Hurrying past the crowd, he crossed the parking lot to the entrance of the grocery store. Once inside, he picked up the multigrain bread requested by his hostess and, on impulse, grabbed a bouquet of flowers.
He’d given up trying to make his old buddy jealous. Not that he’d ever had any real interest in Lyla Simone anyway, but it had taken a mighty shove to make the confirmed bachelor professor tumble into love with his comely graduate student, and Brooks had been only too glad to deliver the blow. Once he’d fallen, Morgan Chatam had fallen hard. He was not a man to give his heart lightly, as Brooks understood all too well. It did Brooks’s heart good to see his old friend so happy after all these years, and for that reason alone he would take Lyla Simone flowers forever. The joy of having a goddaughter—Lyla and Morgan’s child—suddenly thrust into his life only gave him more cause. They’d named her Brigitte Kay, after Brooks’s late wife and one of Morgan’s aunts. She was an adorable little thing, happily and unabashedly spoiled, and in truth, she was the one thing Brooks envied his old friend.
Brooks made it through the checkout line, but before he could take his change, a teenaged male by the name of Jason Crowel burst inside, yelling for him.
“Doc Leland! Doc Leland! She fell down, and blood’s all over!”
Leaving everything behind, Brooks bolted for the door. He saw the crowd as soon as he hit the parking lot. Brooks sighed inwardly. It would be the blonde. Jason caught up to him, bouquet and grocery bag clutched in his hands. The sides of Brooks’s overcoat flapped like wings as he sprinted across the pavement. Digging into the pockets of his dark slacks, he found his car keys and plucked them out as he drew near the van, Jason at his heels. He set off the car alarm so the young man knew which car to go to, then tossed the keys to Jason.
“Leave the groceries and flowers, grab the medical bag off the backseat.”
“Yessir.”
Elbowing his way into the crowd, Brooks asked, “What’s happened here?”
Several people began speaking at the same time.
“She started talking gibberish and just toppled over.”
“Hit her head on the pavement before anyone could catch her.”
“Splattered blood all over.”
The woman sat up, blinking at Brooks in confusion, blood streaking her pale hair. He checked her pulse, which was rapid and erratic, while speaking in a calm, reassuring tone.
“I’m Dr. Brooks Leland. You’ve taken a nasty blow to the head. Try not to move. Can you tell me your name?”
She lifted a hand toward her head. He caught it and gently pushed it down again, repeating his question.
“Can you tell me your name?”
“Tharestershestersaben,” she babbled.
Jason returned with the medical bag, and Brooks took out his penlight, instructing firmly, “If no one has already done so, please call an ambulance.”
He made a quick examination, determined that her pupils were unequally reactive and that she needed stitches in her scalp, at the very least. Moreover, she seemed painfully thin, despite a suspiciously shapely figure beneath a heavy black leotard and all those artfully draped scarves. After applying a compress to staunch the flow of blood from the laceration to her scalp, he glanced around him.
“Any idea who she is?”
Murmurs of denial went through the crowd before someone said, “License plate on the van is Missouri.”
Not a local girl, then, though even with Texas license plates, she might not be known. Texas was a big state, and the eight-million-strong Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex sprawled just thirty-five miles to the north of Buffalo Creek, which itself boasted some twenty thousand souls.
The ambulance arrived within five minutes, but in that time he managed to stop the bleeding from the scalp wound. His patient remained remarkably composed, though she said not a single coherent word. He suspected a stroke and feared that she might be bleeding inside her skull. He made a phone call.
“Morgan, I’m afraid I’m going to be late for dinner, after all.”
* * *
Eva recognized the tap-tap-tap of typing even before she opened her eyes. The room swam for a moment, refusing to come into focus and seeming much too bright. She automatically lifted a hand to shield her eyes, which ached with a ferocity that alarmed but also reassured her.
The light flickered out just as a pleasantly masculine voice said, “Welcome back. You’ve been sedated.”
She remembered all too well struggling to get up off the X-ray table and telling them over and over again that she categorically refused to have pictures made of her head, but of course they hadn’t understood a word she’d been saying. Still, the sedation had been a dirty trick. Reminding herself that they had merely been trying to help, she cleared her throat, swallowed and attempted to speak.
“That’s a relief.” The greater relief was that the words had come out clearly. Flush with success, she quipped, “For a minute I thought it was one of those deals where I’d had so much fun I’d forgotten.”
“Your speech has cleared. You experienced expressive aphasia. That’s a condition where—”
“My brain was speaking English, but my tongue was talking Martian. Yeah, I got that.”
“Is your head hurting?”
“On a scale of one to ten, if a plastic doll is a one and Marilyn Monroe in her prime is a ten, let’s go with Marilyn,” she gritted out, gingerly fingering the heavy bandage on the back of her head. At the same time, she realized that most of her clothes were gone, replaced by a hospital gown, though she still wore her leggings and socks. “So did I crack the bone?”
“Just your scalp, thankfully.”
“How many stitches did I wind up with?”
“About twenty.”
“Yowza. Did they have to shave my head?”
“We did,” he answered.
“But your hair’s so thick it will cover up the bald spot nicely,” said a reassuring female voice. At the same time, movement to Eva’s left drew her attention to a nurse adjusting the drip on a saline bag.
“That’s good,” she muttered. Wouldn’t want to leave an ugly corpse.
“You almost certainly have a concussion,” the doctor went on smoothly. “Your pupils are not equally reactive. I really did not want to have to sedate you.”
The nurse added, “You gave us no other option. Doctor hasn’t left your side since, though.”
Eva closed her eyes and carefully turned her head in his direction, gasping despite her best efforts to deny the pain. “It’s the ICP,” she murmured.
“Intracranial pressure,” he said. “Yes, that would be my guess. Are you a medical professional? You seem familiar with the terminology.”
“Worked as a transcriptionist.”
“I see. Well, I’ve already administered IV medication that will reduce the swelling,” he told her, “and now that you’re awake, I can give you something to help with the pain. Are you allergic to any drugs?”
“Nope. None I’ve ever tried, that is. Hey, that’s not a confession, by the way, just in case you’re a DEA agent in deep cover.”
She