Swimming leisurely in the Pacific, Brooke was glad she had taken the day off of work to play hooky. Wiser from her incident in Cannes, she was staying very close to the shore. Though she did wonder if she got another cramp would her rescuer come to her rescue again?

As much as she didn't want it to, her rescuer or rescuers stayed on her mind constantly. How was it possible that she could have passed out, been pulled from the sea, driven to her hotel, undressed, given a shower, redressed, and placed into bed without her ever awakening once? She had almost called James to see if he could put her under so she could find out the truth about what had occurred. But she refrained, though she had gone to the doctor for a check-up to make sure she hadn't been assaulted. She was sure she hadn't been, but better to be safe than sorry.

Who rescued her? And why? Why would they leave her without a note or a word after all they had done to ensure she would live? It was all very bizarre, but hadn't her life been strange in one way or the other since she met the Forrester family? Things she thought would never happen, say, for instance, her marrying and remarrying Ridge and also his dad and his brother. She always thought she would be the girl who would marry once and marry for life. Instead, she married more times than the last seven generations of her family. Ouch! Life definitely hadn't turned out the way she'd planned it.

She wondered how long she could get away with not returning her siblings or mother's calls. She knew if she didn't call one of them soon, both Jamal Woods, Katie's whipped husband, and Brad Snyder, Donna's equally whipped husband, would be showing up on her doorstep. She was having a hard time deciding who would be the easiest to talk to. It definitely wasn't her mother. Brooke couldn't even begin to contemplate the hurt and rage her mother felt for her husband of over forty years to tell such a horrible, despicable lie. She shook hear head, knowing she definitely couldn't call her mother.

She couldn't call Storm either. She loved her older brother to death but sometimes he couldn't stop himself from making Forrester digs and sprinkling "get away from those evil people" throughout his conversation. This left her with calling Donna or Katie. Donna was expecting her second set of Snyder twins so it wasn't a good idea to upset her, which left Katie.

Katie could be a hothead and would want to hop in her car and go to war with Stephanie, Massimo, and Ridge. All the things she didn't want. She wanted to do what she had been doing, ignore the Forresters and keep everything strictly business. She was cordial and polite, but the minute Eric, Ridge, Thorne, or Stephanie tried to make it personal, she shut down. Maybe that was the key to being free from the Forresters, ignore. Ignore. Ignore. Ignore. If only she had realized that years before, it would have saved her heartache. But who knew if she would have been able to do that years ago. Although she was enjoying "Operation Ignore", it drove Stephanie positively bananas, especially combined with her passive, non-revealing smile she had developed. She was sure that woman was going to have another heart attack soon.

Brooke opened her eyes and was amazed at how far she had drifted from the shore. She spun around and quickly made her way to the shore, until a hand on her shoulder stopped her. Instantly her mind flashed to Cannes; she reached inside her bikini top and grabbed her miniaturized, water-proof can of mace. Turning to spray it, her hand was caught in mid-air.

"Do Ric and Bridget mean so little to you that you would risk death twice? Are you so disappointed they married people beneath them that you would kill yourself? Because if disappointing parents led to suicide, your parents would have off-ed themselves years ago," the mystery man said.

"Who are you? And how dare you scare me like that? And how dare you talk to me like this?" Brooke yelled angrily, as she was pulled to shore and ceremoniously dumped on the sand.

"I dare because I've already saved your life once and I don't need to do it twice."

Clearing the water from her eyes, she looked up to see a tall, Norse looking man staring down at her. He looked to be around his mid-to-late twenties. This was the man who had saved her life. "Why?"

"Why did I save your life? Right now, I'm wondering the same thing. It seems you didn't fully appreciate it the first time around."

Standing up to her full height so she wouldn't feel so overpowered by the over six foot tall stranger, she still had to tilt her head to look him in the eye. "I am not nor have I ever been suicidal and with that said, thank you for the help in Cannes, but I did not need rescuing today. I definitely didn't need to be manhandled by a gigantic brute."

"Well, you do have this can of mace on you. So I guess you did learn something," he said as if he didn't hear her. He handed her back her can.

She took it back and held it ready to use. "Who are you?" If he rescued her, did that mean he undressed her, bathed her? Oh my- -

"Get your mind out of the gutter. I saved your life, found a nice, hearty, motherly looking maid to get you bathed and dressed, end of story. By the way you owe me three hundred dollars for that."

Her jaw dropped. Did he just have the audacity to ask her for money?

"Yes, I asked for my money back. Unlike some people, I'm not a billionaire."

"Neither am I," she retorted haughtily.

"Oh, I'm sorry. I meant multi-millionaire. Oh never mind, I forgot that wasn't my money. It was yours I got it out of your secret stash under the mattress. By the way, that's a horrible place to leave your backup cash."

She stared at him in amazement. Who was this brute, arrogant, uncouth man in front of her? She had never met a man like this before in her life. Who in the world did he think he was?

"Have you looked your fill yet? And close your mouth before bugs start flying down your throat." Taking a look at himself, he tried to squeeze out some of the water in his shirt and jeans. "Now thanks to your stunt I have to drive home in wet clothes. Thanks a lot. What's the fastest way back to the Valley?"

She remained silent. He was obnoxious and rude to her, yet he wanted her help. Was he insane? Maybe this was all some bad dream and she was going to wake up on the beach with her head buried in a Jackie Collins novel.

"I should have known you'd be of no help. Well, I gotta go. And stay out of the water when you're by yourself. Next time I'll let you drown, Ric and Bridget be damned," the blonde warned as he took off across the sand.

"Who are you?" She was finally able to get out.

He paused, turned, and looked at her. "It seems I'm your new guardian angel. Next time, try to kill yourself some place dry, LF."

"LF?"

"Your name. I could call you Logan Forrester Forrester, but after so many Forresters it just gets old and tired so I'll just call you LF for short." Turning back around, he headed for the parking lot.

Brooke gaped. Was she coming or going? Was this bizzaro world? This was without a doubt the most peculiar, oddest meeting, confrontation- -she didn't even know what to call it- -that she had ever had. She was sure she had never seen her so-called "guardian angel" before in her life and unless he was a reporter, how in the world did he know so much about her life? And she had a sinking suspicion that he wasn't a reporter.