Chapter Three #2
“We are so lucky,” she said, searching for the positive in this unholy mess. “Amnesia is a side effect of Rohypnol, but we’ll have to come up with a good story to tell him as to what happened.”
Adam thrust his hands in the air. “Don’t look at me. My job is done. I got him here. Coming up with explanations is Benny’s problem, not mine.”
Benny shuffled through the examination room door. “What’s my problem?” He spotted the unconscious form slumped on the table.
Belle had rolled Beau to his side in case he became sick to his stomach and drool dampened the paper liner under his chin.
“Is this our country singer?”
Country singer, prisoner…
“Adam drugged him,” Belle said.
Benny gave Adam a single short nod of approval. “You used the Rohypnol, right?”
Belle couldn’t believe this was happening. “You knew about this? This is kidnapping we’re talking about.”
Benny and Adam both looked at her as if she were the one who’d taken leave of her senses.
“We have a signed contract with his agent,” Benny said patiently, as if she were slow.
“We paid a fortune for his performance. Leon Schmidt warned us that he might be less than cooperative, but one of the contract’s clauses is that we’re required to keep him here for the full two months while he recovers from his mental health problems, and we’re to teach him how to be a cowboy.
We agreed to provide him with a personal physician, too. ”
On the surface that sounded so harmless, but if one dug a bit deeper, it became pretty shady.
“I’m not a mental health professional,” she said.
“Right now, he needs a GP more than a psychiatrist,” Adam said.
And whose fault was that?
Belle rubbed her temples, double-checking her morality meter. She’d known from the outset that her position in Burning Scrub came with quirks along with its perks. Plus, she really liked everyone here. These were decent, hard-working people, despite their questionable problem-solving skills.
On the other hand, Beau Jones was probably a good person, too.
His singing voice was lovely, and from what little she’d seen of him on television, he was always nice to his fans.
But really—what had he ever done for anyone else, other than win a reality contest with a song written by another artist?
And had she really just tried to justify her own part in a kidnapping? Her morality meter’s needle nose-dived a notch.
Benny, who had no internal struggles with morality that she’d ever noticed, bent his patchy white head over Beau Jones’s comatose form to study his face through near-sighted eyes that he refused to correct. Glasses were for old people. “How long do you think he’ll be out?”
“It’s hard to say.” Belle turned to Adam. “How much Rohypnol did you give him, and when?” Please say one milligram.
“Four milligrams, about three hours ago. He’s a big boy.”
The basketball game resumed in her chest. They used her skull as a backboard.
Beau was maybe six feet and three or four inches tall, and she guessed about one hundred and ninety pounds.
While he looked healthy enough—all things considered—she didn’t believe his personal trainer was earning his or her pay.
Four milligrams wouldn’t kill him, but it wouldn’t be the highlight of his day when he came around, either.
She nudged the trash can closer to the side of the examining table with her foot in case he began to throw up.
“Probably another eighteen to twenty-four hours,” she said.
“Perfect.” Benny clapped his bony hands together, then gave his palms a brisk polish. “We’re going to tell him he ate something bad on the plane.”
“They don’t serve food on domestic flights anymore,” Adam said.
“Are you kidding me? For the money we paid? What is this country coming to?” Benny’s chin puckered in thought as he worked out a new angle. “We’ll just say it was food poisoning and leave it at that. We won’t say where he got it. We aren’t responsible for what happened to him before he got here.”
He said it with such a straight face…
“Didn’t we just kidnap him?” Belle worked up the temerity to ask.
“I don’t know why you keep saying that.”
She didn’t, either, because she might as well be talking to herself, for all the impact it made, but Benny’s frown was enough to make her stop asking questions.
“It’s settled, then,” he said. “We’ll move him into a bed in the jail while he sleeps it off. Belle, he’s your responsibility until he wakes up. Once he feels more like himself, we’ll review the terms of our contract with him.”
The two men left to go get the jail ready. Since she couldn’t very well leave the patient alone on the examination table for fear he’d roll off, or maybe choke on his own vomit, she pulled up a chair and sat next to him.
Asleep, relaxed, he looked … every one of his thirty-two years.
The bruising and scrapes further labeled him as a victim of assault.
The pale, skinny scar on the bridge of his slightly bent nose was an old one—thank heavens.
It looked as if the skin had been split, rather than cut, suggesting he’d been struck by a high-speed projectile.
Maybe a hockey puck or a baseball. Or a fist.
His dark blond hair was shaggy and due for a trim, but thick enough that premature balding wasn’t likely a worry. He had a scuff of darker blond hair on his square jaw and above his full upper lip.
The black Motorhead T-shirt seemed out of place, as did the black denim jeans and the black leather motorcycle boots. The faded T-shirt looked old and squeezed his biceps and chest as if he’d bought it when he was twenty pounds lighter and several years younger.
Maybe the clothes were a disguise. If so, it was a good one. He definitely didn’t look like a country music star.
He did, however, look like Beau Jones. So as far as hiding his true identity went, if that was his goal, then he got a fail. The facts were irrefutable. Beau Jones was here. In real life. In her clinic.
She had no reason to panic. No reason to believe she was an accessory to kidnapping after the fact. No reason to think she might go to prison. They’d only drugged him. They’d only brought him here against his will. They’d only decided to lock him up until they could review their contract with him.
No, she had nothing to worry about.
This didn’t have the hallmarks of a kidnapping at all.
*
Beau
Beau rolled to the edge of the bed and put the bucket someone had thoughtfully positioned next to his head to good use.
“Jesus Christ.” He moaned once his stomach was empty and the dry heaves had abated. He flipped onto his back and flung an arm over his eyes. “What the hell was I drinking?”
Normally, he didn’t drink when out in public, meaning Leon was likely responsible for the monumental hangover tapdancing inside his skull.
He couldn’t recall anything about the party he’d attended, but by the feel of his head and the state of his guts, it must have been stellar.
Even his left pinky hurt. And his skin itched.
He opened his eyes. The low, wood-beamed ceiling was unfamiliar. Turning his head hurt like a sonofabitch, but a quick check said the log walls were unrecognizable, too. The iron bars on the door were the real stumper, though.
As was the angel on the other side of the door, eyeballing him from a rickety wooden chair that looked like something someone’s squirrelly great-uncle slapped together from scraps and called art.
She had medium brown hair piled on top of her head and the prettiest pair of long-lashed eyes he’d ever seen. Right now, her eyes appeared anxious.
She rose from the chair. The heavy gray skirt and ugly button-up boots she wore didn’t detract from her looks in the least. They merely called her taste into question.
Fine-boned, slender fingers gripped the iron bars of the cell door.
A stethoscope hung round her neck. Parts of the past were beginning to manifest. He’d been kidnapped—by Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman, it would appear.
One more reason why he was so done with beautiful women. They all reeked of crazy.
The gray woolen blanket thoughtfully draped over him tumbled aside.
Its coarse fabric and the fact that he wasn’t wearing any pants explained why his skin was so itchy.
That and whatever had been stuffed into the mattress.
He sat up and swung his feet to the floor—which was raw wood—and the pain in his ankle shot to his thigh.
He clutched at the edge of his cot, which aggravated the finger, and waited a second for the room to stop spinning.
She still hadn’t spoken. He was pretty sure Stephen King had written a book about this. If she came at him with a needle, he planned to take action.
“Maybe you can fill in some blanks for me,” he said, taking a casual, friendly approach so she wouldn’t see how creeped out he was. “The last thing I remember, I was getting off a plane in Butte, Montana. The rest is a blur.” Open the door, sweetheart.
He tried to stand up. When he went to put weight on his ankle, he nearly passed out.
Her hand flew to her throat. “You need to keep that ankle elevated,” she said with a gentle hint of reproof.
No. He needed to figure out how a simple flight had gone sideways. All he’d had to do was arrive in Montana and disappear, preferably to somewhere with room service. “Where am I?”
A slight hesitation. “The Ride No More Ranch.” Her eyes skated away.
The location was right. Her delivery, however, was not reassuring.
“I’d like to speak to the owner,” he said.
“He’s not available right now.”
“Then get me the foreman.”
“He’s busy.”
They could play this game all day if he didn’t stop it. “And who are you, exactly?”
Her fingers toyed with the high collar of her hideous blouse, as if she wasn’t quite sure how to answer. “I’m…”
His day—his week—wasn’t off to a great start, and his patience had traipsed off in search of his memory. “It’s not a hard question. You must have a name.”
“Belle.”
He started to laugh.
A spark of irritation flashed into her eyes. “What’s so funny?”
“That’s the best alias you could come up with?”
A frown disrupted the perfect bridge of her perfect nose.
Perfect red lips pressed into a straight, perfect line. “It’s Annabelle, Beauregard. Belle for short.”
And … he’d just flubbed up the friendly approach.
He’d best get things back on track. “It’s just Beau.
Beauregard was my grandpa from southern Tennessee.
” He flashed his winning-female-fans-over smile as he repeated the rumor his agent had started.
His real grandpa couldn’t find Tennessee on a map.
“My apologies, Belle. I guess that makes me the beast in this story. Except in the Disney version, we’d be on opposite sides of this door.
Mind telling me what the hell is going on here? ”
“Your agent arranged for you to come to the Ride No More Ranch because of your recent mental health issues.” Pity eased itself into her tone.
“You had an … incident at the airport yesterday. A minor setback. You became violent and security had to subdue you, and you sustained a few minor injuries. A slight concussion, a broken finger, and a sprained ankle.”
His mental health issues, huh? Leon had some serious explaining to do. Then, Beau would fire him. He wished he could recall exactly what had happened at the airport to help strengthen his case.
“Where did this mother of all hangovers come from, Doctor Belle?” he asked.
She didn’t play with the stethoscope, just her collar, suggesting the medical instrument was the more natural part of her outfit. She might be an actual doctor, at that.
“Unfortunately, they had to sedate you. The aftereffects can be disconcerting, especially when coupled with food poisoning, a mild concussion, and a … a fragile mind.”
Fragile?
The only things fragile about any part of him were his splitting skull and wonky eyesight, thanks to the spinning circular chainsaw blade blinding his vision.
Maybe his swirling stomach, too. And the broken finger.
Plus, an ankle that resembled a punctured basketball, partially deflated. So worse for wear, yes.
But fragile?
He hoped Leon caught Montezuma’s revenge on his luxury vacation for spreading that lie.
He searched for a bright side to this situation and found it.
“I was supposed to work for my keep while I’m here.
Sadly, since I won’t be in any shape for physical labor for the foreseeable future, whatever deal Leon struck with the ranch will have to be canceled.
Let me out of here, give me my belongings, and call me a cab.
Leon can handle any paperwork involved.”
She chewed on her lip. “I don’t know anything about any paperwork, or what deals you might have with the ranch. I’m a doctor. You’re my patient. Besides, after yesterday’s … incident, I think you’re on a no-fly list.”
She had to be the worst liar he’d ever met. His ex-wife would put her to shame, and Jen wasn’t very good at it, either.
He folded his arms, staggered a step, and called her on it. “If you’re my doctor, you should be able to gain access to my medical files. Those files should contain all the information about the state of my mental health required to get me on a plane to New York.”
Her fingers dropped from the collar of her dress to its skirt, which she then alternately crumpled and smoothed.
“I’m not a mental health professional. I’m mainly interested in your physical injuries,” she said.
“I’ll need to examine you before any decisions can be reached about your fitness for travel, and I don’t have a key for the lock. You’ll have to wait for—”
The outer door opened, cutting her off. The bright glare of daylight made Beau wince. The chainsaw in his vision shifted from the left eye to the right, cutting a hole in his head in its wake, so that all he could make out was the blurry, dark silhouette of a man.
“I see the patient’s awake.”
The gritty voice dredged pieces of memory from the abyss in Beau’s brain. An empty parking lot. An unmarked van. The sense—far too late—that all wasn’t right.
“You!” he snarled, then lunged for the bars of the cell.