Stolen Memories. Liz Johnson

something to live for. She did.

      She just didn’t know what it was.

      With jerking motions, she patted her chest and stomach, hoping to find a scalpel or a pair of scissors or a syringe. Her search came up empty, and she flailed her arms until her uninjured hand connected with the side table holding the dinner tray she’d picked at all evening. The metal lid clanged as it bounced off the wall and reverberated when it reached the floor. If she could just get a hold of the edge of the tray, maybe she could hit him in the side of the head. But her fingers couldn’t find a purchase on the rounded edge, and it, too, slipped from her grasp, clattering to the floor.

      As the suffocating pressure below her chin increased, she swiped her hand over the table one more time. And then she found just what she needed.

      A fork.

      Clutching the handle in her fist, she swung it at his arm with as much force as she could muster. When the tines broke skin, she pressed it farther into his arm before yanking it back and stabbing him again.

      “Ow!” he screamed, as if she wielded a dagger.

      She plunged it into his arm, and his fingers loosened. Gulping air, she jabbed at him over and over, puncturing skin and pulling out every time.

      She wasn’t seriously injuring him, but it couldn’t feel much better than a bee sting.

      Finally he let go altogether, and she had the freedom to let loose the blood-curdling yell that had been trapped. It filled the room, went right through the door, flooded the hallway and was promptly followed by a ruckus outside her room that would have brought her out of a coma.

      She knew Brad, her night nurse, was on his way just by the rhythm of his feet on the floor by the nurses’ station. And his steps were not alone. But her attacker vanished. He kicked the mop bucket by the door and it sloshed water, which fell onto the floor with a clap, a sweet pine scent filling the room. The chatter of a handful of high-pitched voices demanding to know what had happened reached her long before she could make out their forms.

      “Who was that coming out of your room?”

      “What happened?”

      As Brad reached her bedside, she held a shaking hand out to him, needing the stability and support that she’d come to expect from the only other man in her life for the moment, but Brad didn’t reach out to her. Instead he picked up the end of her IV tube, which had pulled free during the struggle, and looked at the mess. Leaking saline had left a trail from her stomach down the side of the bed and halfway across the floor.

      Where was Zach? He’d know what to do. He’d know how to make her trembling stop.

      “What happened?” Brad asked again, his words nearly drowned out by the pounding of her heart in her ears.

      “Call security.” Her words came out on a wheeze, and she sucked in air as fast as she could. “That man attacked me. Tried to—” She pointed at her throat. “Tried to strangle me.”

      Brad’s eyes grew wide, if a little doubtful. “Are you sure?”

      Hadn’t he seen the man running down the hall? She nodded, pushing herself up on her elbow and ignoring the pain that sliced down her arm.

      He snatched up the phone and punched in a few numbers before telling the person on the other end to send up security and have them check the back stairwell and exits for a man with blond hair in a blue maintenance uniform. Two female nurses hovering in the doorway followed suit, hurrying in the direction of the attacker’s hasty exit.

      As Brad’s voice chirped on, Julie sank back against the elevated bed. The rush of adrenaline had vanished, stealing her strength.

      “I’ll be right back to get you cleaned up, Julie. Security is on its way.” Brad turned to go, but she grabbed at his arm.

      “Call Zach. Please.”

      “Who?”

      “Detective Jones. Tell him...tell him I need him.”

      * * *

      Zach jabbed the hospital’s elevator button three times, probably harder than it required to light up, but he didn’t have time to wait for it. When the doors didn’t open, he abandoned the lift and ran into the stairwell, taking them two at a time for three flights before running down the corridor.

      His breathing was rapid and painful by the time he reached the ICU. The night nurses shot him strange looks, but the big guy, the one who had called him, waved him toward the security guard in a black uniform.

      “Tell me what happened.” His words were sharp, like the smack of a hammer against wood.

      The security guard had pimples and a patchy beard. He wasn’t much more than a kid with a walkie-talkie and a flashlight, and he took two steps back at Zach’s approach. “Umm. Got here as fast as I could when I got the call, but the guy had already vanished. We checked the back stairwell, and he’s not there, either.” The kid wrung his hands and looked toward the ceiling tiles. “I guess he’s long gone.”

      “When did you get the call?”

      Zach could almost see him calculating the time as he stared at his watch through narrowed eyes. “I guess about twenty minutes ago?”

      He let out a short breath, jamming his hands onto his hips. “Can you be more specific?”

      The kid shrugged and shook his head.

      “You can go.” Zach dismissed the guard but couldn’t seem to take the single step required to enter Julie’s room. Straightening his shoulders, he tried to prepare himself for whatever he might see. Brad wouldn’t have been so calm on the phone if she’d been severely injured. But he’d said she needed Zach.

      It had at once exhilarated and terrified him.

      He liked being needed. He liked taking care of people who couldn’t take care of themselves. Except Julie was an unknown. Nothing about her or her situation was certain or easy.

      And he couldn’t stay away from her.

      He strolled across the room, his shoes silent against the tile. She was so small beneath the blanket, her feet not even close to reaching the end of the mattress. The bed was angled so she was partially sitting up, but her eyes were closed, as though she was fast asleep. Maybe he should go. Let her get some real rest after another traumatic event.

      But she’d asked for him.

      At her side he rested a hand on her arm. She was so pale. Her face and lips were nearly white, the only real color a ring of yellow already materializing at her throat and the still purple bruises.

      Her good eye fluttered open, and her swollen one even managed a slit through which he could make out a matching brown iris. The corners of her lips shifted into a low-wattage smile. “You came.”

      “The nurse said you needed me.”

      Her eyes drifted closed again, and she bit both her top and bottom lips until they disappeared. “I did—do.”

      “All right. I’m here.” He brushed a strand of hair out of her eye, but jerked his hand back immediately. That was way more than professional, and he couldn’t afford to be anything but with a victim. He had to rein in any wayward feelings and get down to business. “You want to tell me what happened?”

      “I must have seen or done something pretty incredible.”

      He lifted his eyebrows, but she continued without any other prodding.

      “He still wants me dead.”

      She spoke with such certainty and calm, yet every muscle in his body tensed, every hair on the back of his neck stood on end. She was in danger. And it was his mistake. If he hadn’t suggested the newspaper article, her attacker might still believe his work was done.

      He swallowed the guilt that rose in his throat. “I’m sorry. This is my fault.” Every syllable threatened