She had no idea if the danger he spoke of was real or imagined, but it was obvious he believed it was real and far too close for his comfort, and suddenly she was more than just a little bit afraid.

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