most important pregnancy test. One that had changed his life. He wanted more than anything to make those thoughts stop, knowing they never led to a good place, but right now he was too tired to fight them off.
He’d once been on that pregnancy roller-coaster ride, one day ecstatic about the prospect of becoming a father. Another day further down the line getting a different lab test irrefutably stating there was no way in hell he could have gotten his wife pregnant. Any hope of becoming a father had been ripped away. The questions. The confrontations. The ugly answers that had finally torn his marriage apart.
Hell.
He needed to leave the clinic. James had been right. He should go home and get some sleep because if he didn’t he might do something he still wanted to do desperately. Give his best—strike that—ex-best friend the beating he deserved.
* * *
On the third day Joe sat in his now favorite chair at the mystery lady’s bedside, thumbing through a fitness magazine. Di Williams, the middle-aged, hard-working head of DOU, had shaken him up earlier when she’d explained Sleeping Beauty’s condition as brain trauma—or, in her case, swelling of the brain—that had disconnected the cerebral cortex circuits, kind of like a car idling but not firing up the engine. She’d also said that if she didn’t come around soon, they’d have to consider her in a coma and would need to move her to a hospital that could best meet her longer-term needs.
The thought of losing track of the woman he’d vowed to look after made his stomach knot. The doctor had also said she’d be getting transferred to a specialist coma unit later that afternoon for an enhanced CT scan that would test for blood flow and metabolic activity and they’d have to go from there, which kept Joe’s stomach feeling tangled and queasy.
Time was running out, and it seemed so unfair for the girl from the bus. What about her baby?
Jane moved and Joe went on alert. It was the first time he’d witnessed what the nurses had said she often did. He’d admitted, when no one had been around, to flicking her cheek with his finger from time to time to get some kind of reaction out of her, but nothing had ever happened. The lady definitely wasn’t faking it. She moved again, this time quicker, as though restless. A dry sound emitted from her throat. He held his breath and felt his heart pump faster as he pushed the call light for the attending nurse.
Jane Doe was waking up.
Tiny sputtering electrical fuses seemed to turn on and off inside him as his anticipation grew. He stood, leaned over the hospital bed and watched the sleeping beauty’s lids flutter. Instinctively, he turned off the overhead lamp to help decrease the shock of harsh light to her vision as her eyes slowly opened.
They were dark green. And beautiful, like her.
But they’d barely opened before they snapped shut again as her features contorted with fear.
* * *
Carey fought for her life, flailing her arms, kicking her feet. Someone wanted to hurt her. It wasn’t Ross. Not this time. She ran, but her feet wouldn’t move. She tried to scream, but the sound didn’t leave her throat. Fear like she’d never felt before consumed her, but she couldn’t give up, she had to protect herself in order to protect her baby.
Someone shouted and ran toward her. She knew he wanted to help. Broad shoulders, and legs moving in a powerful sprint. “Hey!” His voice cut through the night. That face. Strong. Determined. Filled with anger over the man trying to take her purse. She fought more. She had to break away from the smelly man’s grip.
“Hey!”
Fight. Fight. Get away.
“Hold on, everything’s okay. You’re safe.” Did she recognize the man’s voice? “I’ve got you.” Hands gripped her shoulders, kept her still. She held her breath.
More hands smoothed back her hair. “It’s okay, hon.” A woman’s voice. “Calm down. You’re in the hospital.”
Hospital? Had she heard right?
Carey shook her head. It hurt. She was hit by a wave of vertigo that made her quit squirming. She lay still, waiting for the hands to release her. It felt like she was in an extremely comfortable bed. She relaxed her tight, squinting eyes and slowly opened first one then the other. She turned her head to a shadow looming above her. It had features. The face she remembered from her dreams. Strong. Brave. Was this still a dream?
She stared at him, her breathing rapid, waiting for her eyes to adjust to the light. He was the man who’d taken on her attacker. She scanned his face. Kind brown eyes. Short dark hair. A square jaw. Good looking.
“You’re in the hospital and you’re safe,” he said in a low, comforting voice.
She looked beyond him to a gorgeous room. A hospital? It looked more like an expensive hotel with muted colors and modern furniture, chic, classy, a room she’d never been able to afford in her life. Was she still dreaming? Since she’d stopped protesting, it was quiet. Oh, and there was an IV in her arm. Being an RN herself, she recognized that right off. A catheter between her legs? And she wore a hospital gown. But this one was silky and smooth, not one of those worn-out over-starched jobs at the hospital where she worked.
Everything was so strange. Surreal. As she gathered her senses she couldn’t remember where she was other than being in a hospital. She couldn’t figure out why she’d be here. Wait. Someone had attacked her. She’d been pushed down. Oh, no! Her hand flew to her stomach, and she gasped.
“My baby!” Her voice sounded muffled and strange, as if her ears were plugged.
“Your baby’s fine,” the woman said. “So you remember you’re pregnant.”
Her hearing improved. She nodded, and it hurt, but she smiled anyway because her baby was fine.
The attractive young man smiled back at her, and the concern in his eyes was surprising. Did she know him?
“My baby’s fine,” she whispered to him, and a rush of feelings overcame her until she cried.
Then the strangest thing happened. The man that she wasn’t sure if she knew or not, the man with the kind brown eyes...his welled up, too. “Your baby’s fine.” His voice sounded raspy.
She cried softly for a few moments, his eyes misty and glistening as he gave a caring smile, and it felt so good.
“Where am I?”
“You’re in the hospital, hon,” the nearby nurse said.
“But where am I?”
“Hollywood,” he said. “You’re in California.”
She thought hard, vaguely remembering getting on a bus. Getting off a bus. It was all too much to straighten out right now. She was exhausted.
“What’s your name, honey?” The nurse continued.
“Carey Spencer.” At least she remembered her name. But she needed to rest. To close her eyes and...
“She’s out again.” The kind man’s voice sounded far, far away.
“That’s what happens sometimes with head
