A Forever Christmas Read online

  He did it just in time. The spark had multiplied, giving birth to flames that grew instantly larger and larger, as well as more insistent. By the time he’d gotten three hundred feet between his truck and the sedan, the latter blew up.

  He sat in the cab of his truck, staring in disbelief at what very easily could have been his funeral pyre—or at the very least, hers.

  Tension riddled his six-foot-two frame, even as he closed his eyes and exhaled.

  “Guess we both just used up our share of luck for the next fifty years,” he speculated quietly, addressing his words to the unconscious blonde in the seat beside him.

  His nerves badly rattled, Gabriel took a few deep breaths to try to steady his nerves. It would take more than that, but he kept at it, knowing he needed to get a grip on his emotions. People would be asking questions and he was vaguely aware that he had to put this all down in a report.

  It started to rain again.

  Nature was putting out the fire, he thought absently, unable to look away.

  He was so completely focused on what had just happened that he remained almost totally oblivious to his surroundings for at least a couple of minutes. By the time he saw the other two vehicles, they were all but on top of him.

  The weather-battered tow truck led the way. Mick had come, just as he’d promised.

  The second vehicle was a Jeep. The official markings on its sides proclaimed it to belong to the sheriff’s department. As they approached, the Jeep suddenly picked up speed and wound up reaching him first.

  Barely coming to a complete stop, the deputy inside the vehicle jumped out. Alma hit the ground running at her top speed.

  Reaching the truck, she cried out breathlessly, “Are you all right?”

  “Yeah, I’m fine,” Gabriel told her, dismissing himself. “But she’s not.” And then his mind suddenly backtracked, remembering. His only call had been to Mick. He’d stated the problem. He had not asked for reinforcement. “What are you doing here?” he asked.

  “Having a heart attack,” Alma retorted. She nodded toward the scruffy mechanic in the worn sheepskin jacket and faded overalls.

  “Mick called the sheriff’s office as soon as he hung up with you. I picked up the call,” she added needlessly. Satisfied that her brother had no mortal wounds, she seemed to relax a little. For the first time, she took note of the woman slumped beside him on the passenger seat. “What happened to her?”

  Gabe shrugged, his wide shoulders reinforcing his answer. “Damned if I know. I was driving into town when I spotted her car.” He nodded in the general direction of the ravine. “It was tottering on the edge, two wheels in the air and set to drop like a stone at the slightest shift in weight.”

  “And she didn’t say how that happened?”

  Gabe shook his head. “She was unconscious when I got there.” His eyes shifted toward Mick. The mechanic was now standing behind Alma. With the sedan burned, there was nothing for the man to tow or fix. “Sorry I got you out here for no reason, Mick,” he apologized.

  Mick rubbed the ever-present graying stubble along his chin as he looked back at what was left of the sedan. “Oh, I dunno. Might take it back to the shop, anyway, and do me a little detective work on the remains. Figure out why it burned,” he explained, adding, “Things are a might slow right now. Could use the diversion.” He paused and peered closer into the cab of Gabe’s truck. “You don’t need a tow in or nuthin’, do you?”

  With a pleased smile, Gabe sat up and affectionately patted the dashboard. “She handled herself just like the trouper she is, Mick.”

  Mick beamed with satisfaction, like a parent whose child had remembered all his lines in the school play. “That’s ’cause she had a good mechanic,” Mick pointed out matter-of-factly. Then he nodded at the woman whose car was now a charred heap and asked, “What are you gonna do about her?”

  Alma already had her cell out. “I’ll call ahead to the doc, tell him we’ve got an emergency coming in.” She looked at her brother. “Two emergencies,” she corrected. When Gabe raised one quizzical eyebrow, she said, “Have him check out both of you.”

  “I’m fine,” Gabriel told her firmly. He absolutely hated being fussed over, especially when the person doing the fussing was a doctor.

  With a sigh, Alma shifted the cell phone to her other hand. Leaning in, she ran the tips of two of her fingers along his bare arm. Holding up “Exhibit A” for Gabe’s perusal, she said, “Not from where I’m standing. You’ve got cuts on both your arms, big brother. You’re seeing the doctor.” There was no room for argument in her tone.

  Gabe tried, anyway. “But—”

  Alma leveled a pointed, silencing look at him. “You’re seeing the doctor, Gabe,” she repeated with deadly conviction, “even if I have to beat you senseless to do it.”

  He laughed shortly. That was Alma. If sweet talk didn’t work, she instantly turned to verbal threats, which in turn bore fruit if necessary.

  “Comforting,” he cracked.

  “I wasn’t trying to be comforting,” Alma informed him crisply. “I was just trying to keep you from bleeding to death. Don’t want or need you preying on my conscience, Gabriel.”

  Gabe gave up arguing the point directly and resorted to shifting the focus of the conversation.

  “I’m more concerned about her,” Gabe said. He took out a handkerchief and wiped away some of the blood on the blonde’s forehead.

  The handkerchief fell from his fingers when he heard the woman moan.

  It was the first actual sign of life he’d gotten from her. “You’re okay,” he said to the blonde with feeling. “You’re with friends.”

  “Friends she ain’t met yet,” Mick, who’d been silent for the most part, now quipped before walking away to take a closer look at what remained of the car.

  It was still raining. Not nearly as badly as it had been earlier, but sufficiently enough to put out what there still was of the fire. Plumes of smoke twisted and turned in the air before fading off to become part of the atmosphere.

  Alma looked at Gabe uncertainly. She knew the way he thought, knew the way all her brothers thought. Each and every one of them believed he was indestructible. It was a common family failing.

  “You sure you’re okay to drive?” she pressed. “Because I could—”

  Gabe knew where this was going and quickly cut his sister off.

  “I’m okay,” he assured her, then after a beat, added in a quieter voice, “Thanks for asking.”

  For a second, Alma was speechless, then flashed her brother a tight smile. Stepping back from the truck, she told him, “I’ll drive behind you to make sure you don’t suddenly need something.”

  Gabe didn’t see himself needing anything, suddenly or otherwise, but he knew there was no point in arguing. All he could do was just restate his position. “I’m okay, but suit yourself.”

  “Thanks for your permission,” Alma said dryly, though he could tell she was doing her best to cover up her fear of losing him.

  Gabe grinned for the first time since Alma had come on the scene. “Don’t mention it.”

  Alma waved a dismissive hand at him as she walked away.

  Mick was busy hooking up his tow truck to what was left of the woman’s charred sedan and Alma was getting back into her Jeep while making the call to Dan’s office to let the doctor know that he had an emergency patient coming in. Neither one of them saw the woman in Gabe’s truck suddenly sit up as he started the vehicle again.

  “No!”

  The single word tore from her lips. There was terror in her eyes and she gave every indication that she was going to jump out of the truck’s cab—or at least try to. Surprised, Gabe quickly grabbed her by the arm with his free hand, pulling her back inside the vehicle and into her seat.

  “I wouldn’t recommend that,” he told her.

  The fear in her eyes remained. If anything, it grew even larger.

  “Who are you?” the blonde cried breathlessly. She appeared comple
tely disoriented.

  “Gabriel Rodriguez.” Since he knew the name would mean nothing to her, he added, “I’m the guy who pulled you out of your car and kept you from becoming a piece of charcoal.”

  Her expression didn’t change. It was as if his words weren’t even registering. Nonetheless, Gabe paused, giving her a minute as he waited for her response.

  But the woman said nothing.

  “Okay,” he coaxed as he continued driving toward Forever, “your turn.”

  The world, both inside the moving vehicle and outside of it, was spinning faster and faster, making it impossible for her to focus. Moreover, she couldn’t seem to manage to pull her thoughts together. Couldn’t get passed the heavy hand of fear that was all but smothering her, pushing her deep into the seat she was sitting on.

  “My turn?” she echoed. What did that mean, her turn? Her turn to do what, go where?

  “Yes, your turn,” he repeated. Then, because she looked no clearer on the concept than she had a second ago, he elaborated. “I told you my name. Now you tell me yours.”

  Her name.

  The two words echoed in her brain, encountering only emptiness.

  The silence stretched until it was a long, thin thread, leading nowhere. Finally, just before he repeated his question again, she said in a small voice, hardly above a whisper, “I can’t.”

  She was afraid, he thought. She didn’t trust him. He could accept that. Considering what she had just gone through, there was little wonder at her reaction.

  He did his best to reassure her.

  “Look, I’m a deputy sheriff,” he told her, adding, “I can protect you. You can tell me your name.”

  Suddenly very weary, she strained very, very hard, searching, waiting for something to come to her.

  Anything. A scrap.

  But nothing did.

  Not so much as a fragment, not the smallest of pieces occurred to her.

  Nothing but darkness and formless shadows.

  The terror in her sky-blue eyes grew as she turned them on him. She wet her lips before speaking. It didn’t help. The dryness went down several layers, into her very soul.

  “No, I can’t,” she repeated hoarsely.

  This job would take more patience than he’d initially thought. Patience and skill. It certainly was different from what he’d imagined.

  He owed Alma an apology, Gabe decided, for saying that being a deputy in this county was a very slow-paced, boring job.

  So much for that, he thought sarcastically.

  “We’ll protect you,” he told the woman again, but he could see that no matter how he said it, it made no difference to her. Her expression—confused, frightened—didn’t change. Obviously his assurance had no effect on her. He peeled back another layer, approaching the problem from another direction. “And why can’t you tell me your name?”

  “Because,” she began, then stopped herself. She could feel bars going up, safeguards rising out of nowhere, intended to keep this man out.

  Why?

  Was she like that with everyone, or was it just him? And was he really a good Samaritan who’d been passing by, at the right time, in the right place, just in time to “rescue” her, or was that a story he’d made up to lull her into a false sense of security?

  And why would he do that?

  Exactly who was he to her?

  More importantly, who was she to her?

  She felt suddenly hollow and incredibly empty with no clue how to remedy either.

  “Because—” Her voice broke. Taking a deep breath, she pushed on again and this time finished her sentence. “Because I don’t know who I am.” Anger and frustration echoing in her voice.

  She was kidding, right? Gabe thought. When she said nothing more, he pressed, “You’re serious? This isn’t some kind of a joke you’re playing?”

  When she made no answer, he spared her a glance, thinking to coax the answer from her, or at least search her face for a clue as to whether or not she was actually telling the truth—although, when it came to reading people, Joe Lone Wolf, the sheriff’s other deputy and coincidentally also his brother-in-law, was a lot better at that than he was.

  One glance at the blonde told Gabriel he wasn’t about to coax anything out of her, or discern anything from her expression, either.

  She was unconscious again.

  Chapter Three

  His first thought was to stop driving and just pull over to the side. But then what? It wasn’t as if he knew what to do—he didn’t. And neither, he was fairly certain, did his sister. As for the mechanic who was behind them towing in the burned remains of the woman’s sedan, if it didn’t have an engine in it, Mick had no clue what to do or not do, so he’d be less than no help in this situation, either.

  No, the best thing that he could do for this mystery woman was just to drive and get her to the doctor as fast as possible. At least Dan could cauterize her wound and patch it up. And maybe the former New York surgeon knew how to tell whether or not the blonde was telling the truth when she claimed not to know who she was.

  It began to rain heavier.

  Squaring his shoulders, Gabe pressed down on the accelerator and sped up. Having lived here all his life, he knew the terrain in and around Forever like the back of his hand. If need be, he could drive to town with his eyes shut, so the threat of more obscuring rain had absolutely no effect on him.

  But, in an odd sort of way, the woman in the passenger seat did.

  What was it like not knowing who you were?

  If this woman was actually telling the truth and not just being evasive for some reason, he imagined that it had to be pretty damn scary, not knowing your own name. When life got tough, a person was supposed to be able to rely on himself or herself. But if you didn’t even know who you were, how were you supposed to depend on yourself?

  “Who are you?” Gabe asked softly as he spared the unconscious blonde a long glance. “Is there someone somewhere worrying about you? Wondering why you didn’t come home, or call, or even…?”

  His voice trailed off as more and more questions popped up in his head. Questions that would have to go unanswered for the time being. With any luck, most of them would be addressed when the woman regained her consciousness again.

  For all he knew, there might be a missing-persons file on her waiting for them by the time he got into the office.

  “I know I’d be looking for you if you were mine,” he murmured under his breath.

  Even disheveled, with her light blond hair plastered against her face, he could see that she was beautiful. Genuinely beautiful, not one of those women whose looks came out of jars and containers and the clever application of makeup.

  He put the windshield wipers on high and drove a tad faster.

  * * *

  WITH HIS WINTER COAT thrown carelessly over his shoulders to impede the bone-freezing weather from getting to him, Dr. Dan Davenport stood outside his single-story clinic, waiting for the patient that Alma had called him about. The November chill was creeping into his bones when he finally saw the three-vehicle caravan approaching.

  Finally, he thought, moving to meet them.

  “Slow day at the clinic, Doc?” Gabe called out as he jumped out of the cab of his truck and rounded the hood, crossing over to the passenger’s side.

  “Everyone’s healthy at the same time for a change,” Dan answered.

  Which, as far as he was concerned, was a good thing. It balanced out the days when it seemed as if his waiting room was stuffed with patients from first light to way beyond the last.

  Reaching the vehicle, the doctor opened the passenger door before Gabriel had a chance to. He frowned as he peered into the truck, then looked at Gabe. “She hasn’t regained consciousness yet?”

  “No, she did,” Gabriel said. He was unaware that he had elbowed the doctor out of his way to get to the woman, but Alma noticed as she came to join them. In the background, Mick was driving on to his garage, the barbecued sedan in tow behi
nd him. “For about two, three minutes,” Gabe qualified, “and then she lost consciousness again.”

  “Did she tell you her name while she was still conscious?” Alma asked.

  Gabe backed out of the truck’s cab slowly, gently holding the woman he’d just lifted out of the seat. Earlier, when he ran carrying her in his arms, he’d been much too intent on making sure they survived to notice just how light she actually felt in his arms.

  It was as if she barely weighed anything at all.

  The trite saying “light as a feather” seemed rather appropriate in this case. Light as an unconscious feather, he added ruefully.

  “No,” Gabe said aloud, following the doctor back into the clinic. “She doesn’t know her name.”

  The answer stopped Alma in her tracks. “Doesn’t know her name?” she repeated, puzzled. “What do you mean, she doesn’t know her name?”

  “Just what I said,” Gabe told her. He didn’t turn around, but continued to follow Dan once they were inside the clinic. “She said she didn’t know her name. Looked a little panicked when she said it, too.”

  Dan led them straight to the only examination room that was attached to another small room in the rear of the building. The latter doubled as a makeshift overnight recovery room where people who Dan performed minor surgeries on stayed the night to recuperate.

  In New York, where he’d done his residency, Dan had been a very promising up-and-coming surgeon. But because of a promise he’d made to his late younger brother, also a surgeon, he’d come out to Forever to take his place. His brother had firmly believed in “giving back.” After a while, Dan began to understand what his brother had meant. And so, what was supposed to have been just a short-term mission turned into his life’s work.

  Dan was surprised to discover that he’d never felt better about himself than he had this past year.

  “You think she’s telling the truth?” Alma asked her brother skeptically. She looked down at the unconscious woman as Gabe placed her on the exam table, per Dan’s instructions.