The Doctor's Calling

by Stella Bagwell

  It felt odd, even jarring, hearing him reveal such things about his childhood. For some reason, she’d never imagined Russ coming from a broken family. He was too grounded and successful, too normal. “Oh, my. How much time had passed when you finally saw him at your mother’s funeral services?” Laurel asked curiously.

  “About twelve years. And during those years, my mother and I didn’t have a clue as to where he’d gone. Actually, I don’t think she wanted to know. Anyway, I was surprised when he showed up to pay his respects. I’m not even sure who’d contacted him about her death. My uncle, I’m guessing. In any case, it made me wonder if the man might have cared for his ex-wife after all.”

  On that one occasion in the past, Russ had mentioned his mother, but he’d never talked about his father and Laurel had assumed the man was either dead or had never been in the family circle. From what he was telling her now, she could understand why.

  “Did you talk with him? Ask him anything?”

  “We spoke briefly. By then I was seventeen and a whole lot resentful at his leaving. I didn’t question him about his feelings toward my mother—she was gone and it all seemed pointless somehow.”

  She shook her head as she tried to imagine him dealing with losing his mother and confronting a father he never really knew, all at the same time. “So when your mom died, did your father ask you to go live with him?”

  “He asked. But it was just a token offer,” he said bitterly. “The man was a stranger. Up until then, he’d never made an attempt to see his son. He knew there wasn’t any chance of me accepting his invitation. I think he wanted to appear loving and generous, but it was clear to me that the gesture was empty as a beggar’s pockets.”

  “I see.”

  “No. You couldn’t see. The man—” Suddenly he broke off and the embittered expression on his face turned to something like regret. “I’m sorry, Laurel. I started to say the man wasn’t around to give me any sort of support while my mother was dying of cancer. But I can’t tell you anything about being abandoned by a parent. Not after what you told me this morning about your mother.”

  Feeling closer to him than she’d ever imagined possible, she reached over and touched her hand to his. “I didn’t have any idea, Russ. I’ve always imagined you coming from one of those perfect families like you see on those old television shows in the 1950s. With everyone loving each other, and the mishaps that did happen were minor ones. And even those drew everybody together.”

  “Those shows were fantasy.”

  Disappointed by his remark, she looked at him. “You sound so cynical.”

  He arched a brow at her. “And you’re not? I’d think you’d be the first person to agree with me.”

  She shrugged. “Not really. I mean—yes, they were fantasy as far as my family. But I’ve always believed and hoped that there’s something better out there than what I had. Than what you had.”

  “Fairy-tale families are for books and TV. But I do think there’s something better out there, Laurel. Even after the ordeal I went through with Brooke, I still believe in love and children.”

  And that was more than she believed in, Laurel thought sadly. So what did that make her, even more cynical than Russ? The idea troubled her.

  “For you, Russ. Not for me.”

  “That doesn’t make sense. But I’m not going to ask you to explain now. I’d rather we finish our meal first—before I start stating my case.”

  His forewarning put a lump in Laurel’s throat and robbed her of most of her appetite, but she did her best to swallow down a good-size portion of meat and potatoes, along with a half glass of wine, before finally laying her fork aside.

  “That was delicious, but I couldn’t eat another bite,” she said as she leaned back in her chair.

  “What about cake and coffee? It’s Italian cream.”

  She groaned with temptation. “Okay. But only a wee slice,” she told him. So much for gulping down a sandwich and telling him that marriage was out of the question, she thought helplessly.

  “Why don’t you go on out to the living room, and I’ll bring everything in there,” he suggested.

  “I should help you clear the table first.”

  “Forget it. I’ll deal with the mess later.”

  Maybe it would be better if she went on out to the living room, she decided. Working beside him at the kitchen sink could lead to something she might not be able to resist.

  “All right,” she told him. “I’ll go soak up some of that luscious heat from the fireplace.”

  Out in the other room, Laurel did go straight to the fireplace, but after warming her back for a few moments, curiosity got the better of her and she began to stroll around the room.

  Behind the couch, and next to a floor-length window, bookshelves were built into the wall. She studied some of the titles and was wondering if or when he ever had time to read them when she noticed a small photo album jammed between two hardbacks.

  Normally she wouldn’t have dreamed of looking at such a personal item. But Russ had asked her to marry him. Didn’t that mean he wanted to share his life with her? Even his past life?

  Expecting to see images of him and his ex-wife, she was surprised to open the pages and find pictures of a woman and young boy. This had to his mother, Laurel thought, as she stared at the image of the dark-haired woman and the young boy standing next to her.

  “That’s a few snapshots of me and my mother.”

  The sound of Russ’s voice brought Laurel’s head up, and she found herself blushing as he entered the room with a tray of coffee and cake.

  “I’m sorry. I hope you don’t mind me looking.”

  “Not at all. I cherish that album. Those few images of her are the only ones I have. We didn’t exactly have money to spend on cameras or film, and that was long before the days of digital images.”

  Laurel’s gaze returned to the photos in her hands. “Your mother was very beautiful. Mine was, too,” she said, unaware of the wistful note in her voice. “Was yours nice? What was her name?”

  He placed the tray on a nearby end table, then walked over to her side. “Her name was Nanette,” he said, “but most everyone called her Nan. As soon as she learned I wanted to be a vet, she was always encouraging me to follow my dreams.”

  A smile curved the corners of Laurel’s lips. “And when was that?”

  “Oh, probably by the time I was eight years old. I wanted to treat every wounded animal I found on the street or around town. Birds, cats, dogs, reptiles, whatever, they all fascinated me.”

  “I wish she could see you now,” Laurel said softly. “See what a successful vet you’ve become.”

  He let out a quiet sigh. “Yeah, me, too. When she came down with cancer, I was devastated. I had no father. No siblings. She was my whole family.” He drew in a long breath and let it out. “Back then I was afraid to go to bed at night. Afraid if I went to sleep I’d wake up and she’d be gone.”

  Laurel had felt the same sort of fear over Lainey. She’d been afraid to go to school, afraid to leave the house in case her sister should slip away from her. To think that Russ had experienced the same sort of fear was so difficult for her to imagine. He was always such a strong, steady rock, even when they were facing a dire emergency and an animal’s life was in his hands. He never wavered or fell apart. He never showed a speck of fear. But he wasn’t that vulnerable boy now. He was a grown man with the courage of a lion.

  “So where did your uncle live? The one you went to after Nanette died?”

  “Albuquerque. At seventeen, I thought I was old enough to take care of myself. I didn’t want to move up there with him. But about the time Mom died, the bank was foreclosing on our house. I had nowhere else to stay.”

  Feeling foolish and small, Laurel closed the photo album and placed it back on the shelf. “I can’t imagine that, Russ. Forgive me if this sounds insulting, but I’ve always assumed you’d come from a privileged family. You’ve always had so much and—”
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br />   “Laurel, before I met you I had worked as a vet for several years. I’d had time to accumulate what you’re calling wealth. But I don’t think I’ve ever been truly wealthy. Not with the things I consider a man’s treasure.”

  She didn’t ask him what he meant by that. She was afraid he would start talking about love, a wife and children. All the things she couldn’t give him. Well, maybe she was capable of trying to give him those things, being those things for him, she thought. But Russ deserved more than “trying.” He deserved a woman who understood what love meant, a woman who wouldn’t be afraid to be a mother to his children, a wife who could handle the ups and downs of marriage. Not a woman who’d grown up without much love or guidance in her life.

  She moved around the end of the couch and picked up a serving of cake and a coffee mug from the tray. As she carried it over to the fireplace, she said, “It’s strange, isn’t it, that we never knew these things about each other until now?”

  He helped himself to the coffee and dessert, then moved across the room to where she stood on the hearth. “Before now we’ve never had the time to get to really know each other. Or the time to become close,” he said in a low, husky voice.

  She lowered herself to the warm rock hearth and made herself comfortable by settling her weight on one hip and drawing her legs around to one side.

  “Being busy isn’t the only reason,” she said, as she carefully set her coffee cup on the hearth. “We’ve worked together for five years—long hours every day. But we had some quiet times, too. I don’t think—well, at first you were married. And then later, after your divorce, you weren’t exactly a happy man. Instead of talking to people, you barked.”

  “Back then I was feeling pretty worthless. I wasn’t in any shape to contribute to a conversation.”

  Glancing up at him, she said, “Losing your wife must have devastated you. I guess you loved her very much.”

  Seemingly uninterested in his dessert, he placed the dishes on the fireplace mantel, then eased himself down to the hearth and settled close to her side. As his shoulder pressed into hers, Laurel felt her heart skip, then resume with a rapid thud.

  “I once believed I loved Brooke more than anything. But that was in the beginning. After a while, I realized I’d married her for all the wrong reasons.”

  Completely surprised by his admission, she studied his face. “What does that mean? A man like you—I’m sure you married her for all the traditional reasons. And those couldn’t be wrong.”

  One corner of his mouth lifted to a wry slant. “I was wrong to expect tradition out of someone who had no wish to conform. Brooke wasn’t a family-type person. At least, not with me. I should have been smart enough to see that beforehand. Instead she made a fool of me. And it’s taken a damned long time for me to realize I wasn’t the inadequate one. She was.”

  Inadequate. Oh, God, couldn’t Russ see that she, too, was lacking, Laurel wondered. And no matter how much she loved and wanted him, she needed to consider his happiness first. He’d already been hurt by one flawed woman. He didn’t need a second one ruining his life all over again.

  “You couldn’t have guessed she would be unfaithful to you, Russ. And she probably didn’t set out to be. People—well, some people are weak.”

  “Or selfish.”

  Forking a nibble of cake to her mouth, Laurel wondered what she could possibly say to that. Brooke probably had been selfish. But Laurel was in no position to judge the woman. She’d been accused of being selfish herself. Especially by Alexa, who believed Laurel should be sharing her love with a husband and children.

  Suddenly Laurel’s thoughts swung to her mother. Had she been wrong to judge her mother all these years? A crushing load had been thrown on Stacie Stanton’s shoulders, and she’d been too emotionally weak to carry the burden of a dying child and a whining, dependent husband. She’d run away because she couldn’t cope.

  But her mother could have returned at some point, Laurel thought sadly. Or, at the very least, tried to contact her daughters again. As it stood, Laurel didn’t have any idea where the woman was or what might have happened to her.

  All these years, she’d told herself she didn’t care that her mother had run away. “Good riddance to bad rubbish” was the motto Laurel had clung to. But now that she’d fallen in love and had given herself to Russ, it had shown her a myriad of feelings she’d never known existed. She could now see that life wasn’t as simple as love or hate, black or white; there was so much more in between to consider.

  Pushing her conflicting thoughts aside, Laurel asked, “Why did you call Brooke selfish?”

  “Because she wanted everything her way.”

  “And you didn’t? Want everything your way, that is.”

  Blowing out a long breath, he lifted his eyes toward the ceiling. “Maybe you could have called me selfish, too,” he admitted. “I’m not sure anymore if she was more to blame for our failed marriage or if it was me. I only know we both messed up.”

  He squared around toward her, and Laurel’s heart swelled at the tenderness on his face, the softness in his eyes. This gentler, sweeter Russ was someone she’d never seen while they’d been in town at the clinic. And she still wasn’t sure what had caused the change in him or even how to react to it.

  “I don’t want that to happen to you and me, Laurel,” he said lowly. “I want us to be open and honest and sharing with each other. I want us to have children together, grow old together and be proud of the family we’ll have to carry on our legacy.”

  With only half of her cake eaten, she placed her dishes behind her. “You make it all sound wonderful, Russ. But how could it ever possibly work? You and I—we’ve never belonged to a real family.”

  “That doesn’t mean we can’t make one of our own.”

  While Laurel was silently screaming at herself to move away from him, to garner enough space and strength to explain that she didn’t want to give him children or be his wife, he reached for her and like a willing prey to a stalking cat, she waited for him to pull her into his captive embrace.

  “Oh, Russ, if you really believe that, then you need to open your eyes. You need to see I’d make an even worse wife than Brooke.”

  A confused frown creased his face. “I don’t understand why you’d think such a thing. But you’re so wrong, sweet darling. So very wrong. And I’m willing to take the risk to prove that to you.”

  No! Even as his head drew closer and his mouth settled over hers, that one word was clanging like an alarm in her head. But in spite of the warning, his kiss quickly began to heat her blood and send her arms wrapping tightly around his neck. After that, her resistance walked right out the door and into the cold night.

  When the need for air finally pulled their lips apart, she spoke in an urgent rush. “You’re not playing fair, Russ. I can’t make sense of anything like this.”

  Rising to his feet, he pulled her along with him, then before she could guess his intentions, he bent down and swept her into the cradle of his arms.

  With his lips brushing against her ear, he whispered, “I never planned on playing fair. Not about getting you into my arms. We’ll make sense later. Right now I’m going to show you my bed and exactly why you belong there—with me.”

  As Russ carried her through the house, she realized that on so many levels she was a coward. But she was also a woman with a woman’s needs. And tonight she couldn’t deny herself the pleasure of being loved by this man.

  Later, she promised herself, after the hunger in her heart had eased and the fire in her loins had burned itself out, she’d find the courage to tell him that she could never be his wife.

  Chapter Ten

  Much later that night, Laurel rolled away from Russ’s arms and sat up on the edge of the bed.

  “It’s getting very late, Russ. And I can see through the window that it’s snowing again. If I wait around much longer, I’ll slip and slide all the way down the hill.”

  Groaning, he caught her b
y the arm and pulled her back down on the mattress. “Why do you need to get down the hill? My truck is a four-wheel drive. We’ll go to work together—from here.”

  “I’m not going to spend the night with you,” she countered, even as he tucked her back beneath the covers.

  His warm, naked body felt wonderful against hers, and no doubt it would be heavenly to let herself fall asleep in his arms. But she didn’t want him to get the impression that she was changing her mind and giving in to his wishes.

  “Is there something at your place that’s better than this?” he murmured as he nuzzled his nose against the side of her neck.

  All Laurel wanted to do was turn and press the front of her body next to his, to invite him to make love to her all over again. She’d thought that after a few hours, her desire for him would die down; instead it was like a low, steady flame, just waiting for him to fuel it to a torrid fire.

  “I didn’t come up here to fall in bed with you,” she pointed out. “I came up here to talk. And so far I’ve not said what I need to say.”

  Ignoring her neck, he pressed soft kisses over her cheek. The sweet sensation sent goose bumps rushing up and down her arms. “Okay, I’m listening,” he murmured. “I’m ready to hear you say yes to my marriage proposal.”

  “You call what you did this morning a proposal?” she asked in dismay. “That was more like a boss giving an order.”

  He stroked his fingers through her long hair. “I’m sorry, Laurel. A cow pasture isn’t the place for a man to propose to his sweetheart, but I couldn’t hold back my feelings—it all just came out before I could stop it.” His arm curved over her waist as he urged her closer. “I’ll make it up to you, baby. I promise I can be romantic if you’ll give me the chance.”

  A soft sigh of regret passed her lips. She’d never had much romance in her life, but that was of little consequence now. “Whether you proposed in a cow pasture or on some moonlit beach doesn’t matter,” she murmured. “My answer would still be no. I meant what I said this morning, Russ. It’s an affair or nothing at all.”