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“I’m just fine, Ricky,” she said, patting his hand.
“Call me if you need me,” he said. “I’ll bring you something of Preacher’s later.”
“That would be nice, honey.”
The boy went inside to drop off his books, then out again, jumping off the porch steps and back into his truck to drive the whole block to the bar. “I guess a man can’t be separated from his wheels,” Mel observed.
“That appears to be the case.” Lydie laughed.
The next day she sat at the grill at lunchtime with Connie. “I haven’t heard you say you’re leaving for days now,” Connie said. “Something change on that score?”
“Not a great deal,” Mel said. “But since Jack went to such a lot of trouble to work on that cabin, I thought I owed it to him to give it a few weeks. I can deliver Polly’s baby.”
Connie glanced at the bar where Jack was setting up lunch in front of a couple of fishermen. She gave a nod in his direction. “Bet that makes Jack real happy.”
“He seems to think the town can use me, even if Doc doesn’t think so.”
Connie laughed at her. “Girl, you need glasses. The way Jack looks at you, I don’t think it’s about Doc. Or the town.”
“You don’t see me looking back in any particular way, do you?”
“You should. There isn’t a woman within a hundred square miles wouldn’t leave her husband for him.”
“Even you?” Mel asked with a laugh.
“I’m different,” she said, drinking her coffee. “I married Ron when I was about seven.” She took a drink of her coffee. “But okay—if he begged me, I’d leave Ron for him.”
Mel laughed at her. “It is pretty strange that no one’s latched on to him.”
“I heard he was seeing a woman in Clear River. Don’t know how serious it is. Might be nothing.”
“Do you know her? The woman he’s seeing?”
She shook her head, but lifted one curious brow at Mel’s obvious interest. “He’s private, isn’t he? Doesn’t let anything slip. But he can’t hide those looks he sends your way.”
“He shouldn’t waste his time,” she said. I’m not available, she didn’t add. In her new abode, Mel had put her own favorite books on the shelves—all of which she had already read and reread—and Mark’s picture on the table beside the bed. Each night she told him how much she missed him. But she cried less. Maybe because of the way Jack looked at her. The soothing way he talked to her. The house Mel sold in L.A. was almost four thousand square feet and it had never seemed too big; she had loved the spaciousness of the rooms. Yet the cabin, maybe twelve hundred square feet total, felt right. Like a cocoon. It hugged her. One of her favorite parts of the day was at the end, before she drove out to her new cabin. She would go to the bar for a cold beer and some chips or cheese and crackers. Once in a while she had dinner, but she didn’t mind being by herself at her cabin where there was now food in the cupboard.
Jack put her cold beer in front of her. “We have macaroni and cheese tonight,” he said. “I can talk Preacher into putting a slice of ham with that.”
“Thanks, but I’m going home for dinner tonight.”
“You’re cooking?” he asked.
“Not exactly,” she said. “I cook things like sandwiches. Coffee. The occasional fried egg. And takeout.”
“A modern woman.” He laughed. “But that place is working out for you?”
“It’s wonderful, thanks. And I need the quiet. Did you know Doc snores like a freight train?”
He chuckled. “Doesn’t surprise me.”
“I picked up a little gossip about you. That you’re seeing a woman in Clear River?”
He didn’t look all that surprised. He lifted his brows and his coffee mug. “Seeing?
That sounds a little delicate for this crowd.”
“I was glad to hear you have someone in your life.”
“I don’t,” he said. “Ancient history. And I wasn’t exactly seeing her. It was a lot more basic than that.”
Somehow, that made her smile. “Sounds like maybe you had some kind of arrangement.”
He sipped from his mug and gave a shrug. “It was—”
“Wait,” she said, laughing. “You don’t owe me any explanation.”
He put both hands on the bar and leaned toward her. “We had an understanding. I went to her place once in a while. For an evening. Nothing deep. No love affair. Casual sex, Mel, between consenting adults. When I realized it didn’t work for me, we parted as friends. I’m not with a woman.”
“Well, that’s kind of too bad,” she said.
“It’s not necessarily a permanent condition,” he said. “That’s just how it is right now. Want a slice of pie to take home?”
“Yeah,” she said. “Sure.”
Mel had been in Virgin River four weeks. In that time, patients and friends dropped by frequently. Some had a little cash for medical services, a few had insurance, but the majority had produce from their farms, ranches, orchards, vineyards or kitchens. The latter, knowing that a single loaf of bread or pie probably didn’t cover the cost of an exam and treatment or medication, tended to stop by with a little something even when they were well. The unprepared food—a bushel of apples or nuts, canned or fresh fruit, vegetables, berries, lamb shank or veal, would go right over to Preacher, who could make good use of it, later feeding some of it to Mel and Doc. In some ways, it was like a commune.
That usually left Doc and Mel with more food than they could use, especially since they were getting most of their meals at Jack’s. Mel packed up a box of some stuff that was likely to go bad soon—some eggs, bread, sliced ham and a brick of cheese, a pie, apples and nuts. A carton of orange juice she’d picked up from Connie. She put the box in the passenger seat of Doc’s old truck before she asked him, “Could I borrow your truck for a couple hours? I want to drive around some and I don’t really trust the BMW. I promise, I’ll be real careful with it.”
“My truck? I can’t see you in my truck,” he said doubtfully.
“Why not? I’ll gas it up, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
“I’m worried about you driving it off a cliff and leaving me with that piece of shit you call a car.”
She pursed her lips. “Some days, you’re more than I can take. Really.”
He picked up his keys and flipped them at her. She caught them. “Don’t hurt the truck. As God is my witness, I will never be caught driving that foreign job.”
She drove his truck out of town and the minute she was on the winding mountain roads, in the trees, driving up up up and then down down down over the mountain, her heart started to beat a little wildly. She was afraid, plain and simple. But she’d been haunted for two weeks and couldn’t live with the feeling. And that brought a plan into focus.
She surprised herself by remembering where Clifford Paulis’s camp was. She wondered if she was driven by some psychic energy. Her sense of direction in the hills, through the trees, was perfectly lousy. But—before long she was there, recognizing the nearly invisible old logging road that led to their compound. She drove in, made a big turn inside the opening so that she was pointed toward the way out, and then got out of the truck. She stood right beside the driver’s door and yelled,
“Clifford!”
No one appeared immediately, but in a few moments a bearded man came out from around a camper shell that had been pulled off a pickup and she recognized him as one of the men she’d seen on her last visit. She crooked her finger at him, beckoning him to her. He shuffled slowly toward her and as he neared, she reached back into the truck and pulled out the box. “I thought maybe you guys could use this,” she said. “It was going to waste at the clinic.”
He looked at her dumbly.
“Go ahead,” she said, pushing the box toward him. “No strings. Just a little neighborly gesture.”
He seemed to take the box reluctantly. He looked inside.
She dazzled him with her prettiest smile. When he smiled back, his teeth were godawful, but she didn’t react. After all, she’d seen people like him before. But before, she’d call one agency or another, hand them off, clear her charts. It was different out here.
She got in the truck and put it in gear to leave. In the rearview mirror she saw him hurrying toward that camper shell, and a couple of guys had come out from behind and joined him. It made her heart feel better. Good.
When she got back to town, she returned the keys to Doc, who sat behind his desk in his cramped office. “I guess you think I don’t know what you did,” he said. She lifted her chin in some defiance. “I thought I told you—stay away from there. It isn’t an innocent place and no one knows what might happen.”
“You go,” she said.
“And I told you not to.”
“Did we have some understanding? That I was going to follow your nonmedical orders? Because I don’t recall that in my personal life, I’m obligated to do everything you tell me.”
“Guess you’re not obligated to use your brain in your personal life, either.”
“I filled your truck up with gas, you old pain in the ass.”
“I didn’t get caught in that piece of shit foreign job of yours, you obstinate little strumpet.”
And she laughed at him so hard, tears came to her eyes and she had to leave, laughing all the way back to her cabin.
It was a bright and sunny afternoon when Mel went to Doc’s office. She tapped lightly and stuck her head in. “Do you have any idea what’s taking social services so long to do something about Chloe?” she asked him.
“Certainly don’t,” he said.
“Maybe I should do a follow-up—give them a call.”
“I said I’d take care of it,” he answered, not looking up.
“It’s just that—you know—I got attached. I didn’t mean to, didn’t intend to, but there it is. I’d hate for Lilly Anderson to go through that withdrawal. It doesn’t feel good.”
“She’s raised a passel of kids. She knows the score.”
“I know, but…” She stopped talking as she heard the front door open. She leaned out of his office and looked down the hall. Right inside the door stood Polly. She seemed to be holding her belly up with her hands and instead of that usual glow on her cheeks, she looked just a bit pale. Nervous. Right behind her was a young man in almost identical overalls, holding a small, worn suitcase. Mel looked back at Doc and said,
“Showtime.”
Polly wasn’t even sure how far apart the pains were. “It feels like one big one,” she said. “Mostly down real low.”
“Okay, let’s just go upstairs and get settled.”
“Can Darryl come?”
Mel reached over and took the suitcase from Darryl. “Of course. That would help a lot. I’m going to concentrate on you.” She took Polly’s hand. “Come on.”
Once upstairs, she had Polly sit in the rocker while she went about the business of getting a bed ready with the plastic mattress protector and clean sheets. “Good timing, Polly. My cottage was ready at the same time my littlest patient went out to Lilly Anderson’s ranch to stay. I’m all moved out and you, Darryl and the baby can have the whole room.”
“Arrrgggghhhh,” Polly answered, grabbing her belly and leaning forward. There was a slightly muffled sound that preceded the soft dripping of amniotic fluids onto the floor.
“Oh, Polly!” Darryl exclaimed. He looked suddenly stricken. Embarrassed.
