by Leann Harris
The usual lunchtime crowd, a couple of ranchers and several of their hired hands, was there. The instant Alex entered, all activity ceased. She froze, reminding Derek of a deer caught in headlights.
“What’s going on out here, boys?” Mabel asked as she barreled out of the kitchen, balancing three plates on her arm. The instant Mabel saw Alex she stopped. “Well, I guess that answers my question.” Mabel nodded to the table by the door. “Sit,” she commanded the duo. After serving the men their lunch, Mabel grabbed two glasses of water.
Derek removed his hat and set it on the empty chair. As Mabel set down the glasses, Derek hurried to make the introductions. “Mabel, this is Dr. Alexandra Courtland. She had car trouble. Billy’s looking at it now.”
No one knew Mabel Vance’s real age or her true hair color, but Mabel had the warmest heart in two counties and made the best peach cobbler in the state. The blue ribbons she’d won from the state fair hung on the wall by the front door, letting all know of her fame. Throwing the towel in her hand over her shoulder, Mabel rested her fists on her hips. “So, you want two lunch specials?”
“What is the special?” Alex asked.
“Today it’s chicken-fried steak.”
Alex looked as if she’d sat on a whoopee cushion, with her eyes widening and her mouth forming an O. She cleared her throat. “Do you have anything else?”
“‘Fraid not. It’s Monday. Monday’s chicken-fried steak. Tuesday’s meat loaf. Wednesday’s fried chicken.”
Alex’s thoughts were easy to read. Mabel’s diner was cholesterol heaven or hell, depending on your view of the subject. But she smiled at Mabel and said, “Chicken-fried steak sounds wonderful.”
Mabel nodded and disappeared into the kitchen.
Alex’s actions surprised Derek. He had expected her to either turn up her nose at the fare or lecture Mabel on the dangers of frying.
“That was kind of you not to make a fuss,” he told her.
She leaned forward. “I’ll tell you a little secret.” Her voice dropped to a dark whisper, making him think of lovers in the darkest hours of the night. “I love chicken-fried steak. With lots of cream gravy. And biscuits.”
“What?”
She shrugged.
“But I thought all you medical types preached against such things as fat and cholesterol.”
“Yes—well, an occasional fall from grace is permissible.”
He liked this playful part of her personality. “Do you often fall from grace?”
The light dancing in her eyes instantly disappeared, to be replaced by a coldness that chilled him.
“Sometimes, Deputy, survival is the most important thing and nothing else matters.”
What did chicken-fried steak have to do with survival? Derek wondered. Nothing, that’s what.
Mabel reappeared at that moment with two plates of steaming food. “I’ve got cobbler when you finish with this. Just give me a holler.”
Derek watched the doctor as she placed the first forkful of steak in her mouth. She chewed, then her eyes fluttered closed and her lips curved into a sensual line of satisfaction.
“Is it that good?” he asked.
“Heaven.”
His imagination kicked into overdrive, and a vision played before his eyes of her lying across his bed, her blond hair fanning out around her head and that dreamy-eyed look directed at him. He swallowed hard.
“Is something wrong with your food?” she asked, concern coloring her husky, sensual voice.
Her question brought him back to earth with a jolt. “Everything’s fine.”
“Then why aren’t you eating?”
She was one observant woman, he sourly admitted. “I was gauging your reaction.”
“Oh, is that what you were doing?” The answer seemed innocent, but from the inflection in her voice he knew she suspected he’d been having erotic thoughts.
“Mabel,” he called. “I need a cup of coffee.” He turned to Alex. “Would you like some?”
She shook her head.
“Get it yourself, Derek,” Mabel shouted back. “I’m busy.”
After he got his coffee, the meal passed in relative quiet. He had just popped the last piece of biscuit into his mouth when she sprang her question.
“Why did Billy sabotage my car?”
The biscuit went down the wrong way and he choked. “What?” he gasped, reaching for his coffee.
“Why did he tamper with the clamp on the hose? Is he running some sort of a scam? Because if he is, I’ll warn you that I’m not paying some outrageous price for the repair.”
If she’d broken her plate over his head, he couldn’t have been more surprised. “What makes you think Billy sabotaged your car?”
She gave him that cat-ate-the-canary smile. “The clamp on the water hose had been loosened. If it had been that way when I left Big Bend this morning, the car would’ve overheated long before I drove into Saddle.”
Derek wanted to argue that Billy hadn’t done it, but he was ninety-nine-percent certain she was right.
“Why did he do it?” Her eyes held his.
Mabel plunked two bowls of peach cobbler on the table, saving him from having to answer. “Here you go. Dessert.” She gathered up the dirty dishes but didn’t leave. “So, you’re a doctor. It’s good to see a woman doctoring.” She gave Alex a conspiratorial smile. “Since we’ve been tending the sick since the Stone Age, we might as well get the credit. Men don’t know squat.”
Derek watched Alexandra bite back a smile.
“Isn’t that so?” Mabel directed her question at Alex.
“Yes, it is,” she answered.
Mabel nodded to Derek. “Now you take Derek, here. When his little Sarah was sick this winter, he didn’t know a thermometer from a hot water bottle. He had to leave that little thing with his brother and his wife so she could get some proper tending.”
He felt Alexandra studying him as if trying to read something hidden in his eyes.
“And you should’ve seen when Derek took—”
“Mabel, I need a refill on this coffee,” Derek said, holding up his cup. He didn’t want any more of the bitter brew, but he was desperate to shut Mabel up.
After giving him a pointed look, Mabel headed for the kitchen, her head held high.
Derek smiled weakly at Alex. “She tends to mother all the folks in the county,” he explained.
“Maybe you need it.” Alexandra took a bite of peach dessert. “You never did answer my question, Deputy.”
Apparently the doc wasn’t going to be diverted from her quest to know if Billy had rigged her car to overheat.
Mabel reappeared with a large coffeepot in her hand.
“What kind of doctor are you?” Mabel casually asked as she poured the coffee.
Derek silently moaned. It was beginning to sound as if the entire town was involved in a big conspiracy to pry into the doctor’s life.
“I’m an emergency-room physician,” Alex replied in an odd tone. The expression on her lovely face confirmed that she thought something fishy was going on in Saddle.
“You ain’t interested in setting up practice here, are you?”
Derek’s stomach sank to the floor.
“We’ve been without a doc since a year ago spring and this last winter it seemed like everyone got sick. Why, poor Norma, our postmistress, has been sick as a dog, lost weight and can’t seem to shake her cough.”
Alex gave Mabel a polite smile. “I’m on vacation from my job at Ben Taub Hospital in Houston.” She opened her mouth to say something else but stopped.
Mabel shrugged. “Well, it was worth a try. If you need seconds on that cobbler, let me know.”
The instant Mabel was out of earshot, the doc pierced him with a burning gaze. “There’d better be a good explanation for all this coincidence, Deputy, because, if there isn’t, I’ll report you to the attorney general’s office.”
Before Derek could answer, the restaurant door opened and Billy stroll
ed inside.
“Good news,” he said, stopping by the table. “All you need is a new water pump. Bad news is I’ll have to send to El Paso to get it.”
“And how long will that take?” the lady doctor asked carefully.
Derek braced himself for the fireworks.
“Two, maybe three days.”
“That long?” Alex’s voice was as chilly as the winter winds that whipped down from the mountains.
“There ain’t many ‘66 Mustangs around here. I don’t carry anything that would work in your car. But there’s no cause to worry. I send to El Paso all the time. The bus brings it right to town.”
“And how much is this going to cost me?”
Billy stared down at his hands. “Well, the thing is, I thought we could kinda trade services.”
“What exactly do you have in mind?” The words fell from her lips like ice cubes, cold and firm.
“I’ll fix your car in exchange for you looking at my mother-in-law. She’s been sick for a while and needs some doctoring.” Billy glanced at Alex. “What do you say?”
Hell, Derek grumbled under his breath. He should’ve known exactly what Billy was going to do. He just couldn’t believe that his friend would deliberately damage this woman’s car to keep her in town long enough to see his mother-in-law. But when people were desperate, they would do anything. He ought to know that after being a cop in San Antonio for nine years.
Alex closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “All right.”
Billy beamed. “I’ll just go call for that water pump. The deputy here can take you to the clinic. It’s our pride and joy.” Billy scrambled to his feet and hurried out the door without meeting Derek’s disapproving gaze.
Alex stood and pushed in her chair. “Why don’t you show me where this clinic is?” From the tilt of her chin Derek knew the doctor was angry.
“Okay.” He reached for his hat, put it on, then led her onto the sidewalk. “This way.” He started walking toward the last building on the street.
“Is there a phone in the clinic?” she asked.
He glanced over his shoulder at her. “Yes. Why?”
“After I check Billy’s mother-in-law, I plan on making a call to Austin. Since the attorney general and I are on a first-name basis, he might be interested in what’s going on out here.”
Derek stopped so suddenly she ran into his back. He turned and caught her before she fell. “And what exactly is going on out here?” His hands were clamped around her upper arms.
She jerked out of his grasp. “Oh, come on, Deputy, we both know what’s happening.”
He didn’t like the direction of this conversation. “No, we don’t. Why don’t you tell me?”
“Why, you and Billy are running a scam, that’s what.”
With those thunderous and highly insulting words, she marched away.
Chapter 2
“Now, wait just a damn minute,” Derek roared.
Before Alex could take another step, he snagged her arm and spun her around. From his expression, her accusation hadn’t just made him mad; it had made him furious. She glared right back. Well, he wasn’t the only one spitting mad.
“Are you saying I’m dirty?” he demanded.
She’d been the one who’d been railroaded into staying in this little town, then blackmailed into seeing a patient. And he was acting as if he was the victim. “If the shoe fits...”
His eyes narrowed, giving him a predatory look. With that expression Derek Grey could’ve passed for one of the gunslingers who roamed Texas a hundred years ago.
“Well, it doesn’t,” he snapped. “I’ve been a law officer for over eleven years and no one has ever accused me of so much as fixing a traffic ticket. I pay my taxes and bust my butt to make this part of the world safe. And all I get for my effort is the federal government jumping down my throat about illegals, the border patrol making power plays and the governor standing on her head about my hiring practices when this town can barely afford to employ me. And you think I’m dirty?”
Apparently she’d touched a raw spot. “Well, if they don’t pay you enough—”
“Don’t even finish that,” he warned in a low, deadly voice. He glanced into the window of the feed store. She followed his gaze and saw an audience staring at them. The two men and one woman looked from her to the deputy. Derek grabbed her arm. “Come on. I don’t fancy having any observers to this conversation.”
Neither did she until she knew whose side these observers were on. Alex allowed him to guide her toward the small white building at the end of the street. Once they were close enough, she saw the plain metal plaque screwed into the wall by the front door: Brewster Clinic. Immediately something inside Alex shrank back. She didn’t want to go inside.
“If you grew up in Midland,” he said, holding open the door for her, “then you ought to know that honor is still a way of life out here in this part of Texas.”
Alex wanted to turn and go back to the restaurant, but then she’d have to explain her odd reaction. And she wasn’t in the mood to explain anything to anybody. She brushed past him, and the warmth of his large body seemed to wrap around her and draw her to him. His heat was a welcome relief to her battered psyche.
She glanced around the neat, modestly furnished waiting room. “Is that what you label Billy’s actions, honorable?”
That brought Derek up short. He sighed and the sound went bone deep. “No.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “What Billy did was wrong.” He strolled over to a green chair and sat down. “I should’ve known what he was doing when he started questioning you. But Billy’s always been a snoop, and I just assumed he was being his own nosy self.”
“And when did you suspect him of tampering with my car?”
“The instant you left. Billy has this little twitch in his left eye that kicks in when he’s done something wrong.”
“Really?” Alex folded her arms beneath her breasts. She wanted to believe him, but over the past twelve months she’d seen too much violence, seen too many men lie and break their word, to allow her that luxury.
“Yes. First time Billy and I smoked a cigarette in the boys’ bathroom, Mrs. Byers caught us. I think I could’ve convinced her that we didn’t do it, but Billy’s tic gave us away.”
He’d just admitted he’d lied as a youth.
“Don’t give me that look, lady. I’ll lay odds you didn’t make it through adolescence without lying.”
She hadn’t, but she wasn’t going to admit that to him. Besides, she had her own sins to worry about.
“That cigarette made me sicker than a dog and I never touched another one. The whipping my dad gave me added immensely to my dislike of smoking.”
A smile crept up on her. “Your dad sounds as tough as mine.”
He shrugged. “I’m sorry about Billy. The guy’s worried to death about his mother-in-law. It doesn’t excuse his actions, but maybe you can understand why he did it.”
The sheriff seemed honest and his story reasonable. But then again, some of the zealots she’d encountered this past year had seemed honest. Besides, she wasn’t ready to deal with patients just yet. She was emotionally drained and didn’t want to get involved with anyone’s problems. “His stunt could’ve ruined my car’s engine.”
“Yes, it could have,” he agreed. “It was a stupid thing to do.”
“He’s lucky I pay attention to my panel lights and stopped when the temperature light came on.”
“He is,” he calmly answered, his voice a comforting tone.
She didn’t want him to agree with her. She wanted to hold on to her righteous anger because it would protect her, but he was being too reasonable. “So what am I going to do for two days after I examine Billy’s mother-in-law?”
“You could visit my family’s ranch and play cowgirl.”
Alex laughed. “Deputy, when I was growing up, I saw the back end of more cattle than I wanted to. Since I left Midland, not once has the urge to see a cow overwhelmed
me.”
He flashed her a brilliant smile. “It’s that or spend the time looking at me.”
That thought terrified her more than punching cows. Cows weren’t a threat, but this man might be...one way or another.
* * *
“Come on, Mom. The doctor says she’s willing to have a look at you,” Billy said as he ushered a tiny woman into the clinic.
“And why did she agree to do that?”
Billy stopped and glanced at Norma. His left eye twitched. “Because she’s a nice lady.”
Norma placed her fists on her hips but her frosty pose was ruined by a hacking cough.
Billy slipped his arm around her waist. “Are you all right?”
She waved him away. “You’re not going to get away without answering my question. Your eye’s twitching, a sure sign something’s up.”
Derek glanced at Alexandra. She was observing the little drama playing itself out in front of her. Her expression gave no clue as to what she was thinking. But Billy’s argument with Norma was an independent confirmation of Derek’s explanation.
“Now, Mom.”
“Don’t ‘now’ me. Why is this woman doing this?”
Alex stepped forward. “Your son-in-law told me you were sick, and I couldn’t see letting this delay go to waste.”
Norma eyed the stranger. “That doesn’t explain why Billy’s eye’s twitching.”
A calculating light entered the lady doctor’s eyes. “I plan to examine Billy later, believe me. But for now, why don’t we go into the examining room and let me check you out.”
The older woman hesitated. “Are you sure?”
“Positive,” Alex replied, giving Norma an encouraging smile. Her warm, welcoming action seemed to ease the stiffness in Norma’s spine. Derek marveled at the change in the lady doctor. She’d gone from a suspicious investigator to a reassuring medical professional.
Derek waited until the women were in the other room before he turned to Billy. “You’re in lots of trouble, buddy.”
Billy slumped down into a chair. “Yeah, I guess I screwed up big time.”
“What the hell possessed you to do that?”
“She’s a doctor. I thought that maybe if she saw the clinic she might—” He propped his elbows on his knees and hung his head. “Aw, I don’t know what I thought. Norma’s been sick too long. She needed to see a doctor. I’ve tried all winter to get her to drive over to Alpine and see a doctor, but she said she couldn’t afford the time away from her job as postmistress.” Billy picked at the nonexistent crease in his work pants. “Since Doc Talbot retired and moved to Florida, Norma’s refused to see any doc.”
