will remember, Mother. You’ll have to wait a little longer to be a mother-in-law. Desiree lost a lot of blood.’ The man’s voice was gentle, as if he found the whole scenario disturbing, and there was something about his compassionate tone that cut through the airiness in her brain and grounded her again.
She opened her eyes reluctantly. The owner of the voice was tall and dark-haired with kind eyes. She registered that his eyes were as blue as his mother’s and there was something reassuringly familiar about his strong face.
The brightness of his doctor’s white coat made her blink.
Stewart Kramer stared intently at the ghostly pale woman lying back on the pillows. It was a miracle she had lived, he thought. Dark smudges lay under her eyes and her bruised cheek was swollen and purple from the accident.
She confused him. Desiree didn’t have that flashy racehorse quality about her that had consistently seemed Sean’s type and her obviously fierce will would not have sat comfortably with Sean’s need to dominate.
This woman had curves in abundance and her dark waves of hair lay softly against her cheek. Maybe Sean had acquired a more genuine taste in women because there was a lot about Desiree that made Stewart think more of wholesome warmth and strength of character than fashion magazines and the fast lane.
Desiree’s grey eyes glistened with tears but she blinked them away as he watched her grapple with her situation. Inexplicably Stewart had to fight against the urge to scoop her up and cradle her head on his shoulder.
No doubt the urge would be to do with the horror of when he’d first seen her surrounded by those who had died and the gritty hold she’d maintained on her life despite her massive blood loss.
Desiree eased higher in the bed and closed her eyes briefly, and Stewart presumed she felt light-headed.
‘You seem vaguely familiar,’ she said in a soft voice. ‘Maybe you know the answers to some of my questions?’
Stewart tried to imagine what it would feel like to wake up after such an event.
His mother, with her illness, lived in confusion every day to some degree, and he thanked God for her unfailing good humour. He didn’t fancy the idea for himself. ‘I’ll try, but I’m a paediatrician here, not your doctor.’
She looked at him with those big silver-grey eyes, eyes shadowed with pain and bewilderment, and a sudden twist of jealous rage against his careless brother stunned him with the raw emotion. It wasn’t Sean’s fault the train had crashed so his sentiment didn’t make sense.
It was just that she seemed so different to what he’d imagined Sean’s wife would be like. Sean had never cared for real people. What the hell had she been doing with Sean? He wanted to throttle the truth out of his brother but it was too late now. So too was being unexpectedly affected by meeting Desiree.
He ground his teeth and forced the useless emotions back into a deep cave in his chest and sealed the door. When he spoke his voice sounded coldly clinical, even to his own ears. ‘You have amnesia, probably retrograde, involving memory from the time prior to the blow to your head.’
‘When will I remember?’ Her voice shook, and with compunction he reached out and covered her fingers. Her hand was soft and defenceless under his.
‘In the accident you were knocked unconscious for a short time. Goodness knows what you hit on impact. With the swelling near your brain your memory could take hours to return or even months.’
She watched him as if he had all the answers and Stewart felt inadequate for the first time in a very long time.
‘Will my memory definitely come back?’ she asked, and he felt the weight of her need as if it were his obligation to make her world right.
That was the rub. ‘In the majority of amnesia cases, most of the patient’s memory does come back in time.’
‘So reassuring,’ she murmured ironically, and turned her head away from him on the pillow. Strangely, she left her fingers curled safe in his, though. Stewart found himself absurdly touched by her trust.
He left the silence between them and it built until she turned back to face him. There was resolution on her face that he could only admire and the urge to comfort her returned with force. What was it about this woman that made it so easy to read her thoughts? What was it about her that made him want to read them? The concept elbowed for room in his own crowded mind.
She cleared her throat. ‘So you can tell me anything you like and I have to believe you until my memory returns?’ she said.
He had to applaud her dry sense of humour because he doubted he’d be up to jokes in Desiree’s position.
He glanced at Leanore and his mother stared vaguely out the window, sidetracked in confusion caused by her tumour. He did it for Leanore every day.
At least he was practised at orientating lost people. ‘So it appears. You will just have to sue me for any incorrect answers.’
Desiree had no choice but to trust him for the moment. She steeled herself for the question she dreaded the answer to. ‘Who is Desiree?’
Obviously this was not the question he’d expected, by the lift of his dark brows. Well, it was the one she needed an answer to the most, and she held her breath as she waited.
‘You.’ He’d said it gently but the answer still slammed into her. ‘Your name is Desiree Kramer.’ She winced as she exhaled.
She’d been afraid of that. Desiree Kramer? No bells rang, no recognition sparked. So it was true. She couldn’t even remember her own name.
He enunciated slowly, as if she were a slow learner. ‘Desiree Kramer, lately of Queensland, and newly arrived in Sydney.’
Desiree screwed her nose up and shook her head. ‘And you are sure my name is Desiree? Not something simpler or plainer?’
‘Desiree, I’m afraid, but we could call you anything you like if that would make you more comfortable.’
‘Don’t patronise me.’ She sighed and accepted what she had been afraid of. It was incredibly hard, not having a past to call on.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘That was not my intention.’
She gathered her frayed composure around her. ‘I’m sorry for snapping. Do I know you?’ Her voice had wearied, and she’d closed her eyes again.
‘I’m your brother-in-law. Stewart Kramer.’
Startled, her eyes flew open. ‘I have a sister?’ She didn’t remember that!
‘You married my brother. I don’t know your family.’
She shook her head at this new information and her whole body stiffened in the bed. No way. ‘I’m not married.’
‘No.’ Stewart agreed. ‘You are a widow with a twelve-month-old child.’
She barely heard his second pronouncement because the first one had blown her away. ‘I mean,’ Desiree enunciated slowly and clearly, ‘I have never been married.’
