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obedience, and he found himself intrigued. More intrigued by a
    human being than he'd been in a very long time .

    She pulled the chair up beside the bed and laid her palm on his forehead. It was the
    touch he remembered—that his body remembered. He shivered as if with fever, the
    tremor radiating south from her hand to his extremities like an electric current. The
    charge gathered in his groin and lingered there, even when she withdrew her hand. His
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    arousal was immediate and formidable. She might as well have bared her luxurious
    breasts, within such easy reach of his hands, and offered them up to his exploration .

    He swallowed and closed his eyes. His mind was conjuring up these visions because he
    literally couldn't remember the last time he'd taken a woman to his bed. He was burning
    up with lust, and he was afraid .

    "You aren't warm," Johanna said, as if to herself. She bent to her black bag and
    removed a gauze packet, unwrapping a glass thermometer. "Please open your mouth—
    ”

    If you'll open yours, he thought. Yes; make a joke out of it. That had always saved him
    before. "Don't you think we ought to be properly introduced before engaging in such
    intimacies?" he asked with a grin .

    She paused as if genuinely surprised, her thermometer suspended in midair .

    "My name," he said with a slight bow from the waist, "is Quentin Forster. You must be
    the famous Doctor Johanna. I understand that I have you to thank for my presence in
    this very comfortable bed.”

    She raised one straight eyebrow. "I am Doctor Schell," she said. "I am pleased to see
    that you remember who you are.”

    Quentin started. Did she know about his lapses in memory? Had he been here long
    enough for her to learn so much?

    She set down the thermometer and placed her thumb and forefinger above and below
    his right eye, pulling open his lids. "Very good," she said. "Do you remember how you
    came to be here?”

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    He considered lying. No, not with this one. And why bother? He'd be gone soon enough .

    "Unfortunately, I do not," he said. "I wish I did, considering the state in which I found
    myself when I woke up.”

    She must have understood his intimation, but her expression remained tranquil. It was
    really quite striking, that face—or would be, if it could be made to smile. Without any
    good reason at all, Quentin wanted to make her smile .

    Maybe then she'd actually see him. Remind him that something of the old Quentin was
    still within him, unsullied—the devil-may-care rogue beloved by the Prince's set in
    England, the gambler, the jokester who never took anything seriously .

    "Your state," she said, "was extremely poor when we brought you here. You're very
    lucky to be alive, young man.”

    Young man? He was entering his third decade, and she couldn't be so much as a year
    older than he was, if that. He laughed. It hurt his chest, but he let it go with abandon .

    "Do you find that amusing, Mr. Forster?" she said coolly .

    "I'm not an infant, Doctor, and you aren't a grandmother yet, unless I'm very much
    mistaken." He grabbed her hand and turned it palm up. The hand was lightly callused
    and strong, but her fingers were tapered and graceful. The fingers of an artist. Fingers
    that would heal a wound or stroke naked skin with equal skill

    "Ah, yes," he intoned with an air of dramatic mystery. "I see that you have a long life
    ahead of you. You let nothing get in the way of your ambitions. But unexpected
    adventure awaits. A great challenge. And romance." He drew his finger over the
    creases in her palm. "A man has come into your life.”

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    She reclaimed her hand without haste. "If that is the best you can do, Mr. Forster, you
    need additional instruction in fortune-telling.”

    Was that a twinkle in her blue eyes? Did she have a