by Linda Kage
Tess’s shoulders slumped with relief. She’d tensed up so much in the last couple of minutes, it physically hurt to watch Jonah go through this. Every muscle in her body ached for relief.
Her misery had to be nothing compared to his, though. Not only was it physical torture for him, but she could see it breaking down his emotions and pounding his morale into submission as well.
She was so ready for everyone else to leave so she could pamper him for a while, until he smiled up at her with that smile of his she so adored.
But as the two nurses helped him lie back on his bed, the expression on his face devastated her. He looked hopeless. Beaten. What if she couldn’t make him smile?
Frenchie bent slightly to speak confidentially into Jonah’s ear, and the entire time Jonah lay unnaturally still without responding. She glanced away and concentrated on breathing through her nose, but her sympathy kept rising up in her, wanting to consume her.
When she turned back, she caught the therapist watching her. He cast her a weary half-smile before he patted Jonah’s shoulder and told him he’d be back Friday so they could try again. Then he strolled from the room.
Once Jonah and Tess were alone, she hurried to his side. But he closed his eyes and turned his head aside, away from her.
“I’m kind of tired,” he said, his voice so low he rasped the words. “I think I’ll take a nap.”
“Okay. That sounds like a good idea.” She touched his hair, but he only flinched from her fingers.
Dropping her hand, she watched him rest his hand by his head and breathe slowly. She knew he was still awake, but he refused to open his eyes.
Knowing he didn’t want her there, she gave up and trudged reluctantly from the room.
She didn’t collapse until she pushed open a door and found herself in an empty, quiet stairwell. Then she pressed her back to a wall, slid to the ground, and hugged her legs so she could sob into her knees.
After a good five minutes of tears, she’d calmed herself enough to dig her phone from her purse and send Bailey an SOS text.
Thirty seconds later, her friend responded, calling her phone directly. “What’s wrong? Are you okay? Who do I have to kill?”
“I…I’m okay. But can you come to the hospital and pick me up?”
Bailey was quiet a second. “If you’re at the hospital, why don’t you have my car already?”
Tess sniffed back a stray tear. “You made it sound like you didn’t want me to use it anymore, so I took a bus here.”
“Christ, Tessie, you know my car is your car. But, yeah, sure. Give me a couple minutes to sneak back into class, grab my things, and ditch. Then I’ll be right there.”
“Good. I need you.” Closing her eyes, she blew out a relieved breath. She could always count on Bailey.
Chapter Eleven
“I’M SORRY YOU HAD to ditch class for me.”
Bailey sighed as she turned down the street leading to Grammar Hall. “Ditching class for you is the least of my worries. Why the hell were you ditching class?”
Tess didn’t answer. She already knew Bailey had figured out the truth. God, why hadn’t she listened to her best friend’s advice the first night she’d met Jonah? Why hadn’t she just come clean and told him everything? Maybe she wouldn’t have grown so close to him. Maybe she wouldn’t have stuck around to see his absolute heartbreak today. And maybe she wouldn’t feel like she was being ripped in two right now.
Sniffing as more tears flooded her cheeks, she tried to wipe them away with the back of her hand. But they just kept falling.
“Jesus,” Bailey muttered, reaching past her to open the glove compartment. She yanked out a handful of fast-food restaurant napkins and thrust them at Tess. “Here. Take care of yourself. I can’t—” She blew a breath and shook her head. “I can’t handle seeing you this upset.”
“Thank you.” Tess had her face dry by the time Bailey parked.
After killing the engine, Bailey didn’t move except to rest her hands on the steering wheel and clutch it with a white-knuckled grip. “You have to stop this, you know.” Her voice was low and void of her usual sarcasm. “This guy has made you cry more than once, Tess. He’s not—”
“Jonah has never made me cry. It’s the situation he’s in that’s heartbreaking. I’m crying for him, not because of him.”
“I don’t care,” Bailey muttered, shaking her head adamantly. “My best friend does not cry this much. She smiles and laughs and always finds the good in life. She’s optimistic, happy, and blissfully carefree.”
Yeah, well, lately, Tess’s world had been filled with fear and heartbreak. Ever since the shooting, finding something to smile about had become a lot more difficult.
“That’s it.” Bailey ripped her keys from the ignition and shoved open the driver’s side door. “Come with me.”
As she marched toward their dormitory, Tess scurried to follow. Her friend stormed all the way into the building and up the stairs, and then down the hall toward their room. Once they were inside, Bailey grabbed her arm and tugged her through the bathroom and into Paige’s room.
“I’m calling an intervention,” she announced loudly as soon as she stepped inside without knocking. “Right now.”
Tess jerked to a halt when she glanced around Bailey’s shoulder and caught sight of Paige and Logan on the bed, curled up together where they’d obviously been making out. Poor Paige’s lips were swollen, and Logan’s face was flushed. Tess tried to retreat, but her bestie yanked her forward again.
Catching the apprehension in her gaze, Bailey rolled her eyes and hooked her thumb toward the door. “But hot guy’s got to go first.”
Paige immediately scowled, pushing upright into a sitting position even as she straightened her shirt. “Hey, don’t tell him to—”
“It’s fine,” Logan cut in, setting his hand on Paige’s arm. “I don’t do girl talk all that well, anyway. And they obviously need to…girl talk.” Kissing her check, he rose to his feet, saluted to Bailey, sent Tess a sympathetic glance, and turned toward the exit.
As soon as the door shut behind him, Bailey lit in. “Jeez Louise, did the doctor sew you to him when he got his bullet hole patched back together? I haven’t seen you guys apart since the shooting.”
Paige flinched at the word shooting. “Hey, we’re no more attached than…than you and Tess are.”
Bailey made a face as if she was going to argue, but then she shrugged. “Touché.”
Scowling with irritation at Bailey, Paige tried to smooth out her tousled hair. “So, what’s up?”
Or maybe it was sexual frustration clouding Paige’s face. Tess totally understood that excited yet unsatisfied gleam in her suitemate’s eyes. She’d been experiencing some of the same sensation herself lately, pretty much every time an interrupting nurse walked into Jonah’s hospital room.
“Tessie’s lost her damn mind, that’s what’s up.” Without grace, Bailey flopped onto Mariah’s abandoned, stripped mattress to sling and arm over her head. “I don’t know what to do for her.”
When Paige lifted her eyebrows and glanced at Tess, Tess hugged her waist and cowered in the bathroom doorway, the situation making her extremely uncomfortable.
“She’s overreacting,” she said. The changes to Paige’s room didn’t help ease her anxiety either. Without her old roommate’s large screen TV, microwave, or cluttered bedding and clothes, the room looked stark and lonely, adding to Tess’s discomfort, reminding her how much the world had recently changed.
“Am not,” Bailey shot back. Pointing to Tess, she spoke to Paige. “Just look at her eyes. Can you even imagine how long she had to cry to get them that red and swollen?”
Sympathy filled Paige’s face as she finally scooted off her bed and went to Tess. “What happened?” she asked, enfolding Tess into a sisterly hug.
Bailey might be her best friend on earth and Tess would always choose her over their suitemate, but Bailey wasn’t exactly the touchy, huggy type. Tess latc
hed onto Paige’s hug and started weeping all over again into her shoulder.
“Oh, for the love of God,” Bailey exploded, letting Tess hear the underlying panic in her voice. “Here we go again. Just make it stop, Paige. Make her happy again. Tess is not meant to be this miserable.”
Paige Zukowski truly had a talent for cheering people up. Not five minutes after Tess and Bailey had invaded her room, she’d led Tess to her bed, set her down, and had her spill everything. Well, maybe not everything. Tess kind of excluded exactly how close she and Jonah had grown. She’d probably go to Best Friend Hell for that one, but she just couldn’t kiss and tell. Those stolen moments with him had meant everything. Bailey would only try to morph it into something bad and wrong. And it hadn’t been.
It just couldn’t have been.
“So, Tess tells some guy no one knows, even himself, that she’s his girlfriend to make him feel a little better while he’s in the hospital and she grows a little too close him,” Paige said, summing up the past week in one sentence. Glancing at Bailey, she asked, “But what I’m confused about is why you’re so worried about this?”
Bailey’s mouth fell open. She jabbed her pointer finger toward Tess. “Because!” she exploded. “The guy has amnesia. He doesn’t even know who he is. How could she get to know him at a time like this to know for sure whether or not he’s worthy of her? And let’s not forget that the entire foundation of their relationship is a big fat lie. He’s going to get his memory back someday, and then what?”
Paige smiled patiently. “Well, I’m sure Tess has already thought that scenario through and has a plan to explain the truth to him.” She glanced to the topic of their conversation. “Right?”
Tess bit her lip, feeling a little sick to her stomach. “Um…”
“See.” Bailey popped to her feet and began to pace the room. “She’s got nothing. She’s going into this totally blind, and she’s going to end up hurt. And I just can’t allow that.”
“Then I guess we’ll have to help her come up with a reasonable explanation to give him whenever she feels it’s time.”
“But there is no reasonable explanation except that her ridiculous stupid gene comes out every time she’s in the presence of a hottie. And I’m not just calling her names; I know for a fact how this evil gene affects her. It’s like Tess’s very own scientifically proven disease. But how exactly do you explain it to a clueless guy?”
“Actually.” Tess blushed furiously when Paige and Bailey glanced at her. “He already knows about my stupid gene. I mean—” she flailed a nervous hand “—I told him about how I blurt out crazy things in the presence of men who attract me.”
“You did?” Bailey blinked and blindly sat down on Paige’s bed next to them. “How the hell were you able to confess a thing like that?”
“It was kind of in the middle of one of my stupid-gene, blurt-it-all-out moments. But surprisingly, after that, I felt a lot better and could actually relax around him and, you know, be myself.”
“Holy shit.” Covering her mouth with her hand, Bailey gaped badly until she dropped her fingers and let out a huge grin. “That’s it,” she said with finality. “He’s never allowed to get his memory back again. This guy is good for you. I can’t believe you…you mean, you can seriously be yourself with him? One hundred percent Tess?”
Tess bobbed her head, grinning big time, her chest swelling with joy as Bailey grinned back.
“Oh, my God,” Bailey wailed, wiping away a mock tear…or maybe it was real. “My baby’s got her first boyfriend. I’m so proud.” Then she threw open her arms and hugged Tess hard.
Tess was so startled by the enveloping squeeze, it took her a moment to hug her best friend back. Before she knew it, they were laughing and hugging each other some more, swaying back and forth over the momentous occasion.
Until Paige discretely cleared her throat. “Um, not to be a spoilsport or anything. But maybe we should get back to working on a plan to tell this guy the truth. Especially in light of recent events.”
“Screw that,” Bailey said. “I’m all for sneaking into his hospital room tonight and bashing him over the head again to make sure the amnesia stays permanent. You know, keep him her clueless boyfriend forever.”
Tess immediately frowned at that idea. Anything that involved him and more pain was not a good plan.
Next to her, Paige sighed. “Five minutes ago, you were ready to accuse him of being a serial killer.”
Bailey just snorted and waved her hand. “That was before I knew he was perfect for my Tess. Seriously, Paige. Relax. She was able to open up to him. She doesn’t just do that for anyone, you know. She’s got senses like a dog or something; it’s as if she can smell evil on a person. If this guy got past her shy zone, then he’s fine.”
Flattered by Bailey’s complete faith in her, Tess reached over and squeezed her friend’s hand. “Thank you.” But now she was even more worried because—
What if her dog senses were all out of whack? Just how well could she trust herself? Because when it came to Jonah Abbott, she always reacted the way she knew she shouldn’t.
“In that case, then,” Paige said, “I think we really need to come up with a good game plan to keep him around after his memories come back.”
Tess’s shoulders slumped. What if they never came up with a way to make Jonah want to stay with her? And just how had she gone from simply wanting to help a stranger feel loved to wanting to make her fake boyfriend a permanent one?
Tess couldn’t sleep. Listening to Bailey’s heavy breathing, she pushed the covers off her and rose from her bed.
After she’d spent most of the day talking about Jonah with her two friends, she couldn’t get him off her mind.
Hours into their discussion, Logan had shown up with pizza, so Paige had invited Bailey and Tess to stay and eat with them. The four of them talked and even managed to laugh over a few jokes. But they never really came up with a feasible strategy of how to best explain her lies to Jonah. And that worried her. There really would be no way to explain it, would there? He’d either forgive her or push her away. And the uncertainty of what he’d choose terrified her.
“Did you ever talk to his coach?” Logan had wondered at one point. Tess had to admit she hadn’t yet.
In fact, since the moment she realized she wanted him all to herself, she’d stopped trying to contact anyone on his behalf. And that couldn’t be good. The entire point of this was to help him find someone who cared and who would keep him company until he got his memory back so he didn’t feel alone.
Guilt swamped her. She really did need to approach Jonah’s coach the first chance she got.
She knew she’d grown too close to Jonah, and she was pretty sure he’d grown just about as close to her. But would he change his mind once his memories returned? As soon as he knew who he was, would he return to his old life and abandon her?
In that case, maybe it would be best to tell him everything now, while he was still the Jonah she’d come to know, not the one neither of them knew. Gaining his forgiveness now might be easier than it would be later…when he was someone else.
But thinking about him being someone else, someone she didn’t know, alarmed her. She could only imagine what that same uncertainty did to him.
God, the poor guy was dealing with so much; he had “tangled mess” written all over him. All she’d wanted to do was somehow help him unravel a few of the knots so he could begin to sort his life out again. But she’d managed to somehow get herself tied up right along with him until she felt tethered to him and caught in the middle of his issues just as deeply as he was.
She needed to be close to him now, more than she’d ever needed to be with anyone. She dressed in the dark. Barely daring to breathe so she didn’t wake her roommate, she tiptoed to Bailey’s desk, found her car keys by feel, and left the dorm room.
Pausing in the hall, she waited thirty seconds just to make sure Bailey didn’t follow. But Bailey must’ve been in the
deepest stage of sleep. She didn’t wake up.
Jonah was also dead asleep when she snuck into his hospital room twenty minutes later. Tess felt as if she’d been holding her breath since the moment she’d stolen Bailey’s keys. But the air rushed from her lungs now, in a strange kind of relief, as she stared at his peacefully dreaming body, a blanket draped over him all the way up to his chin.
Lifting the sheet, she eased into his bed, only to realize he was wearing nothing but the jogging pants he’d had on earlier when he’d tried to walk. His chest was bare and smooth, gleaming in the dim lights around the room. A four-inch patch of square gauze was taped to his lower torso on the right side.
She touched the area gently as she laid her head next to his, facing him.
He woke with a jerk, sucking in a startled breath.
“Sorry,” she whispered, touching this face. “I didn’t mean to wake you.” Or maybe she had. She was so messed up right now.
She moved her fingers over his beautiful features as he blinked her into focus.
“Tess?” he mumbled, his voice full of sleep and eyes heavy-lidded. “What’re you—” He shook his head as if he needed to clear it and glanced around. “What time is it?”
“A little after two.”
He squeezed his eyes shut and then drug them back open. “In the morning?”
She winced. “Yeah. I’m sorry, I should go.”
When she moved to roll off the bed, though, he curled onto his side and into her, so they could fit more fully together.
“No. Don’t go.” He slid his arm around her waist as if it was the most natural act in the world.
She froze, holding her breath again. “Okay.”
Jonah nuzzled his face into her. “What’re you doing here, though?”
“I couldn’t sleep,” she admitted and leaned forward to kiss his chin full of dark stubble. “I was sad. I needed my boyfriend to make me feel better again.”
Worry filled his tired eyes as he cupped her face. “What happened? Are you okay?”