Lisa Childs - Agent to the Rescue

But then, Dalton’s car thieves had never taken a hostage before.

Whose case was this?

Her heavy lashes fluttered against her cheeks as she lifted her lids and stared at him. “You’re back...” Her breath shuddered out with relief.

Relief eased the tightness in his chest. She wasn’t dead...

“Where are these doctors?” he asked Blaine. But he didn’t look around for the ER physicians; he couldn’t pull his gaze from hers.

“She doesn’t need surgery,” Blaine said.

“But the head wound...” If her head was bandaged, it must have been beneath her hair, because he couldn’t see any gauze or tape. “It isn’t a GSW?”

Blaine replied, “She wasn’t shot.”

Dalton uttered a sigh of relief—which Bell echoed. Until now, the profiler had barely paid any attention to the victim. Of course, as a profiler, he was all about the perp. Did he intend to link this case—and her—to his serial killer?

“I have a concussion,” she said. “The neuro specialist said that’s probably why I can’t remember...”

“You can’t remember?” Bell asked. “Anything...?”

She glanced at him but turned back to Dalton, as if seeking assurance that she could trust the stranger. Earlier he had convinced her that she could trust Blaine. Hell, Blaine Campbell was well-known for his protectiveness. Dalton wouldn’t have trusted her safety to anyone else—not with a man out there determined to kill her.

Dalton hesitated only a moment before nodding that she could trust Bell, too. The guy was legendary for his intelligence and determination. Only one killer had escaped him in all the years he’d been a profiler.

“I don’t remember anything,” she said. “But him...” She lifted her hand toward Dalton. “I just remember him lifting the trunk lid...”

“Nothing else?” Bell asked. “You don’t remember anything that happened before that?”

She closed her eyes as if searching her mind for memories. Or maybe she was just exhausted.

“She’s in no condition for an interrogation right now,” he admonished Bell.

“The doctors said her concussion is serious,” Blaine added. “She lost a lot of blood from the head wound, too, so she’s really physically weak.”

Her eyes opened again. “I am not weak.”

“She’s not,” Dalton agreed. Just as he had told her earlier, he repeated, “She’s very strong.” She had survived two attempts on her life.

“I could handle an interrogation,” she said. “I would love to answer your questions—all of your questions—if I had any answers. But I can’t tell you anything about how I wound up in that trunk. I can’t even tell you my name.”

Tears glistened in her eyes, but she blinked furiously, fighting them back. He suspected they were tears of frustration. He couldn’t imagine losing all of his memories—to the extent that he didn’t even know his name. As he had when she’d been bleeding in the trunk, he reached out and clasped her hand. At that time he had been urging her to hold on to life; now he wanted her to hold on to him.

She clutched at his hand and squeezed. “Since you can’t interrogate me, I’m going to interrogate all of you. I need answers. I need to know who I am and what happened to me.”

He had been right about her. She was strong—hopefully strong enough to handle the truth, whatever it was.

“Does she have any other injuries?” he asked Blaine.

“I remember what the doctor told me,” she informed him. “I just don’t remember anything before you opened that trunk.”

He didn’t want to upset her by asking her how else she might have been injured, but it was important to know what kind of attacker they were dealing with. A sexual predator? Anger coursed through him. He wanted to find this guy. And he wanted to hurt him for hurting her .

“What are your other injuries?” Jared Bell asked the question now, no doubt because he was trying to profile her attacker.

She shivered even though a few blankets covered her hospital gown. He squeezed her hand, offering comfort and reassurance, and she offered him a smile. God, she was beautiful—so beautiful that his breath stuck in his lungs for a moment.

“What you’re thinking,” she said, “it didn’t happen.” She shuddered now—in revulsion at the thought and in relief. “I have some bumps, bruises and scrapes—”

“In addition to the head injury and amnesia,” Blaine finished for her.

“Amnesia,” she bitterly repeated. “I need to know who I am. You’re all in the FBI. You must know something about me.”

“Contrary to public opinion,” Blaine said, “we don’t have files on everyone. So we don’t know your identity. We don’t know anything yet.”

“We checked the missing person’s report in the area,” Agent Bell said. “No one’s reported a bride missing.”

She glanced at Blaine and then Jared Bell before focusing on him again. “None of you have any answers,” she said with a ragged sigh of resignation and weariness. “You don’t know who I am or why I was in the trunk of that car, either.”

“We don’t,” Dalton admitted.

“So what do I call myself?” she asked. And now her voice sounded weak, thready, as exhaustion threatened to claim her.

“Jane Doe,” Blaine suggested.

She wrinkled her nose in distaste. “That makes it sound like I didn’t survive. Like I’m a dead body.”

Dalton had another suggestion. But he didn’t want to upset her. “We’ll find out your real name,” he said. “And how you wound up in that trunk. I promise you that we will find out.” He squeezed her hand again.

While she wasn’t weak, she was exhausted, and her eyes closed again as sleep claimed her.

“You shouldn’t have made her any promises,” Jared Bell admonished him.

“Why not?” Because the profiler intended to steal the case from him?

“It isn’t like you,” Blaine agreed. “You always swear you’re not going to make anyone any promises. You’re never getting married.”

“I’m not marrying anyone,” Dalton anxiously corrected him. That was a promise he’d made himself long ago. “I’m just going to find out who she is and how she wound up in that trunk.”

“But if nobody reports her missing and she doesn’t have DNA on file, there might not be any way to find out who she is,” Bell cautioned him. “You can’t risk putting her picture out there. You can’t risk a news report about her.”

“I wouldn’t risk it,” Dalton assured him. He couldn’t risk kooks coming out of the woodwork trying to claim they knew her or cared about her—not in her vulnerable state.

“Why not?” Blaine asked. “Her attacker obviously knows she’s still alive, or he wouldn’t have tried running the ambulance off the road.”

Jared Bell shook his head. “The last thing her attacker needs is any publicity...”

Dalton wasn’t worried about her attacker; he was worried about her.

“But it might be the only way,” Blaine said, “since the doctors said she might never regain her memory.”

Even while his heart sank for her, Dalton shrugged. “It doesn’t matter. I will still find out who she is and what happened to her.” And he would find out without putting her in even more danger.

* * *

SHE MIGHT NEVER regain her memory .

She had only closed her eyes to hold back more tears—not to sleep. So she’d heard what the agent had said.

She had already heard the doctor say it, too, though, so the pronouncement wasn’t a shock. But hearing it again made it more real. She might never remember her life before the moment that Special Agent Dalton Reyes had opened the car trunk and rescued her.