Making a Comeback Read Online Free

nothing more than a wife and mother.
    “I’m a model,” she finally answered. “Or at least, I was.”
    She reached up to touch the bandage on her face. “How bad is it? I know it will leave a scar, but…”
    It felt like her face was cut from her left temple to her jaw. That’s where it hurt the most. But she might have a smaller cut or two above her eyebrow and across her cheek.
    “I won’t lie to you. It’s going to look pretty bad right now. There will be a lot of redness and swelling. You won’t look like yourself for a few days.” The doctor offered a sympathetic smile. “But you’ll improve steadily over the next several weeks.”
    Annabelle wanted to see, but had a feeling she wouldn’t like what she saw.
    “Let’s take a look, shall we?” The doctor pulled up a chair and started unwrapping the gauze around Annabelle’s head. “Not bad. It looks like a clean wound.”
    “But it will leave a scar?”
    “Yes, I’m afraid so.”
    “That’s not going to help my modeling career.” Annabelle hated how disappointed she sounded. Almost whiney.
    “Tell me about what happened today,” the doctor said as she applied a fresh bandage. This one was smaller, and it didn’t cover her eye. “What do you remember about the accident, and what you did earlier in the day?”
    Annabelle recalled snippets of time. Sitting in a chair having her makeup done. Wardrobe changes. Bright lights and the clicks of the camera. A typical day as a model. She’d done her first Sports Illustrated issue when she was only nineteen. Had it been ten years already? Somehow today’s shoot had felt new and exciting, like the first time, only better. Her agent had set her up on a photo shoot with a small upscale boutique in Aurelia Beach. The ads would run in a regional magazine, distributed at restaurants, hotels, and businesses throughout Orange County, giving her plenty of exposure. She’d hoped it would be enough to re-launch her career.
    She sank back against the pillow, trying to gather more details from the foggy corners of her mind.
    “I was on my way to a photo shoot.” It was like that dream. The one where she was running in slow motion, only instead of her feet, it was her brain that felt stuck in quicksand. “No. I was on my way home. I had done my job and I was going to meet the school bus.”
    “But you didn’t meet the bus?”
    “No. I saw a flash out of the corner of my eye.” And then crunching metal. Broken glass. So much blood. “It must have been the car that hit me.”
    Annabelle closed her eyes, hoping the picture would form in her mind. But she was tired. So tired.
    “Can I go home?” she asked again, weary of the hospital. Of the questions that seemed much harder than they should be. “I just want to go home.”
    “Do you have someone staying with you?” the doctor asked.
    “My daughters live with me.” She sensed that wasn’t the right answer, but it was the honest one.
    “I’m afraid I can’t release you unless you have a responsible adult who can keep an eye on you for the next twenty-four to forty-eight hours.”
    “I can’t think of anyone who could stay with me.” If she was in San Francisco, she could call Hunter. No, she was still on her honeymoon. They would be coming to Aurelia Beach in a few days on their way home.
    “What about the man who is here to pick you up?”
    “Cooper? He’s my neighbor.” And she couldn’t just ask him to stay overnight with her. Not when she was such a mess.
    “He’ll need to stay with you. Next door isn’t close enough.”
    “I couldn’t impose like that.” Especially since she wasn’t sure where they stood. He’d said they were friends, but there was something more between them. Something she couldn’t act on.
    “Okay, then we’ll just admit you overnight.”
    “No. Wait.” If she didn’t go home, who would watch her girls? If she couldn’t ask Cooper to babysit her, she certainly couldn’t ask him to look after her