The Tycoon's Proposition

The doctor finished rewrapping his patient’s head, then lowered the bed so Richard was lying almost flat.

“I can think of one thing.”

“What?”

“You could give his legs and feet a soothing massage with that lotion over on the table. It will relax his whole body and help him to sleep.”

“I’ll do it.”

“Excellent. I am sure your husband is looking forward to such a lovely wife ministering to his needs.”

The doctor was mistaken on that score, but she was equally certain Richard craved any relief from the pain that he could get. If a massage would help, she was only too glad to provide it.

“Tomorrow we will put him in the shower for the first time. That will make him feel really good, too.”

Terri had no doubt of it and thanked him.

“I’m impressed with the wonderful care you’re getting,” she said after the doctor had left the room. “Tomorrow you’ll be stripped of all these bandages. I know you can’t wait. Until then I’ll do as he suggested and try to bring you some comfort.”

She moved over to the table and picked up the lotion, and then walked to the end of the bed. After pulling out the sheet to expose his left leg to the knee, she squirted a mound of the cream in her palm to begin the rubdown.

But when she started to work the lotion into his skin, her hands froze.

Dear God.

This man wasn’t Richard!

The burnished, hard-muscled leg did not belong to her ex-husband! Richard’s legs were shorter, bulkier, hairier; his foot was wider, not as long.

Terri began to tremble. She removed her hands and hurried to the door to turn on the overhead light.

Without hesitation she rushed to his side and bent over him so she could peer into his eyes.

Pain-filled gray eyes stared back at her between dark lashes. There was a frantic urgency in his look she could feel to her bones.

“You poor man,” she whispered in a shaky voice. “All this time everyone has thought you were my ex-husband. No wonder you’ve been so upset.”

He let out a moan which she took for a yes.

Her eyes filled with tears. “I’m sorry it took me this long to discover the truth. Last evening when I arrived, Dr. Dominguez told me they were keeping the light off in here so you could sleep. If I’d been able to look into your eyes, I would have known immediately you weren’t Richard.

“The fisherman who brought you in said you called out my name. That means you knew Richard. I assume you were friends or colleagues. Were you both in the accident?”

The stranger lifted his head enough to nod, but it was clearly a strain. Nevertheless it meant he understood her English.

“Lie still,” she begged. “Please don’t exert yourself. Obviously you have family and friends looking for you. They must be in agony wondering where you are.

“I’ll alert the staff right now, then I’ll leave and go straight to the police to find out if the Herrick company or someone else has put out a missing persons report for you. I suppose it’s possible Richard was taken to another hospital in the city.”

This time the stranger shook his head.

She was trying to understand. “If he’s not at a hospital, do you know where he is?”

He nodded again, but the strain on him had taken its toll. His eyelids closed. The unidentified man had to be in grueling pain. She could feel it.

“That’s all right. You sleep while I’m gone. I swear I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

She covered his leg and tucked the sheet in place. Then she put the lotion on the table. After turning off the light, she grabbed her purse and tore out of the room.

To her relief the same doctor happened to be at the nursing station down the hall. She took him aside and told him what she’d discovered. He looked shocked and said he’d immediately notify the staff as well as the head of the hospital.

Within a half hour she’d told the same story to Captain Ortiz, an officer at the main police station in Guayaquil. He knew nothing about an accident at sea and proceeded to ask a lot of questions. She gave him a full description of her ex-husband. As for the stranger lying in the hospital bed, there was less to tell about him.

The captain said he would send another officer to the hospital to interview the doctors who were taking care of him. If the police could find the fisherman who’d brought him in, it would answer a lot of questions. At some point he would get back to her either at the hospital or the hotel.

Terri in turn said she would find out where her ex-husband was living. The bandaged stranger had indicated that Richard wasn’t in a hospital. That had to mean he hadn’t been badly hurt in the accident and was convalescing at his apartment or wherever it was that he lived. If she found him first, she would phone the captain right away. He agreed that it sounded like the best plan of action.

After agreeing to stay in close touch, Terri left the police station for the Herrick head office. The taxi driver knew the name and drove her to the heart of the city where he deposited her in front of a complex of buildings, one of which housed the company in question.

A Latin beauty sat at the main reception. When Terri told her she needed some information about one of the employees who worked for the Herrick Corporation, the woman told her she couldn’t give out confidential information.

However as soon as Terri mentioned Martha Shaw, Mr. Creighton Herrick’s secretary, her tone changed. The woman made a quick phone call before looking up Richard’s record on the computer. She gave Terri his address, but there was no phone number listed.

After thanking the receptionist, Terri asked her to call for a taxi. Once that was done, she went outside to wait.

When the driver pulled up in front and she showed him the address, he told her it was located twenty-five miles south of the city and would take close to an hour to get there.

Terri didn’t care about that. She climbed in the back seat and handed him fifty dollars to cover the round-trip. Then she told him to step on it.

He smiled before starting up the taxi to merge with the other cars. The drive turned out to take fifty minutes in the early-afternoon traffic. By the time they reached the city limits, she could tell that the barrios in the outskirts were more run-down.

Eventually he pulled up in front of a small three-story apartment called the Mirador. There was no landscaping to speak of, and a cluster of little children played on the stairs. She asked him to stay put while she went to the door. In case Richard wasn’t there, she needed to be sure she had a ride back into town.

The driver nodded and reached for a magazine to read.

Number ten put Richard on the second floor. She stepped past the curious children to find his apartment, then knocked. When there was no answer she knocked again.

“Richard?” she called out. “It’s Terri. If you can hear me, let me know. I heard about the accident and have flown all this way to see you.”

Still nothing.

Afraid he could be inside unable to get up and answer the door, she turned the handle, hoping he might have left it unlocked.

“Aiyee!” she heard a woman scream.

Terri didn’t know who was more frightened.

Through the opening in the door, which the chain guard allowed, she saw a woman probably much younger than Terri’s twenty-seven years. With long black hair and liquid-brown eyes, Terri could well understand her ex-husband’s attraction.

The woman stood there wearing Richard’s yellow robe, looking very pretty and very pregnant.

CHAPTER TWO

“BUENOS tardes.” Terri spoke first. “Habla Ingles?”

The other woman shook her head without the slightest hint of welcome in her expression.

At this point Terri had only her two years of Spanish to rely on. “Por favor, donde esta Richard?” Heavens! It had been so long since high school, she couldn’t remember if she was supposed to use Estar or Ser.

The woman responded too fast. Terri couldn’t follow.

She tried again. “Quiero hablar con Richard.”

There was another spate of unintelligible words before the woman shut the door in Terri’s face.

If Richard had been inside, Terri was positive he would have come out to see what was going on.

The fact that his lover seemed to be angry rather than in despair, led Terri to believe Richard had to be all right. In fact, the fiery woman was probably expecting him home later in the day and couldn’t believe some strange American woman had appeared at the door unannounced and unwanted.

Only jealousy could have prompted her to behave in such a rude manner. It was more than possible Richard had never told this woman about Terri. Certainly he’d never expected to see his ex-wife again. Especially not down here in Guayaquil, which was about as far from Lead, South Dakota, as you could get.

Terri hurried back to the taxi and they left for the city. En route she asked the driver to drop her off at an upscale department store near the San Lorenzo Hospital. She needed to make a few purchases.

Assuming for the moment Richard was out of danger, Terri’s thoughts converged on the stranger who’d been lying in a hospital bed since he’d been rescued. The painful desperation in his beautiful gray eyes would haunt her for a long time to come.

How frightening it must have been to wake up in an unfamiliar place, unable to talk while everyone around him thought he was someone else!

He probably had a wife who was out of her mind with grief because he was missing. Until a relative or friend came to claim him, Terri would stay with him and encourage him to get better. It was the least she could do.

An hour and a half later she rushed inside the hospital with her arms loaded. After taking the elevator, she hurried down the hall of his floor where various helpers were serving dinner to the patients who could eat.

She stopped at the nursing station long enough to be offered a tray of food for herself, then she breezed into his room with her packages.

“Hi!” she called out in a soft voice, not wanting to jar him. As he lifted his left hand in greeting, her dinner arrived. She put everything down on the floor, then reached for the tray and drew the chair next to him so she could be seated.

“I was gone a lot longer than I’d intended. First off I went to the police station and explained the situation. Then I took a taxi to the Herrick office. I’ve been so busy I haven’t eaten anything since breakfast. Now I’m starving.

“I hope you don’t mind my eating in front of you. If the smell makes you nauseous, put up your hand and I’ll eat out in the hall.”

He made no gesture, so she had to believe it was all right.

“Earlier when you told me you knew where Richard was, I asked the receptionist at the Herrick office to give me his address. It took a little doing, but she finally complied. From there I took another taxi out to his apartment to see if he was there, and found a woman in residence. Judging by her pregnant condition, it seems Richard’s been living with her for a long time.”

More indecipherable sounds came out of the stranger.

“She wasn’t in the least happy to see me at the door. I tried out my Spanish on her, but she spoke too fast for me to understand. Later I’ll try to get in touch with Richard through someone at the office who knows him personally. In the meantime, I’m anxious to help you in any way I can.”

The chicken and beans tasted good. So did the fruit juice which was an interesting blend of peach and something else, maybe mango.

After she’d drained the glass she said, “There’s a Captain Ortiz at the police station who’s working on your case. He hadn’t heard of any accident at sea. However with the information I’ve given him, he said he’ll come up with some answers soon and hopefully find out who you are.

“If we don’t hear from him in the next few hours, I’ll call him before I leave. In case there’s no news, I have an idea.

“Since the doctor said they’d be removing the bandages on your hands in the morning, maybe with my help you could write your name or your home phone number on a piece of paper. That is, if it doesn’t hurt too much.

“Depending on your mobility, you might even be able to write down a word that will tell me Richard’s location. One way or another we’ll unravel this mystery.”

She finished the rest of her chicken, then put the tray over on the table. Eager to do something to bring a little pleasure to the man who’d been through so much suffering, she turned to him.

“Now that I’ve eaten, I’ll give your legs that massage you’ve been waiting for.”

Not expecting an answer from the stranger, she picked up the lotion and walked over to the bed.

After squeezing lotion up and down his left leg, she began to rub it in. “When I was in junior high, we once read The Invisible Man for Halloween. That’s a holiday in the States, in case you haven’t heard of it. The children dress up in costumes and go door to door asking for candy.

“Anyway, there was this scientist who’d made himself invisible. He wrapped himself in bandages so it would outline his body. But sometimes a dog or a cat would chase after him in the streets and pull the bandages away. People would scream in terror when they couldn’t see anything underneath.

“It was a really fascinating concept. Of course I love science fiction of all kinds, so the story captured my attention right off. Anyway, when I walked in this room yesterday and saw you, I was reminded of that story.

“Thank goodness when I looked in your eyes this morning, I saw life there staring back at me,” she teased. “You’re kind of a cross between him and The Mummy.

“Maybe you don’t know about this old movie. It concerns a guard of the Pharaoh who dared to love his Egyptian queen. For his punishment the other guards turned him into a living mummy. It still gives me chills just thinking about it.”

A faint noise came out of him. It could mean most anything.

“If your feet are ticklish, I’m sorry. I’ll try not to drive you crazy.”

When she’d finished with one leg, she moved around the end of the bed and started on the other. Strange how it felt so natural doing this small service for a total stranger. The darkness of the room with just the two of them added a certain intimacy, which she enjoyed.

In truth it was much easier than if it had been Richard lying here. Too much unhappy history had passed between them to have made it an enjoyable experience.

“Do you know? I haven’t the faintest idea of your nationality. Obviously you understand English, but you could be from so many different countries besides Ecuador, your predicament has fueled my imagination.

“You’ve probably never been to South Dakota. That’s where I live in the States. A small town called Lead, gateway to the Black Hills and Mount Rushmore. Fresh out of college with an English degree, I started working for the local chamber of commerce.

“In the beginning it was only supposed to be a temporary job until I found a good teaching position. However the work became so interesting to me, I’ve been with them ever since.

“If you asked me what I actually do there, the answer would be a little bit of everything under the sun. Something’s always going wrong and I have to fix it. That’s why I like it so much.

“Of course my family is there. My mom and my sister Beth who married Tom three months ago. Now they’re expecting a baby. You already know my marriage to Richard failed, so that’s about it. The story of my life. No doubt I’ve bored you to tears.”

She gave his foot a final rub, then covered his legs with the sheet. “Since there’s no television in here, I’ll read you what’s on the front page of today’s newspaper. Someone left it in the room. In case you’re a native Spanish speaker, please forgive my pronunciation.”

Terri washed her hands, then put on some lotion from her own purse before placing the chair near the wall light so she could read the print.

“This is from El Telegrafo. Let’s see…

“Mediante oficio No. 19370 enviado al Presidente del Congreso, José Cordero Acosta, el Procurador General del Estado, Ramón Jiménez Carbo, senñala que su pronunciamiento sobre la inconstitucionalidad del artículo 33 del Reglamento que dispuso la prisión domiciliaria para—entre otros—los ex presidentes y ex vicepresidentes de la República, ‘tiene carácter vinculante.’”

She put the paper down. “If I knew what vinculante meant, this article would make a lot more sense. But I don’t think it would be of interest to anyone who isn’t involved in local politics. Of course, maybe you are. If so, forgive me if I don’t read further.”

To her surprise, his body appeared to be shaking. Alarmed, she jumped up from the chair and hurried over to his side.

“What’s wrong? Do you need the doctor?”

He shook his head.

“Are you cold?”

Again he made the same gesture.

After a moment of consideration, “Are you laughing?”

He nodded.

Her lips curved into a smile. “My Spanish was that awful?”

Once more he shook his head.

“Liar,” she whispered, loving their one-sided conversation more than she’d loved anything in years.

“I’m glad you can laugh, but maybe you shouldn’t, just in case it pulls at the stitches under your chin. When your wife comes rushing in, I’m sure she’ll be looking for the same attractive man she married before the accident.”

He shook his head.

“Don’t be modest. I’ve seen your eyes, remember? And you’ve got great legs.”

His body shook again.

“With that head of dark hair, something tells me there’s a real hunk hidden under all those bandages. In case you haven’t heard the word ‘hunk’ before, it means, a good-looking man. In Spanish a woman would say, muy guapo. You’ve probably been called that a lot around here.”

She left him long enough to find the packages she’d bought and had asked to be gift-wrapped.

“These are for you. I think they’ll fit. You’re probably six feet two or three. I thought you’d want to be wearing something more spectacular than a hospital gown when your family shows up.”

Terri put the packages on the chair and opened them one at a time. “I bought you these navy pajamas and matching robe. I’m sorry if they’re not your taste, but with that tan I think you’ll look sensational in them.

“I also picked up these leather sandals. They’ll fit a size eleven or twelve foot. In case that sizing doesn’t mean anything to you, be assured you’ll be able to wear them.”

She held everything up for him to see. “After your shower in the morning, you can put these on. It will make you feel more normal.”

Leaving everything on the chair, she moved it against the wall, then returned to his side.

“I’m sorry Captain Ortiz hasn’t phoned yet. I know he would have if there’d been any news. Please don’t be disheartened. Who knows? When morning comes, I might walk in here and discover you’ve got a room full of company.

“In that case, you’re going to need a good night’s sleep so I think I’d better leave. It’s getting late.”

He let out another strange sound and shook his mummy-like head.

“What’s wrong? You don’t want me to go yet?”

Again, his head moved back and forth.

“So—you want me to help you pass the time, is that it?”

His definite nod secretly pleased her. It meant her presence brought him some comfort. It felt good to be needed.

“Since your hearing hasn’t been affected, I guess I could stay for a while longer and talk to you. But don’t be surprised if one of the sisters comes around to check your vital signs and throws me out. I’ll put your new clothes in the drawer so I can sit next to you.”

In a few seconds she was seated at his side once more.

“I’ve just thought of another idea. When my sister and I were little girls, we used to print the names of movie stars on each other’s backs and try to guess who they were. The one who got the most right answers on the first round had to buy the other one a treat the next day.

“Why don’t I try printing a continent on your leg? The one you come from. You nod when I’ve stumbled onto it.”

Excited over her own idea, she uncovered his leg and started drawing the letters for Europe up his shin bone.

When she’d finished, his head remained motionless.

“Hmm. How about this?”

She wrote South America.

Still there was no gesture from him.

Next she printed the words North America.

Now she got the nod she’d been waiting for.

“American?”

Another emphatic nod.

Terri shot to her feet. “I should have played this game with you earlier.” Her voice shook. “Do you work for the Herrick Company, too?”

He gave her a nod.

She sucked in her breath. “Okay. Let’s learn your first name. I’ll start saying the alphabet. You lift your right hand slightly when I come to the right letter. A,” she began. “B.”

He lifted his hand.

“Second letter. A. B. C. D. E.”

Again, his hand moved.

She went through the alphabet a third time. When she reached N, he raised his hand.

“Your name is Ben!” she cried out. “Short for Benjamin?”

He nodded.

With her heart racing she said, “Let’s do your last name.” She went through the same process. It seemed his last name started with an H. By the time she’d been through the alphabet seven times, he’d spelled the name Herrick.

Terri blinked. “Is it a coincidence you have the same name as the company you work for?”

He shook his head.

“You mean you’re the head of the company here?”

Contact at last!

Ben nodded as he gazed into her expressive eyes. They widened in incredulity. Their heavenly blue color reminded him of Texas bluebonnets which flowered every spring at the ranch.

With her dark-blond hair cut in a kind of windswept shag, and a mouth shaped like a heart when she was pondering something serious, she looked utterably adorable to him.

“But if that’s true, how is it possible no one’s looking for you of all people? Captain Ortiz never said anything about the head of your company disappearing. It doesn’t make sense! But that doesn’t matter right now. The important thing is that you’re alive and on the road to recovery.”

He watched helplessly as she bit the soft underside of her lip. What he’d give to taste such an enticing mouth.

“I’ll call Martha Shaw and tell her you’re here so she can let your family know.”

No! Lord, no. Not Martha.

He moaned, then lifted his hand in the air. Unfortunately his blond angel of mercy wasn’t paying any attention to him.

Stunned over her discovery, Terri grabbed for her purse to get the secretary’s number. When she found the paper she’d written it on, she hurried over to the wall phone at the head of the bed.

Using her phone card, she made the call. This time it took six rings before the other woman answered.

“Martha Shaw speaking.”

“Ms. Shaw? This is Terri Jeppson.”

“Yes, Terri. How is your husband?”

“I believe he’s all right, but I haven’t seen him yet. There’s another reason I’m calling.” She struggled for breath.

“You sound upset. What’s wrong?”

“The man the hospital thought was my husband has turned out to be someone else. The trouble is, his throat was burned and he can’t talk. However I discovered a way to communicate with him. He says his name is Benjamin Herrick.”

After a long silence, “Ben is the patient?” She sounded as shaken as Terri.

“Yes. I need to inform the police, but I thought you should be told first so you can get in touch with his family and co-workers. Naturally he’s had no visitors.

“The thing is, today’s his fourth day in here. Though he’s been getting excellent treatment, it has to have been a ghastly experience for him not being able to talk or explain who he really was.”

Ben heard the tremor in Terri Jeppson’s appealing voice. The woman’s compassion for his plight—never mind the fact that she was still waiting for word about her ex-husband—touched him in places he hadn’t known existed.