Money Man's Fiancée Negotiation Read Free

think.”
    “You think? Didn’t she say?”
    “We haven’t mentioned the miscarriage. We think it would be too upsetting at this point in her recovery.”
    “So she believes she’s still pregnant?”
    “She has no idea that she was pregnant when she was in the accident.”
    Ash frowned. That made no sense. “How could she not know?”
    “I’m sorry to have to tell you, Mr. Williams, but your fiancée has amnesia.”
     
    The gripping fingers of a relentless headache squeezed Melody’s brain. A dull, insistent throb, as though a vice was being cranked tighter and tighter against her skull.
    “Time for your pain meds,” her nurse chirped, materializing at the side of the bed as though Melody had summoned her by sheer will.
    Or had she hit the call button? She honestly couldn’t remember. Things were still a bit fuzzy, but the doctor told her that was perfectly normal. She just needed time for the anesthesia to leave her system.
    The nurse held out a small plastic cup of pills and a glass of water. “Can you swallow these for me, hon?”
    Yes, she could, she thought, swallowing gingerly, the cool water feeling good on her scratchy throat. She knew how to swallow pills, and brush her teeth, and control thetelevision remote. She could use a fork and a knife and she’d had no trouble reading the gossip rags the nurse had brought for her.
    So why, she wondered, did she not recognize her own name?
    She couldn’t recall a single thing about her life, not even the auto accident that was apparently responsible for her current condition. As for her life before the accident, it was as if someone had reached inside her head and wiped her memory slate clean.
    Post-traumatic amnesia, the neurologist called it, and when she’d asked how long it would last, his answer hadn’t been encouraging.
    “The brain is a mysterious organ. One we still know so little about,” he’d told her. “Your condition could last a week, or a month. Or there’s a possibility that it could be permanent. We’ll just have to wait and see.”
    She didn’t want to wait. She wanted answers now . Everyone kept telling her how lucky she’d been. Other than the head injury, she had escaped the accident relatively unscathed. A few bumps and bruises mostly. No broken bones or serious lacerations. No permanent physical scars. However, as she flipped through the television channels, knowing she must have favorite programs but seeing only unfamiliar faces, or as she picked at the food on her meal tray, clueless as to her likes and dislikes, she didn’t feel very lucky. In fact, she felt cursed. As though God was punishing her for some horrible thing that she couldn’t even remember doing.
    The nurse checked her IV, jotted something on her chart, then told Melody, “Just buzz if you need anything.”
    Answers, Melody thought as the nurse disappeared into the hall. All she wanted was answers.
    She reached up and felt the inch-long row of stitchesabove her left ear where they had drilled a nickel-size hole to reduce the swelling on her brain, relieving the pressure that would have otherwise squeezed her damaged brain literally to death.
    They had snatched her back from the brink of death, only now she wondered what kind of life they had snatched her back to. According to the social worker who had been in to see her, Melody had no living relatives. No siblings, no children, and no record of ever having been married. If she had friends or colleagues, she had no memory of them, and not a single person had come to visit her.
    Had she always been this…alone?
    Her address was listed as San Francisco, California—wherever that was—some sixteen hundred miles from the site of the accident. It perplexed her how she could still recognize words and numbers, while photos of the city she had supposedly lived in for three years drew a complete blank. She was also curious to know what she had been doing so far from home. A vacation maybe? Was she visiting friends?