Fortune's Mystery Woman
Autore
Allison Leigh
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Capitoli
16
Chapter One
The car.
It was the car.
Late-model sedan. Four doors. Charcoal gray.
The sun reflected blindingly off the windshield, preventing her from seeing who was behind the wheel, but it didn’t matter. The car was steadily approaching. Coming her way.
Nausea clawed up Hope’s throat, and sweat suddenly beaded on her lip despite the sharply cool January day. She nearly slipped when the forward momentum of her fake-leather boots stalled, and she wrapped her arms tighter around the carrier strapped against her front.
Protect the baby!
The words screamed through her head as she shrank back against the solid building next to her. As soon as her shoulder felt the contact, she whirled. The back of her winter jacket crinkled and caught against the rough brick as she rolled around to escape. Heart hammering in her chest, the recessed doorway right behind her felt like a godsend, and she ducked into it, not daring even a single glance back as she yanked at the glass-fronted door.
The jingle of bells above her head were an assault on her heightened senses despite the merry little tone of them. She started forward, but something from behind tightened around her throat.
Choking.
She gasped, taking another step, frantic to escape, but it tightened even more. She squeezed her eyes shut.
Protect the baby!
“Hold on there, hon. Your scarf’s caught in the door.”
She hardly heard the words over the racket of her heartbeat.
“There you go.” The constriction around her throat abruptly eased, and a smiling middle-aged face swam into her vision. “That wind out there is crazy today, isn’t it? Just blew the door shut right on you. Saw that right away.” The woman was tugging her hood off her own head as she peered at the bundle strapped against the front of Hope’s coat. “What a darling girl,” she cooed. “My youngest granddaughter just had her first birthday. She was a Christmas baby. Bet you’re not quite that old yet, are you, ladybug?” She laughed delightedly at the animated leg kicks her comment seemed to earn, and wiggled Evie’s fuzzy-lined boot for half a second before she turned her smile to Hope’s face.
The nausea was starting to fade, but Hope felt as breathless as if she’d run a marathon.
Not that she could remember ever running a marathon. It was just one detail among hundreds of others—like her own name—that Hope hadn’t been able to recall for the last six months.
She cradled Evie’s comforting weight against her but couldn’t keep from looking over her shoulder back through the windows of the door.
The rear end of the dark gray car was just rolling past.
Her mouth dried all over again, even though the vehicle kept traveling, innocuously moving through the intersection.
When it had gone far enough that she couldn’t see it anymore, her breath silently eased out between her clenched teeth.
She turned again and realized the lady was still looking at her, the smiling question in her eyes shaded by more than a little concern at Hope’s behavior.
“I, uh, I thought I saw someone I knew,” she said with too much cheer that didn’t seem to fool the woman at all. “Time flies really fast, doesn’t it?” she added quickly. “Evie’s eight months now.”
At the sound of her name, her daughter garbled nonsensically and kicked the little fuzzy boots that had been under the tree on Christmas morning just two weeks ago.
Another gift from Ridge.
He’d given Evie so many things.
Hope, too.
The knowledge was like a little weight inside. Comforting yet very, very disturbing.
At least the woman stopped eyeing her as if she suspected Hope was someone who needed eyeing. “It does go fast. Enjoy every minute of it,” she said. Then she caught the little starfish hand that Evie had extended and laughed lightly. “Even more so when you get to my age.” She wrinkled her nose, still smiling engagingly. “You realize it’s all gone by in the blink of an eye.”
“Hi, Miranda.” A slender brunette carrying a stack of hardback books appeared nearby, prompting Hope to take proper stock of her surroundings.
A bookstore. Cozy. Slightly crowded. Entirely charming.
Her breath evened out a little more.
“I thought I heard your voice.” The brunette was speaking to Miranda. “I’ve got your special order in the back.” Her bright smile took in Hope and Evie. “Are you here for our story hour?” She tilted her head toward the back of the shop. “They’re just getting started, and we always have room, particularly for new faces. I’m Remi, by the way. Are you new in town? Visiting someone for the holidays?”
Panic had driven Hope inside the shop, not the lure of story hour. In all the months since she’d inexplicably found herself in Chatelaine, Texas, she’d only ventured into the town proper a handful of times. She started to shake her head. “I, um—”
“You should join them,” the woman—Miranda—encouraged. “Nothing like forgetting yourselves in a good story hour. Remi here has amazing taste in books, whether for children or old ladies like me.” She winked. “Books. Always good for what ails you.”
“Truer words,” Remi quipped with a smile, “but old ladies?” She rolled her eyes, giving Hope a conspiratorial grin. “We should all have the energy of Miranda Tibbs.” She maneuvered the stack of books in her arms and extended her hand toward Hope. “I’m Remi Fortune.”
Fortune.
Undoubtedly another relation of Ridge. He was almost as new to the Chatelaine area as Hope—and in addition to his siblings who’d also recently relocated there—the whole region seemed riddled with members of the extensive Fortune family.
All of whom had been nothing but kind to her and Evie.
“Hope,” she returned, quickly shaking Remi’s hand before resuming her usual position of cradling Evie against her. She didn’t give her last name. How could she? It wasn’t the first time she’d felt a moment of awkwardness from that telltale omission. One would have thought she’d have learned how to deal with it by now. “I, um, we can’t stay. I’m supposed to be meeting someone at the Daily Grind.”
“Maybe next time, then,” Remi said easily. “We have story hour every Wednesday at ten. Mondays, too.”
“Thanks.” Now that she’d mentioned the coffee shop, she felt inordinately anxious to leave, so she backed up again to the front door, pushing it open with her weight. “It was nice meeting you.”
“You, too, Hope.”
The two women continued smiling at her as she went through the doorway, and if there was speculation in their eyes, Hope pretended not to see it.
Once outside, she turned again into the stiff breeze, pressing her lips against her daughter’s silky hair before tugging the hood of Evie’s tiny jacket in place. Looking over her shoulder, she searched the street for a glimpse of the dark gray sedan.
From what she could tell, traffic in downtown Chatelaine was never all that heavy and this Wednesday was no exception. Which is probably why it had been so easy to see that car.
Why had she thought she recognized it?
There was nothing special about a dark gray car. There was one right now, in fact, parked not far ahead of her in front of the feed store, and it wasn’t filling her with the screaming meemies. It didn’t have to mean there were people in town again asking questions about a young woman and baby...
So what was it about that other sedan?
She’d known it was the car. The one that Ridge’s brother Nash had talked about seeing only a few months ago.
She pressed her fingers against the pinpoint of pain behind her right eyebrow. It was coming more frequently lately. Ever since she’d started getting flashes of memories.
If they were memories.
For all she knew, she was just losing her mind.
She blinked against the tears that threatened and ducked her head against the cold wind.
Focus. Just focus on one thing.
How many times had Ridge said those words to her?
Take a breath and let everything else go.
He could have been standing right there next to her, saying the words in his low, deep voice.
She took a deep breath, inhaling the presence of her daughter. “We’re going to be fine, Evie,” she murmured against the baby’s slick hood. “Ridge—”
Her throat closed.
He was their rescuer. Their safe harbor. She’d known it from the moment her blurred vision had cleared on his face six months ago when she’d woken up in his stables one night with no memory of how she—or the baby who’d been crying in her arms—had gotten there.
Nothing in the time since had convinced her otherwise.
He was wonderful. Perfect. Handsome. Gentle. Kind. He never lost his temper. Or raised his voice. Evie loved him and so did—
She gave a sharp shake of her head, focused on the cracked cement sidewalk under her boots and started down the street again. They were already ten minutes late, but she knew that Ridge would just blame that on their appointment with the pediatrician’s office.
Evie started fussing, and Hope quickened her pace, looking up and down the now-empty street before jaywalking across it, angling toward the bunch of vehicles parked diagonally in front of the Daily Grind.
She was jiggling the baby to no avail as she went inside, following in the wake of a wizened old gentleman wearing a cowboy hat big enough to house a family of squirrels. Her gaze immediately settled on the tall man leaning against the far side of the counter.
He’d been watching for her, too, and his smile was slow and slightly tilted as he straightened.
She kept herself from skipping—jogging...okay, racing—to him with an effort and tried not to fall into a pathetic heap when his focus went from her face to Evie.
“What’s the matter, baby?” Ridge’s eyes were as brown and delicious as a shiny dollop of dark, melted chocolate.
Predictably, Hope’s mouth seemed to water and feel dry all at the same time, and only several months’ worth of practice kept her from visibly reacting when his hands brushed against her as he deftly undid the fasteners of the carrier before lifting Evie out of it.
He swung the baby above his face and tilted her until her nose touched his. “What’re you sounding so cranky about, Little Miss?”
As soon as he’d lifted her, Evie’s fussing had magically stopped, and now her little hands closed in his brown hair—just as glossy as his eyes—and she yanked enthusiastically. “Ba-be-ba-ba!” Her fuzzy boots frog-kicked so hard that one of them flew off.
Hope laughed and caught it before it could land in someone’s coffee.
And right then and there, the entire charcoal gray car reaction became a thing of the past.
Ridge was laughing, too, and he deftly twirled Evie in his arms until she was cradled high against his chest. “You’re gonna roast in that thing,” he told the baby, tugging off her little puffy purple coat to reveal the red T-shirt with Mommy’s Bestie printed on the front. He tugged the hem of the shirt down over the slight pudge of her tummy and the stretchy denim leggings. Only after he’d dealt with Evie did his gaze finally focus on Hope. “How was the doc?”
“Fine.” She took the coat from him before working the boot back onto Evie’s stocking-clad foot. It wasn’t easy with the way she curled her toes. “She’s grown an entire inch since her six-month checkup.” Not that this was a surprise to either one of them, given the rate Evie had been growing out of her clothes.
“And the cough?”
The cough Evie’s developed in the last few days was the reason for the appointment in the first place. “Dr. Monahan said she’d prescribe something if it doesn’t clear up on its own, but she doesn’t have an infection or anything.” Hope patted her daughter’s padded rump, and when her fingertips brushed accidentally against Ridge’s forearm, she curled her fingers as tightly as Evie’s toes. “Have you ordered?”
He shook his head, and she made a point of looking at the laminated coffee menu lying on the counter. He stood close enough that she felt surrounded by the warm scent of him. Soap. Fresh air. Him. “She said to call again if it worsens or starts affecting her eating and sleeping.”
“Hear that?” Ridge was addressing Evie. “No more waking up at three in the morning, or it’s back to the doctor for you.”
“Ba-ba-ba!” The baby’s blue eyes were adoring as she hung her head back, arching herself over Ridge’s arm and clasping her hands together.
The empty carrier sagged from Hope’s torso, and she unconsciously rotated her shoulders. Ridge was a foot taller than she was. Evie’s height was no burden at all to him. “Did you get your business finished okay?” Ridge had also had an appointment in town that morning, which is why he’d said they’d meet up in the Daily Grind after.
“For now.” He didn’t elaborate. Not that Hope expected him to.
Yes, they had fallen into a certain familial-like routine since he’d found her unconscious last summer. But Hope wouldn’t make the mistake of forgetting that they were not a family.
Evie had a father. He’d been Hope’s husband. She was almost certain of that now, and Ridge was perfectly aware of that fact, too, since he’d been present when she’d remembered that she used to wear a wedding ring. She’d also remembered her husband’s funeral. Or at least she thought she’d remembered it.
Her memories were so disjointed, she was afraid to trust anything as real. What if she was confusing real facts of the past with the jumbled dreams...nightmares...that plagued her?
Why didn’t she feel grief? Was there something more wrong with her? Was her mind coming up with a horribly convenient way to justify the life she was living now?
Until she could trust her own mind, there was no hope of going back.
Nor any hope of moving forward.
Certainly not with Ridge.
Because as much as he adored her daughter—and everyone, including his mother and his five brothers and sisters, freely acknowledged that this was so—he’d never once crossed the line where Hope was concerned.
He’d held her when she’d needed comfort.
Wiped her tears when they’d needed wiping.
But he’d never kissed her.
Not even close.
She wasn’t sure what she would do if he ever tried.
And what sort of woman did that make her?
“Decide what you want?”
She jerked slightly, looking up from the laminated menu that was clenched between her fingers. She hadn’t even realized that she’d picked it up or that she’d shoved Evie’s coat into the already strained-at-the-seams diaper bag.
Her throat felt tight, and she shrugged, forcing a smile that she didn’t feel. “I can’t. There’re too many choices.” She knew the Daily Grind had the best coffee in the county, but in her heart of hearts, she was a tea girl.
He plucked the menu from her fingers. “Close your eyes.”
She obediently closed her eyes.
“Now stick out your finger and point.”
She pointed, feeling the slick menu against her fingertip.
“Mocha latte,” he gave the order as she opened her eyes and saw that what she’d really pinned the finger on was espresso. Only he’d known better. “Americano with two extra shots for me,” he added.
The coffee shop was busy, and it was obvious it would take a few minutes for their order to be prepared, so Hope headed to one of the few empty tables while they waited. She pulled off the carrier and looped it and the fraying strap of her pink-and-white-gingham diaper bag over the back of her chair before sitting down and peeling off her own coat.
Ridge had offered more than once to get her a larger, sturdier diaper bag, but she kept refusing. If it wasn’t for the name Evie embroidered in minty green on the flap of the bag, she wouldn’t even know the name of her own daughter.
Her eyes prickled, and she turned to stare out the side window. By the time Ridge joined her at the table, managing both Evie and a paper plate nearly too small for the large chocolate croissant it held, she’d banished the tears once more.
He set the croissant in the middle of the table beyond Evie’s reach and tossed down a bundle of napkins he’d pulled from the pocket of his leather jacket.
Despite herself, Hope’s mouth watered, and she immediately reached out to break off a corner of the warm, flaky pastry and popped it in her mouth.
The croissant was buttery. The chocolate was rich and slightly bittersweet. The combination was addictive. She reached again and her fingers knocked into Ridge’s.
“Sorry,” she mumbled and snatched her hand back, twisting her fingers together in a knot atop the table. Her skin hummed, feeling warm from the steady look he gave her.
“You seem antsy.”
The observation didn’t help her nerves. “Not at all.” The lie was obvious even to her.
He shifted Evie on his lap and reached forward, settling his palm over Hope’s white knuckles and pressing slightly to keep them in place when she automatically tried to withdraw. The gleam of his gold watch peeked from beneath the edge of his leather sleeve.
He was Rolex watches and designer duds, whereas she was homemade diaper bags and discounts. No matter what she remembered or didn’t remember, she needed to keep that in mind.
Ridge Fortune was in a class all his own.
“Did you have another memory?”
Her throat felt tight, and there was no scarf caught in a closed door to blame this time. “No.”
“But...?”
She shifted in her seat. “It’s nothing.” She didn’t want to tell him about the car. About her illogical fear of it. But when he looked at her the way he was now, she knew from experience that she had no willpower whatsoever.
“Hope—”
“Order up for Ridge.” The call came from the clerk at the counter.
Ridge’s lips tightened slightly.
“I’ll get it,” she said in a rush and slid out of her seat.
Saved by the coffee.
