She twisted and buried her head in the pillow, still hiding her tears, although they were coming, whether she wanted them or not.

“I’m sorry,” Silas murmured. She felt his big hand pressed against her shoulder. “You’re welcome to stay here for as long as you need to.”

She turned toward the window. The moon was a high, yellow, silver-lidded eye. “I guess I don’t have anywhere else to go…”

Silas stood. “I’m sorry,” he said again.

“I want to go to sleep.” She closed her eyes. “I wish I hadn’t remembered anything.”

“Try to sleep.” He moved to the door and then turned to ask, “Do you remember your name?”

“Jolee Mercier.”

He stood for a long time. So long she turned to see if he was still there, framed in the doorway.

“Silas?”

“You should know.” He cleared his throat. “Carlos Mercier is my brother.” Jolee gave a short, sharp laugh, but the man didn’t return her mirth. He was serious. It wasn’t possible, couldn’t be true. Carlos’s brother was gone, dead, that’s what he’d told her, told everyone. But that was all she’d ever known about her husband’s only sibling. She tried to remember more and couldn’t.

“Goodnight, Jolee.”

She tried to see him in the moonlight but could only discern his outline. “Goodnight, Silas.”

Overwhelmed with the crushing impact of chance, she turned her face to the wall and closed her eyes, wishing again for oblivion.

* * * *

The woman was impossible.

He’d wanted to take her into a hospital when the snow finally stopped, but Jolee refused, too afraid Carlos could find the records, trace her somehow.

“There are privacy laws,” he’d reminded her, but she just gave him a long, steady look and shook her head.

She did seem to be getting better, her cut healing, memory returning, but he would have felt better if he’d had confirmation from an emergency room doctor, or at least a few x-rays or an MRI.