Page 185 of Modern Romance September 2025 1-4

“I suppose it is lucky you have such a hard head.”

He almost winced, thinking the ghost voices were gone but now they were back and he’d have to have a psychiatric evaluation to go along with whatever it took to recover from his injuries.

But after a second or two, he realized it was Amelia’s voice.

He forced his eyes open, though they were slow to obey. The room was bright, but not as bright as it had been when he was on the side of the road, bleeding and…hallucinating.

Slowly, things focused, and his gaze settled on Amelia. She stood by his bed, dressed in a drab black. But her hair glowed like a halo, and her silver eyes regarded him.

Perfect Amelia. His angel. His hope.

Because her voice was connected with a living, breathing body. She was real and…he had pushed her away. Pushed her love away. And she was still here.

He still did not believe in the voices, but maybe…maybe he was being given some second chance. A chance to see past the grief, release the crutch of guilt and make things right.

He could make things right.

He opened his mouth, but he couldn’t seem to make words come out. Not her name. NotForgive me. NotI love you. NotI swear to God, I heard our families’ voices.

“Shh,” she said, moving closer to the bed. “There will be time to talk yet. The doctors are feeling positive about your chance for recovery,” she said, pulling a chair next to the bed.

He yearned for her to reach out and touch him, but her hands were carefully folded in her lap. It hurt deep in his chest, while his physical injuries seemed like a dull ache underneath the mists—some kind of painkiller, no doubt. But this pain could not be dulled by any medication.

It was the pain of failure and fear and everything she’d ever accused him of. It was the pain of losing her, when he could have reached out and held her instead.

But there was still time. He had been given time. Somehow.

“I will not scold you for driving into a snowstorm and nearly getting yourself killed,” she said primly. “You made your choices, and now you will deal with your consequences.” She said this very firmly, but he got the feeling she was speaking more to herself than him. Reminding herself she would not baby him when this was his own fault.

And it was his fault. To run away. To hide away. These were the choices he’d made, and they werehisfault. But they were not irreversible mistakes. He could learn a damn lesson. He would.

For her.

Because he had been given a second chance. A second chance not allowed his family. Which meant he owed it to them to use itwiselyinstead of wasting it in grief and self-punishment.

This time when he opened his mouth, he managed to rasp out words. Because he had to tell her… “I… I had the strangest dream or hallucination out there. All of them. Their voices.”

Her eyebrows beetled together, and she glanced back at the door. He realized his words were garbled, didn’t make much sense, and she was worried, likely, he’d suffered some debilitating head injury.

Of course, the words wouldn’t make much sense even if he could speak clearly. Hearing voices. But he knew, in this moment, he needed Amelia’s take. He had to know what she thought.

He tried again, this time working to make sure he enunciated each word. It was still raspy, but at least she seemed to make it out this time.

“Whose voices?” she asked, still sounding quite concerned.

He should probably not try to explain it to her. It was insanity. But…she had to know, didn’t she? She had to assure him it had been a hallucination, or he might actually start to believe it.

Ghosts. Angels. Love from some great beyond.

“My family. Your father. They…spoke to me. Told me to get to my phone. Told me I could not…leave you.” He shook his head, but it left him feeling dizzy and nauseous. “A dream. Something pulled me out of the car, but it was just a dream. I had to have done it, of course.”

Her eyes got very wide, and she leaned forward. He yearned for her to put her elegant hand on his face, but she didn’t. She did speak though.

“The police… I talked to them outside. They cannot reconstruct how you managed to get yourself out of the car. They’re looking for whoever might have helped you, but they haven’t found them yet.”

“I… I had to have crawled out. It was nothing but light that pulled me out, but that was a dream. It doesn’t make sense. The voices, they were just…hallucinations to get me through.”

“Diego, they also haven’t been able to track down who made the emergency call…”