When Lightning Strikes Twice. Debrah Morris

but it’s not mine.” She melted butter for garlic bread. “Remember? Housing is a perk I get for working at the clinic.”

      “Oh, right. I forgot.”

      He’d forgotten a lot of things. He hadn’t seemed to recognize much when they’d driven through town. She’d left him in the truck while she ran into the grocery store to pick up a few things. When she came out, Glorieta Tadlock was leaning in the passenger window attempting to engage him in conversation. In the loosest sense of the word. Dressed in a sequined halter-top that showed off the butterfly tattoo on her shoulder and short shorts that showed off everything else, the blowzy blonde treated him like a baby bird that had fallen out of its nest. To Joe’s credit, he’d seemed perplexed and embarrassed by the attention.

      If she hadn’t known better, Mallory would have sworn he’d never laid eyes on the belly-ringed nail technician in his life. Which was pretty strange considering the two had once been an item. Since neither knew what the word platonic meant, he’d probably laid a lot more than his eyes on her.

      “So you can live here as long as you’re the doc?” he asked.

      “Or until I get a place of my own.” Before she did that, she planned to save enough to put a down payment on a house for her parents. Seeing their only child through medical school had cracked their working-class nest egg. Buying them a home wouldn’t come close to repaying all the sacrifices they’d made for her, but at least they wouldn’t have to worry about the future.

      Happily married for nearly forty years, Al and Lois Peterson had set a good example of wedded bliss for their daughter. Unfortunately, Mallory had never had time to be much of a romantic and didn’t believe she would ever find the kind of love her parents shared. Her doubts weren’t based on logic, they just were. She’d never suffered a betrayal. No faithless lover had broken her heart. She simply didn’t think of herself and true love in the same context.

      She assumed it was because she’d always been too focused on her goals to fall in love. College and medical school and interning had made it impossible to fit a personal life into her schedule. She had more time now, but neither the inclination nor opportunity. A drought of available men had just about dried up the gene pool in Slapdown.

      At the age of twenty-nine, solitude had become a habit.

      “I hope your room is all right.” She set the salad bowl on the table. The careful way he watched her increased her jitters. It was one thing not to find him totally repugnant, but finding him intriguing and attractive was like slipping into an alternate universe.

      “It’s more than all right. This is just about the swankiest place I’ve ever stayed.”

      Mallory smiled. He thought a doublewide on a wind-swept west Texas hill was swanky? Poor man didn’t get out much. “Why don’t you have a seat? Dinner’s almost ready.”

      He stood in the doorway, looking uneasy. “I wouldn’t feel right sitting down before you.”

      “Don’t be silly, get off those feet. Doctor’s orders.”

      Reluctantly, he pulled out a chair and levered himself into it. He bumped his left foot against the table leg and winced.

      “If you’re hurting, I’ve got pain reliever.”

      “I’ve known worse.”

      Odd. Stoicism was another quality she’d never associated with Joe. He’d probably caused more pain than he’d ever experienced. She thought of the people he’d hurt most of all. “You can use the phone to call Brandy if you want. Maybe you should let your family know where you are?”

      A look of panic flashed in his eyes before he shuttered them from her scrutiny. “No. I don’t think so.”

      Oh. Sore spot. Mentioning the ex-wife wasn’t the way to go. “Whatever you think is best.” The couple had been divorced over a year, but Mallory’s mother stayed current on town gossip despite her recent retirement from the diner, and said the marriage had ended long before that. Brandy had told Mallory at Chloe’s last clinic appointment that she was trying to make a new start by getting into paralegal school.

      Mallory drained the pasta and poured a jar of sauce over it. After placing it on a slow burner to warm, she removed the Italian bread from the oven. Joe followed her movements as though trying to memorize them. Why? Unless his memory loss was more serious than Mac suspected, he surely knew how to make spaghetti the easy way. Long a master of deception, Joe might have faked his way through the tests, fooling the doctor into thinking he was doing better than he was.

      Conducting a little covert evaluation of her own shouldn’t be too difficult. After all, he wasn’t going anywhere for the next few days.

      She served the food and was flabbergasted when Joe bowed his head over his plate. Manners and religion? No way. Things were getting downright spooky around here. First thing tomorrow morning she was checking Dink Potter’s alfalfa field for crop circles. She followed his example, echoing his heartfelt “amen” at the end of the silent thanksgiving.

      “Looks good,” he said enthusiastically as he picked up his fork. “What’s it called?”

      “Spaghetti.” Another word-finding lapse. Maybe the nurses were right to be concerned. They spent more time with patients than doctors, and their astute observations were usually dead-on. “You seem different to me, Joe.” She took a sip of ice tea.

      “Do I?” He kept his eyes on his food. Good thing. Their new harrowing, hypnotic quality gave her the shivers.

      “Just a little.” Like maybe scouts from an alien mothership had sucked out the old Joe and replaced him with a too-perfect pod person.

      “I reckon I’m still a little befuddled.”

      Befuddled? There was another term you didn’t hear every day. His expressive language problems hadn’t affected his newly acquired vocabulary of Mayberryisms. “I’ve noticed you have some trouble remembering things.”

      “I suppose. They tell me I had quite a jolt.”

      “To put it mildly.” Shock. Temporary cardiopulmonary failure. Oxygen deprivation. A fluid-filled body was an excellent conductor of electricity. Lightning entered through holes in the head, eyes, nose, ears and mouth. The brain, bathed in salt water, was particularly vulnerable to electrical effects. The fact that he was sitting here talking at all was amazing.

      She poured bottled dressing on her salad. “Ranch or French?”

      He looked up, clearly confused by the question. She raised one brow, waiting for his answer.

      “Neither.” Joe continued wrangling the slippery spaghetti onto his fork.

      Fast thinking. She’d seen stroke patients become quite proficient at compensating for cognitive deficits. The smart ones learned quickly how to talk around the odd little holes in their memory. Like calling a hammer a hitter and using verbal confabulation to avoid answering direct questions. She’d try another tack. “Would you like dressing on your salad?”

      He looked up, and a large blob of sauce-soaked pasta slid off his fork into his lap. “Tarnation!” He grabbed for his napkin, upsetting his glass in the process. Tea and ice cubes joined the spaghetti. “Well, now I’ve done it!”

      Mallory stepped over to the rack near the sink and tore off a wad of paper towels, which she handed to him. He scooped up the spaghetti, and then scrubbed at the wet tomato stain on the front of his jeans.

      “I’m as clumsy as a booze-blind cowboy.” Flushing, he dabbed at the puddle of tea darkening the green placemat. “I hope I didn’t ruin anything.”