Kill Me Again

“The hospital, I know,” Olivia said, a tiny kernel of concern beginning to form in her chest. Carrie had no earthly reason to be calling her today—especially not from her job, which she took very seriously. “What’s going on?”

Carrie drew a breath. “Okay, it’s—I have a patient here. Male, mid-thirties maybe. Dark hair and eyes. Six feet or so, pretty buff. No ID.”

“Sounds like you’re looking for a home for a stray, Carrie.”

“Sort of. He had your business card in his pocket, so I thought you might be able to help us identify him.”

Olivia closed her eyes slowly as her mind fit Tab A into Slot B. God, was it Aaron Westhaven? Was that why he was so late? “Is there anything written on the back of the card?” she asked.

“Yeah. Your home phone number. Address, too. Do you know who he is?”

“I think so,” Olivia whispered. It was him. It had to be. She didn’t give anyone her home address. Ever. But she’d made an exception for the semifamous recluse with the direct line into her brain. “Is he all right? I mean how bad—”

“I really can’t discuss that—”

“Right, right.” Rules, regs, confidentiality. Carrie wasn’t going to breech protocol and risk her medical license. Not over the phone, anyway.

“Can you come over here?” Carrie asked.

Olivia nodded hard, just as if Carrie could see the motion. “I’ll be there in fifteen minutes,” she said, then hung up the phone without another word. She headed for the door, the issue of what to wear entirely forgotten, and grabbed her handbag on the way.

Freddy ran ahead of her and waited by the door, tail wagging.

She crouched, but only a little, and cupped his great big, flappy jowled face between her palms. “You have to stay here, Fred. I’m going to the hospital, and they don’t allow dogs there, so you have to stay here. But I promise I won’t be long.”

He sighed heavily and lowered his big head, just as if he understood every word.

She kept hold of him, though, and kissed him right on the snout. “Don’t be sad. I’ll be back.”

He got up and plodded away, sinking onto his super-size doggy bed as if his heart was breaking.

Olivia took momentary pity on her best friend, and snapped on the TV, tuning it to Animal Planet. Freddy seemed marginally placated. Then she tossed the remote onto the highest shelf in the room to keep him from eating it and headed for her hybrid SUV.

Fifteen minutes later she was standing in front of the nurses’ desk at Shadow Falls General, asking for Dr. Carrie Overton. A hand on her shoulder made her stop in midquestion, and she turned to see a face she knew, though not the one she’d been expecting. She stared up at the tall cop. “Bryan. I almost didn’t recognize you in your uniform. Must seem good to have it back, hmm?”

“Better than you’d believe,” Bryan Kendall said. “How have you been?”

“Good. Good.”

“And that horse you call a dog?”

“Moping that he didn’t get to ride along, but otherwise good. You and Dawn should stop by and visit him.” Then she frowned and asked, “What are you doing here?”

“Same thing you are,” he said.

That reply made her brows go up. “The police are involved in this?”

Bryan nodded, his face serious. “Yeah. I’ll explain what I can while we wait for Dr. Overton. Right now she’s busy reaming out her kid for taking the car without permission.” He nodded to the left, and Olivia saw the stunning redhead, wearing a white lab coat and a stethoscope, apparently in midlecture. Her audience consisted of two teenage boys with their heads hanging low.

Carrie glanced up, and Bryan beckoned her over. She pointed sternly, directing the boys to a pair of chairs, then called over her shoulder as she came through the glass door, “Do not leave that spot until I come back.”

Then she took a breath, smoothed her fiery curls and approached them. “Thanks for coming, Olivia. Did you fill her in yet, Officer Kendall?”

Olivia shook her head as Bryan said, “No, not yet.” Then, with a sympathetic look at the boys in the other room, he added, “You know Sam and Kyle probably saved the guy’s life by finding him, right?”

“That’s no excuse,” Carrie said. She looked at Olivia again. “The mystery patient is this way. Will you take a look at him for me?”

“I don’t know what good it will do,” Olivia began, following as Carrie walked briskly down the hall, stopping outside a door with the number 206 on it.

“Why not?” Carrie asked.

There was a window beside the door, the blind open just enough to reveal the man in the bed. He lay on his back, staring at the ceiling, his head swathed in bandages. “Because I’ve never actually seen—Oh.” Olivia lost her words somehow, and her breath with them, as her gaze slid from the white bandages on the man’s head to his face. God, he was beautiful. She hadn’t expected that.

“Do you know him?” Bryan asked.

“Not by sight,” Olivia replied. She thought she ought to face Bryan while speaking to him, but she couldn’t take her eyes off the man in the bed. His were open, and they were soft eyes. Their color was green or maybe brown. She couldn’t tell from this distance. But they were dark and striking, as was the way they turned down slightly at the outside corners, giving him an inherently sad expression. And while his age surprised her—as did her instant reaction to his good looks—the pain and stoic, steadfast endurance expressed by those eyes didn’t shock her in the least. She’d expected him to be strong, she realized.

“Olivia?” Bryan prompted.

She blinked and cleared her throat. “I’ve never actually met him before. But I’m fairly certain I know who he is, and that he was on his way to see me.”

Bryan tensed a little. He was one of the very few people who knew Olivia’s secrets. And inviting a stranger to her home wasn’t something he would expect her to do.

“It’s a long story,” she began.

“Just give us the digest version for now,” he said.

She nodded. “He’s a writer, an author, as well-known for being reclusive as for his work, which is, to put it mildly, brilliant. His name is Aaron Westhaven, although as closely as he guards his privacy, it’s probably a pseudonym. He doesn’t do public appearances, doesn’t even allow himself to be photographed, and doesn’t want anyone to know he’s in town.”

“Why was he coming to see you?” Bryan asked.

“I invited him to speak at a fundraiser at the university.”

“And he agreed?” Looking more coplike than ever, Bryan was frowning now.

“Yes, he did,” Olivia said. “I was stunned, really. But there were strict stipulations. We were doing this as a secret-guest, by-invitation-only thing. He insisted on no press, no publicity. Just a private lecture, with wine and cheese and him as the guest speaker. He was supposed to stay at my place—more private than a motel or an inn.”

“And you agreed to that?”

She met Bryan’s eyes, saw the disbelief in them. “It was my idea. And the university agreed to every condition. Getting him at all was a real coup, Bryan. He’s special. His work…it’s meant a lot to me. I even used to write to him. Not often. I mean, I’m not a drooling groupie or anything.”

“I would never mistake you for a drooling groupie, Olivia,” he said dryly.

She acknowledged that with a nod. “He never wrote back, probably never even saw my letters. But still, I felt—” She turned her gaze back to the man in the bed. “I felt as if I knew him in some small way, through his work. I felt we were on common ground about some things.”

“Uh-huh,” Bryan said, the way you say it when pretending you understand something you actually don’t.

Olivia read his face, then frowned, turning to Carrie as what should have been an obvious question occurred to her. “He’s conscious. Why aren’t you asking him all these questions?”