slapping his hands away.
“Shh,” Wade murmured, reaching into his pocket for his phone. “It’s okay. You’re going to be okay.”
“I don’t know...anything....” Her eyes rolled back in her head and she was out again. He punched 911 into the phone and checked her pulse again. Steady, if too fast. But her skin was icy to the touch. If she wasn’t already going into shock, it wouldn’t be long.
Wade shrugged off his jacket and laid it across her, tucking in the edges while he told the 911 dispatcher the situation. The injured woman made a low groaning sound, deep in her chest, but remained utterly still.
He couldn’t make out much about her in the dark, other than a general description: female, youngish, dark hair and dark eyes. There was something vaguely familiar about her, though he was pretty sure he’d never met her before.
The 911 dispatcher offered to stay on the line with him, but he told her he was going to call his cousin Aaron, a sheriff’s deputy. He lived close by and might be able to beat the paramedics there.
Aaron answered on the second ring. “What’s up, Wade?”
Wade explained what he’d stumbled onto. “Not sure what happened to her, but I think this could be a crime scene.”
“On my way,” Aaron said.
True to his word, Wade’s cousin arrived within five minutes, ahead of the paramedics, swinging a bright flashlight as he moved toward Wade through the woods. “Wade?”
“Over here!” Wade waved him over.
Aaron hiked through the underbrush with ease, his long legs eating up big chunks of real estate at a time. He carried a large blanket in one arm and had his Smith & Wesson M&P 40 in his weapon hand. Behind him, his wife, Melissa, followed in his wake, struggling to keep up with her big husband’s long strides.
Reaching Wade’s side, Aaron aimed the flashlight beam toward the woman. Her eyelids crinkled when the bright light hit them, and she groaned again as she turned her face toward the ground to block out the light.
“That’s a good sign, believe it or not,” Melissa said, crouching beside the woman. She checked her carotid pulse, just as Wade had. “Ma’am? I need to take a look at you. Are you awake?”
Wade kicked himself. Why hadn’t he been checking her over, trying to keep her awake? Had the damned Kaziri rebels shot all his good sense out of him when they nearly took off his knee?
You can’t crouch beside her. You can’t kneel. Better to let someone able-bodied take over the hero business, right?
“Wade?”
Wade looked up at his cousin, tamping down his irritation with his own weakness. “Yeah?”
“Take a look at her face.” Aaron moved the beam of the flashlight over the woman’s face again.
She had turned back toward them, some of the blood on the side of her face smeared away by the leaves on the ground, revealing more of her features.
Wade’s breath caught. “Son of a bitch.”
“It’s her, isn’t it?” Aaron asked.
Wade nodded, gazing at the pale oval face of the woman he and his family had spent the last three weeks trying to find.
Melissa looked up at them. “Who?”
“Annie Harlowe,” Wade answered. Daughter of the missing Air Force general.
Aaron looked at Wade, his expression grim. “So if she’s here, where the hell’s the general?”
Chapter Two
Annie couldn’t remember the dream, only that it had left her heart thundering in her chest and her stomach roiling with nausea. She woke to pain—in her shoulders, her wrists, her knees and especially her head, which felt as if it had been hollowed out and filled with burning agony.
For some reason, she expected to open her eyes to bright lights and chaos, but the room around her was blessedly dark, save for a faint light seeping in from the doorway several feet away. The unfamiliar bed supporting her weakened body was uncomfortable, the gloom-shrouded surroundings dull and sterile.
A shadow moved to her right, and her heart skipped a beat.
“You’re awake.” The voice was low and soft, broadened by a southern accent.
“Who are you? Where am I?”
“I’m Wade Cooper,” the shadow answered. “And you’re on the fourth floor of Chickasaw County Hospital.”
The pain made a little more sense. “How’d I get here?”
“I found you semiconscious in the woods near Gossamer Lake.”
She narrowed her eyes and instantly regretted it as agony streaked through her forehead. She lifted her hand to the aching spot and found a bandage. “What happened to me?”
“Don’t know yet,” Wade said. “Think you can handle the light?”
She wanted to say no, as she was pretty sure the last thing her throbbing brain could handle was anything bright. But she didn’t like talking to a shadow, so she said, “Yes.”
He rose to his feet and turned on a light over the bed. After the initial shock, her eyes adjusted quickly to the mercifully dim light and the headache settled into bearable territory. Her visitor sat down, giving her a better look at him. Early thirties, she guessed. Lean and fit, with broad shoulders and a pugnaciously masculine jaw. In the low light, his eyes looked coal-black and mysterious, but his calm, neutral expression suggested her mind was playing tricks on her.
“You okay?” he asked.
“I think so.” She noted his clothing—jeans and a green plaid shirt under a faded denim jacket. “You’re not a doctor.”
He smiled, flashing a set of straight white teeth. “No ma’am, I’m not.”
“Where did you say I am, Chickasaw County? In Georgia?” She couldn’t remember if there was a Chickasaw County in Georgia. She seemed to have a lot of gaps in her memory all of a sudden.
“Chickasaw County, Alabama,” he corrected.
“Alabama?” She frowned, the movement sending another dart of pain through her injured scalp. What the hell was she doing in Alabama?
“You don’t remember how you got here?”
Before she could answer the question, the door to the hospital room opened and a man in green surgical scrubs entered, holding a chart. His eyes widened with surprise when they met hers. “You’re awake.” He glanced at Wade. “And you have a visitor,” he added, his tone disapproving. “Well past visiting hours.”
Wade looked briefly sheepish but didn’t move. “I didn’t want her to wake up in the hospital all alone.”
Annie slanted a quick look at him, surprised by the kindness in his voice. She worked in Washington, D.C., where random acts of kindness weren’t exactly the norm, at least not in the circles in which she ran.
“Nice of you,” the doctor said without much sincerity in his clipped tone. “But I need to examine my patient now.”
Wade started moving toward the door. For the first time, Annie saw that he walked with a visible limp.
“Wait,” she said as he reached the exit.
He turned in the doorway, his powerful shoulders and lean hips silhouetted by the light from the corridor. Built like a cowboy, she thought, her dry lips curving at the notion. “Yeah?” he said.
“Are you leaving? The hospital, I mean.” Hating the neediness she heard in her voice, she told herself she’d be better off if he said yes.
“No,