Prim, Proper... Pregnant

Chapter Two

The hospital corridor was long and straight. In her haste, Amelia had run across the grass outside, grass which was wet from a sprinkler, and now the soles of her shoes squeaked against the spotless linoleum. She stopped at the nurses’ desk to ask the way to the ICU, but before she could form the question, she caught sight of Jack Hogan leaning against a wall at the far end of the hallway. She started toward him.

He looked up when she was within twenty feet. Amelia’s pace faltered; the change in Jack’s appearance from a few weeks before when she’d bumped into him at the grocery store just about broke her heart.

He was tall like his sons, but stooped today, his skin, always pale, now waxen and dull. He stared at her with the brown eyes he’d passed along to his children, eyes he might very well have passed down to the child Amelia carried inside her. Those eyes were now blurred by unshed tears.

She took his hands and they stared at each other without speaking. His grief was so tangible, it seemed to seep through her skin. She was afraid to ask about Ryder. After a long pause, she finally whispered, “I’m so sorry about Rob.”

He nodded as the tears rolled down the creases in his cheeks. She cried along with him.

Nina came through the opaque glass doors, closing them quietly behind her. When she saw Amelia, her composure cracked. “I knew you’d come!” she sobbed as she threw her slight frame into Amelia’s arms.

Amelia mumbled, “Ryder. Is he…”

Nina pushed herself away and regarded Amelia with red-rimmed eyes. Her salt and pepper curls looked wilted, defeated, and her mouth was a trembling line of sorrow as she whispered, “He’s still in a coma.”

“He’ll be okay,” Amelia said with as much confidence as she could muster.

Nina bit at her lip. “The doctor says he’ll come out of it, but she doesn’t know when. You’ll stay here with him, won’t you? I already cleared it with the nurses. They say a fiancée is the same as family. I know having you by his side will make all the difference in the world.”

Gently, Amelia said, “But we’re not engaged anymore—”

“I know you were only engaged a few days before you broke it off,” Nina said, “but I also know you two will work things out.”

Amelia searched for a diplomatic way to say that she would stay out in the hall with Nina and Jack for as long as they needed or wanted her to, only please, not in Ryder’s room. She kept hearing him say that she was using his family to trap him, and she knew her presence in the room would accomplish nothing. Maybe she should tell them the truth….

But Nina opened her hand just then. Nestled in her palm, like a treasure, was the red rose boutonniere Amelia had last seen when Ryder swept it across her cheek.

“They found it in Ryder’s pocket,” Nina said, new tears filling her eyes. “Oh, dear God, I don’t know what we’ll do if we lose him, too.”

As Jack comforted his wife, Amelia stared at the bruised flower which had dropped to the floor. In some fuzzy way, it loomed like a sign of her complicity in this tragedy. If only she’d waited to tell Ryder about the baby in private, without alcohol around, how different things might now be.

She knew she would do what Nina and Jack wanted until Ryder awoke and asked her to do differently.

And inside her heart, she, too, mourned for Rob.

He opened his eyes slowly. His lips felt dry. One shaky hand touched the left side of his face. Rough gauze—a bandage?

Where am I?

The room was white, spare, clean…a hospital room. An IV dripped into his arm. The drapes were open and gray skies showed through the glass. Pain throbbed in his temples.

He’d been awake, briefly, once before. Half awake, half a man.

Questions filled his head like loud music, reverberating off the empty spaces in his skull. He felt cold beads of sweat pop out on his forehead and he groaned.

Cool hands touched his arm, and he turned to find a woman staring down at him with eyes as gray as the sky outside.

“It’s okay, Ryder,” she said softly. “You’re going to be fine.”

He licked his lips.

“Do you want a drink?”

He managed to nod. She gently held the back of his head as he took a sip of water from the glass she offered. He had seen her once before, when he woke the first time. She’d been asleep in the chair beside his bed then, her chin tilted toward her chest. With a jolt, he realized she must know him which meant he should know her.

But he didn’t. He’d never seen her before. Never.

She was quite lovely. Her skin was fine-textured and smooth, her eyes huge, her nose and mouth delicate. Honey-blond hair that looked as though she’d raked it with her hand a dozen times capped her head. She was wearing a roomy, dark blue shirt, the neck open, the sleeves rolled up…a man’s shirt that did nothing to detract from her bounding femininity. He was positive she wasn’t a nurse. He was just as positive that she wasn’t the kind of woman he would forget.

“I’m going to go find your folks,” she said.

His folks. Panic began to creep into his brain. He had no memory of parents. He swallowed his heart.

She frowned at him, biting her lip. Then she said, “Don’t worry, Ryder, I won’t come back now that you’re okay.”

He caught her hand as she turned away, managing to force out a single word. “Stay.”

Her eyes shifted uneasily, but at last she nodded. As his eyelids closed, he concentrated on the feel of her hand in his, the warmth of human flesh in a sea of bleached cotton, a link to the world that was quickly slipping away from him again.

Who was Ryder?

Amelia stood with her hand clasped in Ryder’s hand. As far as she knew, this was the first time he’d opened his eyes in three long weeks, and she was dying to call the doctor, to run out into the hall and find Jack and Nina and share the good news.

She didn’t move. There was an implied trust in her agreeing to stay and she wouldn’t break it. Nor could she force herself to release his hand. Hooking the leg of the chair with a toe, she dragged it closer and perched on the edge.

This was crazy. She needed to alert people. And she needed to prepare herself for Ryder’s true awakening when he was clear-headed enough to realize he didn’t want to rely on her of all people.

And yet she stayed. For weeks she’d been sitting by this bed, spelling Jack and Nina and Philip after he returned from his honeymoon. She’d been here when they attended Rob’s funeral and when they dragged themselves home to try to sleep. She’d been here on days when the sun shined in the window and days when the rain outside echoed the sadness inside. And all the while, she’d told herself she would vanish the second Ryder opened his eyes, that she was anxious to get on the road and set up house in Nevada, to get ready for her baby, that she was here only to help his family.

Now she realized that was only a partial truth. She was here for herself as well, for herself and for their baby. Just the night before, hoping to give Nina and Jack a ray of hope to cling to and knowing it was a miracle her condition had gone unnoticed this long, she had confided that she was carrying Ryder’s child. Her news had been met with unqualified joy.

Had she done the right thing in telling them? Should she have kept it to herself? Had she told them because she was afraid Ryder would never wake up and claim his child? And now that the worst was seemingly over and it was time for her to leave, would it break their hearts?

Well, soon Ryder would discover what she’d done and he would feel that she’d backed him into a corner, just as he’d predicted she would.

And yet, she stayed, his hand loosely wrapped around her own. His summer tan had faded at an accelerated rate in the hospital, but she could still discern the faint whitish line across his ring finger. She leaned over and kissed his hand, not realizing until her lips touched his skin what a foolish act it was.

But she had loved him once and he needed her now and he’d asked her to stay. Why?

The door creaked and she turned her head as a stranger entered the room. He was a tall man in his late forties with a graying flattop and piercing black eyes. He wore a charcoal suit over his lanky frame and black shoes that needed polishing. The smile he gave Amelia looked forced and anything but friendly. There was an unmistakable air of officialdom about him.

“May I help you?” she asked, thinking he must have entered the wrong room.

“I’m looking for Ryder T. Hogan,” he said, his voice raspy. Gesturing at Ryder like he was a slab of meat, he added, “That him?”

Unexpectedly, Amelia felt a surge of protective ardor. She positioned herself between the man and Ryder. “May I ask who you are?”

He flipped aside his jacket. Fastened to the pocket on his pants was a metal badge. “Detective Hill,” he said. “Seaport Police.”

“Ryder has been in a coma for two weeks,” she said, deciding on the spot to omit mentioning the fact that he’d been awake less than five minutes before. “Obviously, he can’t talk to you or anyone else.”

“I’m investigating the death of Robert Hogan,” he said sternly. “I have questions that need answering.”

She felt a piercing stab of fear burn its way through the lining of her stomach. She’d been waiting for this, she realized with a start. Ever since the accident, she’d been anticipating police involvement. Surely blood tests had been taken at the clinic where the brothers were taken after the accident. Surely the results of those blood tests would show that Ryder had been intoxicated.

“When he wakes up, we’ll call you,” she said. Her voice sounded shaky and her knees felt wobbly. Why didn’t he leave? She added, “If you don’t believe me, ask his doctors. They’ll tell you he’s in no shape to talk to anyone.”

“I spoke with his doctors,” he said. “I wanted to see for myself.”

“And now you’ve seen,” she said, praying that Ryder wouldn’t choose that minute to open his eyes again.

The detective looked at her closely. She had the feeling there were few secrets kept from his prying gaze and she could feel the heat suffuse her cheeks as she fought to keep hers. He finally said, “Who are you?”

“Amelia Enderling. I’m…I’m Ryder’s fiancée.”

He nodded as though he’d heard her name before. “Aren’t you more of an ex-fiancée?”

“Where did you hear that?”

Glancing at Ryder’s still face, he said, “I’ve talked to some of his friends.”

“We made up. I guess his friends don’t know about it.”

“I guess not. Well, Miss Enderling, are you aware that your boyfriend had been drinking when he took off with his brother on the night of the…accident?”

There was a telling pause before the word “accident” that sent a chill through Amelia. She bit her lip and kept silent.

“It’s common knowledge,” he added.

She squared her shoulders. Her initial mistrust of him was becoming more and more pronounced. She finally said, “If you insist on holding a conversation despite what I’ve told you, maybe we should go out in the hall.”

“Why?” he said, a smug smile lifting one corner of his mouth. “He’s in a coma, right? He can’t hear us.”

“How do you know what he can or can’t hear?” she snapped. “Just because he’s in a coma doesn’t mean he’s not aware of his environment. Numerous studies have proved—”

Hill interrupted. “It’s not you I want to talk to, it’s him.”

She remained silent.

“I’ll check back in a couple of days,” he said at last, delivering the message like a warning.

Amelia sank down on the chair as the door closed behind Detective Hill, and she looked at Ryder’s face, so recently familiar again.

What would happen to him when he discovered he was responsible for his brother’s death and that the police wanted to talk with him about it? The guilt alone would be devastating, for she earnestly believed that beneath Ryder’s selfishness was a decent core struggling to get out. And if he was convicted, there would go his life as he knew it.

It wasn’t her problem. He would neither expect or desire her involvement, but in his current vulnerable state, it was hard to feel callous. And, too, there was Nina and Jack to consider—they’d lost Rob because Ryder had been irresponsible and reckless. What would happen if they now lost Ryder to the legal system?

Rob. His death conjured so many emotions. Guilt that she’d told Ryder the big news about the baby when he had access to both liquor and a car. Anger that Ryder had survived a crash he was responsible for. More guilt for the anger because Ryder had not escaped without injury himself. And added to the mix, sadness that Rob, or at least what little she had known of him, would never be the uncle her baby needed, that she would never open the door and find him standing there with a stuffed bear in his arms.

A noise at the door cut short her painful musings. She turned, expecting another go-round with Hill. Instead, she found herself facing Jack and Nina Hogan.

“Thank goodness you’re here,” she said with relief.

Nina crossed the room quickly, pausing to pat Amelia on the shoulder. “How’s our little mother feeling?” she asked, the thrill of Amelia’s pregnancy still lighting her eyes.

“Just fine.” On the spur of the moment, Amelia decided to delay mentioning the police. Instead, she would share the good news.

Watching their faces closely, she said, “He woke up.”

Both of them stared at her as though she’d just delivered a statement in Swahili. “Ryder opened his eyes,” she elaborated. “He spoke to me!”

Nina clasped her hands together and squealed.

“What did he say?” Jack demanded.

“Not much. He seemed…confused.” At their furrowed expressions, she added, “He was only awake for a minute or two.”

“Do the doctors know?”

“I haven’t had a chance to tell anyone but you two.”

Jack nodded briskly and went back out into the hall, presumably to alert the medical staff. Nina crossed to Ryder’s other side and smoothed a lock of dark hair back from his forehead before kissing him.

Amelia looked down at her hands. It was time to leave. She had rehearsed the way she would explain her departure, but now that the time had come, her mouth felt dry and the words were gone.

Jack burst back into the room, Dr. Solomon in tow. She was a middle-aged woman with kinky gray hair and kind eyes. A pair of glasses bobbed on a chain against her ample chest. Amelia had met her on numerous occasions and liked her.

“He was conscious?” the doctor asked as she took Amelia’s place by the head of the bed.

“Yes. I gave him a sip of water.”

Dr. Solomon shined a small flashlight into Ryder’s eyes and called his name softly. Amelia was startled to see Ryder’s lids flutter open.

The doctor looked up at Jack and Nina and smiled. Then she looked back at Ryder who was gazing at her with a puzzled expression on his face. “How are you feeling, Ryder?”

He licked his lips. “My head aches,” he murmured at last.

“Understandable. You have a concussion. You’re doing fine,” she said, adding as she stepped out of the way, “there are some people here who want to see you, young man.”

Nina, all smiles, said, “Hello, darling.”

Ryder’s baffled expression deepened. Slowly, he looked from his mother to his father, who stood beaming at the end of the bed, and then to Amelia. When he saw her, he said, “You…”

Amelia heard it as an accusation. She took a step back, toward the door. She’d been expecting this, but now that it was upon her, she felt awkward and embarrassed.

He smiled at her. It was the smile she had loved first, the smile that lit his brown eyes and warmed the room. It also stopped her in her tracks. He said, “You, I know.”

“Of course—”

“You were here earlier.”

“Yes.”

He nodded, wincing slightly as though the motion caused him discomfort. His gaze traveled back to Nina and then to Jack. “I don’t know you people,” he said.

Jack chuckled. “That’s my boy, always with the jokes.”

But Nina leaned closer and stared right into her son’s eyes. Then she looked over her shoulder at her husband and said, “I don’t think Ryder is making a joke.”

The doctor said, “These are your parents. Are you saying you don’t know them?”

Licking his lips again, Ryder said, “The girl was here earlier when I woke up, but I’ve never seen any of the rest of you before in my life.”

Nina’s hands flew to cover her mouth and she gasped. The doctor said, “Do you know who you are?”

He stared hard at her. Amelia could see him trying to search his mind for answers. He finally said, “You keep calling me Ryder. I’m afraid the name doesn’t ring a bell.”

Jack’s face was as bleached as the sheets. He finally said, “You don’t know who I am, son?”

Ryder looked contrite as he murmured, “No, I’m sorry, I don’t.” He struggled to sit up a little in the bed. The doctor helped him with pillows.

“Do you remember the car accident that sent you here in the first place?” she asked gently.

Again he seemed to search his memory bank which apparently he found empty. Narrowing his eyes, his fists clenched, he finally said, “Damn it, doctor, I don’t remember a thing. Not a thing.”

“Calm down,” she cautioned. “It’s not unusual for a head injury to cause temporary amnesia.”

“Amnesia,” Jack mumbled.

Nina, her hands crossed on her chest as though trying to keep her heart in place, said, “You remember nothing about the accident, Ryder? Nothing?”

The doctor flashed her a warning glance. Nina’s gaze shifted to Amelia. Her expression seemed to say, He doesn’t remember his own brother! What now? Haven’t we been through enough?

Amelia grabbed hold of the one hopeful word and said it out loud. “Temporary?”

“Almost certainly,” the doctor said brightly. “Give him a day or two.” With another meaningful look directed at all three of them, she added, “And don’t swamp him with details of the accident, not now.”

In other words, thought Amelia, don’t tell him he was driving drunk and his brother is dead because of it.

Nina blinked a couple of tears from her eyes. “So you’re saying that in a couple of days he’ll know who we all are? He’ll be himself again?”

The doctor answered with a brisk nod. “Meanwhile, I’ll send Doctor Bass in to see you.” She patted Ryder’s knee and added, “He’s the staff psychologist. You’ll like him.”

Ryder nodded. He looked at Amelia and she realized with a jolt that to him she was a familiar face, even though that familiarity was only hours old. It left her in an odd position. Did she give him the support he was obviously looking for, or did she protect herself from the man he would be in a few days when his memory returned, when he no longer wanted anything to do with her or their baby?

Unsure, she smiled back.

Chapter Three

Still a little shaky on his feet, he crossed the room and peered into the small mirror above the sink, searching his eyes for some spark of recognition.

Nothing.

He ran a hand through his hair as he studied each of his features. Straight nose, brown eyes, chin. He opened his mouth and found the proper number of teeth, apparently without a single filling. He needed a shave.

He took a step back and stared at his whole face. The odd thing was that other than the bandage on his left cheek and a general disheveled appearance, he looked exactly as he knew he should look. He just couldn’t put a name or, more importantly, a past with himself.

He said, “Ryder. Ryder Todd Hogan. Ryder Hogan.”

The brown eyes still looked blank, but he’d heard his name said so many times over the past few hours by doctors, nurses, his parents and especially by the beautiful woman he’d found sitting by his bed, that it was beginning to sound familiar.

“My name is Ryder,” he said. But who was he? He didn’t know which foods he liked, what music he listened to, if he had a dog or a parakeet or a goldfish. He wasn’t sure where exactly he was, only that it was overcast outside and everyone spoke English. So how come he could place himself in the United States in late summer, judging by the tree foliage outside his window, near the coast if the seagulls weren’t lost, but not identify himself or his loved ones?

Obviously, it was time to ask questions and demand answers.