Rude Awakening Read Free Page A

door and reached inside to a shelf, tugging a blanket free and handing it to her.
    She let go of his hand and accepted the tartan fleece, wrapping it about her shoulders quickly, as though finally recognising her naked state. Her whole body shook, her teeth chattered, and her eyes appeared large in her tiny, pixie-chinned face. Where on earth had she come from? What life had she led that made her look half-starved and frightened? And what the hell was she doing outside in a snowstorm?
    Those questions and more fizzed on his tongue, but he refrained from asking them just yet. Bombarding her too soon might see her taking flight again, and until he could hand her over to someone who cared for her, he’d keep his probing to a minimum.
    “Come this way,” he said, cursing himself for sounding the toff people thought him to be. “To the kitchen.”
    He walked across the foyer to a door beside that of the living room and pushed inside. He flicked on the light and held the door open for her, guiding her across the room, as she shivered on shaking legs, to one of the pine chairs around the matching table.
    “So there is no one I can call?” he asked again, gently, pouring still-hot coffee from his percolator and adding four spoons of sugar in case she was in shock. He’d heard sugar was good for that. Whether it was true or not remained to be seen.
    “No,” she whispered, accepting the mug in both hands, taking a healthy gulp and wincing.
    “I see.” He pulled out a chair opposite and sat, watching her for signs of distress. “Your name then?”
    “I…I don’t remember.”
    She took another sip, her body shaking less, though it still gave a violent jerk now and then.
    “You don’t remember?”
    As she shook her head and turned away from him to stare at his back door, he wondered if she was getting ready to bolt. If she did, there wasn’t much he could do about it, short of holding her prisoner while he called the police then let them deal with her.
    “Hmm,” he said, his need to fill the silence strong. “Do you know why you were outside with no coat on?”
    “No,” she said, sipping, still staring outside.
    “Are you happy to stay here until the morning? Until we can figure out what to do? I doubt an ambulance or the police—”
    “No!” she said, snapping her head to face him. “Don’t call anyone. No one at all. I’ll be all right. If I can just stay here until…until I know who I am, then I can go back home.”
    How long would that take? He wasn’t versed in the medical field, but he knew amnesia could sometimes last years. At some point she would have to leave, he’d have to let the authorities take care of her, but despite her having no apparent recollection of who she was, he skated on thin ice with regards to keeping her here. As a lawyer, he knew if she was aware of who she was, she might not want to stay here at all, and if he allowed her to stay when she wasn’t sure of her own mind, he could be in a heap of trouble.
    Monday. She can stay until Monday.
    “All right,” he said, scraping his chair back and wincing at the harsh sound it made on the slate floor tiles. “We’ll leave it over the weekend, but only on the condition that as soon as you remember who you are, you must tell me. People could be worried about you.” He decided to push it a little more. “And considering your…appearance, it doesn’t look like you’ve been eating too well recently.”
    She let a small smile touch her lips and drank more coffee, gaze straying back to the door.
    “Do you want to leave?” he asked, giving her the option despite his instincts shouting that she couldn’t walk back out there tonight.
    “No,” she said. “No.”
    “Are you looking at the door for any specific reason?”
    “Yes. Wondering if it’s locked.”
    “Yes, it’s locked. It’s night-time and I live in the middle of nowhere, so it needs to be lock—”
    “Good.” She nodded. “Good.”
    She relaxed, her shoulders