“If not for you I wouldn’t be here, Mallory.”

“Just doing my job.” She shifted uncomfortably. Joe was too close.

“I wasn’t talking about you making me live.”

“Then what?”

“If not for you, I wouldn’t have a reason to live.” Joe moved closer. “I know I’ve made mistakes. More than a man’s entitled to make in a lifetime. I won’t ask you to overlook the past. But is there any way you could bring yourself to think about the future instead?”

Mallory gulped to loosen the knot in her larynx. His gentle touch had ignited a riot of emotions inside her. Longing, desire, joy and sadness, exploding in turn like a string of firecrackers. Her resistance evaporated, and she leaned toward him, pulled by a need stronger than any she’d ever known.

Mallory sighed in resignation as Joe’s lips found hers. She was only human. How could she be expected to fight a force as powerful as fate?

Dear Reader,

If you’re like me, you can’t get enough heartwarming love stories and real-life fairy tales that end happily ever after. You’ll find what you need and so much more with Silhouette Romance each month.

This month you’re in for an extra treat. Bestselling author Susan Meier kicks off MARRYING THE BOSS’S DAUGHTER—the brand-new six-book series written exclusively for Silhouette Romance. In this launch title, Love, Your Secret Admirer (#1684), our favorite matchmaking heiress helps a naive secretary snare her boss’s attention with an eye-catching makeover.

A sexy rancher discovers love and the son he never knew, when he matches wits with a beautiful teacher, in What a Woman Should Know (#1685) by Cara Colter. And a not-so plain Jane captures a royal heart, in To Kiss a Sheik (#1686) by Teresa Southwick, the second of three titles in her sultry DESERT BRIDES miniseries.

Debrah Morris brings you a love story of two lifetimes, in When Lightning Strikes Twice (#1687), the newest paranormal love story in the SOULMATES series. And sparks sizzle between an innocent curator—with a big secret—and the town’s new lawman, in Ransom (#1688) by Diane Pershing. Will a seamstress’s new beau still love her when he learns she is an undercover heiress? Find out in The Bridal Chronicles (#1689) by Lissa Manley.

Be my guest and feed your need for tender and lighthearted romance with all six of this month’s great new love stories from Silhouette Romance.

Enjoy!

Mavis C. Allen

Associate Senior Editor, Silhouette Romance

When Lightning Strikes Twice

Soulmates

Debrah Morris

www.millsandboon.co.uk

For my critique partner, Diana Ball,

who made a suggestion that led to an idea

that created a character that resulted in a book.

Thank you for the inspiration and

for sharing your flashlight when the journey gets dark.

Books by Debrah Morris

Silhouette Romance

A Girl, a Guy and a Lullaby #1549

That Maddening Man #1597

Tutoring Tucker #1670

When Lightning Strikes Twice #1687

DEBRAH MORRIS

Before embarking on a solo writing career, Debrah Morris coauthored over twenty romance novels as one half of the Pepper Adams/Joanna Jordan writing team. She has changed careers several times in her life, but much prefers writing to working.

Readers may contact her via her Web site: www.debrahmorris.com.

INTEROFFICE MEMO

To: | Celestian, Heavenly Air Traffic Controller
From: | A Texas Ranger Destined To Reunite with His Soulmate
Date: | Right Now
Re: | Simple Request

Dear C—

Given that I’m a straggler up here on a fluffy cloud, I’d really like to return to earth and somehow occupy a body so that I can be reunited with my love, Dr. Mallory Peterson. I mean, I’m not really doing anything up here. As a Texas Ranger, I see my work isn’t needed in heaven.

So, whaddya say?

Eternally,

A Man in Love

Contents

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Epilogue

Prologue

“Send me to heaven, or send me to hell. Just get me out of here!”

“Keep your voice down.” As time-out monitor, Celestian had to maintain his composure at all times, but even a saint’s serenity wasn’t safe around Will Pendleton’s troublesome spirit. Without ever making it past Reception, he had managed to get himself deemed Unfit for Return and to get Celestian busted down to a position devoid of prestige.

“I had no idea being dead could be so danged boring.” The restless soul paced the confines of the holding area.

“You’re here to learn acceptance, and you’re stuck until you do.”

“All right, then. I accept. I’m ready to move on. I’ll do whatever it takes. Now get me out of this nowhere place. Molly has been reborn, and I miss her.” Despair tempered his belligerence. “I gotta know. Will I ever return to her?”

“In time.” Celestian felt sorry for Pendleton, even if he was a pain in the astral. No one liked to see soul mates separated.

“I ain’t got a lot of time, bub. If I was to go back now, I’d have to start out as a baby. What kind of fool plan is that?”

“One that works just fine for us, thank you.”

“But Molly’s already grown. I don’t want her pinning my drawers.

“Time is irrelevant.”

“Maybe here in limbo land. But dang it, I’ve been cooling my heels in this milky joint for a hundred years. A hundred years today!”

“Happy anniversary. Please take your seat.” Had it only been a century? Seemed longer. Time didn’t fly when you weren’t having fun.

“No! I ain’t taking my seat. I’ve been sitting for a century. I need wrongs to right and laws to serve. I should be on earth catching crooks and protecting the innocent, not here jawing with a yahoo like you.”

Celestian rolled his eyes. Just because Pendleton’s destiny was to stand up for truth, justice and honor, didn’t mean he had to be so self-righteous about it.

Due to his untimely end as a Texas Ranger, the warrior spirit had yet to complete his cosmic cycle. He had evolved through many lifetimes, serving variously as village constable, musketeer, palace guard, crusading knight and tribal warrior, but as Will Pendleton, he had arrived too soon, leaving unfinished business on earth.

The Ranger leaned across the desk, invading space that was not his. “I feel useless. Give me something to do.” His conversational style hadn’t improved much. He’d arrived making demands and was still doing so ten decades later. “I ain’t used to living in a sitting position.”

Celestian smiled. “Technically, you’re no longer living at all.”

An angry, insubstantial fist slammed onto the desk without disturbing the tranquility of the white, soundless room. “I’m dead because you made a mistake, you pea-brained fool.”

“You are not dead,” Celestian corrected. “You are currently not living.”

He snorted. “Pardon the hell outta me if I can’t appreciate the difference.”

“You are not living because you slipped your mortal coil. You know that.”

“I know all right. I know my mortal coil got a decent burial back in Slapdown in 1903. I know the whole town mourned my passing, and some of my compadres even sobbed at my graveside. I know the woman I was meant to spend my life with died a sad and lonely old spinster because you yanked me back before my time. That’s what I know.”

“Spirits live forever. Mortal coils decline and die. Maybe you weren’t listening the first ten thousand times I explained the transmutation process.” Celestian concealed his irritation. The Boss frowned on displays of human emotions. Conversations between routing reps and detainees were often recorded and assessed for quality assurance.

Backsliding was duly noted during evolvement reviews. Since being demoted to time-out monitor, Celestian had been cited more than once for acting too human. It wasn’t his fault. Pendleton could provoke a senior-level saint.

The situation had begun innocently enough. Less than a day after Celestian began working in the Department of Natural Forces, Pendleton had alighted in Reception yelling about how he’d been hot on the earthbound trail of a cold-blooded killer. Just when he had the miscreant in his sights, a lightning bolt had arrowed out of a cloudless sky and ended his life.

That assessment was a bit off. It was actually the desperado who had gotten the drop on the lawman. An Emergency Order to Intercede had been fired down to the department, and Celestian had dispatched a spear of lightning on the Ranger’s behalf. New to the job, he’d miscalculated both the trajectory and heaven to earth time differential.

Misfiring lightning bolts was bad enough, but Celestian’s real mistake had been admitting his error. News that the shocking end had been intended for the bad man only fired Pendleton’s anger. Seems he’d been snatched from the arms of his true love three days before their wedding.

In the end, failure to accept his unscheduled death had earned him a U.F.R. designation and a trip to the cooler. Bungling his very first assignment had earned Celestian a demotion.

“I want to go back.” Pendleton paced like a caged beast. “There must be a way for me and Molly to be together.” He slammed his fist into his palm, and the silence only increased his frustration. “Didn’t you mention once that there’s an alternate way to return?”

“If the opportunity arose, I suppose you could go back as a walk-in.” Celestian heaved a sigh he hoped wasn’t too human. “But transmutation is beyond my abilities. I’m not certified in the latest technology.”

The Ranger wheeled around. “A walk-in? What’s that?”

“Sometimes when a mortal coil expires, and the resident spirit alights, another can assume the body and live out its natural life. If the M.C. is revived in time. It’s a simple transference procedure but only used in emergencies.”

“I want to do it. Send me back. Now!”

Celestian scoffed. “It’s not that simple. First, we need an appropriate M.C. You don’t want to return to your beloved as a cockroach do you?”

“No. But there is a way we can be together? So we can live as we were meant to do before you made a hash of everything?”

He sounded so sad, so hopeful that Celestian couldn’t tell him the odds against such a transfer. Pendleton’s soul mate was currently living her last earthly life during which she would fulfill her destiny. At demise, her spirit would retire. She and the Ranger, lovers in many lifetimes, would spend eternity apart. An injustice that might have broken Celestian’s heart, if he still had one to break.

“There may be a way. But it’s a long shot. Transference only works if an appropriate coil becomes available at the right moment in the precise geographical location. The resident spirit must alight before the coil is revived. The chances of that happening are—”

“What? A million to one?” There he went again, being hopeful.

“At least. The paperwork’s a killer. It has to be completed in triplicate and approved—”

“I’m willing to do anything, be anybody, for the chance to go back.”

Celestian reluctantly keyed in the routing request. Fat chance, but miracles had been known to happen. A miracle was exactly what the lovesick Ranger needed.

No point telling him the real odds. That he had about as much chance of returning to his true love in her lifetime as he had of being struck by lightning.

Again.

Chapter One

A whopper of a west Texas thunderstorm was headed her way.

The hair on the back of Dr. Mallory Peterson’s neck prickled the instant she stepped out the back door of the Western Plains Medical Clinic. The severe weather front, predicted to move in at midnight, had arrived ahead of schedule. Heavy black clouds boiled across the sky, and the sharp scent of rain tingled in her nostrils. She squinted in the unnatural gloom of an unseasonably hot and humid early May evening. No doubt about it. Trouble was brewing.

A stiff wind yanked the heavy door from her hands and slammed it shut with a bang. Blue-white lightning flickered on the horizon, followed by the rumble of distant thunder. She shivered, unsure whether the chill was due to dropping temperatures or a premonition of disaster.

After ten on-her-feet hours caring for a steady stream of patients, she was ready for a quiet Friday night alone with a good book and a bag of microwave popcorn. A big bag. With extra butter. She’d earned a treat. Not just for today, but also for every grueling shift she’d worked since accepting the position last autumn.

Clutching her medical bag, Mallory locked the deadbolt. If she got a move on, she could make it up the hill before the rain hit. Free living quarters close to the clinic was one of the perks of being the only physician in Slapdown. A native Texan who’d cut her teeth on cyclones, she had no qualms about riding out a little bad weather in a double-wide.

Yet, she couldn’t shake the feeling that all hell was about to break loose.

She glanced over the fence dividing the parking lot from the property next door. She’d slaved all spring to keep her lawn and flower beds alive in the unseasonable heat. By what freak of horticultural nature did her neighbor’s straggling patch of monster grass and gargantuan weeds grow so abundantly?

Neighbor? Squatter was more like it. The insolent, ill-mannered oaf did not pay his too-kind landlord a dollar’s worth of rent. How many times had she told Brindon Tucker that helping a lazy down-and-out bum like Joe Mitchum exceeded the limits of human generosity? Unfortunately, her longtime friend was a big-hearted guy who looked for the best in people.

What he saw in Mitchum was beyond her. Texas was filled with good ole boys, but Joe wasn’t one of them. After being thrown out of his manufactured home by a woman smart enough to finally divorce him, the shiftless ne’er-do-well had moved into a ratty, forty-year-old travel trailer he’d rescued from the salvage yard. Mere moments before it was scheduled to be flattened into a cube the size of a 29-inch television from the looks of it.

Aside from a few female tavern dwellers whose judgment was obviously impaired by frequent applications of hair bleach, his only regular companions were a pack of mangy dogs. None of which had ever had a bath, received a rabies vaccination or seen the inside of a vet’s office.

Which only proved the adage, “No man ever sinks so low that a dog or a woman won’t take up with him.”

Pumped up by righteous indignation, Mallory ignored the approaching storm and her unsettling undercurrent of misgiving. She glared at the rusting car bodies and heaps of scrap metal. How had Mitchum managed to accumulate such an impressive collection of junk in the few short months he’d lived there? The place was a scandal and a danger to community health. It was a veritable wonderland of tetanus just waiting for an unsuspecting victim to stumble and puncture something. She shuddered at the thought of the chiggers, toxic ticks and poisonous snakes lurking in the overgrown brush.

She’d lodged numerous official complaints about the eyesore on the clinic’s behalf. The citizens of Slapdown subscribed to a “live and let live” policy, but that hadn’t stopped her from trying to convince the town council to issue a citation. Warnings hadn’t worked. Maybe if they made it official and ordered Mitchum to clean up the place, haul off his junk and mow the offending vegetation, things would change.

Oh, wait. Something had changed. Another gutted auto hulk had been added to the landscape. According to the mayor’s wife from whose shoulder Mallory had removed a questionable mole this afternoon, the lazy redneck had laughed in response to the last warning.

“Sure thang,” he’d said. “Soon’s I get around to it, I’ll have the place lookin’ fresh and dewy as The First Lady’s rose garden.”

The heavy clouds squeezed out a few fat raindrops, which practically bounced off the hard, dry ground. Mallory bolted for home, jogging over the well-tended clinic grounds where flowers bloomed in color-coded symmetry and grass was not permitted to grow longer than three inches. She glanced up to track the storm, and a disturbing sight stopped her in her tracks.

Joe Mitchum was perched atop a utility pole on the clinic side of the fence. Dressed in scruffy jeans and a T-shirt, he looked grungy even from a distance. His precarious position was loosely secured by a makeshift lineman’s harness. She had never mistaken him for a genius, but lightning was flashing, and the man was clinging to the highest object in an otherwise open area. Tampering with electrical wires.

Somewhere a village was missing its idiot.

The wind kicked up as she dashed across the parking lot. She stopped at the bottom of the pole and looked up. Rain stung her face like liquid needles. “Hey! What do you think you’re doing up there?”

“Borrowing a little juice. Power’s out.” Mitchum grinned down at her. He had an annoyingly wide smile that revealed naturally straight, white teeth. Had to be natural. No way did orthodontia fit into his unemployed slacker budget. Heck, the four-syllable word wouldn’t fit into his caveman vocabulary.

As far as she knew, there had been no power outages in the area. Mitchum’s electricity had probably been cut off due to failure to pay. “Are you crazy? Or just plain stupid?”

“I’m a wrestling fan,” he called over the wind. “Wanna come over and watch the WWF with me tonight? You can bring a six-pack.”

What a waste of decent looks and bulging muscles. While he could be creepily charming at times, she’d rather break both her thumbs than set foot in his tumbledown, flea-infested trailer shack. “In case you haven’t noticed, there’s a storm rolling in.”

“Better get inside then. You’re so sweet, Doc, the rain might melt you.”

A few ginger-colored curls had escaped the ponytail elastic securing her unruly mop. She pushed an errant strand of wet hair out of her eyes. “I realize Mr. Hardy flunked you out of physics class, but are you at all familiar with the basics of electrical conduction?”

“Yep. Electricity makes the world go around. Or does love do that?”

“You’re hugging a lightning rod there, Einstein.” Mitchum had been two grades ahead of Mallory throughout junior high and high school. She’d finished at the top of her class, earned a full college scholarship, gone on to graduate summa cum laude from Baylor Medical School.

Joe had dropped out a month before his own high school commencement for reasons known only to his unambitious self. In the twelve years since, he’d accomplished nothing noteworthy, nor done anything even remotely useful. Unless you counted his career as the poster child for brainless wonders.

Then there was his precocious three-year-old daughter, Chloe. Mallory recalled the adorable preschooler from a recent clinic visit. Mitchum’s ex-wife Brandy had recently moved to a neighboring town to live with her parents but continued to bring her child to the clinic. She was doing an admirable job of raising Chloe, but the little girl deserved more than the paltry child support Joe managed to scrape together each month, and occasional court-mandated visits.

While he’d never been caught committing a crime, Mitchum had no visible means of support. He called himself a mechanic and sported the dirty fingernails to prove it, but Mallory had never met anyone whose car he had actually repaired. Judging from the automotive debris littering his yard, he was more adept at taking them apart than he was at putting them back together.

“You’d better shinny down that pole,” she called up to him. Unless you have a burning desire to be a fried hick on a stick.

“Don’t get your panties in a knot, Doc.” He pulled the steel spike strapped to his boot out of the pole and lowered it a notch. Repeating the move with the other foot, he started down. “I’m done.”

So was she. Her hair was soaked, and she was cold. If the bozo wanted to risk electrocution in order to watch half-naked overweight men throw chairs at each other, who was she to question his choice of entertainment? Joe Mitchum wasn’t worth catching pneumonia, and she had a date with some hot buttery popcorn.

She turned and stalked away. Tomorrow she’d have a little chat with Nate Egan, the county sheriff. Texas hadn’t passed any laws against being a dumb jerk, but bootlegging power was definitely illegal.

She was halfway across the parking lot when a bright spear of lightning knifed to earth, followed by a deafening boom of thunder. The distinctively pungent odor of ozone assaulted her nostrils, and her scalp tingled as the super-charged air lifted her hair. Heart racing, she wheeled around and gasped. Popping, crackling flames erupted from the reduction transformer atop the utility pole. A shower of sparks, like a miniature fireworks display, cascaded to the ground and rained upon the still, silent body of Joe Mitchum.

With no thought for her own safety, Mallory surged into doctor mode and rushed to the fallen man’s side. Kneeling beside him, she immediately assessed his condition. Eyes closed, skin pale beneath a dark three-day growth of beard, he lay motionless as drops of rain splashed onto his face. She checked his airway and palpated his carotid for a pulse, silently willing him not to die.

His shirt and jeans were tattered, but he didn’t appear to be burned. The bolt of lightning had probably not struck him directly. More likely, the current had zinged down the pole, conducting a charge through the steel spikes attached to his boots. Still, he wasn’t breathing, and the electrical shock had stopped his heart.

She crouched beside him, punched 9-1-1 into the cell phone clipped to the waistband of her slacks and ordered the dispatcher to send an ambulance from the hospital in Midland. It would not arrive for at least fifteen minutes, and she couldn’t afford to waste another second. Just as she initiated cardiopulmonary resuscitation, the clouds opened up, and a cold rain poured onto her and the man whose life was now in her shaking hands.

She pinched his nostrils shut and sealing her lips firmly over his, administered a series of life-giving breaths. Under normal circumstances, she never would have allowed their lips to touch, but nothing was normal now. When she determined he still wasn’t breathing, she locked the fingers of her hands together and delivered the rhythmic chest compressions needed to keep his heart beating and blood flowing. An average human brain could survive only three or four minutes of oxygen deprivation, but this was no average man.

Joe Mitchum couldn’t afford to lose any brain cells.

Fifteen compressions, two breaths. Mallory performed the cycle over and over. After four unbelievably long minutes, she heard him gasp in a breath. Color gradually seeped back into his face, but she still couldn’t detect a pulse.

“Come on back, Mitchum.” Mouth-to-mouth was no longer required, so she straddled her patient for better leverage. The change of position gave her tired arms a respite. Counting aloud, she rocked forward with each cycle of compressions. Keep breathing, you stupid son of…don’t die on me. Being only human, it occurred to her that his death would be no great loss to the world. In fact, his untimely end might have been ordained by a higher power.

The thought shocked and sickened her. What was she thinking? She was a doctor who’d sworn an oath to save lives, no matter how wasted that life might be. And what about little Chloe? The child needed a father. The poor kid had the rotten luck to be stuck with a lousy one, but Joe was only thirty years old. He still had time to turn his life around and make something of himself.

If he lived.

“Come back to me, dammit.” Grimly determined and focused on her task, Mallory lost track of time as the rain pelted down, soaking her cotton blouse and khaki slacks, and plastering her hair against her head. She’d never administered one-man CPR in a real life-or-death situation, and the extended effort tightened her muscles into hot knots. She sighed with relief when the shrieking ambulance siren wailed in the distance.

The unconscious man probably couldn’t hear, but she spoke to him anyway. “Hold on, Joe. The paramedics are coming. If you can make it to the hospital, you have a chance. Hang in there for Chloe. Don’t die.”

Please, God, don’t let him die. It was a plea and a prayer. She only hoped Someone was listening.

His eyes fluttered open. During his last life as a Texas Ranger, Will Pendleton had sure enough woke up in some pretty strange places. Border town bordellos. Fancy Fort Worth hotels. Gulf-front flophouses. He’d even come to at the bottom of a dry well once after a gang of drunken malfeasants had knocked him out and thrown him down the hole. Plenty of times, he’d awakened with nothing but the wide blue sky over his head and the cold ground beneath him. The best place for a man to wake up was in a sweet woman’s arms, but in his line of work, he’d learned to be alone.

His skin bristled like a nervous colt’s. It was one thing to wake up in a strange place. Waking up in a strange body was a whole new experience.

When his blurred vision cleared, the only thing familiar was the color of his surroundings. Everything was white. Besides his own, there were five other beds in the room. All held forms draped with white sheets and attached to contraptions that made noises like birds trying to chirp.

He lifted his head for a better look-see, but it flopped weakly onto the pillow. Two women, dressed in blue pajamas like the Chinese laundryman used to wear, tended the folks in the beds. He heard their murmuring voices, but couldn’t make out what they said. Their soft, white shoes made no sound on the floor.

He tried to move, but he was hog-tied by some kind of cord that ran from a needle taped to the inside of his elbow to a bag of clear liquid suspended from a metal pole. A fancy clothes-peg attached to another cord clamped painlessly on the end of his finger. He examined the hand. Long-fingered, callused and sun-brown, it had obviously belonged to a hardworking man.

Where was he? Had the transference been completed? It was possible he hadn’t returned at all, but was stuck in yet another corner of Reception, still awaiting a routing assignment. The thought that he might not have made it back to earth—back to his precious Molly—filled him with aching sadness.

He wouldn’t get another chance. Celestian had barely explained the possibility of walking-in when an appropriate mortal coil had been vacated. At the right time. In the right location. He wasn’t too clear on events after that. Everything had happened fast. So fast the time-out monitor had little opportunity to give instructions, issue cautions or provide historical updates. He only knew one thing for sure. Due to another stunning accident, the spirit inhabiting the mortal coil known as Joe Mitchum had alighted unexpectedly in Reception, his life over and his number up.

In her assigned role as healer, Molly, or Mallory as she was now called, had persevered until she revived the uninhabited coil. According to Celestian, the resident spirit had given up first reenter rights, electing to remain in the Reception queue in hopes of receiving a better assignment.

That’s when things had gotten really lively. Celestian started squawking about how they only had a small window of opportunity during which another spirit could take over, if Mallory succeeded in snatching the coil back from the brink of permanent death. He hadn’t been blowing smoke when he said he’d do anything, take any form, to go back. He had snatched the walk-in opening without considering the implications. Like a baseball player who had spent a hundred seasons on the bench—during which all the rules had changed—he was unexpectedly thrust back in the game.

At least he hoped that’s what had happened.

Thankfully, he’d observed Molly/Mallory often enough on the spirit monitor to know some of the details of her Molly life. In 1973, at age ninety-seven, she’d passed over quietly in her sleep. She had returned as Mallory, born later the same year to a hard-working local couple. Because memories of past jaunts were mercifully deleted before reentry, Mallory recalled nothing of Molly’s existence or any of the other lives she’d lived.

That was the way it had to be.

Oh, yeah. He knew something else. Celestian had emphasized this was the last chance for his warrior spirit and her healer spirit to unite. They would not share the rest of these lives, nor would they be allowed to spend eternity as mates, unless she fell in love with him this time around.

That, too, was the way it had to be.

Another half-formed memory floated into his thoughts. Celestian had yelled something just before he’d been sucked into the new coil. What was it? Thinking only made his head hurt worse, but he had to remember. Celestian had been so danged insistent, it must have been important. He closed his eyes, concentrating until the monitor’s words came back to him.

Yeah. He could never tell Molly/Mallory who he really was, or reveal any details of their past lives together. It was against the rules.

That was the way it had to be.

The fact that Molly was Mallory, and he was now Joe complicated things. What if she didn’t recognize him? She might not even like him. Uncertainty gnawed at him, and he calmed his fears by telling himself it shouldn’t be too difficult to win Mallory’s heart. Not after all they’d been through together. Not after all the lifetimes they’d shared.

When he moved, pain ricocheted through his body and settled in his sore, bandaged feet. Being cooped up in the cooler with that ornery hombre Celestian for a hundred years had been a trial. Getting a ticket home had been nothing short of a miracle. Lying still when he wanted to crawl off the bed and search for the woman who would help him fulfill his destiny by fulfilling her own? That required every shattered bit of his willpower.

He tried to relax. The hard part of this trip was behind him. Charming Dr. Mallory Peterson into falling in love with him again, even after a lifetime apart, would be simple.

As easy as eating pie.

He must have nodded off for a while, because when he awoke again one of the pajama-clad women was fussing around the machinery by his bed.

“There you are, Mr. Mitchum. You’re back.”

“Am I?” Dry and raw at the same time, his throat was so sore he couldn’t make spit or speak above a whisper. “Am I still in Reception?”

“Oh, no, sir. You’re in the ICU.”

He groaned in frustrated agony. Why couldn’t people call things by their proper names? “What is this place?”

“The hospital. You had an accident. Don’t you remember?”

“Not much. Who are you?”

“I’m Kathy. I’ll be your nurse tonight.” She smiled and wrapped a heavy cloth tightly around his upper arm, squeezing a small bulb until it tightened uncomfortably. After a few seconds, she released the bulb. “Your blood pressure is almost normal. How do you feel?”

“Like I’ve been lightning-struck.”

She patted his arm. “I’m not surprised. Take it easy now, the doctor will be in to see you soon.”

“Is that Mol—er, Mallory?” The name didn’t feel as strange coming out of his mouth as he thought it would. “Is she here?”

“You mean Dr. Peterson? I don’t know. Would you like to see her?”

“Yes.” A rush of emotion tightened his damaged throat and threatened to cut off his breathing again. “Please.” He’d waited a hundred years for this moment. Mallory Peterson looked nothing like his former fiancée, midwife Molly Earnshaw. Nor did her appearance match any of the other mortal coils she’d inhabited over time. Still, he couldn’t wait to see her. From tribal bonesetter to medieval herbalist to village wise woman, she’d always been a healer. Now she was a doctor. She’d finally reached the goal she’d yearned after so long.

The nurse picked up his wrist, felt his hammering pulse, frowned and wrote something on a paper clamped to a board. “I don’t know if Dr. Peterson is still in the building, she may have gone home by now.”

“No!” Not seeing her would hurt more than the injuries he’d suffered.

“Okay, calm down. I’ll have her paged. Maybe she’s still around.”

“Thank you. Please, just find her.”

The woman tucked the sheet around him. “You rest, and I’ll see what I can do.”

“I have to see her,” he whispered tightly. He had to. He couldn’t wait another moment.

“It was the darnest thing I ever saw.” After changing into clean green surgical scrubs, Mallory sat in the doctor’s lounge with a cup of coffee. She related the evening’s events to Andrew “Mac” McKinley, the on-call physician who’d taken charge of Joe in the emergency room. “I’m telling you, that fork of lightning hit the pole like a heat-seeking missile. It was almost as though it had made a special trip down from heaven, specifically to strike him.”

Mac shook his head. “I’m surprised at you, Mal. That’s not a very scientific explanation for someone with an undergrad major in physics.”

“I know, but it was still pretty amazing.”

“What’s amazing is the fact he’s still alive. You saved his life, you know.”

“I did, didn’t I?” She grinned. “That’s what we’re here for, right? Mallory Peterson’s my name, saving lives is my game.”

“Are you planning to hang around until our patient wakes up?”

“I’m thinking about it.” Mac was an excellent physician. She had no reservations about handing off Joe’s care. Yet, she felt responsible for the man whose heart had resumed beating under her hands. She’d insisted on riding to Midland in the ambulance with him and had assisted in the initial assessment. She didn’t understand, and couldn’t explain to her colleague, the indefinable connection she felt for the man she’d brought back from death.

“Inconsiderate of him to get toasted on a Friday night,” Mac teased. “Don’t you have anything better to do?”

“No. I’ll just see how he’s doing before I go.”

“Suit yourself.”

Mallory was relieved when he didn’t chide her about her absentee social life. That would have to wait, until she’d proved to the town that their faith in her had not been misplaced. Too bad time was finite. A limited resource, it ran out. Got used up. Squandered. Every life was allotted a certain number of minutes, and they were too precious to waste. She’d already spent an inordinate amount of her allotted time pursuing her dream.

She hoped she’d made the right decision. Although becoming a physician had never felt like her decision to make. For reasons neither she nor her family understood, she had wanted to be a doctor even before she knew what a doctor was. When she was two and a half, her mother claimed she had grabbed the pediatrician’s stethoscope, cried, “Mine!” and refused to let go.

Her fate had been sealed when her parents had given her a toy doctor kit for her third birthday. She’d spent all her playtime clumsily bandaging imaginary injuries sustained by her dolls and dispensing invisible pills to her patients. At five, when her father bragged that she might grow up to be a nurse, she’d stamped her foot. “No,” she’d declared. “I’m gonna be a doctor.”

The story made an amusing family anecdote, but achieving her dream had not been easy. She came from a working-class home where money was tight and ambitions realistic. Her father drove a big rig back and forth across the country, and her mother waited tables. They knew their daughter was as smart as she was dedicated, but financing the education necessary to complete medical training seemed beyond their reach.

In typical driven fashion, Mallory had seized control of the situation. Even in junior high, she had willingly sacrificed her personal life on the altar of ambition, studying hard to make grades that would attract the attention of scholarship committees. She saved most of the money she made working at the Bag and Wag after school, weekends and summers, and still found time to volunteer and participate in extracurricular activities.

When she’d earned a scholarship to Thorndyke College, the people of Slapdown had banded together to raise money for additional expenses. Throughout her undergraduate years, and later at Baylor, they’d sent her a small monthly stipend. They said it was because they believed in her. Knowing folks who had never realized their own dreams wanted to be part of hers made all the work worthwhile.

She was lucky to have that kind of support, and she had made them a promise. When she received her medical license, she would return to her hometown and dedicate herself to caring for the people who had helped her. In its one hundred-and-twenty-year history, Slapdown had never had a full-time doctor. Now little Mallory Peterson was responsible for the health and well-being of its citizens.

She still couldn’t believe it.

As a further gesture of good faith, Brindon Tucker, another local boy who’d made good, had built Western Plains Medical Clinic with money won in the state lottery. She’d come home to run the state-of-the-art facility, hanging out her shingle as soon as the ink on her license had dried.

Under her management, the number of people served by the clinic had grown since the doors opened last fall. Once word got out, residents of neighboring towns and rural areas sought care at Western Plains. The staff included a nurse practitioner, an RN, a medical assistant and an office manager. Not bad for a town that had never had its own doctor before.

Mac was refilling their coffee cups when Mallory’s beeper chirped. She answered the page on the lounge phone. When she hung up, she turned to the other doctor. “Mitchum’s awake.”

Mac gulped down the lukewarm brew, and they hurried out into the corridor. “Did the nurse say anything?”

“Just that he asked to see me.”

“I’ll need to assess his cognitive function to determine whether he suffered brain damage,” Mac said as the elevator doors closed.

“Well, the guy was on a utility pole stealing electricity during a storm,” she reminded. “All things considered, I’m not sure you’ll be able to tell.”

The Ranger opened his eyes when the man with Mallory introduced himself. “I’m Dr. McKinley. I guess you know Dr. Peterson.”

“Yes, sir.” He’d known her so long, she seemed like an extension of his own being. She looked different, yet he knew her immediately. He would have recognized the spark in her warm sherry-colored eyes anywhere. For a hundred years, he’d longed to kiss her heart-shaped lips. “I owe you my thanks, Doc.”

“It’s a miracle I was there when it happened,” she said.

“They don’t call it a miracle,” he muttered.

“What?” she asked.

“Never mind.” He had to be careful. He was somebody else now. He could not reveal himself and had to start thinking like this Joe fella before anyone got suspicious. Will Pendleton, Texas Ranger, was gone, dead over a hundred years. He no longer existed, not even as a memory. Molly, the last person who might have held him in her thoughts, was long gone, too.

There was no turning back now. He’d bet it all when he did a walk-in to Joe Mitchum’s life. But who was the man whose coil he now inhabited? What was he like? What kind of relationship did he have with Mallory? Blessing or curse, he didn’t know much about Joe. He was on his own.

Dr. McKinley explained his medical condition, reassuring him he’d sustained no long-term physical damage. His feet were injured because the steel spikes on his boots had conducted an electrical charge through them as it exited his body. The second-degree burns were limited and would respond well to treatment. Joe was a very lucky man, given the fact that he’d just been struck by lightning.

“When can I get out of here?”

“Don’t be in a hurry,” McKinley said. “When you’re feeling stronger, we’ll run some tests. If everything checks out, you should be able to go home in a couple of days.” The doctor’s belt chirped, and he excused himself, explaining he had rounds to make.

“What’s wrong with those folks?” He gestured to the forms in the other beds. “Did they come back, too?”

Mallory frowned. She’d watched him with a confused expression since arriving in the ICU. “What do you mean, come back?”

“Nothing. I didn’t mean anything.” He didn’t want Mallory to leave. He’d waited so long to be with her; now that she was here, a few minutes were not enough. He wanted more. “The nurse said you saved my life.”

She shrugged. “All in a day’s work. Do you remember what happened?”

“Not much.” He closed his eyes because they were tired and heavy. What could he tell her? That the first thing he’d become aware of as Joe Mitchum was the weight of her body as she straddled him to pound on his chest? That her warmth had comforted him? That he’d recognized her familiar scent? He’d settled uneasily into his new body, like a weary man cramming his feet into boots a size too small. Knowing she was there had made the transition easier.

He was still grappling with the knowledge that a stopped heart could be made to beat again. It was truly a wonder. One of the last things Celestian had said was how there had been all kinds of changes in the world since he’d left it last. The time-out monitor hadn’t gotten a chance to explain those changes. He’d promised that although Joe’s mental and emotional memories were gone, departed with his alighted spirit, Joe’s physical memories would kick in once Will’s spirit acclimated to the unfamiliar coil.

“Why don’t you tell me what happened?” He’d say anything to keep her near a little longer.

“Not tonight. You’ve been through an ordeal. Don’t try to talk. You need to rest.” She stood uneasily by the bed, shifting from foot to foot as though torn between the desire to go, and an inexplicable urge to stay. “I’ll try to stop by tomorrow to see how you’re doing.”

When she turned to leave, he grabbed her hand, and held it. “Don’t go!” Sadly, he couldn’t remember how her skin felt against his own. Yet there was something infinitely right about their touch.

She must have felt it, too. Surprise and shock washed over her face as she pulled her hand from Joe’s. She stepped back and folded her arms across her chest. “Dr. McKinley is a fine physician. He’ll take good care of you.”

“I want you.”

She blinked, as though he’d spoken in a language so foreign she could not comprehend his meaning. “What?”

He struggled to sit, but she pressed him back onto the bed. “Don’t try to get up. Rest. Please.”

He stared into her golden brown eyes, and for a fleeting moment, he glimpsed the healer he had loved so much. Overcome with emotion, he flung his arms around her, pulling her close in a fierce bear hug that nearly upset the pole with the hanging bag. “I want you…to be my doctor.”

Tensing, she pulled from his desperate embrace to right the pole and stepped behind a shield of professionalism. Did she think it would protect her from personal involvement? She cleared her throat. “Maybe I can see you on an outpatient basis after your discharge. If you require additional care.”

She watched him closely, but he couldn’t tell if she was attracted or repelled by what she saw. Before she could be swayed by either emotion, she spun on her heels and pushed her way through the swinging door. He couldn’t do or say anything to stop her.

He slumped back on the bed, longing burning in him like a fever. He could almost taste the acrid tang of disappointment on his tongue. He couldn’t reveal himself, and there had been no spark of recognition in her eyes. She had no idea who he really was. When she looked at him, she saw nothing of the men he’d been, or the lives they’d shared. She saw only Joe Mitchum, a fellow unlucky enough to get himself struck by lightning.

Mallory believed he was Joe. Judging from her reaction, that fact would clearly work against him.

Chapter Two

Mallory spent Sunday afternoon cleaning house. She lived alone and was compulsively neat, so housework didn’t eat up a lot of her time. She saved her least favorite chore—ritual refrigerator cleansing—for last. Trying to focus on the stimulating task of clearing out tiny dishes of petrified lasagna and mummified peas, she was distracted by Friday night’s events. Leave it to Joe Mitchum to require lifesaving measures in such a bizarre and dramatic fashion.

Instead of enjoying much needed time off she had spent the weekend thinking about him and the desperate way he’d grabbed her in the hospital. The look in his eyes haunted her. He’d been glad to see her, but she’d seen more in the dark brown depths than relief. Like elation. Too bad she couldn’t toss out unwanted thoughts of Joe as easily as Wednesday night’s chicken.

Strangely enough, she’d felt something too. His touch had made her shiver in a wow-what’s-going-on-here way. She’d had a déjà vu moment, like being hugged by Joe was nothing new. Which was absurd. She’d known Joe for years, but they’d never shared anything but animosity. Since he’d moved in next door to the clinic, he’d gone out of his way to aggravate and provoke her. So why had he been so happy to see her?

She finished spraying the inside of the fridge with antibacterial cleanser, and carefully replaced the contents on the shelves. Pickles on the left. Jelly on the right. She was imagining things. He’d been relieved to see her because…well, he’d nearly died and was probably glad to see anyone, especially the doctor who’d saved his life.

Her preoccupation with Joe was no more than professional interest. That would account for the thoughts spinning through her mind like blind lab rats in an endless maze. She closed the refrigerator. Still, it was unsettling to find Joe Mitchum occupying her thoughts so fully. What had changed?

Nothing. He was gifted at getting in trouble, and this time his foolish behavior had nearly gotten him killed. She’d performed her job by resuscitating him. That was it. Her noisome neighbor was intriguing only from a medical standpoint. That’s why she’d spent hours on the computer last night searching medical databases for information on lightning strike survivors.

The facts had amazed her. In the United States alone, twelve hundred people a year were hit by lightning. Less than ten percent of the victims died, so from a statistical standpoint, it wasn’t miraculous that Joe had survived. That a trained doctor happened to be near enough to begin CPR immediately? Probably a coincidence. Or Joe’s dumb luck.

He would have suffered respiratory failure, followed quickly by cardiac arrest if the chain of events had been different. She couldn’t shake the idea that she’d been thrust on the scene for a reason.

With nothing to occupy her time once the housework was done, Mallory gave in to a strange compulsion to drive to the hospital and check on Joe’s progress. When she arrived, she discovered he’d been moved from ICU into a regular bed on third floor medical. She stopped by the nurses’ station to skim his chart and read the latest lab reports. Everything was normal. As were his vital signs. No indication of infection in the burns on his feet.

Modern medicine, one. Mother Nature, zero.

She was about to close the chart when one of Mac’s notations caught her eye: Mental status exams inconclusive for residual cognitive impairment. However, nursing staff reports episodes of confusion and disorientation. Consider neurological referral if condition persists.

Before she could ask the nurse on duty about those episodes, the doctor stepped into the cubicle on his evening rounds. He’d been kind enough to drive her home after she’d ridden to the hospital in the ambulance with Joe.

“Hey, Mallory, what are you doing here?” He pulled a patient’s chart from the rack and flipped it open to jot a quick note. “I thought one of the perks of being a clinic doc was no weekend duty.”

“Just checking on Mitchum.” She closed the chart and patted it. “Sounds like he’s doing all right.”

“Physically. He appears to have suffered some memory loss, but considering what he’s been through, his recovery has been amazing. In fact, I’m ready to discharge him.”

She shot him a questioning glance, and he shrugged. “No insurance. I’m catching flak from the business office to cut him loose.”

Mallory groaned. Mac knew her opinion of the early release policy for indigent patients. She turned to the nurse seated nearby. “Good news for the staff, huh? I don’t imagine Mitchum is a very pleasant patient.”

When Nurse Evelyn Dodd looked up, her apple dumpling face was etched with surprise. “Are you kidding? Joe’s a sweetheart. A real pleasure to have on the floor. Such a gentleman.” The middle-aged nurse pulled homemade treats wrapped in cellophane from the stash in her bottom drawer and offered them to the docs. “Here, you two look hungry. Actually, I’ll be sorry to see him go.”

Now it was Mallory’s turn to act surprised. Sweetheart and gentleman were not words she would have chosen to describe Joe Mitchum. “Really? That’s interesting.”

“He hasn’t had a single visitor,” Evelyn went on. “I asked if he wanted me to contact anyone, and he said there was no one to call. That just breaks my heart. A nice boy like that ought to have lots of folks worried about him.”

Nice boy? “We are talking about Joe Mitchum, right?” Mallory could believe the loner had no friends or relatives concerned about his well-being. He’d managed to alienate just about everyone who’d ever tried to have a relationship with him. The thing she found hard to accept was the nurse’s generous assessment of his personality. And the fact that he hadn’t summoned any of his bottom-feeder female companions to his bedside.

“Yeah, he’s not as bad as you made him out to be, Mal.” Mac finished charting and returned the file to the rack. “You had me expecting a dumb oaf with the IQ of a keg of lug nuts. Instead, he’s soft-spoken and polite. Pretty sharp, too, considering how close his brain came to frying like a funnel cake.”

“What gets me is he’s so grateful for every little thing we do for him.” Evelyn wiped a tear from her eye. “It’s embarrassing. I keep telling him I’m just doing my job. Speaking of which…” she slipped her stethoscope around her neck. “I’ve got vitals to check. You docs be good now.”

Mac bit into Evelyn’s brownie and rolled his eyes in bliss. “Mmm, delicious.” He noticed her watching him and sighed. “What?”

Mallory shook her head. “That just doesn’t make sense. I did some research on lightning strike survivors and didn’t find a single case where being charged with 100 million volts of electricity actually improved the victim’s personality.”

Mac laughed. “You never know. Maybe rubbing elbows with the Grim Reaper made the guy turn over a new leaf.”

“Hmph! Joe Mitchum would have to turn over a whole forest to achieve sweetheart status.”

Mac poked the last of the brownie in his mouth and held out his hand for Joe’s chart. “I’m writing the discharge order. I don’t have any medical reason to keep him, and I’ve already told him he could go home.”

“What about the ‘episodes of confusion and disorientation’ I read about?” Mallory fidgeted in the swivel chair. Sitting still was difficult. New nervous energy made her want to keep moving. Moving toward Joe. Disgusted by the thought, she forced herself back to reason.

Mac looked up from his note-writing. “Taking a jolt like that would give anyone a memory lapse. Didn’t your research turn that up?”

“Well, yeah.” Her reading had revealed a broad range of lightning effects. Victims often sustained skull fractures, ruptured eardrums, bruises on the heart, brain contusions and paralyzed lungs, among other things.

“He does fine on cognitive tests, but seems to have a few word finding problems and trouble recalling past events.”

“What about the neurological referral?”

“I told him if he’s still having problems in a week or two to let me know. I’d appreciate it if you’d keep an eye on him for me.”

“Me?”

“Isn’t that what neighbors are for?”

“Please.”

“Are you going to eat that?” Mac eyed the brownie she’d forgotten.

Mallory handed it over. “If you’re planning to remain a confirmed bachelor forever, you really should learn to cook.”

“No time.”

“I think I’ll look in on Joe before I leave.” Mallory made the decision sound professional. In truth, she’d had a weird urge to see him all weekend. What was the matter with her?

Walking down the hall, she gently pushed open the door to his room and watched his clumsy efforts to make the bed for a moment before speaking. “You don’t have to do that, you know.”

At the sound of her voice, he stopped trying to smooth the blanket and turned, leaning on a pair of aluminum crutches. When he saw her, his face creased in a wide, happy grin. “Mol-Mallory! I mean, ma’am. Dr. Peterson. Lordy, I don’t know what to call you.” He grasped the crutches and turned, leaning awkwardly against the bed.

It took Mallory a moment to respond. The lightning bolt had left quite a transformation in its wake. He was clean-shaven for the first time in as long as she could remember. His shaggy hair had been clipped short. A do-it-yourself job, judging from the uneven results. She noticed tiny flecks of gray gleaming among the dark strands. Were those new?

“You can call me Mallory. We go back far enough for that.”

“Yes.” He nodded and gave her a small, enigmatic smile. “We do.” He must have noticed her staring at his clothes. “Nurse Evelyn showed me the outfit I was wearing when I got here. Everything was so tattered, it looked like I was the loser in a bear fight.”

“Yes, that happens sometimes with lightning. Clothing is shredded, metal zippers and fasteners fuse. People have been knocked right out of their shoes.”

“She said the owners wouldn’t be needing these now.” He was dressed in a pair of freshly laundered jeans and a wrinkled white shirt that had been washed but not ironed. “I don’t know about wearing a dead man’s clothes, but since I was pretty near dead myself, maybe they won’t bring me bad luck.”

“I don’t think you have to worry about that.”

“I reckon not. I’ve been plenty lucky lately.”

Reckon? Hardly a Joe word. Now that she thought about it, he sounded different too. The timbre of his voice had changed. It was deeper, more confident. Temporary inflammation of the trachea maybe.

That wouldn’t account for the change in his eyes. Where before they had been mud-dark and flat, the luminous brown depths now possessed an indefinable mystery. As if that weren’t unsettling enough, there was also a new stillness in his features. Surely, such composure hadn’t been there before. Just looking at him was like glimpsing the familiar for the first time. Like what Brindon’s wife Dorian had said about the Eiffel Tower. The image had been imprinted on her consciousness for so long that when she finally saw it, she had felt an eerie sense of recognition.

Joe’s straight nose, firm lips and dimpled chin were the same. Yet, they were different, too. Finer. Like a stone tumbled by a river, until all its rough edges had been worn smooth. Why had she never noticed how good-looking he was? A twist of shame tightened her belly. Maybe she’d never really looked at him before. Never truly listened. Never given him a chance.

Her character flaws didn’t explain how he had morphed from a greasy, ill-mannered slacker into a clean soft-spoken man who said “reckon” and “ma’am” and endeared himself to career nurses. Now there was a mystery.

“Seriously. You don’t have to make the bed. They have people to do that.”

“Seems the least I can do, considering everything folks have done for me. They bring me tasty grub three times a day and juice and cookies whether I want ’em or not. Some lady’s always coming in to check my temperature and make sure I’m comfortable. It sure is a hospitable place. Hmm…guess that’s why they call it a hospital, huh?”

“Maybe so.” Mallory smiled, but his comments confused her. He was sincere, not flippant or sarcastic. Sincerity was not an attitude she expected from a man who had been born obnoxious and then suffered numerous relapses. “Dr. McKinley tells me you’re ready to go home.”

“Yep. As nice as it is here, I can’t afford to run up a bill for room and board.” He gestured to the bedside chair. “Would you care to have a seat?”

Mallory sat, marveling at his courtesy. The last time she’d seen him, he had suggested she buy a six-pack and watch a wrestling match. “Has anyone talked to you about your bill?”

“Yes, ma’am. A nice lady came in. Called herself a social worker. How can she be social and work at the same time?” He shrugged. “Said they’d fix me up with a payment plan so I can settle my debt when I get back on my feet.”

“Good. How are you planning to get home? Have you called someone to come for you?” Mallory tried not to stare, but was intrigued by the way the setting sun shone through the window and backlit his head with a golden corona.

“No. There’s no one I care to call. Since I’m afoot, I guess I’ll walk it.”

“On those?” She eyed the crutches propped against the bed. “Excuse me for saying so, but you haven’t exactly mastered their use.”

He grimaced apologetically. “I’m about as gimpy as a one-legged chicken. Dr. Mac said I should keep off my feet for a few days, but I figure I can make it home.”

“Slapdown’s twenty miles from here,” she reminded him.

“It is? Well, of course it is. Maybe hoofing isn’t the way to go.”

“I can give you a ride home.”

His face brightened, his warm brown eyes glowing with appreciation. “I’d be much obliged.”

She echoed Mac’s words. “What are neighbors for?”

“We’re neighbors?”

Was this an example of the confusion the nurses had noted? “You live next door to the clinic where I work and close to where I live.”

He beamed. “Well, good. That’s about the best news I’ve heard all day.”

News? Had he forgotten where he lived? “Really, Joe, how are you feeling?”

“Right as rain and happy as a pup with two tails.”

Brain damage was definitely a possibility. Simply being charged with negative electrons wouldn’t cause him to suddenly start talking like a character from Mayberry. “Are you sure?”

“Matter of fact, I haven’t felt this alive in…well, let’s just say in a long, long time.”

A couple of hours later Joe checked himself out of the hospital, and they drove home. Dodging Mallory’s questions was like walking through a cow pasture: you had to watch where you stepped. He couldn’t tell if she was suspicious about him or just abnormally curious. The only good thing about living through lightning was having an excuse to act as worn-out as a fat uncle’s welcome.

He pretended to wake up when Mallory parked her little truck in front of a rickety metal house on wheels. From the beat-up look of it, the trailer as Mallory called it, had been plunked down in the middle of the junk-strewn lot by a cyclone. Several skinny dogs crawled out of the shade to bark a yapping welcome. Joe’s heart sank deeper as he looked around. “I live here?”

Mallory grimaced. “Home sweet home. I fed the demon horde while you were in the hospital.”

“The what?”

“The dogs.”

“Oh. Thank you.” He looked around in disgust. What kind of self-respecting man lived in a rat-hole like this? The place would embarrass a blind fur trapper. “Are all these dogs mine?”

“Apparently so. Five at last count.”

“That’s a heap of dog.”

“And not a keeper in the bunch.”

Joe reached for the door handle, and grinned when he knew exactly how the contraption worked. That happened more often than not. As Celestian had predicted, his new body carried the old Joe’s physical memories. Deeply ingrained in his sinews, they enabled him to adapt to his new life without going walleyed over twenty-first century advancements. That’s why watching television and walking through automatic doors and racing along the road at more than fifty miles per hour didn’t feel nearly as strange as it should have.

“Thanks for the ride,” he told Mallory. “If you’ll fetch my crutches from the back, I’ll get on in the…house.”

“Shall I help you out of the truck?”

“I can manage.” She handed him the crutches, and he hopped onto the uneven ground. Pain zinged up his legs from the burns on the soles of his bandaged feet. He hoped the inside of his new home wasn’t as junked up as the outside. If it were, he’d have a heck of a time getting around.

Mallory walked ahead and opened the door. He limped across the yard, and the hounds slunk up to sniff him. A couple growled and backed off, while the rest tucked their tails and whimpered back into their hiding places. None of them seemed exactly enraptured to see him.

“So much for man’s best friends, huh?” Mallory held the door open. “Leave for a couple of days, and they forget who you are.”

Joe struggled onto the cinder block that served as a step, and Mallory took his arm to help him inside. He ducked under the low threshold, and a powerful stink slapped him in the face. “Whoa! It smells worse in here than hell on housecleaning day.”

Mallory stepped inside and poked around the tiny kitchen until she discovered the source of the stench. “Sheesh, Mitchum! You left a pound of hamburger in the fridge, and the electricity’s been off all weekend.”

With her hand clamped over her nose, she couldn’t have looked more disgusted if she’d uncovered a decaying corpse. “You can’t stay. The place is filthy. There’s no telling what kind of infection you’d contract just walking around in here.”

“I reckon I can clean things up.”

“You and what hazmat team? There’s no power, no running water and it’s hotter than a brick oven. No one should live like this.”

Being from west Texas, he didn’t mind the heat, though a smart man could learn to like the cool air they had at the hospital. He wouldn’t miss electricity and running water. Such luxuries had been beyond his ranger’s salary. That toe-curling smell, though, would take some getting used to.

“C’mon, let’s get out of here.” Mallory found a couple of brown paper bags. Into one, she stuffed clothes from the tiny wardrobe and built-in drawers. She dropped the rotting package of meat into the other and carried it outside, flinging it into a charred metal barrel. “I hope those mutts don’t turn over the trash can.”

“Might improve the looks of the place.” Joe leaned on the crutches and limped down the step. “Where are we going?”

Mallory tossed his makeshift suitcase in the back of the truck and helped him into the passenger seat. “I have an extra room. You can stay with me until the bandages come off, and you can walk without crutches.”

Her offer confused him. “I don’t know about that. How will it look for a young maiden lady to take a man into her home?”

She laughed. “A young what?”

“I couldn’t forgive myself if I besmirched your reputation in any way.”

She glanced sideways at him as she started the engine and shifted gears. “You’re kidding, right?”

The blast of cool air from the dashboard was a modern convenience he would hate to give up. “I know how people talk.”

“Don’t worry about my reputation, Mitchum, I can take care of myself. And don’t get any smart ideas. I’m offering you a place to stay. Nothing else.”

“Well, if you’re sure it won’t get you into hot water.”

“Let me ask you something.” She threw the gearshift back into Park and turned to face him. “Since when have you been so concerned about what people think?” Her golden eyes flashed, and her full lips clamped together in a don’t-lie-to-me line.

“A good reputation is the most valuable thing a person can own,” he replied.

“Is that a fact?”

“Yes, ma’am. I’d rather lose my right arm than my honor.”

Her sudden hoot of laughter wounded him in a way he hadn’t known possible. He fell silent in the face of her ridicule. The old Joe must have lived by a different code. That’s why Mallory held him in such low esteem. An obstacle like that would complicate his mission, but sharing living quarters with her would provide him with plenty of opportunities to win her over.

He watched Mallory angle the gearshift into Reverse and back out of the rutted drive. He couldn’t see Molly in her face, but at times, he could hear his old love in her words, sense her in Mallory’s efficient movements. Not now of course. At the moment, she was all Mallory. A smart woman who wouldn’t admit there were things she couldn’t understand. A familiar stranger who would never know how important she was to him unless he opened her eyes.

He wouldn’t lose this chance. He was meant to be here and felt at peace in Mallory’s company. He felt like a man who’d finally made it home after a long, heart-sore journey.

When he and Celestian hadn’t been biting each other’s heads off, they’d had deep discussions. A hundred years added up to a lot of gab. One topic they’d thrashed out was the purpose of corporeal life.

The Spirit-Maker divided every created spirit and sent it on an earthly mission to find its other half. The Plan provided each questing spirit with the knowledge needed to complete its search. However, due to a snag in the system, once a spirit assumed human form, it seemed to forget its mission. Human beings expended enormous time and energy creating philosophies and religions to explain their existence. But what they didn’t know—couldn’t know—was that when they made the right connection, everything else fell into place.

A whole spirit could change the world, do unlimited good, serve the Spirit-Maker and mankind. A half spirit could only quest. And while that spirit might accomplish worthwhile objectives on earth, it would never feel complete as it yearned forever for its missing half.

Without even knowing what it hungered for.

Hope was eternal, and if a half-life spirit alighted in Reception, it was carefully rerouted to begin the cycle again. Considering how important the quest was in the scheme of things, it was an ironically sad fact of cosmic life that only a few managed to find the spirit that would make them whole. All were given the opportunity, but most were too blind to use it.

The Ranger considered himself lucky. He’d spent several lifetimes with his healer half and then a century in time-out, learning the way. Fate had handed him an undeserved gift when it allowed him to return as Mallory’s neighbor. He was not going to make the most human of all mistakes and forfeit his last chance.

Because of the old Joe’s poor housekeeping habits, he could spend the next few days under the same roof as his destiny. Things were looking up. Coincidences that weren’t coincidences had come to his aid.

Mallory steered the truck into the paved parking lot, drove past the clinic, and up a little hill. She parked in front of a white house with green shutters, surrounded with neat flowerbeds and trimmed grass. Potted plants swung from the porch posts. This was more like it. This was a home, not a hovel. Good things could happen here.

He sighed gratefully.

Thank you, Joe Mitchum, wherever you are, for being such a lazy ne’er-do-well.

Chapter Three

Mallory settled Joe in an extra bedroom at the opposite end of the house. He would have his own bathroom, so their paths would not have to cross any more than necessary. So far, he hadn’t been nearly as annoying as she knew he could be, but once the shock wore off, he might revert to old habits.

Openly admiring the accommodations, he limped around the blue-and-white bedroom on his crutches, pulling out drawers and inspecting the closet. He bounced the mattress experimentally with one hand and grinned like he’d never seen a pillow-top queen before. Some people were easily impressed.

She left him to put away the things she’d grabbed at the trailer while she started dinner. She hadn’t been her practical, logical self since that errant bolt of lightning had thrust Joe Mitchum into her life. Doing something mundane would restore her sense of normalcy. Making nice with a guy whom she’d always considered an odious nuisance was unnerving. Factor in the twitchiness that overcame her when he was near, and it was no wonder she was feeling weird.

Helping Joe was a way of paying back some of the generosity she’d received over the years. A distressing mission of mercy, but somebody had to do it. Hoping he wouldn’t give her a reason to regret opening her home to him, she heated water for spaghetti and dumped a bag of prepackaged salad into a bowl. Turning to the stove with pasta for the boiling pot, she jumped and nearly dropped it. Joe was watching her intently from the doorway.

“Jeepers! Don’t sneak up on me like that! Do you want to give me cardiac arrest?” After years of living alone, having another person around would take some getting used to. Having Joe Mitchum around…well, there were some things she would never get used to.

“I didn’t mean to startle you.” He leaned on his crutches and took in the gleaming appliances, glass-fronted cupboards and cheerful sunflower wallpaper. “Nice place.”

“Thanks, but it’s not mine.” She melted butter for garlic bread. “Remember? Housing is a perk I get for working at the clinic.”

“Oh, right. I forgot.”

He’d forgotten a lot of things. He hadn’t seemed to recognize much when they’d driven through town. She’d left him in the truck while she ran into the grocery store to pick up a few things. When she came out, Glorieta Tadlock was leaning in the passenger window attempting to engage him in conversation. In the loosest sense of the word. Dressed in a sequined halter-top that showed off the butterfly tattoo on her shoulder and short shorts that showed off everything else, the blowzy blonde treated him like a baby bird that had fallen out of its nest. To Joe’s credit, he’d seemed perplexed and embarrassed by the attention.

If she hadn’t known better, Mallory would have sworn he’d never laid eyes on the belly-ringed nail technician in his life. Which was pretty strange considering the two had once been an item. Since neither knew what the word platonic meant, he’d probably laid a lot more than his eyes on her.

“So you can live here as long as you’re the doc?” he asked.

“Or until I get a place of my own.” Before she did that, she planned to save enough to put a down payment on a house for her parents. Seeing their only child through medical school had cracked their working-class nest egg. Buying them a home wouldn’t come close to repaying all the sacrifices they’d made for her, but at least they wouldn’t have to worry about the future.

Happily married for nearly forty years, Al and Lois Peterson had set a good example of wedded bliss for their daughter. Unfortunately, Mallory had never had time to be much of a romantic and didn’t believe she would ever find the kind of love her parents shared. Her doubts weren’t based on logic, they just were. She’d never suffered a betrayal. No faithless lover had broken her heart. She simply didn’t think of herself and true love in the same context.

She assumed it was because she’d always been too focused on her goals to fall in love. College and medical school and interning had made it impossible to fit a personal life into her schedule. She had more time now, but neither the inclination nor opportunity. A drought of available men had just about dried up the gene pool in Slapdown.

At the age of twenty-nine, solitude had become a habit.

“I hope your room is all right.” She set the salad bowl on the table. The careful way he watched her increased her jitters. It was one thing not to find him totally repugnant, but finding him intriguing and attractive was like slipping into an alternate universe.

“It’s more than all right. This is just about the swankiest place I’ve ever stayed.”

Mallory smiled. He thought a doublewide on a wind-swept west Texas hill was swanky? Poor man didn’t get out much. “Why don’t you have a seat? Dinner’s almost ready.”

He stood in the doorway, looking uneasy. “I wouldn’t feel right sitting down before you.”

“Don’t be silly, get off those feet. Doctor’s orders.”

Reluctantly, he pulled out a chair and levered himself into it. He bumped his left foot against the table leg and winced.

“If you’re hurting, I’ve got pain reliever.”

“I’ve known worse.”

Odd. Stoicism was another quality she’d never associated with Joe. He’d probably caused more pain than he’d ever experienced. She thought of the people he’d hurt most of all. “You can use the phone to call Brandy if you want. Maybe you should let your family know where you are?”

A look of panic flashed in his eyes before he shuttered them from her scrutiny. “No. I don’t think so.”

Oh. Sore spot. Mentioning the ex-wife wasn’t the way to go. “Whatever you think is best.” The couple had been divorced over a year, but Mallory’s mother stayed current on town gossip despite her recent retirement from the diner, and said the marriage had ended long before that. Brandy had told Mallory at Chloe’s last clinic appointment that she was trying to make a new start by getting into paralegal school.

Mallory drained the pasta and poured a jar of sauce over it. After placing it on a slow burner to warm, she removed the Italian bread from the oven. Joe followed her movements as though trying to memorize them. Why? Unless his memory loss was more serious than Mac suspected, he surely knew how to make spaghetti the easy way. Long a master of deception, Joe might have faked his way through the tests, fooling the doctor into thinking he was doing better than he was.

Conducting a little covert evaluation of her own shouldn’t be too difficult. After all, he wasn’t going anywhere for the next few days.

She served the food and was flabbergasted when Joe bowed his head over his plate. Manners and religion? No way. Things were getting downright spooky around here. First thing tomorrow morning she was checking Dink Potter’s alfalfa field for crop circles. She followed his example, echoing his heartfelt “amen” at the end of the silent thanksgiving.

“Looks good,” he said enthusiastically as he picked up his fork. “What’s it called?”

“Spaghetti.” Another word-finding lapse. Maybe the nurses were right to be concerned. They spent more time with patients than doctors, and their astute observations were usually dead-on. “You seem different to me, Joe.” She took a sip of ice tea.

“Do I?” He kept his eyes on his food. Good thing. Their new harrowing, hypnotic quality gave her the shivers.

“Just a little.” Like maybe scouts from an alien mothership had sucked out the old Joe and replaced him with a too-perfect pod person.

“I reckon I’m still a little befuddled.”

Befuddled? There was another term you didn’t hear every day. His expressive language problems hadn’t affected his newly acquired vocabulary of Mayberryisms. “I’ve noticed you have some trouble remembering things.”

“I suppose. They tell me I had quite a jolt.”

“To put it mildly.” Shock. Temporary cardiopulmonary failure. Oxygen deprivation. A fluid-filled body was an excellent conductor of electricity. Lightning entered through holes in the head, eyes, nose, ears and mouth. The brain, bathed in salt water, was particularly vulnerable to electrical effects. The fact that he was sitting here talking at all was amazing.

She poured bottled dressing on her salad. “Ranch or French?”

He looked up, clearly confused by the question. She raised one brow, waiting for his answer.

“Neither.” Joe continued wrangling the slippery spaghetti onto his fork.

Fast thinking. She’d seen stroke patients become quite proficient at compensating for cognitive deficits. The smart ones learned quickly how to talk around the odd little holes in their memory. Like calling a hammer a hitter and using verbal confabulation to avoid answering direct questions. She’d try another tack. “Would you like dressing on your salad?”

He looked up, and a large blob of sauce-soaked pasta slid off his fork into his lap. “Tarnation!” He grabbed for his napkin, upsetting his glass in the process. Tea and ice cubes joined the spaghetti. “Well, now I’ve done it!”

Mallory stepped over to the rack near the sink and tore off a wad of paper towels, which she handed to him. He scooped up the spaghetti, and then scrubbed at the wet tomato stain on the front of his jeans.

“I’m as clumsy as a booze-blind cowboy.” Flushing, he dabbed at the puddle of tea darkening the green placemat. “I hope I didn’t ruin anything.”

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