The Sound of Consequence (Puget Sound ~ Alive With Love Book 1) (26 page)

His eyes widened and then Stacie was pulled against his chest, those strong arms she loved wrapped around her, holding her close. His heart thumped so loudly that it felt like it was in her head rather than in his chest. She took in the feel of his body holding hers, that sexy masculine scent that was uniquely his, the feel of his breath skating over her hair. This was the happiness she didn’t realize she’d been missing.

If only she’d recognized it before she was going in for brain surgery, before she might lose it all over again.

“Owen,” Stacie sighed, “I’m scared.”

“Everything will be fine.”

“What if I don’t remember you? What if I forget everything that’s happened?”

Admitting that was enough to cue the tears. Owen held her as her cheeks were drenched and the sobs made her gasp for air. When she finally dried up, he kissed her with so much passion that he made her toes curl. “I think it’d take more than brain surgery for you to forget me.” Owen’s lips lightly brushed against hers as he spoke.

“Owen,” she whispered, wanting more. Needing more.

Owen pulled away and smirked. “And if you don’t remember, I’ll just have the pleasure of making you fall in love with me all over again. A picnic at Gasworks. Frappuccinos on the ferry. Making love on the beach. My hands exploring every curve of your delicious body, my tongue following close behind.”

Stacie’s body temperature spiked. Maybe forgetting wouldn’t be so horrible after all. “Promise?”

“Promise,” Owen said, smiling back at her.

“So I suppose ripping your clothes off right here might be considered inappropriate behavior,” Stacie said, splaying her hands on his chest, her fingertips lightly tapping the buttons on his shirt.

“Given your current condition, I don’t think you can be held responsible,” Owen’s breath was warm on her ear. Stacie noticed that Owen was wearing button fly jeans. Her insides melted thinking about what was coming alive beneath those buttons.

She turned her head and kissed him hard on the mouth, revealing her full intentions. The bed was right there. It wouldn’t take much for them to get horizontal.

Unfortunately, Owen pulled away and looked at her, then nodded at the room.

Oh yeah, she was in a hospital room where a nurse could walk in at any moment.

“So surgery tomorrow, then?” he asked.

“Surgery tomorrow.”

Owen awoke at 6:00 the
next morning when the nurses came in to Stacie’s room to prep her for surgery. He had spent the night on the chair that folded out to a twin size bed. It was amazingly comfortable, way better than the army cots he’d spent more nights on than he could count.

Jenny had opted to go home for the night but returned around 6:30. They chatted quietly while the nurses did their thing. They hadn’t had much time to talk yesterday with Owen compartmentalizing everything in order to focus on Stacie. Now, he realized what a good friend she was to Stacie and how much he liked her too. She was going to be a great neighbor, probably even a good friend.

“Stacie says you’re a bit of a workaholic. Is the marketing world going to survive without you?”

“Probably not,” Jenny laughed. “Actually, I have a pretty great team and if there’s a problem, one of the other managers can fill in. I’m overdue for some time off.”

“You’re OK with that?”

“As long as it’s not Hunter, yeah.”

“Hunter?” Owen asked, wondering if Jenny had a boyfriend at work. Or an ex-boyfriend.

“Famous for being late on campaigns. He gets the best publicists though, to compensate for his inadequacies. I’m not sure how he got the manager position.”

“So do you have family here? Siblings? A boyfriend?” Owen asked.

“My parents are in Florida and I’m an only child. My aunt and uncle own the condo. They’re letting me live there while they travel the world.” She paused for a moment, looking at her hand and fidgeting. Owen recognized her actions. He’d often fidgeted with his ring finger, trying to get used to a ring not being there. Jenny folded her hands on her lap, inhaled a deep breath and smiled. “No boyfriend.”

Before Owen could ask if she was divorced, Dr. Kam appeared. It was just before 7:00 and he explained what would happen leading up to the surgery, during the surgery, and during post-op recovery. The surgery was going to be very long and the doctor suggested Owen and Jenny might want to go home and get some rest. They could plan to be back early in the evening. They both declined. Owen wasn’t going anywhere as long as Stacie was under the knife. Apparently, her roommate felt the same way.

The hours passed by slowly. Owen dared not leave Stacie’s hospital room, afraid a nurse would come in with news while he was gone. He’d talked to Morgan on the phone a few times. She’d offered to come over, Bryan too, but Owen didn’t think it was a good idea to have too many people around.

He felt bad about ditching his sister. She reassured him that she’d be back in a month to set up residence. Then she’d teased him by saying Bryan was taking care of all her needs. Upon calling his best friend, and threatening bodily harm, Bryan assured him that Morgan was just being Morgan and that Bryan was hands off with his best friend’s sister.

Jenny made a couple food runs, the first time to the cafeteria, where they had a Starbucks kiosk. The second time she went around the corner for some Chinese take-out and brought lunch back for the two of them. Owen was grateful, though he couldn’t stomach the Kung Pao chicken. By mid-afternoon, he settled into the chair where he had spent the night and nodded off briefly. A nurse came in just after three o’clock. Owen startled awake. “What’s wrong?” he asked, his voice hurried and stressed.

“Everything’s fine, Mr. Landry. Dr. Kam just asked me to let you know that Stacie is fine, the surgery is progressing as planned, and there is nothing to worry about. It’ll be another hour or two before Stacie is out, and then she’ll be in recovery for several hours before you can see her. You may want to go home and get some rest.”

Owen breathed a sigh of relief and frustration. He was relieved that the surgery was going well, but frustrated at how long it was taking.  “I’ll be fine right here,” he said to the nurse. “I’m not going anywhere.”

After 6:00, Dr. Kam came in. Owen was staring out the window and Jenny was dozing in the chair. They both snapped to attention when Dr. Kam said hello.

“Stacie’s fine. She’s in recovery and will be there for several hours. The intracranial bleeding was more extensive than we initially anticipated, so the surgery took longer. We managed to stop the bleeding and relieve the pressure.”

The doctor slid the chart under his arm and smiled. That must be a good sign. Surely a doctor wouldn’t smile after a long surgery if it hadn’t gone well.

“She’ll need to stay here at the hospital for several days and she’ll need lots of rest tonight. Tomorrow she should be lucid and ready for visitors. I recommend that you both go home and when you return in the morning, you should bring something for her to do…books, crosswords, knitting. Whatever will keep her from getting too bored. The TV in here is hooked up to a DVD player, so you could also bring in DVDs.”

“I want to be here when she comes in from recovery,” Owen told the doctor.

“Mr. Landry, I appreciate your concern, but even if she is awake, chances are she won’t be lucid. It really is best if you go home for the night.”

“Chances are she won’t be lucid. That means there is a chance she will be. If she’s awake and aware, I need to be here.”

“That’s your decision.” Dr. Kam turned and left.

“I’ll go home and get together some things for her. You really should go home too Owen, even just to get some sleep. You’ll need to be refreshed when she wakes up tomorrow. We wouldn’t want her seeing you in shambles.”

Owen sighed. He knew Jenny and Dr. Kam were right. He could use a shower and a bed to sleep in, but he didn’t think he would be able to sleep. “Maybe just a shower,” he said and followed Jenny out of the room.

~~~

Stacie felt like she’d drank an entire bottle of Jägermeister. Her head throbbed and she had the worst case of cottonmouth in the history of the world. She opened her mouth, smacking her tongue, trying to find moisture somewhere. Opening her eyes, she found Jenny standing at the end of her bed. The room was unfamiliar, all light pastel and clean. Not tidy clean, but sanitary clean. Stacie wanted to ask where she was but “water” was the only word she could form.

Jenny came around to the side of the bed and handed her a cup. Then she pressed a button on the side of the bed. Stacie focused and realized she was in a hospital room. She took a long drink from the cup, draining it, and handed it back to Jenny.

“More,” she barked. There was a pitcher of water sitting on the rolling table next to the bed. Jenny dutifully poured another cup.

Stacie felt a strange tingle at the back of her neck. There was also a masculine smell in the room. Spicy with a hint of bergamot. It was sexy and familiar but she couldn’t place it. Before she could figure out where it was coming from, a doctor and an entourage of nurses marched into the room.

“How are you feeling this morning, Stacie?” the doctor asked.

The water had slightly alleviated the cottonmouth, but her head still throbbed. She moved her hand up to apply pressure to her forehead, hoping that would help. She was surprised to feel a thick bandage.

“What happened?” she asked before the vision of a moose flashed through her mind and she thought of Audrey, draped over the steering wheel, her eyes open and empty. Tears filled Stacie’s eyes. “Audrey,” she said, half question, half exclamation.

“This is normal,” the doctor said in a low voice, but he hadn’t spoken to Stacie. His attention was focused on the left side of her bed. Stacie turned to see who the doctor was talking to and found a man standing in the corner. He was familiar and she knew he must be the source of the sexy masculine smell. For some reason, she couldn’t place him.

The doctor turned his attention to her. “Stacie, I’m Dr. Kam. I’m a neurosurgeon at Harborview Medical Center, in Seattle. A couple months ago, you were in a car accident. You had delayed swelling of your frontal lobe and intracranial bleeding, which has been causing you some problems lately. Yesterday we operated and corrected the problem. All of these memories should start coming back to you over the next few days. Right now, I need to take a closer look at you.”

Frontal lobe. Bleeding. Surgery. Seattle.

Her head was spinning like a disco ball. Trying to remember something, anything. Being in Seattle made sense since Jenny was there, but why was Stacie there? How long had she been there? Who was the guy in the corner with the sexy smell? Why did she feel as if she knew him? What was the tingling down the back of her neck?

She had nothing, no answers. It was like sitting down to take an exam, only she hadn’t read the book.

Dr. Kam shoved a small penlight into her line of sight and did a full range of tests, from vision to reflexes to balance. “Everything checks out fine, Stacie. How do you feel?”

“OK, I guess.” Stacie started. “I have a headache. And a strange tingling sensation down the back of my neck.” She reached her hand to the back of her neck to rub it a little, wondering if that would make the sensation stop.

Jenny laughed, drawing everyone’s attention. “Do you have something to add, Ms. Carter?” Dr. Kam asked.

Jenny had the most devious smile on her face. “The, ah, the neck tingling is normal for Stacie, under…certain circumstances.”

Stacie gave Jenny a questioning look.

“Ms. Carter?” Dr. Kam asked again.

“It’s normal, doc, really,” Jenny said.

Dr. Kam’s expression was serious. Stacie was curious too.

“Come on Jen, what is it?” Stacie urged.

Jenny smiled at her. “We call it your Owensense. Whenever Owen is around, you get a tingle down your neck.”

Stacie could feel her cheeks blush as she turned to the man in the corner. Owen. Obviously she knew him. Why couldn’t she remember?

Dr. Kam got them back on task. “Tell me about the headache, Stacie. Show me where it hurts and describe the pain.”

Stacie pointed to the part of her head that ached and described the pain as a throbbing ache. Dr. Kam explained that the pain was residual from the surgery and that a mild painkiller would help, if she wanted it. “You’re scheduled for a CT scan in a couple hours. We’ll change the bandage then too so you look a little less like a Q-tip.”

After the doctor left, Stacie turned to Owen and offered a friendly smile. “Would you excuse us for a minute?” she asked. “I really need to talk to Jenny.”

He touched her cheek with the gentlest caress as he walked by the bed. A wave of heat rushed through her body from where Owen touched her down to her fingers and toes and pooling in the most intimate region of her body. Wowza. That was something new. When was the last time Stacie had been hit with a desire like that? Had she ever?

After he left, she turned to Jenny. “What am I doing in Seattle?”

It was a long story, the accident, Stacie calling one day and asking if the invitation was still open, then showing up a week later. Stacie was shocked, and relieved, to find out she’d broken up with Greg.

Stacie thought about the man, Owen, who had been standing in the corner, looking very worried. And the way she felt when he touched her. She wanted a second dose of that medicine.

“Tell me about Owen. About this tingling.”

“How much do you want to know?” Jenny asked with a coy smile.

Stacie smiled back, reading Jenny’s expression. “Everything.”

It was quite a story. A one-night stand? Wow, that was crazy. At the same time, it was all very familiar, like a book she’d read so long ago that she couldn’t recall exactly what had happened.

“There’s some other things you need to know,” Jenny said after she gave Stacie a little time to process the story. “Greg might have hacked into your computer to spy on you. You were going to ask Owen to check it for you—he works with computers. You ended up here before you could ask him.”

Stacie was confused. “That doesn’t sound like something Greg would do. I’ll admit he can be controlling at times, but hack into my computer? That’s malicious. He’s never been malicious.”

“It doesn’t hurt to have it checked out.” Jenny offered. “And one more thing. You aren’t going to like this.”

Stacie looked at Jenny, urging her to go on.

Jenny sighed. “I think your parents might be on their way here. You called them yesterday to let them know about the surgery and told them not to come, that I’d keep them posted. I haven’t been able to reach them. I thought about the time in college when you broke your leg during a soccer game. You called your parents, told them not to come. They did anyway.”

Stacie rolled her eyes. She really didn’t want her parents there. It didn’t surprise her that she had told them not to come.

“You are their daughter, Stace. Despite how they may treat you, they still love you, and worry about you.”

Jenny had a point. Her parents always had good intentions. They wanted the best for Stacie, even if they always thought that they knew better than Stacie what was best for her.

“Do they know about Owen?” Stacie asked, knowing how much they adored Greg. They wouldn’t be accepting of a replacement.

“You told them a little about him when you called them yesterday.”

Stacie was frustrated at having no memory of any of this. To her, the car accident had happened yesterday. It had been almost two months and she didn’t remember anything that had happened since then, like breaking up with Greg. Though she was so relieved and happy that she finally had. She also didn’t remember coming to Seattle or meeting Owen or anything about him. What was strange, though, despite not remembering, she still longed to have him near her.