Out of the Storm (Buckhorn, Montana #1) - B.J. Daniels Page 0,104
back to her. For some reason, she seemed to think that he’d saved her life.
Each time he woke, she was gone. He would beg someone to tell him what had happened to him. “I need to know,” he told the nurses and doctor. “I keep having these crazy dreams.”
The doctor would explain about the concussion but little more. “Give your brain time to heal. More might come back with time as your brain fills in the blank spots.”
Time. He felt confused, anxious and scared. There were moments when he couldn’t remember his name, and he would panic. The doctor kept telling him to be patient.
He was relieved almost to tears when he recognized a familiar face and could even put a name to it. “Earl Ray,” he said. “I can’t remember—”
“It’s all right,” the older man said, hurrying to his bedside. “Don’t try. It’s so good to see you awake. The doctor said you’re doing amazing, and in time—”
“In time,” he said with disgust. “Why do I feel like there’s something that can’t wait?” He met Earl Ray’s gaze. “I keep having these dreams about a woman with green eyes. I feel like I...know her. Like I have these memories...” He shook his head in frustration. “I know she probably doesn’t exist, but I feel like I have to get to her. Does that make any sense?”
Earl Ray chuckled. “Oh, she exists all right, my friend. She’s an amazing woman. I’ll tell you all about her.” He pulled up a chair next to the hospital bed. “Her name is Kate. You call her Katie. She lost her husband twenty years ago, but I’m getting ahead of myself. The best part of the story begins in Buckhorn, Montana, the day Katie’s car broke down in the middle of a snowstorm.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
THE TEXAS SUN beat down relentlessly on the patio. Kate watched the automatic sprinklers come on to water the flowers she’d planted around the pool. Everything was in bloom—a riot of colors next to the shimmering turquoise of the water in the pool. A warm breeze stirred the leaves on the oak trees outside the fence that surrounded her house.
After her daughters had left home, she’d often thought about selling the house. Now she was so glad that she hadn’t. It was too large for her alone, and yet she loved her yard, especially the wild array of plants and flowers she had growing around the pool.
She’d never thought of herself as having a green thumb, far from it. But since arriving back in Texas, she’d been at loose ends. Winter had left the pool area looking drab. She’d yearned for color after all that winter white in Montana. Sometimes she thought about those days in Buckhorn when it snowed day and night and she’d thought it would never end. She thought about how quiet the snow made the world, how pure and clean it had looked and felt. She thought about the cold stillness and how her breath had come out in frosty puffs.
While she’d never been that cold in her life, she had only good memories of Buckhorn. She thought often of Jon Harper, knowing that he was gone. And as Earl Ray often reminded her when he called, Jon would never be back. She loved getting reports from Buckhorn via Earl Ray. Spring had come, the snow had melted and the snowbirds were returning to open homes and shops. The Closed for the Winter signs were coming down. The fields were greening up, and the air smelled of new growth and pine, he’d told her.
Bessie would be opening her bakery at the edge of town Memorial Day weekend—the official start of tourist season. “You never got to try her fried pies. They are a little piece of heaven,” Earl Ray said.
She’d asked him if he was watching his diet after his heart attack.
“I don’t have to. Bessie watches it for me,” he said with a laugh. “She has me eating fruits and vegetables with every meal.”
Kate had smiled. “You sound good.” She desperately wanted to ask about Danny but didn’t because the news was always the same. He was recovering. The doctors were encouraged by his progress.
She didn’t need to ask how Bessie was doing. She could hear it in Earl Ray’s voice. The two had gotten closer. She listened as he talked, telling her about people she’d met at the funeral. Sharing the latest gossip. A few names she could put faces to, others not so much.