Rachel beamed. “I’d be happy to.”
Porter took one swinging step forward, then looked back to Nikki, as if he suddenly remembered she was there. “Come with us, doc.”
“Maybe later,” she lied, shutting the door to move him along. He looked as if he might protest, but she succeeded in shepherding him into the hall and closed the door on the happy couple. Nikki stood with her ear to the door and listened until the thump, thump of his crutches meeting the floor faded. Rachel’s tinkling laughter reached back and curled under the door, mocking Nikki. I’m just like you…only prettier.
Nikki indulged a barb of envy, then sat down and penned a note to the Armstrong brothers saying she’d decided Sweetness wasn’t for her after all, and propped it on the table. When silence settled over the house, she gathered both pieces of luggage, opened the bedroom door and stuck out her head to make sure all was quiet. When she was convinced she was alone in the house, she carried her suitcases into the hall, closed the door and stole downstairs.
Moving stealthily, Nikki exited through the front door, crossed the shadowed porch and hurried in the direction of her extended van.
Darkness was settling quickly. A light high on a pole in front of the boardinghouse illuminated fluttering moths and guided her footsteps to the side of the road. Then she picked her way down the row of vehicles to her van. Insects chanted in rounds, the noises swelling, then falling away to build again. The unbearable heat of the summer day had given way to a breezy evening. She attributed the wide swing in the temperature to their altitude.
She swallowed hard at the thought of descending the mountain road with nothing more than her headlights and the glow of the three-quarter moon to guide her. Maybe she should wait until morning….
Across the road and beyond a tree line, voices, music and the radiance of a fire indicated the barbecue was getting underway. The good-time sounds pulled at her, but the suitcases in her hands propelled her forward. If she waited until morning, there would be confrontations, explanations, excuses…drama she didn’t want or need.
Especially when it came to a certain pair of cobalt-blue eyes.
After loading her suitcases in the back, Nikki climbed into the driver’s seat that was uncomfortably warm from the buildup of the day’s heat. She zoomed down the window to let the stale air escape.
In the side mirror, the amazing watercolor sunset was melting onto a distant mountain range. Nikki paused a few seconds to drink in the matchless scenery. If this town ever took root, it would blossom in the most glorious of surroundings.
Then, nursing a tiny pang of regret, she started the engine, turned the van around and pulled away.
8
From a rocking chair in the shadows of the porch, Porter observed Dr. Salinger pulling away in her long van. Damn it, Marcus and Kendall had been right about her hightailing it back north at the first chance. Sneaking out when everyone was preoccupied, without so much as a “nice to know you.”
Truth be known, his feelings were a little hurt.
Porter pulled at his chin and waited, counting off the seconds the way he and his brothers used to do when they were little, trying to figure out how far away storms were by measuring the time lapse between a flash of lightning and a rumble of thunder. One Mississippi…two Mississippi…three Mississippi…
The van’s brake lights came on before four Mississippi, then the engine sputtered and died.
Porter positioned his crutches and pushed to his feet. His leg was aching from crawling under the van to disconnect the fuel pump, but it was a quick way to safely disable the vehicle.
Marcus had charged him with keeping the little lady doc here. He hadn’t specified the methods had to be aboveboard.
The van slammed into Park, and the sound of the engine trying to crank floated on the evening breeze. By the time Porter reached the driver’s door, Dr. Salinger was banging on the steering wheel and cursing like a longshoreman.
“What’s up, doc?”
She startled and screamed, then turned her head to look at him through the open window. “You scared me to death!”
He grinned. “Sorry about that. Going some where?”
She opened her mouth, then seemed to cast about for a plausible explanation. “I…was just…exploring.”
He craned his neck to look over her shoulder into the backseat. “With your suitcases?”
She looked away, then back, and lifted her hands. “Okay, you got me. I was leaving.”
“I guess we didn’t make a very good first impression,” he conceded. He was struck by the perfection of her profile in the low lighting. The woman had exquisite bone structure. She was really quite pretty…not sexy by any stretch of the imagination, but pretty.
“I shouldn’t have come here in the first place,” she said quietly. “I…I don’t belong here.”
No surprise, he thought, Sweetness wasn’t good enough for her and her medical degree. “So you’re going back home?”
Her small hands tightened on the wheel. “If I can get out of here. I don’t know what’s wrong with the van.” She peered at the dashboard. “The gas tank is almost full and I bought a new battery a couple of weeks ago.”
“Let me take a look under the hood,” Porter offered magnanimously. “Do you have a flashlight?”
She rummaged in the glove compartment and came up with one. “Can I help?”
“Uh, no. Stay inside in case I need you to turn the key.”
He hobbled to the front of the vehicle, then made a big production of lifting the hood and putting the hood’s prop arm in place. He pinged the light around, pretending to inspect various pieces and parts, but craned in the direction of the barbecue site with longing. The voices and music were louder, beckoning. Damn, all those hot, single women were being sociable and he was stuck trying to convince the one woman who wanted to leave Sweetness to stay.
“Try turning it over now,” he called idly.
She did, but of course, deprived of fuel, the engine didn’t catch.
He tapped the flashlight on an engine support, then called, “Again.”
She turned over the ignition but again, nada.
After a respectable pause, he slammed down the hood and wiped his hands on his jeans. “Sorry. Looks like you’re stuck for a while.”
She thrust her head out the window. “What’s wrong?”
He shrugged, careful not to lie…too much. “Could be a lot of things. Hard to say in the dark. Best to have a mechanic take a look in the morning.”
Her jaw dropped. “In the morning?”
“Everyone is at the barbecue,” he said, jerking his thumb over his back toward the commotion through the trees. “Except us.”
She frowned. “I thought you were going with Rachel.”
As if he needed to be reminded that he’d had to cut the leggy blonde loose. “My ankle was hurting, so I told her to go on ahead. I was resting on the porch when I saw you sneaking out.”
“Did you take the pain pills I gave you?”
“Sure did.”
She climbed out and slammed the door. “I wasn’t sneaking out.”
“Do you need help with your suitcases?”
“You’re on crutches,” she reminded him, then opened the back door and yanked out her luggage. “Is it safe to leave my van sitting in the middle of the road?”
“It’s not like we have a lot of traffic.”
But she didn’t seem amused as she turned and headed back to the boardinghouse.
“I’ll have a couple of the guys come back and roll it to the shoulder,” he promised as he hurried to keep up with her. She marched into the house and down the long hallway. For such a small woman, she was sure man-handling those suitcases. At the bottom of the stairs, she whirled around.
“Why are you following me?”
He drew back. “Since you’re staying until morning, I thought we’d go to the barbecue together.”
“You should be in bed.”
Porter�
�s mouth went dry because standing this close to the little lady doc was messing with his senses. The scent of the lemony soap she used filtered into his lungs. Why was he suddenly thinking about her lithe body straddling his on a big, soft bed? Porter shifted on his crutches as a dozen responses to her comment came to mind, innuendos that would’ve entertained or tempted most women. But he was already in trouble for pushing things too far with this one, and he couldn’t afford to nudge her over the edge.
“I don’t want to miss the party,” he said finally, then grinned. “But I’d feel better if I were under medical supervision.”
“I told you I don’t care to go!”
When her eyes filled unexpectedly with tears, Porter almost bolted. Tears were beyond even his skillset. The reasons men cried could be counted on one hand: a Superbowl win, a Superbowl loss, too much hot sauce and losing a favorite spinner bait. The reasons women cried were limitless and mysterious, running the gamut from hormones to clearance sales. He was at a loss.
Besides, he was a modern guy—the woman had a right to do whatever she pleased. Homestead or no homestead, who was he to try to change her mind? After she stomped upstairs to spend the evening alone, he’d go outside and reconnect her fuel pump. She could leave in the morning as planned and forget all about Sweetness. They’d find another doctor.
But, damn…those tears. They made her eyes glisten like huge emeralds against her pale skin. She looked small and vulnerable standing there with her little chin stuck in the air. Unbidden, protective instincts welled in his chest.
And his brothers’ words came back to him. From the broken leg that needed tending to the stolen kiss to the cold-water shower, he hadn’t exactly been the Welcome Wagon. He couldn’t be sure of the exact cause of her tears, and he was limited in his remedies, but there was one thing that always made men feel better.
“You should have something to eat,” he announced.
On cue, her stomach howled like a wild animal.
Taking advantage of the opening, he rushed to add, “There’s a guy on our crew from Memphis who makes the best barbecue you ever tasted.” She didn’t react, but she didn’t flee, so he went for the close. “Besides, I’m sure my brothers would like to say goodbye.”
She looked away, then back, wavering. Porter gave her a little smile of encouragement. Her chin dipped. “Okay.” She sounded utterly defeated. “Give me a few minutes to stow my suitcases in my room, and I’ll be back down.”
Feeling frustrated because he couldn’t help her, and for other reasons he couldn’t quite put his finger on, Porter watched as Dr. Salinger struggled to carry her luggage up the stairs. Her shoulders drooped and her feet dragged. Porter frowned. Usually women who were going to spend the evening with him acted a little happier about it.
He exhaled loudly. Entertaining the mousy little lady doc all evening was going to be a major bummer.
Then those amazing green eyes flashed into his head and Porter pursed his mouth.
He reckoned he could take one for the Armstrong team.
9
Nikki pushed open the door to the corner room she’d left only minutes before, felt for the overhead light switch and flipped it on, then carried in her suitcases and set them down.
A wave of defeat washed over her. Academically, she knew she wasn’t stranded here forever, that she could leave as soon as her van was repaired. But emotionally, she felt as if she was being thwarted at every turn. And that cosmically, she was being punished for doing something so wildly out of character as leaving the family practice in Broadway and coming to a Southern town in the middle of nowhere with the fantasy of starting over.
She pressed her palms to her temples and shook her head. Coming here was easily the dumbest thing she’d ever done. It served her right to be stuck.
Out of nowhere came her grandmother’s words of advice that things would look better in the morning. Considering the setting, it wasn’t so unusual she’d think of her Grammy, who had raised her family in a dense auto manufacturing city in Michigan, but who had spent her own childhood in a small town in Tennessee. Grammy had been full of commonsense sayings with country roots. For the first time, Nikki wondered if some part of her had been attracted to the idea of coming here because her grandmother had made rural life sound so idyllic.
It suddenly occurred to her that Grammy might have embellished the truth a bit for the sake of her only grandchild.
Nikki walked into the bathroom to splash her face with cold water—the one thing that Sweetness had plenty of. She patted her skin dry with a hand towel, then peered at her face. Pale, pale, pale, with bluish circles under her eyes and splotches of red on her cheeks. But she didn’t have time to do anything about it…not that her inept skills with makeup would make a difference. The best she could do was run a brush through her fine hair to fluff it a bit. Then she chastised herself.
It wasn’t as if this was a date.
That…thing…that had sprung up between her and Porter Armstrong earlier, that thick, palpable pressure hanging in the air after she’d made the comment that he should be in bed…it hadn’t been sexual tension. It couldn’t have been. The more likely explanation was…humidity.
That was it—she simply wasn’t used to the barometric pressure at this altitude.
And she had agreed to accompany Porter Armstrong to the barbecue simply because the irreverent man needed to be monitored over the next several hours in case he developed complications from his fall.
Her stomach growled.
And because she was famished.
She retraced her steps to the stairs and ignored the little jump in her pulse at the sight of Porter Armstrong waiting for her. The man was ridiculously handsome, and she knew when she was out of her league. But she was only going to be in Sweetness, Georgia, for a few more hours, and there were worse ways to spend it than on the arm of a good-looking man, even if he’d only extended the invitation out of…
Nikki frowned. Why had he extended the invitation?
He smiled and, if possible, grew even more handsome.
The reason didn’t matter, she told herself as she walked downstairs. She could pretend over the next few hours that he saw something in her no other man had ever seen. Sweetness owed her a fantasy evening.
“Ready?” he asked.
“Ready,” she said.
Porter was grateful the weather was holding. “Doc” Riley had announced all week that his forecasting bunions were hurting, which meant rain was on the way. But the last thing the Armstrongs wanted was for their guests to see the ugly mud hole this place turned into when driving rain met bare red clay.
He was aware of the small woman walking next to him, and tried to imagine what this place looked like through her eyes. It was a glorious Southern night, steeped with the scent of freshly mowed grass and the hum of insects.
Dr. Salinger sneezed violently, then smacked at something on her neck.
He winced. Maybe it wasn’t so glorious if you were allergic to freshly mowed grass and attracted mosquitoes. “God bless you.” He stopped and balanced himself to fish a clean handkerchief from his back pocket, then handed it to her.
“Thank you,” she said, giving her nose a wipe. “Why do Southerners say that?”
“Say what?”
“‘God bless you’ after someone sneezes.”
He laughed. “Is that a Southern thing?” Then he shrugged. “I never thought about it. Didn’t mean to offend.”
“You didn’t offend me. I just think it’s curious how different people are, and how different the customs are in different parts of the country.”
She sounded so clinical, as if she were conducting a study. Little lady doc sounded…lonely. “Do you have family back in Broadway?”
“No.”
“Another part of the country?”
“No.”
An orphan. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s not your fault,” she murmured. “I was an only child. My father passed away when
I was very young, and my mother died when I was in high school. But I was loved.”
Loved. Past tense. Porter’s chest tightened. And she’d pulled herself through college and medical school—impressive. “As much as my brothers and I butt heads, I couldn’t imagine a world without them in it.”
“You’re lucky to have each other. Are your parents still living?”
“Pop has been gone for a while now. But Mom is as feisty as ever—she lives just north of Atlanta.”
“Is that where you grew up?”
Porter stopped and blinked at her in the semi-darkness. “You don’t know?”
She stopped, too. “Know what?”
“Sweetness is where my brothers and I grew up. A tornado destroyed the town ten years ago.”
The moonlight caught her face as those amazing eyes widened. “So that’s why you’re rebuilding this town—it’s…it’s your home.”
Something about the tone of her voice—she sounded awestruck…and almost envious. Unbidden, a lump formed in his throat, catching him completely off guard. “Th-that’s right.”
“I only decided at the last minute to come with the rest of the group. I guess I didn’t read the fine print.”
As they started back down the path, Porter tucked away that nugget of information. Dr. Salinger did not seem like the kind of woman to make a last-minute decision. Something had forced her hand. A lost job, a foreclosed home…a bad breakup?
I was loved.
A hasty departure would also explain why most of the women had come with trunks and trailers of personal possessions, and Dr. Salinger had arrived with only two small suitcases. Lucky for him she’d been more concerned about packing her portable X-ray machine than her extra case of high-heeled shoes.
Not that she seemed like the type to own a closetful of high-heeled shoes.
He pursed his mouth. And consequently—not his type at all. He liked the trappings of femininity—heels, hosiery, skirts, cleavage, long hair, perfume, painted fingernails, jewelry—
“The materials used in the rooming house were recovered from tornado debris?”
Baby, Drive South Page 6
