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“Probably about as good as she looks.”
About as good as she looked?
She must look horrible.
“Just so you know, I’m awake, and I can hear every word you’re saying. If you plan on going into excruciating details about how terrible I look, I’d rather you not.” She managed to lift her head, and met the eyes of a sixty-something woman with salt-and-pepper curls and a barely lined face.
“You’re beautiful, bruises and all, my dear. Put her on the couch, Chance. It’s warmer than the back bedroom.”
“You mean the room I spent eighteen years of my life in?”
“Your father and I offered to let you sleep upstairs when you were five, but you were afraid the bogeyman would get you.”
“Yeah, and by the time I was a teenager, I liked the idea of ground-floor windows.”
“If we’d known that, we’d probably have insisted that you take one of the rooms in the upstairs apartment.”
“That’s exactly why you didn’t know.” Chance carried Rayne into a dark living room and set her on a couch that faced an oversize stone fireplace.
“Thanks. Next time, I’ll carry you,” she said, and he smiled, his face softening, his eyes warm in the darkness.
“I’m not sure we’d both survive that. You’re kind of puny.”
“Puny? I’m strong as an ox.”
“But much prettier,” he said, and then frowned, backing away, letting his mother move in to cover Rayne with a blanket.
“How are you feeling, dear?”
“I’m okay.”
“Thank the Lord. I was worried sick when you didn’t come home after work. You’ve never been late before.”
“I’m sorry I worried you.”
“Please, don’t apologize. I’m just glad I knew enough to be worried. Another couple of hours in that ditch, and you could have frozen to … Well, it doesn’t bear thinking about. You’re going to be okay, and that’s all that matters.” She patted Rayne’s hand, the motherly gesture reminding Rayne of all the things she’d left behind in Arizona.
“In case you’re wondering, Rayne, this is my mother, Lila Richardson.”
“You’re introducing me as if I haven’t been her landlord for a couple of months.” Lila laughed, apparently not realizing how serious the situation was.
Nearly two months in Washington.
Not even one memory.
“She has partial amnesia, Mom. She doesn’t remember anything after she left Arizona.”
Lila’s amusement slipped away, and she patted Rayne’s hand again. “I’m so sorry, Rayne. I didn’t mean to make light of things. Tell you what, I’ll bring you some tea. That should help you relax and sleep.”
“I’d like to see Emma first.” She sat up, ignoring the pain and dizziness that followed. She couldn’t sleep, wouldn’t sleep until she saw Emma, made sure she was okay. No matter how well she might have known Lila before the accident, Rayne knew nothing about her now. The nurse’s words had been comforting, but something niggled at Rayne’s mind every time she thought of her daughter. Fear. She knew the feeling, had felt it the day she’d had a gun pointed at her head, but she shouldn’t be feeling it now, sitting in a cozy living room.
She needed to see Emma.
Needed to hold her.
Need to make sure that her fears were unfounded, that her daughter really was safe.
“She’s in the guest room. Chance, why don’t you bring her out here? That way Rayne won’t have to get up.”
“I’m not sure waking a baby up at two in the morning is a good idea,” Chance said, not moving.
He was right, of course.
It didn’t make sense to pull Emma out of bed, but Rayne was going to see her. She stood, all the blood draining from her head.
“Careful.” Chance eased her back down onto the sofa, and she knew she wasn’t going anywhere.
“It won’t hurt Emma to see her mommy, and I know you’ll sleep better once you’ve seen her,” Lila said. “Don’t put anymore mother guilt on her, Chance. She’s been through enough without adding that into the mix. You go get the baby while I make the tea. Rayne, you just stay right where you are and let us take care of you.”
Let them take care of her?
Wasn’t that breaking rule number one?
Rayne was certain it was, but she did exactly what Lila said.
Sat.
Right there on the couch. Waiting for other people to take care of her and her daughter.
Mother guilt?
Yeah. She knew all about that. Had felt it almost every day since Chandra died and she’d become Emma’s legal guardian.
Guilt because she had to work.
Guilt because she didn’t spend every minute of every day caring for her daughter.
Guilt because she hadn’t been there to see Emma roll over for the first time, crawl for the first time.
You’re not ready to be a mother, Rayne.
In some ways, Michael had been right, but Rayne wasn’t sure any woman was ever truly prepared for motherhood. She just had to work hard to be the best mother she could be. That would be enough.
She hoped.
“Do you want me to get her, Rayne?” Chance asked.
Such an easy question to answer, but Rayne’s brain seemed to be misfiring, her thoughts scattered. “I don’t know.”
“Then I’ll get her.” He walked across the room and down a narrow hallway, and she waited, afraid to move for fear the room would move with her.
Seconds later, Chance reappeared, Emma resting against his shoulder. Bright red hair. Big blue eyes, slowly blinking open. Chubby cheeks. She had little of Chandra’s dark exotic beauty, though the almond shape of her eyes and the fullness of her lips reminded Rayne of her childhood friend.
“There she is, kid. Mommy is home.” Chance shifted Emma so she could see Rayne, and the baby reached out, babbling excitedly.
“Mamamamamama.”
Chance set her on Rayne’s lap, and the scent of baby lotion and formula filled Rayne’s nose. It was the best kind of perfume. The most wonderful aroma.
She smiled, kissing Emma’s soft curls, and hugging her close. “I missed you, baby.”
Missed an entire two months of her life.
“I see the princess is awake and raring to go.” Lila walked back into the room, carrying a tray that contained a mug and a plate of cookies and setting it on the coffee table.
“Hopefully, she won’t stay awake when Rayne is ready to sleep.”
Ready?
She’d passed ready. Her eyes drooped, her arms felt heavy, and it was all she could do to hold Emma. Pain throbbed behind her eyes, speared through her skull, but she didn’t want to give in to it. Didn’t want to put Emma down or hand her to someone else.
Eight months ago, she’d agreed to be guardian to Chandra’s baby if anything were to happen to Chandra. She hadn’t thought it through when she’d agreed, hadn’t taken more than five minutes to consider how becoming a mother would change her life, hadn’t prayed about it, hadn’t done any of the things she usually did when faced with major decisions.
Probably because there really hadn’t been any decision to make. She and Chandra had been best friends since kindergarten, and there was nothing Rayne would have refused her. And even though the decision had been hasty, Rayne couldn’t regret it. Emma was the best thing in her life.
“Mamamamam.” Emma grabbed a fistful of Rayne’s hair, holding it tight in her chubby hand as she bounced with excitement.
“Careful, kid. Your mom already has a headache. She doesn’t need you adding to it.” Chance unraveled hair from Emma’s fist, smiling as the baby grabbed his nose.
“Why don’t I take her back into the room, get her settled back down before she’s too wide-awake?” Lila reached for Emma, and Rayne didn’t have the strength to protest. She loved her daughter, wanted to care for her, but her leaden body refused to do anything but sag into the couch.
“Thank you, Mrs. Richardson.”
“No need to thank me. I love having a baby around the house. And you’ve always called me Lila. There’s no need to change that now.” Lila smiled as she carried Emma back down the hall.
“Your mother seems like a wonderful lady.”
“She thinks you are, too.” Chance grabbed a cookie and bit into it, holding the plate out to Rayne.
Her stomach lurched and she shook her head. Regretted it immediately when the lurching sensation grew worse. She felt dizzy and sick, her thoughts sliding away.
“Take a deep breath, Rayne. You’ve gone ten shades of pale.” Chance pressed his hand to her forehead, the warm, dry feel of his palm anchoring her to the moment.
“I’ll be okay.”
“You’ve said that several times tonight, but you haven’t convinced me yet.” He handed her the mug, and she took a small sip of the flowery brew, her hand shaking, tea sloshing over her wrist.
“Careful.” Chance wiped the liquid up with a napkin, and Rayne set the mug down on a coaster, not sure she trusted herself to keep holding it.
Done in.
That’s how she felt.
All she wanted to do was lie back, close her eyes and try to forget the pounding pain.
“I think it’s time to say goodnight,” Chance said, and Rayne realized she’d closed her eyes, was slumping forward.
If she slumped any farther, she’d be facedown on the floor.
She straightened, nodded. “You’re right. Sleep is about all I seem capable of.”
“I’ll head out then. If you’re up to it, I’ll stop by tomorrow. I have a few questions I’d like to ask when you’re feeling better.”
“Questions about what?”
“The accident.”
“I don’t remember it, so any questions will be impossible to answer.”
“I know, but you were working with one of my clients last night. You’d told my mother you’d be back by five. When you didn’t show, she called me, and I called the client who said you’d asked for directions to the airport before you’d left.”
“I did?” She couldn’t remember, and trying to push through the fog, grab the memories and hold on to them made her feel sick and disoriented.
“That’s how I was able to find you. I retraced the route to the airport and spotted your car in the ravine. Do you have any idea if you were expecting a friend or family member to fly in?”
“I … really don’t know.” It was possible, though. She couldn’t remember anything after leaving Arizona, but she remembered everything prior to that. Remembered all her friends who’d promised to come for a visit.
Maybe one of them had.
Thoughts swirled and whirled, images flying through her brain too quickly to grasp.
Darkness.
Bright light.
Fear.
The accident?
“It’s possible, but if I’d picked someone up at the airport, wouldn’t he or she have been with me in the car?”
“Maybe you didn’t make it to the airport. The police think you lost control going around a curve in the road. The pavement was covered with a sheet of ice, so it’s impossible to know which direction you were heading.”
“Then whoever was waiting would have called to find out why I wasn’t there, right?”
“For someone with a concussion, you’re thinking fast. Want to check your cell phone?” He smiled, handing her a familiar black purse.
Finally, something she remembered.
Of course, she’d had it for a couple of years, so that wasn’t such good news after all.
She pulled out her cell phone, scrolled through her call history. “The last call came in at five last evening. It’s not a number I know.”
“That would have been a few minutes before your meeting. How about we call and see who it is?”
“Okay.” But concentrating on the numbers made her head spin, and she handed him the phone and leaned back against the couch cushions.
“You’re done in. Tomorrow will be soon enough. I’m going to write down the number, though. I have a friend in the police department who might be able to trace it for us. I’ll give him a call and see what he can come up with.”
“It would be a lot easier if I could just remember.”
“Memories or not, we’ll figure out what happened.”
“We?” She looked into his eyes, felt a quicksilver moment of awareness, knew that she’d looked into his eyes before, been drawn into his gaze.
“Why not?”
Because she had a feeling spending time with Chance could be dangerous. Because she could get lost looking into his eyes and forget all the reasons why relationships weren’t for her. Because she had three rules—three perfectly good rules—for heart-healthy living, and there was no way she planned to break any of them.
“I … don’t know.”
“Then how about we just go with it for now?” He patted her knee, the warmth of his palm seeping through her slacks and into her chilled flesh.
The rules, Rayne. Don’t forget about the rules.
But they were hard to remember with her head pounding and her stomach churning. Hard to remember when she was looking into Chance’s eyes, feeling the warmth of his touch. She wanted to lean on him. She really did. And that terrified her.
“Since I’m too tired to argue, I guess we will.” She tried to smile, knew it fell flat. She needed him to leave before she threw herself into his arms and begged for him to stay.
“Are you sure you’re going to be okay?” Chance asked, and she nodded, because she had no choice. Emma depended on her.
A welcome responsibility, even if it was a heavy one.
A responsibility Michael hadn’t wanted.
His response to Emma had taught Rayne just how careful she needed to be with her heart. Not just because she didn’t want it broken again, but because she couldn’t risk Emma attaching to a man who would turn his back and walk away when things got tough.
Rayne closed her eyes, wishing she could block out pain and worry as easily as she could block out the sight of Chance.
“Good night.” Fingers brushed her cheek, there and gone so quickly she wondered if she’d imagined them. A door opened, cold air whipping into the room before it clicked shut again.
And then she was alone.
Just Rayne and her thoughts.
Fun.
She shifted so she was lying down, her head on a throw pillow, the blanket clutched around her shoulders.
She’d wanted her new life to be fun, exciting and filled with adventure, but a car accident, a concussion and amnesia were more of an adventure than she’d bargained for.
“You could cut me a break, Lord,” she whispered, then became aware of the muted sound of a woman singing drifting into the room.
Lila singing Emma to sleep?
It had to be.
The knowledge warmed her.
Perhaps her prayer had been answered before she’d even uttered it.
Rayne had fallen far before she’d moved to Spokane, her once-charmed life crumbling around her. But as she listened to Lila’s quiet singing, felt the comforting warmth of the old farmhouse settling around her, she couldn’t help thinking that in the midst of all the falling, God had found her a very soft place to land.
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