Page 14 of One Little Memory (Cherry Valley Novella)

As Jo sipped her tea, Phoenix studied her surreptitiously. She was in more pain now. Her movements were jerky, and she was jumping at every sound. He’d like to write it all off to the intruder, but thought there was more to it. His cop instincts kicked in.

When she set down her mug, she spilled a bit on the counter.

Her hands were still shaky. He moved across the room and pulled her in for a hug.

It was stupid, but he couldn’t look at those wounded dark eyes any longer without seeing the fear in their depths.

She needed comfort, and there was no one else here, so it was up to him.

“You’re fine. I’ll make sure the phone is functional before I leave so you’ll be safe. I don’t think whoever tried to break in will be back tonight.”

She wrapped her arms around his waist and settled her head against his chest. “I’m sure you’re right. It’s just…”

“A lot. I know. I can’t imagine. You must be exhausted.”

She nodded and then promptly yawned. “I’d just fallen asleep when I heard the thump.”

They were standing in the kitchen. Her body was tense but, little by little, she started to relax and lean into him more. It felt good to stand there with his arms around her. Like she was made to fit his body.

He bit back a sigh. That was not a helpful thought.

He had no idea who she was or what the hell was going on, but he had a dead body with traces of blue metallic paint on it, and her blue metallic car had gone over an embankment on the same night.

He wasn’t one to believe in coincidences.

There was a connection. He just couldn’t fathom that this soft, warm, sexy woman he was holding could also be a cold-blooded killer. He closed his eyes against the thought.

He was desperately trying not to notice that she was wearing his old T-shirt from his football days or that she didn’t have anything on underneath it as far as he could tell.

She had amazing curves, and he had a damn good idea what he wanted to do with them, but he really needed to get some distance.

He was a cop, and she was a…a what? Suspect? A witness at the very least. A fact that made her off limits. Now he just needed his body to know that.

“Why don’t you go get in bed? I’ll stay for a while and keep you company.”

She yawned again and nodded.

That made one of them totally unaffected by their closeness.

He tried not to be insulted as he watched her pad over to the bed.

She looked as good going as she did coming.

He grabbed the cell phone off the table where he’d left it and pulled it out of the package.

He was looking around for a plug to charge it when he noticed she was watching him.

“Can’t sleep?”

“I’m exhausted, but now I can’t seem to get my brain to shut down.”

“Okay. How about I plug this in next to you and show you how it works? It’s a pre-paid phone, so it’s not like a smartphone.”

“Sounds good.” She scooted over to make space for him on the bed.

He plugged in the charger, kicked off his shoes, and lay down next to her. He started explaining the features and, within minutes, she was asleep. He studied her face. She was beautiful. It was hard to believe there was no one out there looking for her. Someone somewhere must be missing her.

She made a small sound in her sleep. If only she would tell him the truth.

He was sure she had been holding something back earlier when she told him about the intruder.

She was being honest with him, but there was something that she didn’t share.

He didn’t think it was about the intruder exactly, but…

he wasn’t sure. Maybe she was getting her memories back, and they weren’t good ones.

It was too easy to speculate. He needed cold hard facts before he confronted her on anything. She’d been through enough.

He closed his eyes for a moment, thinking about how he needed to set up some cameras in his backyard. He’d bought some a couple of weeks ago but just hadn’t gotten around to installing them yet. There hadn’t seemed a need until now.

He’d lied to her about the teenagers, and he could tell she hadn’t believed him.

Someone had known he wasn’t home and came over here.

He was sure it wasn’t to break in and steal his stuff.

She’d been right about that. It had been about her.

But what exactly, he didn’t know. Yet. He’d figure it out, though.

Until then, he was going to keep her with him.

That was the only way he knew for sure she was safe.

The only good thing was that the intruder didn’t know to look for her in the garage apartment.

They’d only gone to the house. They wouldn’t make that mistake again.

It would be all over town tomorrow that she was staying in his garage.

He was going to have to think about some kind of security system for her.

Whoever it was had known he was out. Yeah, it was a small town, but not that small.

It had to be someone who’d seen him. Lloyd Bondy, Chance the bartender?

Lachlan? Maybe. Or maybe someone who’d followed him and knew he was headed away from town when he left the Underground.

Either way, he wasn’t trusting Jo’s safety to anyone else.

“Help!” she pleaded. “Help me…” Her voice died out.

“Jo.” Phoenix shook her gently. She was curled into the crook of his arm and had her head on his chest. It was obvious she was having a nightmare. “Jo,” he said again and gave her shoulder a squeeze. Then he reached over and turned on the bedside lamp.

She moaned. Her breathing was coming in gasps. She opened her eyes and blinked. Then she looked up at him. “Phoenix,” she breathed.

She struggled to sit up. He sat up, too, and arranged the pillows behind his head. “Nightmares or memories?”

She bit her lip. “I-I think memories.” She glanced at him but looked away quickly.

“Can you tell me about them?”

She let out a long breath. “I’m in the car, my car, and I open my eyes, but I can’t see. It takes a bit to focus and only one eye works. There’s something in the other one.”

Blood. He knew it because that’s how she was when he first found her. There’d been lots of blood. So much that he’d thought she was dead. Turned out it was a head laceration, and those suckers bled fiercely.

“I finally focus and see a figure there. A man. He’s standing on the passenger side of the car, looking in through the broken windshield. I ask him for help, but he just stares at me. Then he reaches in and takes my purse. I call out and ask for help again, but he disappears.”

She finally met his gaze. “It sounds crazy but…I think…I think it was the same man that was at your back door trying to break in.”

That put a whole new spin on things. Someone had gotten down to her car and didn’t help her before he’d gotten there. His shoulders tensed and lifted. Someone had wanted her to die. Or maybe someone just didn’t want to help. Those were two different things.

“Phoenix?”

“Sorry. Just thinking. Do you remember anything else about this person?”

“No. I can’t really see him. Or, at least, I don’t remember him clearly.”

Phoenix ran a hand through his hair. “And he took your purse.”

“That I remember. I kept wondering why. I didn’t have much money in it. Why wouldn’t he help me?”

He wasn’t going to comment on that because the truth would just scare her more. “Is there anything else you remember? Any small detail?”

She closed her eyes. “I remember the rain. It bounced off the hood and splashed me. I remember the pain. My head hurt. My shoulder…” She paused. “I remember you. At the door of my car. Reaching in and touching me. Talking to me. Asking if I was okay.” She opened her eyes. “Thank you for saving me.”

His heart gave a lurch. When she looked at him like that, like she really valued him, like she wanted him, he was powerless to say no to her. Anything she asked, he would do, and he knew it. Thank God, she didn’t know the effect she had on him.

He cleared his throat, but his voice still cracked a bit when he asked, “Do you remember how long it was between when the figure disappeared and I showed up?”

Her gaze roamed around the room. “Not really. A few minutes. Not more than, say, twenty minutes. It’s just a guess, but that’s what it felt like.”

She yawned and then winced when she slid her legs over the side of the bed.

“You okay?”

“Yeah. Everything just hurts more now.”

“There’s some ibuprofen in the bathroom behind the mirror.”

She got up, padded across the room, and disappeared inside the bathroom, closing the door behind her.

He rubbed his hands over his face. She was remembering, which was good, but those memories were all bad.

Someone had been down at the car with her before he’d arrived.

Someone took her purse. If she was right, that could really only mean one thing.

Actually, that wasn’t true. It could be that someone saw her go over the embankment and decided to go down to help. Then they thought she was dead, or at least not going to make it, and decided to steal her purse. It could’ve happened that way. But in his gut, he knew it didn’t.

Someone went down the embankment, and after seeing her, thought she was dying.

With all the blood at the scene, it was an easy assumption to make.

Then he took her purse and probably anything else he thought could identify her and left.

He did not want her to be found, or at least not identified.

He’d even ignored her pleas for help. That also meant the chances were excellent that he’d helped her over the embankment.

Phoenix’s gut churned. There was no getting away from it.

Someone had tried to kill Jo. But why? And why did they want to hide her identity?

The door opened, and she came back across the floor. “Do you mind staying with me? I’m kind of freaked out still.”

“I… No, that’s fine.” He helped her get situated again and then reached up and turned out the light. The darkness settled around them.

He knew two things. One, someone was trying to kill Jo, or at least had a vested interest in her not getting her memory back, and two, he was falling for the mystery woman in his bed.