Page 67 of The Billionaire Benefactor

Chapter 21

“Are you sure you’re ready for this?” Blake asked.

Roman sat outside Jenny’s house in his truck, the engine still idling. It was warm still for October. Houston generally was. These were the kinds of things he remembered. They were just there. Unlike Jenny’s house. His GPS had led him here and though his doctor said that he didn’t have any way of knowing when or how or if his memories would return, Roman had hoped. But…nothing. This house looked like any other on the street.

“It doesn’t look familiar,” he said.

“She moved. Tony, L’Trel, and I helped her. You’ve never been to this house. I can take you to the old one sometime if you’d like?”

“That’s okay. Are you sure she wants to see me?” Roman asked.

“Positive. Though I think she’s a little scared.”

“Of me?”

“Of getting hurt.”

Roman gripped the steering wheel tighter, twisting his hands over it again and again. His head had been feeling better since he started the daily hyperbaric oxygen treatments, but he was starting to feel a dull ache in his neck. He bought his own machine for his mother’s house so he didn’t have to keep driving to the hospital. It wasn’t quite the same caliber, but unlike the hospital chamber, he could bring in his laptop and watch movies or scroll the internet. Two weeks with it gave him the first headache-free times since the accident. Until now.

“I wish I could promise I wouldn’t hurt her again,” he said. “I hate that I hurt her at all. Maybe this was a bad idea.”

“Will you just get out of the car already? Sheesh. You’re going to have a traumatic brain injury from all this thinking. Just knock on the door. You want to know something weird?”

“From you? Maybe?”

Blake laughed. “Well-deserved. Here goes: I’ve been praying for this.”

Roman choked back a laugh when Blake was silent. “Oh—you’re serious.”

“I am.”

“But…you don’t pray.”

“I know. Your heathen friend is praying for your relationship.”

“No pressure or anything.” Roman smiled.

“Nope. None at all. I mean it. You can’t really control stuff like this: how you feel or whether your memories come back. Just go in and see. Okay? And call me after.”

“Will do. And Blake? Keep up the praying. For my sake.”

Blake chuckled. “We’ll see. No promises, man.”

Roman sat for another few minutes with his phone in his hand. Had Jenny noticed his truck idling out front? Did she wonder what he was doing? Was she as nervous as he was? Despite the blasting air conditioner in his car, sweat beaded on his forehead, the back of his neck, and his palms.

He shouldn’t be so nervous. Blake had talked to Jenny beforehand to let her know that Roman didn’t remember her. He had asked if Roman could come by and see her, as a way of trying to jog the memories loose. They seemed closer now, almost something he could grasp in his mind. He dreamed of Jenny most nights, but could hardly remember the dreams either, just her face. Maybe he was dreaming memories?

It was odd that he saw her face at all in his dreams. He had only seen her in the hospital, and in some photos that were taken at a ball they attended. She looked incredible in a silvery-blue ball gown, but it was strange to look at pictures of her with him, photographs of them talking and dancing, that he could not remember. He kept one by his bedside table, so when he woke from the dreams, he could look at the picture, as though somehow seeing Jenny might keep the dreams from disappearing like fog.

Roman got out of the truck. He carried two bouquets of lilies with him, which he had a heated debate with himself over. They reeked of desperation. And yet, in the letters (copies of which he’d tucked into his back pocket), he said that if he could do it over, this is what he would do: bring lilies for Jenny and for Lucy. He was trusting so much in the words on those pieces of paper. His words. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have come, no matter how hard Blake had pushed him. He simply had to meet this woman that had gotten him to fall in love within a matter of a month. It sounded crazy, no matter how gorgeous Jenny looked in the photos of the ball or how soft her voice had been in the hospital when she told him good morning.

Before he could knock or ring the doorbell, Jenny opened the door. A giant black dog pushed past her and barreled into him. She had a dog? He stepped back in surprise as the dog nuzzled and licked his hands, almost crushing the flowers, and rubbed against him almost catlike. The dog clearly remembered him.

When he looked up again at Jenny, her face was a mix of raw emotions. Her eyes looked wet, as though she was already holding back tears, but she was smiling, hesitant. He could see fear, but also hope. His heart was moving at a rapid rate as he stared.

She was the kind of beautiful that didn’t need makeup. A fresh beauty that made him have to remind himself not to stare.

But seeing her in person did not make him remember.

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