I don’t know.”
“Where do you come from?”
He looked around again and pointed over Petunia’s hood. Since there wasn’t a streetlight in sight, all that she could see out there was the ravine dropping off from the shoulder, and the black-on-black shadow indicating the woods beyond.
“Uh-huh.” The smell of being set up returned stronger than before. “Who are you?”
He tried to answer. She could tell by the way his facial muscles tightened and he broke out in a sweat. But in the end he simply gave her a confused look.
“Adam?”
She should have suffered whiplash from the way her skepticism switched to concern. Without thinking, she reached up to touch his bruised face. “You poor man. You don’t have a clue, do you?”
“No. Do you?”
She shook her head. “But don’t worry,” she added quickly. “We’ll find out in no time at all. First let’s get you settled in my truck, and after that I’ll go check out the ditch. Surely something’s there that will tell us what we want to know.”
If he agreed, he kept that to himself, and merely stood there looking as if whatever would come from her mouth had to be the gospel. Frankie decided it was one thing for Lambchop to take on that expression when she had to leave for work; it was another to have a grown man doing it.
With more questions than answers as to what she was dealing with, she helped him around to the passenger side of the truck. It wasn’t easy. He had to be at least six feet, maybe a bit more, and he had a sturdy build. No doubt his mother—or wife, she amended, embarrassed at how neatly she’d almost avoided that thought—had made sure he didn’t skip too many meals. At the same time, he was well toned. Taut. She tried not to let her gaze wander to places the leaves only began to cover, but who could help noticing?
Once she opened the door, she reached inside for the blanket kept behind the seat. “Here you go. This might itch a bit. It’s Maury’s and he tends to shed, but it’s all I have.”
The stranger looked over her shoulder as if waiting for someone to protest his having the covering. “I can share.”
What was she dealing with, here? Once again Frankie eyed him with suspicion. When she still saw no reason to think this was a cunning act, she wrapped the blanket around him and helped him into her vehicle.
She ripped out a few tissues from the mangled box crunched between the windshield and dashboard, to dab at the worst of the blood already beginning to dry on the side of his face. Once she got most of it, she pressed the tissues into his hand, grabbed her flashlight out of the glove compartment, and ran to look for his clothes and whatever else she might find that would indicate his identity.
She found an empty beer can, an ice-cream stick, and a number of cigarette butts, which made her grateful they’d been crushed out when discarded. She didn’t, however, find anything that would help her solve her mystery.
After prolonging her search a bit more, she returned to the idling truck and paused beside the open passenger door to consider the shivering stranger. The way he stared back at her made it clear that no matter what she asked him, she wasn’t going to be reassured by the answer.
But what a nice face—despite the ugly abrasion on his forehead, a less severe one on his cheek, and the dirt and weeds in his brown hair. He had a face that spoke of strength and frankness, centered by an Anglo-straight nose, balanced by a wide, generous mouth, and punctuated with a slightly stubborn chin.
It was his mouth that drew her attention most. With the slightest smile, he would undoubtedly steal hearts. With the grimmest frown, he would undoubtedly scare the hush puppies out of anyone. If she’d been the betting type, she would have bet tonight’s tips that this was the man everyone in school would have voted Most Likely to Succeed. Here was the guy no girl ever forgot, even if she never got lucky enough to date him. No doubt some woman somewhere was beginning to pace the floors and chew her fingernails to nubs with worry over him.
Frankie felt another pinch in the area of her heart, and in self-defense shifted her attention to the large-boned hands that clutched at the blanket. He wore no ring, which meant nothing; these days guys were professionals at hiding such minor technicalities as wives and children. But surely this man wasn’t one of those? Why else would she have such a powerful impulse to say, “Finders keepers"? He was definitely keeper material.
“I’d better get you to the hospital,” she told him, concerned that she’d let her fantasy go too—
“No!”
His sharp response stopped her from shutting the door. “Look, you’re hurt. You need medical attention.”
“You. You help me.”
As charming as this you-Jane-me-Tarzan dialogue was, it was starting to wear thin. “Listen, gorgeous, it doesn’t take a medical degree to see that this is more than a kiss-andmake-it-better situation.”
“You.”
He had no idea what he was asking of her. Shaking her head, she took the tissues from him—he hadn’t done a thing with them, anyway—and once again dabbed gently around his worst wound. “I don’t know why you’re making this difficult for me.”
“Just need to rest.” He winced, and shifted slightly away from her.
“That’s what I’m trying to tell you. At a hospital you could. And they would contact the police, who would—”
“Please.”
Frankie stopped dabbing and leaned close to look deeper into his eyes for a clue as to what was going on. In the dim overhead light the color wasn’t exactly dark like a deepwater blue, but more of a slate or stormy shade. Of course, some of that gray could be a result of the concussion or whatever it was that he was suffering from. In any case, it bothered her to be tempted to find out how they would look in the light of day, or when he was healthy. Smiling.
Stop it, Jonesy. You don’t need the trouble or the heartache.
Nevertheless, she heard herself murmur, “I guess I could take you down the road to my place. But I should warn you, it’s not fancy.”
“I only want to lie down. Get warm.”
He was cold? She’d thought he’d been shaking from the fright she’d given him, and from whatever he’d gone through that had put him in this state. After all, it was July, and it had to be at least seventy degrees or better. That more than anything else decided her.
She tossed the soiled tissues onto the floorboard, and carefully shut the passenger door. When she once again slid behind the steering wheel, she shot him a wry look.
“Maybe I’d better warn you about a few more things. I don’t live alone.”
He seemed confused for a moment, but soon inclined his head. “I won’t stay. Just… rest.”
Maybe it was wishful thinking, but she could have sworn he looked disappointed. “You misunderstand. I mean that you won’t quite have the privacy you might want, because I have pets and they, um, get around.”
“I
