Sandra Marton - The Second Mrs Adams

Her eyes had grown accustomed to the shadowy darkness; she could almost see him clearly now. He had a hard face with strong features: a straight blade of a nose, a slash of a mouth, hair that looked to be thick and dark and perhaps a bit overlong.

“And me?” His voice had fallen to a whisper; she had to strain to hear it. “Do you know who I am, Joanna?”

She took a deep, shuddering breath. Should she remember him? Should she at least know his name?

“No,” she said. “No. I don’t.”

There was a long, almost palpable silence. She felt the quick bite of his fingers into her flesh and then he lifted his hands away, carefully, slowly, as if she were a delicate glass figurine he’d just returned to its cabinet for fear a swift movement would make it shatter.

He rose slowly to his feet and now she could see that he was tall, that the broad shoulders were matched by a powerful chest that tapered to a narrow waist, slim hips and long, well-proportioned legs. He stood beside the bed looking down at her, and then he nodded and thrust his fingers through his hair in a gesture instinct told her was as familiar to her as it was habitual to him.

“The doctors told me to expect this,” he said, “but...”

He shrugged so helplessly, despite the obvious power of his silhouette, that Joanna’s heart felt his frustration.

“I’m sorry,” she murmured. “I’m terribly, terribly sorry.”

His smile was bittersweet. He sat down beside her again and took her hand in his. She had a fleeting memory, one that was gone before she could make sense of it. She saw his dark head bent over a woman’s hand, saw his lips pressed to the palm...

Was the woman her? Was he going to bring her hand to his mouth and kiss it?

Anticipation, bright as the promise of a new day and sweet as the nectar of a flower, made her pulse-beat quicken. But all he did was lay her hand down again and pat it lightly with his.

“It isn’t your fault, Joanna. There’s nothing to apologize for.”

She had the feeling that there was, that she owed him many apologies for many things, but that was silly. How could she owe anything to a man she didn’t know?

“Please,” she said softly, “tell me your name.”

His mouth twisted. Then he rose to his feet, walked to the window and stared out into the night. An eternity seemed to pass before he turned and looked at her again.

“Of course.” There was a difference in him now, in his tone and in the way he held himself, and it frightened her. “My name is David. David Adams.”

Joanna hesitated. The black pit that had swallowed her so many times since the accident seemed to loom at her feet.

“David Adams,” she murmured, turning the name over in her mind, trying—failing—to find in it some hint of familiarity. “We—we have the same last name.”

He laughed, though there was no levity to it:

“I can see you haven’t lost your talent for understatement, Joanna. Yes, we have the same last name.”

“Are we related, then?”

His mouth twisted again, this time with a wry smile. “Indeed, we are, my love. You see, Joanna, I’m your husband.”

CHAPTER TWO

THE nurses all knew him by name, but after ten days there was nothing surprising in that.

What was surprising, David thought as his driver competently snaked the Bentley through the crowded streets of midtown Manhattan, was that he’d become something of a celebrity in the hospital.

Morgana, his P.A., had laughed when he’d first expressed amazement and then annoyance at his star status.

“I’m not Richard Gere, for heaven’s sake,” he’d told her irritably after he’d been stopped half a dozen times for his autograph en route to Joanna’s room. “What in hell do they want with the signature of a stodgy Wall Street banker?”

Morgana had pointed out that he wasn’t just a Wall Street banker, he was the man both the President of the World Bank and the President of the United States turned to for financial advice, even though his politics were not known by either.

As for stodgy...Morgana reminded him that CityLife magazine had only last month named him to its list of New York’s Ten Sexiest Men.

David, who’d been embarrassed enough by the designation so he’d done an admirable job of all but forgetting it, had flushed.

“Absurd of them to even have mentioned my name in that stupid article,” he’d muttered, and Morgana, honest as always, had agreed.

The media thought otherwise. In a rare week of no news, an accident involving the beautiful young wife of New York’s Sexiest Stockbroker was a four-star event.

The ghouls had arrived at the Emergency Room damned near as fast as he had so that when he’d jumped from his taxi he’d found himself in a sea of microphones and cameras and shouted questions, some so personal he wouldn’t have asked them of a close friend. David had clenched his jaw, ignored them all and shoved his way through the avaricious mob without pausing.

That first encounter had taught him a lesson. Now, he came and went by limousine even though he hated the formality and pretentiousness of the oversize car he never used but for the most formal business occasions. Joanna had liked it, though. She loved the luxury of the plush passenger compartment with its built-in bar, TV and stereo.

David’s mouth twisted. What irony, that the car he disliked and his wife loved should have become his vehicle of choice, since the accident.

It had nothing to do with the bar or the TV. It was just that he’d quickly learned that the reporters who still hung around outside the hospital pounced on taxis like hyenas on wounded wildebeests. Arriving by limo avoided the problem. The car simply pulled up at the physicians’ entrance, David stepped out, waved to the security man as if he’d been doing it every day of his life and walked straight in. The reporters had yet to catch on, though it wouldn’t matter, after tonight. This would be his last visit to the hospital.

By this time tomorrow, Joanna would be installed in a comfortable suite at Bright Meadows Rehabilitation Center. The place had an excellent reputation, both for helping its patients recover and for keeping them safe from unwelcome visitors. Bright Meadows was accustomed to catering to high-profile guests. No one whose name hadn’t been placed on an approved list would get past the high stone walls and there was even a helicopter pad on the grounds, if a phalanx of reporters decided to gather at the gates.

Hollister pulled up to the private entrance as usual and David waved to the guard as he walked briskly through the door and into a waiting elevator. He was on the verge of breathing a sigh of relief when a bottle blonde with a triumphant smile on her face and a microphone clutched in her hand sprang out of the shadows and into the elevator. She jammed her finger on the Stop button and turned up the wattage on her smile.

“Mr. Adams,” she said, “millions of interested Sun readers want to know how Mrs. Adams is doing.”

“She’s doing very well, thank you,” David said politely.

“Is she really?” Her voice dropped to a whisper that oozed compassion the same way a crocodile shed tears. “You can tell Sun readers the truth, David. What’s the real extent of your wife’s injuries?”

“Would you take your finger off that button, please, miss?”

The blonde edged nearer. “Is it true she’s in a coma?”

“Step back, please, and let go of that button.”

“David.” The blond leaned forward, her heavily kohled eyes, her cleavage and her microphone all aimed straight at him. “We heard that your wife’s accident occurred while she was en route to the airport for your second honeymoon in the Caribbean. Can you confirm that for our readers?”