But this serving was for his mermaid, he thought, bringing it over to the table where, during business hours, the salads were prepared.
She stood on ceremony for exactly half a minute, then ate with gusto.
He liked seeing people enjoy his food like this, although, to be fair, the woman would have probably enjoyed anything at this point. She seemed to be as ravenous as she’d claimed.
The entire serving was gone within less than ten minutes. He supposed that nearly drowning spiked a person’s appetite.
“More?” he asked when she pushed the empty plate away from her.
Smiling for the first time since he’d saved her, the woman shook her head. She had a nice smile, Trevor thought.
“No, I’m full.” She resisted the urge to run her fingers over the plate and lick them. “And it was very good. You made this?”
It was one of the first things he’d ever learned to prepare. He’d been seven and Kate had made him her assistant, tying one of her aprons around his waist. It had dragged on the floor, but he’d had the time of his life. He’d gotten hooked on cooking from the very start.
“It’s an old stand-by,” he answered.
“Well, it’s very good,” she repeated, her tone sounding a little awkward. “Thank you.”
He saw concern slip over her face. “What?”
She tried not to let the anxiety take her prisoner. “That’s it exactly. ‘What?’ What do I do now?”
“Well, if you want my opinion,” he said, “I think you should be checked out at a hospital. Just in case.”
She frowned. At the mention of the word hospital, she felt something tighten inside. Was she afraid of hospitals? Had she had a bad experience? Had someone she cared about died in a hospital? It was so terribly annoying, not having a single answer, a single clue to anything about herself.
“I’m okay,” she answered.
“You have amnesia,” Trevor pointed out to her. “That’s not okay.”
She followed him out into the dining hall again. “But they can’t fix that in a hospital, can they?”
“I don’t know, but this way, you find out if you have a concussion, or anything else wrong.” Although from where he sat, she looked damn near perfect, at least on the outside, he mused.
He kept the thought to himself.
“They’re going to want to know my name,” she said.
“We’ll just tell them that you can’t remember it.”
We. Did that mean he was coming with her? She had no idea why, but the thought brought her a sense of relief.
“But I need a name,” she protested. She raised her eyes to his, silently asking him to christen her, if only for the time being.
“Okay.” Fishing out his keys, he thought for a moment. “How about ‘Venus’?”
“Venus?” she echoed. It was pretty. She liked it.
He nodded as he locked the door behind them and then armed the security system. “Like the Botticelli painting. Venus rising out of the sea—”
“On a giant half shell,” she completed.
Her eyes widened.
Chapter Three
“I remember that,” she cried excitedly.
Without thinking, she grabbed at his shirtfront. The jacket he’d put around her began to slip off, but he caught it in time and set it back on her shoulders. She was vaguely aware of an electrical charge dancing through her, but her excitement was focused on this tiny kernel of information that she’d stumbled across.
She searched his face for an answer. “How do I remember that?”
Very gently, he disengaged her hands from his shirt. “You’re an artist, you work in the art field, or maybe you just like Botticelli. Or clams,” he added, picking up on her description of the half shell. “Or maybe your memory’s coming back. Can you remember anything else?” he prodded.
Like a child trying to recall a phrase she’d memorized, the woman slid her tongue along her lips, a faraway look in her eyes. Trevor watched her and could almost see her effort to summon a familiar thought, any familiar thought.
Her frustration was apparent when she shook her head.
“No.” She exhaled the words. “Nothing else.”
Pocketing his keys, he began walking. She fell into step. “Maybe you shouldn’t try so hard, then,” he suggested. “It’ll come back on its own. Like the Botticelli painting.”
She dragged her hand through her hair. Disappointment was evident in every word. “Not fast enough for me.”
He resisted the temptation to put his arm around her shoulders, sensing that the gesture wouldn’t be welcomed. “C’mon, Venus, let’s get you checked out.”
Stumbling blocks became evident. “I don’t have any money,” she told him even as she followed him to the far side of the restaurant’s perimeter, where the parking lot was located.
One lone car stood unattended. His, she surmised. He drove a Mustang. While she recognized the vehicle’s make and model, it meant nothing to her. No bells rang, no fragments of memory were dislodged. It was annoying beyond words.
She stopped before the car, waiting for him to unlock it. “And since I don’t know who I am, I don’t have any medical insurance.” She saw him look up at her. He seemed a great deal happier than she did. “Why are you grinning like that?”
Aiming his key at the car, he pressed a button and disarmed the vehicle’s security system. All four locks sprang to attention. “You just remembered that you need medical insurance.”
She paused for a second before getting into the Mustang. She felt a great deal less pleased about this supposed breakthrough. “You’re right, I did. But if I can remember something that trivial, why can’t I remember who the hell I am?”
Opening his car door, Trevor got in. She followed suit on her side. “Maybe you don’t want to.”
She frowned. “That’s ridiculous. Why wouldn’t I want to remember who I am?”
Psychology wasn’t his thing—that belonged to Kate and his brother Trent. But he’d heard enough about the topic at home to venture an educated guess. “Maybe you’re running from something. Something that involves who you are.”
Her frown deepened. “That’s a little far-fetched, isn’t it?”
Inserting the key into the ignition, Trevor shrugged. “Just a thought.” He glanced at her. “You remembered to buckle up.”
Her irritation increased. Did he think she was a child in need of endless encouragement? “All right, I get it. I remember some things. Some general things,” she emphasized. It was in the same category as remembering how to walk and talk. “You don’t have to keep pointing those things out.”
He started up the car. “Just trying to give you some hope, Venus.”
Guilt assaulted her. She was being waspish again—and he was being nice and definitely going out of his way for her. He didn’t have to be doing any of this. “Are you sure I don’t know you?”
Leaving the lot, he made a left turn, easing onto Pacific Coast Highway. The hospital, Blair Memorial, wasn’t far. “I’m sure.”
It didn’t make any sense to her. Something told her that she was accustomed to people who didn’t go out of their way for anyone. The thought made her sad. “If you don’t know me, then why are you going out of your way like this?”
“Can’t very well save your life then just say, ‘See ya,’ and go on my way, now can I?”
Why couldn’t he? she wondered. “Wouldn’t most people?”
“I don’t know people like that.” Coming to a red light, he eased onto the brake and spared her a look. “But you obviously do.”
She became defensive without knowing why. “How do you know that?”
“Because you wouldn’t have asked that question if you didn’t,” he told her simply. “It wouldn’t have been in your ‘general’ frame of reference.” He emphasized the word she’d balked at previously.
She thought about it for a minute. Without knowing it, he’d hit upon the same thought she’d had, except that h
ers involved an uneasy feeling. “That’s pretty good. You always this logical?”
Being creative, he’d never thought about being logical. But he did now. He realized logic pretty much dictated a good portion of his life. Unlike Travis, he didn’t act first then think later. He did it the other way around—except when it had come to rescuing Venus. He’d reacted rather than reasoned. But, looking back, he supposed logic came into play even there. Because if he’d stood by and done nothing, her life—and death—would have weighed heavily on his conscience.
But he didn’t want to get into a discussion about himself. It was her they needed to identify, not him.
“Mostly,” he admitted.
She nodded her head. She appeared complacent, but then she challenged him. This was a woman to keep you on your toes, he noted.
“Then tell me how you can logically take me to a hospital to be checked out when I have no money and no identity?” she asked. “They’re going to want to get paid.”
“Don’t worry about that.” He could feel her eyes on him. The woman obviously wanted details. He deliberately remained vague, not wanting to get into an argument. She was already displaying more than the average share of pride. “I’ll take care of it.”
Which meant he was going to pay for her care out of his own pocket—unless he owned a hospital as well as a restaurant.
“If I’m a stranger to you, why would you do that?” she asked.
Because he’d been raised to lend a helping hand when he could. But he had feeling if he told her that, it would sound too much like charity. “In some cultures, if you save a life, it’s yours. That means you have to take care of it.”
Venus shook her head. “This isn’t one of those cultures.”
“Something else you know,” he said cheerfully. He had no idea why he was enjoying himself so much, but he was. “You can pay me back when your memory returns,” he told her. He slanted a look in her direction, then turned back to the road. “That satisfy you?”
“I guess it’ll have to.”
She thought for a moment, then examined at his profile, wondering if she’d just had some kind of a breakthrough. The rest of her mind still felt tangled. But right now, a few fragments floated through her brain. Fragments that seemed familiar, even though she couldn’t harness them. It was all too vague. And so damn aggravating.
She sighed, giving voice to her discovery. “I don’t think I like being beholden to anyone.”
“Nothing wrong in asking for help once in a while.”
“There is if asking for help places you in someone’s debt.”
There was a long stretch between lights. He took advantage of it by stepping on the gas, careful to remain on the alert for the occasional motorcycle cop. “That sounds as if you’ve had some not overly satisfactory relationships with people.”
He was right. It did sound that way. Was this another piece of the puzzle that contained her identity? Venus tried vainly to fit it in somewhere. She struck out.
“I don’t know,” she admitted. But even as she said the words, something nebulous slipped over her. It was elusive and refused to take on any definite form, but came with a feeling that there was some truth in what he said.
He hadn’t expected her to suddenly exclaim, “Eureka!” and have her memory rush back. But he had no doubt that eventually, the woman would remember things. Just not yet.
“Maybe you were just born skeptical,” he theorized.
“Maybe,” she mumbled under her breath. She might not have been born that way, but she felt it now.
Pacific Coast Highway and Newport Boulevard were fairly empty at this time of night. Trevor made the trip from Kate’s Kitchen to Blair Memorial in record time.
Luck continued to hold for them because, judging by the hospital’s emergency room parking lot, it had been a rather slow night at Blair, as well. Two minutes after they entered through the electronic doors, Venus was sitting down in a chair before the receptionist. Rather than take the chair next to her, he stood behind her.
The woman on the other side of the desk had to be approaching retirement age and was definitely cheerful. She gave each of them a wide smile as they approached her.
“You caught us at a good time,” the receptionist, Rebecca according to the name tag pinned to her left shoulder, told them. “So, what brings you to the emergency room tonight?”
“He did,” Venus answered, turning her head toward the man behind her.
“She means besides that,” Trevor interjected, then took over the narrative. “She almost drowned tonight.”
Sympathy flared in the woman’s brown eyes as she appraised the would-be patient in front of her. “And you want us to check you out for any ill effects?”
Again, when Venus didn’t answer quickly enough, Trevor took over. “The ill effect is that she can’t remember who she is or anything about how she got into the ocean to begin with.”
“The ocean,” the receptionist repeated, looking surprised by the information. And then she nodded. “That would explain the damp clothes,” she surmised. The smile on her lips indicated she was a tad chagrined. “I thought you were talking about falling into a swimming pool.” Typing, she made a notation on the screen, then automatically asked, “Do you have any identification?”
Impatience had woven through her the second she’d walked through the doors.
“If I did, I’d know who I was, wouldn’t I?” Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Trevor flash her a look. Everyone couldn’t be as nice as he was, she thought defensively. And she had a feeling that she wasn’t in Trevor’s league when it came to being laid-back.
“Right.” Rebecca hit several keystrokes, then glanced up again. “No insurance cards, either, I take it.”
“No anything,” Venus replied, doing her best not to sound impatient.
Trevor saw the receptionist look at Venus, then raise her eyes to his. “And how would you like to—”
Trevor anticipated her. Before the receptionist could find a comfortable way to ask the question, he had his wallet out and produced a credit card. Leaning over the desk, he handed it to her.
“Put it on my card,” he instructed.
After taking the card from him, the receptionist rose. “I’ll be right back,” she promised. “I just have to run this through.”
“I don’t feel comfortable about this,” Venus told him as the receptionist went to a room behind the registration area.
“It shouldn’t take too long,” he assured her. In his opinion, she really needed to get checked out, just in case something was wrong. “She said they weren’t busy tonight.”
Venus waved away his words. “No, I mean having you put this on your credit card.” It was hard to believe selfless people like this man were still around. “How do you know I won’t skip out on you once my memory comes back?” she challenged.
“I just know.” When she looked at him skeptically, he added, “Call it a hunch.”
“I call it being foolhardy,” she retorted.
“Why?” His mouth curved in amusement. “Are you planning on skipping out once your memory returns?”
“No,” she answered with feeling. “But you don’t know that for sure.”
He gazed into her eyes and her stomach went queasy. That was twice now that she’d reacted to him this way. Why?
“I just know,” he told her softly.
The receptionist returned with the paperwork before Venus had a chance to challenge Trevor again. He signed on the line allotted for his signature. In less time than it took to house the paperwork in a folder, they were being ushered into the rear of the emergency room where all the beds were.
Most of them were empty.
The attending nurse took down more information, although it, too, was sparse beyond Trevor’s recounting of the events. Venus had nothing to add because she couldn’t remember.
X-rays and blood work were ordered.
An orderly wheeled her away to the lab, leaving Tre
vor to sit and wait and wonder if he was getting in over his head. Normally, these days, the most interaction he had with women outside his family was to ask them if everything was all right with their meal. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been out socially.
The thought made him smile. His father and Kate would be happy about this. Any girl in a storm.
The physician on duty reviewed the films and glanced at the lab report. His expression indicated that he was unimpressed by either.
“Everything looks normal,” he declared, returning the X-rays to the oversize manila envelope that protected them.
“But I can’t remember anything,” Venus protested.
The physician seemed fairly unconcerned. “There’s no evidence of a concussion and no tumors or lesions are indicated. Most likely, what you have is a case of hysterical amnesia.”
“Hysterical?” she echoed with distaste. Venus didn’t care for the term’s connotation. She was fairly certain she wasn’t the hysterical type and resented being categorized that way.
“Hysterical amnesia brought on by a trauma, either physical or emotional,” the doctor explained. “In either case, most people suffering from that recover their memories in a few days.”
Venus zeroed in on the crucial word. “Most people, but not all.”
“No, not all,” the doctor freely admitted. He glanced at the chart again, then placed it at the foot of her bed. He looked at Trevor as he continued, “But there’s no reason to believe that you won’t.”
“Are there people who never recover from amnesia?”
The emergency room physician appeared reluctant to comment on her question. Venus waited for an answer.
“Every now and again, yes, a few never recover their memory. But again, there’s no reason to believe that you’ll number among them.” A hint of a smile creased his thin lips. “You’ll get your memory back.”
That wasn’t enough. She needed facts. “Give me a good reason to believe that I will.”
The doctor seemed weary. It was apparent that he wasn’t accustomed to justifying his opinion, but he humored her.
“Well, you’re young, healthy and in very good physical condition. Those are the best conditions. Give yourself a little time.” He glanced at the man beside her, silently enlisting his aid. “Nearly drowning is a pretty intense experience.”
[Kate's Boys 02] - The Bride With No Name Page 3