Tonight she wore a sleeveless blouse and loose-fitting cotton pants. They were colorful—blue-and-yellow patterned. It was like Leah to wear loud clothes. They were probably her own design. They were cut to show off her slender, shapely form.

She walked toward him. “Can I help you?”

Roman’s mouth went dry, his heart constricted. Her voice. Husky, low, sweet. Leah. He had to force himself to speak, to risk breaking the magic spell or dream or fantasy—whatever it was that had brought her back into his life. He had to find out if she was real.

“Hello, Leah.” He managed to speak in a steady voice.

She didn’t vanish. But her face held no expression as she stared at him. “Would you like a beer?”

Her eyes were wide open, the same as before. No recognition.

He had to know.

“Do you remember—” His heart was in his throat.

“Remember what?” She looked confused.

“—me?” he finished quietly.

“Um, I saw you here the other night.” Her voice wavered into wariness. “A couple of nights, actually.”

Either she was the best actress he’d ever seen, or she really didn’t know who he was. He felt as if he’d been kicked in the stomach and at the same time as if the world was opening up all over again.

“You want a beer?” she asked again.

“No.”

She started to turn away.

“Wait.”

Her shoulders tensed. She turned back. The noise of people talking, glasses clinking, seemed to fade into the background.

“I just…want to talk to you,” he said.

“I don’t have time to talk.” She gave a pointed glance around the bar.

“Then maybe we can talk after you close. What time is that?”

“I can’t,” she said. “I go to bed then.”

“Then, in the morning,” he countered. “I’ll run with you.”

Her eyes narrowed. “How do you know that I run in the morning?”

“I’ve seen you.”

“Look,” she said, her eyes cool, “I don’t know what you’re thinking, but I’m not interested.”

“If you don’t know what I’m thinking, how do you know you’re not interested?”

“Joey told me— He said you were asking questions about me. That you said I was—”

“Attractive,” he supplied.

She shrugged.

He had to speak to her.

“Give me a few minutes, that’s all. I need to talk to you,” he persisted.

“I can’t.”

“Why not?”

In Manhattan, he would have walked away a long time ago. He never asked a woman out twice if she rebuffed him. He wasn’t a pursuer. But he couldn’t walk away from Leah.

He knew little—actually, nothing—about memory loss. He’d called his sister Gen’s husband, Mark Davison, the day before. Mark was a physician. He’d been surprised by Roman’s questions but had answered them in a general way.

Memory loss could be physical or psychological. Short-or long-term. Permanent or temporary. Forcing too much information too soon on the patient could be dangerous. But Mark was a pain specialist, not a psychiatrist, he reminded Roman. He didn’t have all the answers.

Why the questions? Mark had asked. But Roman had hung up without answering. He’d asked Mark not to tell Gen about the phone call. He wasn’t ready to tell anyone about Leah.

“I don’t date,” Leah said finally.

“Why not?” He kept his tone light. She tucked her hair behind her ear. He recognized the familiar gesture. He was making her nervous.

“I’m a lesbian, all right?”

Roman almost burst out laughing. “I don’t think so,” he said. His mind rushed with images. Leah playing footsie with him in front of the fire—wearing nothing but socks. Leah pulling him behind a barn for a roll in the hay—at a farm where they had stopped for a wagon ride. Leah crying out during sex—at his parents’ home. She was the most uninhibited, passionate sex partner he’d ever had.

“Who are you?” she demanded now, and the look in her eyes stopped him short.

Fear. She was afraid—of what? Him? He felt cold all over. What the hell had happened that night she’d gone over that bridge? Why had she been there? He’d never understood that. She’d been on a highway she didn’t normally travel, on a trip she’d told no one about, carrying divorce papers he would never have signed. It had just been one of the many strange, horrible things about her death.

Finding the car had taken them two harrowing days. Inside, they’d discovered her purse, with her wedding ring tucked into a side pocket, and divorce papers inside a briefcase—but no body. They said her body had been washed away in the rain-swollen river. The search had gone on for interminable days, but divers had found nothing.