The Mysterious Stranger (Triple Trouble) Read online

  A wave broke over her, pushing her toward the cliff. The rocky walls loomed closer. She kicked away from them and managed to draw a clean breath. Then her stomach convulsed again. The next wave pushed her nearer to the unforgiving stone. She held out her hand to brace herself but it wasn’t enough. The last thing she remembered was the searing impact of slamming into the rigid, vertical surface.

  * * *

  “Tell them the bid is final,” Jarrett Wilkenson said, turning his back on the spectacular view exposed by the floor-to-ceiling glass windows in his office. “Either they sign or we walk away. Understood?”

  “Yes, sir,” the voice on the other end of the phone replied briskly. “Just two more items on the agenda.”

  Jarrett pulled a sheet of paper toward him and crossed off the third-last line. These biweekly conference calls took a lot of time, but they were easier than flying back to the States and meeting with everyone in person.

  “There is still the matter of the Riverbend hotel,” his caller said. “According to my sources…”

  The door to Jarrett’s office flew open. Anna Jane dashed into the room. “Uncle Jarrett, come quick! There’s an emergency.”

  He glanced at his niece. Her dark eyes were wide with fear.

  “Hold on, Roberts,” he said, and pressed the Mute button. “What is it?” he asked the girl.

  She skittered to a stop in front of his desk and pressed her hands tightly together. “There’s a lady on the beach,” she said quickly. “Frank said she probably got caught in the cove and washed ashore. She’s hurt. He says she needs a doctor.”

  Jarrett nodded. He released the Mute button and spoke.

  “We’ll pick this up later, Roberts. I have to take care of something here.” He hung up without waiting for a reply. By pressing two different buttons, he engaged his autodialer. When a woman answered the phone, he explained about the injured person on the beach and received confirmation the doctor would be sent right away.

  He rosé to his feet and started for the door. A mysterious woman washing up on his beach. He grimaced. It was a good trick—original, if risky. But they were often willing to take incredible risks to get to him. Somehow he’d thought he would be safe here. For a while he had been.

  He crossed the foyer of the large house and headed for the rear doors. From there it was a short walk to the beach.

  The woman had probably made her way up from the resort. Had she known about the danger of high tide in the cove? Had she counted on it? Or hadn’t she noticed the watermarks on the stony cliffs?

  It didn’t matter, he told himself. As soon as the doctor arrived, the woman could be transported back wherever she belonged. If he was smart, he wouldn’t even risk meeting her. Yet he couldn’t stay away. He had to see her face. He had to make sure she was alive.

  “Uncle Jarrett?” The breathless call from behind him reminded him he’d left Anna Jane in his office. He slowed his long stride and waited for the girl to catch up. She trotted toward him and raised her small, stubborn chin until she could see his face. “Uncle Jarrett, I think I did a bad thing.”

  Her lower lip trembled at the admission. At times he could see traces of his sister in Anna Jane’s face. Shadows of familiar expressions, words spoken in a certain tone or cadence that took him back to a nearly forgotten past. But other times, his niece was a stranger. Perhaps because he’d seen her only half a dozen times in her young life. Until he’d brought her here after her mother’s funeral a few weeks ago, they’d never been alone together.

  A bad thing? What did that mean? What did he know of children and their faults? Tracy should have named someone else as the girl’s guardian. A friend with children of her own. Someone who knew what to do when faced with big eyes and a confession of wrongdoing.

  “I see,” he said.

  Anna Jane nodded. “I didn’t mean to. I was lonely and I wanted someone to play with so I wrote a letter.”

  “That’s hardly bad,” he said, turning away and starting for the beach.

  “There’s more.”

  He paused and glanced back at her. The path angled down to the beach. Anna Jane stood at the crest of the rise, a small figure dwarfed by the large trees and the three-story house behind her. He heard her words for the first time. I was lonely.

  Loneliness was a familiar companion in his world. He’d grown to accept it as one accepts a chronic pain or an annoying relative who has decided to move in. Yet he hadn’t thought about a child being lonely. Weren’t children always going and doing? Again he wondered what Tracy had been thinking when she’d written her will. Then he reminded himself his sister had not expected to die so young.

  He stared at the forlorn little girl and wished he could do better for her.

  “I asked whoever got the letter to come visit me,” Anna Jane continued. “I drew a map of the island and marked the house.”

  “I don’t see what—”

  “I put the letter in a bottle, then sent it out in the water,” she interrupted. “That’s why she came. She found my letter and now she’s going to die.”

  Like Mommy. Anna Jane didn’t say the words, but Jarrett heard them. Loneliness and guilt. A pair of hounds that guarded the gates of hell. How would he explain that none of this was her fault?

  “If you put your bottle in the ocean recently, it wouldn’t have had time to get to another island,” he said.

  Her hands twisted together as she considered the information, then she smiled. “You’re right. I just sent the bottle yesterday.” She walked to his side and touched his arm. “Thanks, Uncle Jarrett.”

  “No problem. Let’s go check on our mystery guest.”

  He led the way down to the beach. Frank and Leona, the married couple who acted as housekeeper and head gardener for the estate, crouched beside a still figure on the sand.

  “Stay here,” he told Anna Jane, then crossed the last twenty feet to the woman.

  Leona stood as he approached. “Oh, Mr. Jarrett, Anna Jane told you about her. Poor thing.” She motioned to the woman. “She’s breathing, but she won’t wake up. Frank says there’s no way to tell what’s wrong. Did you call the doctor? Do you know who she is? One of the guests, perhaps. Or someone on a day sail. She could have fallen off her boat.”

  Leona continued to list an assortment of possible fates, all of which ended badly. Jarrett knelt next to the woman and pressed his fingers against her neck. A faint pulse thudded steadily.

  “You know her?” he asked his gardener, suspecting the answer in advance.

  “No.”

  Jarrett studied the still figure. Except for the dark bruise on the left side of her face, a gash on her forehead and the scratches on her arms and legs, she was pale. Long blond hair fanned out on the sand. She wore a one-piece swimsuit and shorts. No shoes. Mid-twenties, pretty. He’d never seen her before in his life.

  “I don’t think anything is broken,” Frank said.

  “Good.”

  Giving in to the inevitable, Jarrett scooped the unconscious woman up in his arms and carried her back to the house. By the time he’d placed her in one of the guest bedrooms, Dr. John Reed had arrived. Leona showed him upstairs, and Jarrett met him in the doorway.

  The two men shook hands. John had graduated from a prestigious medical school and gone into a high-volume, lucrative practice in New York. After fifteen years he’d been close to burning out. Jarrett had offered him tropical paradise, a waterfront home and enough money to enjoy his new life. The island had its first resident doctor and John Reed had avoided leaving medicine altogether.

  “What’s going on?” the older man asked as he approached the woman lying on the bed.

  Jarrett filled him in with what he knew. He sensed Leona, Frank and Anna Jane hovering in the doorway.

  “She’s young,” John said. “Pretty, too.”

  “Uh-huh.” Jarrett couldn’t have been less interested.

  John examined her. “Nothing broken. Just scrapes. She probably swallowed a lot of w
ater. I—”

  A soft moan cut him off. Jarrett moved closer to the bed. The woman’s eyes fluttered, then opened. Her irises were the color of summer grass. Pure green. She blinked.

  “What—” She broke off and coughed.

  John sat on the bed next to her and smiled. “Don’t worry, you’re fine. You had a little accident in the ocean, but you’re okay now. I’m Dr. John Reed. Take a deep breath before you try to talk.”

  The woman did as she was instructed. “I was in the ocean?” she asked. She glanced around the room. “Where am I?”

  “In a private residence,” John said. “How do you feel?”

  The woman shifted, then winced. “Sore, but okay.” She reached up and touched her face. “Did I hit something?”

  “It looks that way.” John shone a penlight into her eyes. “How many fingers am I holding up?”

  “Two,” the woman said. “I’m not dizzy, if that’s what you’re trying to find out. The room’s not spinning or anything. My stomach’s a little upset and I feel shaken, but not badly injured.”

  “Good.” He glanced at Jarrett. “I’d like to keep her quiet for the next day or so before moving her, but I think she’s going to be fine.”

  Jarrett swallowed his instinctive refusal. John knew enough about his past that he wouldn’t ask if he didn’t think it was important. “Fine,” he said between clenched teeth.

  John turned his attention back to his patient. “I want you to stay in bed for the rest of the afternoon. You’ve been traumatized. Your body needs to recover.” He frowned. “I’ve been out in the sun too long,” he said. “I forgot to ask your name.”

  The woman smiled. “You had a few other things on your mind. I’m…” She paused, her mouth open. Her lips moved, but no sound emerged. The smile faded and her eyes widened slightly. Fingers fluttered as her hand reached out into air, grasping for something he couldn’t see.

  She stared at John. “I don’t know my name.”

  Chapter Two

  Jarrett sat behind his desk and squeezed his Mont Blanc pen. He waited until his friend had poured himself a glass of Scotch from the decanter on the shelf on the far wall. When John had taken a swallow and crossed to the window he spoke.

  “What’s the prognosis?”

  John shrugged. “I did as thorough an examination as I could. Good vital signs, no evidence of internal injuries. There are some bruises from her run-in with the cliff and she’s not going to feel a hundred percent for a day or so, but aside from that, she’s in great shape.” He stared expectantly, as if waiting for Jarrett to comment on the double meaning in the last comment.

  Jarrett ignored him. Yes, he’d noticed the mystery woman had a nice body. So what? Thousands, hundreds of thousands of women had nice bodies. That didn’t mean he was interested in any of them.

  “She needs rest,” John continued when Jarrett was silent. “I’m sure you want her gone as quickly as possibly, but resist the urge to throw her out until tomorrow.”

  “I’m not completely inhuman,” Jarrett said frostily.

  “Nice to know. Sometimes I wonder.”

  Jarrett ignored that comment, too. “Is she faking?”

  “The amnesia?” John shrugged. “It’s hard to tell. Head injuries are tricky. We understand so little of the brain and how it heals. Often this kind of amnesia is bought on by a traumatic incident. It’s usually temporary and disappears on its own. On the other hand—”

  “Of course she’s faking,” Jarrett interrupted. “And she conveniently lost her identification or left it behind.”

  “That would be your professional opinion?”

  “I know women.” Jarrett stared out the window, forcing himself to see the blue sky and glittering water beyond. While he didn’t appreciate the view as much as he should, at least he could focus on it instead of the past. Anything was better than remembering.

  John took another swallow of Scotch, then sat in the chair in front of Jarrett’s desk. “If you know she’s faking, why bother with me?”

  “I’ve been down this road before. I won’t be played for a fool.”

  “Ah, I understand.” John smoothed a hand over his thinning hair. “I wasn’t aware you were being stalked by a series of women who had lost their memories. Under the circumstances, then, you would definitely have more insight into this problem than I do. I bow to your superior knowledge and experience.”

  Jarrett narrowed his gaze. “You’re not the least bit amusing.”

  John grinned. “Hey, I think I’m funny and, in the end, isn’t that what matters?”

  Jarrett kept his expression cold.

  John sighed. “All right. We’ll do it your way, but I think you’re taking this too much to heart. It is possible that the mystery lady is just that, a mystery. Not a stalker or a woman out to trick you into a relationship.”

  “I can’t afford not to be careful.” He stared at the man who, despite Jarrett’s natural inclination to hold the world at bay, had become a friend. “You know some of what happened in my past, John, but you don’t know everything that happened. I have to assume the worst. Especially now that Anna Jane is with me. Her safety is my responsibility.”

  “Do you want her to come stay with me tonight?” he asked.

  Jarrett raised his eyebrows. “She’s only nine, John. You can’t leave her alone.”

  “I know that.” John sounded hurt. “I’m a doctor. I wouldn’t mind staying in for the evening. I could use the rest.”

  “With your schedule, I’m not surprised.”

  John’s exploits were legendary. His beachfront home had played host to a legion of lovely ladies. Most were resort guests who stayed with him for the length of their vacation. Some were hotel staffers. He never claimed to want more than a passing affair, and the women seemed pleased to comply.

  “Anna Jane will be safe enough here,” Jarrett continued. “You said the woman can be moved in the morning.”

  “All she needs is a good night’s sleep. Besides, you can use the time to figure out if she’s faking or not,” the doctor said. “If she is, as you said, playing you for a fool, you should be able to trip her up. If she’s the genuine article, then you’ve simply spent a few hours in the company of a lovely lady. There are worse fates.”

  Jarrett ignored John’s last comment. He didn’t share his friend’s desire for constant female companionship. “If the amnesia is real, what will happen?”

  “I’m not sure. Her memory could return in pieces or it could all come back at once. She’ll probably remember odd bits of information while forgetting seemingly simple things. The brain is a complex organ.” John finished his Scotch. “In the meantime, what are you going to do with her?”

  “She’s not my responsibility. In the morning Frank will drive her back to the resort. My housekeeper’s theories aside, I doubt she came from one of the neighboring islands. I’m sure she has a few friends who are expecting her back tonight. I’ll return her to them.”

  John rosé to his feet. “It’s your call. But I can’t believe you’re not the least bit curious about her.”

  “Why would I be?”

  “A beautiful woman washes up on your private beach. She doesn’t know who she is or where she’s from. Think of the mystery, the fantasy, the possibilities.”

  Jarrett grimaced. “The lawsuit.”

  “You have no romance in your soul.”

  True. He didn’t have a soul at all. At least, not one he’d felt recently. He’d turned off all his emotions a long time ago. Life was easier once he’d learned not to feel. He depended on logic and action. They were enough.

  John walked to the door. “Call me if anything changes, but she should be fine. Don’t forget to feed her dinner. You could even invite her to share the meal with you.”

  “Goodbye, John.”

  John winked. “Lucky SOB. Why doesn’t stuff like this happen to me?” He waved and left.

  Jarrett stared after him. If John knew the truth, he wouldn’t wa
nt Jarrett’s life or his past.

  * * *

  Anna Jane paused outside her uncle’s study. The big door stood open. She didn’t want to go inside. She didn’t want to tell her uncle the truth and have him be mad at her. Maybe she didn’t have to. Maybe Leona wouldn’t say anything and she could just—

  Nana B. had taught her to be honest. Her nanny often explained that honesty wasn’t just about telling the truth. It was also about living a life without deceit and manipulation, although Anna Jane still wasn’t sure what manipulation was.

  She swallowed hard once, then tapped softly on the open door. Her uncle looked up and saw her. For a moment, his hard expression softened as he beckoned her inside.

  “I would have thought you would be with our mystery guest,” he said lightly.

  “She’s sleeping. Dr. John says she’s going to be all right. Is that true?”

  Her uncle nodded. “She’ll be fine. I’m sure she has friends waiting for her at the resort. As soon as they get in touch with the hotel manager, he’ll tell them she’s okay. They can come and get her in the morning.”

  Anna Jane reached into her shorts pocket and pulled out a damp piece of paper. After smoothing it flat, she passed it to her uncle.

  “She did get my note. That’s why she tried to find me. It’s my fault she almost d-drowned.”

  Her uncle scanned the note, then turned it over and looked at the map. “You put this in a bottle?” he asked.

  “Yes,” she whispered.

  He frowned. “The tide would have carried it north, not south,” he said, almost to himself. “Where did you drop it in the water?”

  “I know I’m not allowed down to the beach by myself. I didn’t go there. I put the bottle in the pond by the house. The stream carried it away.”

  “That makes sense. That’s an inland waterway. Your bottle never made it to the ocean. So our mystery guest could only have come from the resort.” He gave her a smile. “Thanks for telling me. This will make her identity easier to discover.”

  “I didn’t mean to hurt anyone.”

  “The woman isn’t really hurt, Anna Jane. None of this is your fault,” he said.