“I know a fair amount about first aid.” He opened three eggs with considerably less dash than she had. He spread his butter methodically, placed his bacon precisely. “I suspect you have at least one cracked rib.”

She took a painful breath. “Me, too.”

“There’s nothing to be done. The old belief was to wrap them. The new belief is to leave them to heal.”

“If wrapping will make them hurt less, let’s wrap them.” Soon.

“As you wish. In your judgment, do you have other broken bones?”

She rotated her shoulders, wiggled her toes, moved from side to side in her chair. “No. When I was a kid, I broke my wrist rollerblading.” She looked at the wrist. “How do I remember that?”

“Traumatic event. They tend to imprint themselves on your consciousness.” He pushed two blue pills toward her. “Take your pain relievers.”

She did as she was told, then in a voice so bright, so perky, she could be from a teen sitcom, she said, “So no need for a doctor!”

“You’re suffering from the remnants of hypothermia. Quite serious.”

She started to argue.

He raised a hand to stop her. “Yes, if your appetite is anything to judge by, you’re on your way to recovery.” He seemed to choose his next words deliberately. “But unless you’re lying, you still suffer from amnesia.”

She put her fork down. “I’m not lying. I don’t remember anything but... I’m Elle. Elle Something Something.”

“Elle Marie?”

“No. But more than just Elle. I remember flashes of that man, coming at me again after I’d killed him. And every time I remember that...” Heart pounding, she stared at Adam and lived it again.

She screamed and screamed, but his hands gripped her throat in a killer’s hold, and not a sound escaped.

The square of light from the window slid across the glistening floor as if it was slick. From inside the cabin the music throbbed, there was laughter and singing. She knew her friends and colleagues were in there, drinking, partying, interested in each other and not in her.

They couldn’t hear her, silently screaming...dying.

Out here, the storm lashed the two struggling figures with rain and wind.

He held her against the wall, choking her with increasing force.

“Elle.” Adam knelt beside her, his arm around her shoulders. “My God, Elle. When this happened, where were you?”

She breathed in with a gasp and realized she’d been holding her breath. “I don’t know. If I could remember...”

“No wonder you were screaming. All those pent-up screams clamoring for release.” Adam pressed her fingers. “I will not let him kill you.”

“I know. I trust you. I know you’d do your best to keep me safe.”