Mountain Mystic

by Debra Dixon

  Some of the towns they passed through were only wide spots in the road—a collection of buildings around a stop sign or railroad tracks. Victoria couldn’t imagine living less than twenty feet from an active train route, and wondered why the houses hadn’t shaken apart over the years. A few dead coal mines also dotted the landscape, their chutes and works rusted with age and idleness. The mines looked like ugly tentacled creatures hunkered down in the midst of a gorgeous panorama.

  The leaves were beginning to turn color, but foliage still sheltered much of the road from sunlight. Patches of light dappled the shade as she negotiated the serpentine road and hairpin curves that would have nauseated her if she hadn’t been driving.

  “Slow down,” Joshua advised.

  “But I’m only doing thirty!”

  “The road drops out from under you around the next curve.”

  “Oh.”

  She glued her eyes on the road where it disappeared around the mountain, and Joshua kept his eyes on her, noticing the way her hands clutched the steering wheel. “Nervous?”

  “About what?”

  “About your first patient.”

  “Oh. No, I’ve had lots of patients. It’s the road and all that talk about it dropping out from under me. Why don’t you people have guardrails?”

  “We do. In some places.”

  Victoria shot him a sour look. “Not in enough places.”

  Ignoring her displeasure, Joshua asked, “How can you have had a lot of patients? This is your first practice.”

  “I’m new but not untried, for heaven’s sake. I’ve done more clinical course work than I care to remember. They don’t give us a book exam and turn us loose on the unsuspecting public!”

  “Well, what do they do? I mean, you can’t exactly call up Acme Midwife School.”

  “Actually you can. There are about forty nurse-midwifery programs, but my bachelor of fine arts degree didn’t qualify me. So I went to nursing school to get my R.N., much to the horror of Richard, my ex-husband. After the divorce I got my midwifery certification and a master’s degree from Columbia University.”

  “Why’d your husband object to nursing school?” Joshua asked as he pointed out another sharp curve.

  With her attention split between the road and the conversation, she answered the question more honestly than she intended. “Wives don’t work; they dress well, volunteer, and entertain. A really good wife can do all three simultaneously.”

  “I take it that wasn’t enough for you.”

  Victoria hesitated. The truth was that Richard wanted a business arrangement with bedroom privileges, not a real marriage. Unfortunately, he hadn’t let her in on the secret until he slipped the ring on her finger and announced his agenda for success, expecting her to fall in line like the well-connected society debutante he’d thought he’d married.

  Instead of telling Joshua the truth, she gave him the same flip, easy explanation that satisfied most people. “Midwifery beats wallpapering hands down as the acid test for a relationship.”

  “But you weren’t a midwife when you were married to Richard,” Joshua objected astutely. “You didn’t get into the midwifery program until after the divorce.”

  Abruptly, she asked, “How much farther?”

  Joshua’s eyebrows shot up. He got the message loud and clear. Victoria’s failed marriage was not open for discussion. Fair enough. He didn’t want to have to drag all the details of his past into this relationship either. Relationship? He thought he’d settled that question this morning. Then why are you nosing around in her past? Because I never could resist nosing around in the past, he admitted honestly.

  “How much farther?” she asked again.

  “Not very far. A couple of miles up the road you’ll see a creek and a railroad trestle. Chapel Road is on your left. After that I don’t know how far it is. We’ll have to start checking the mailboxes.”

  “What mailboxes?” Victoria asked. “We haven’t seen one in”—she broke off and looked back over her shoulder for a second—“there it is again!”

  “What?” Joshua craned his head around to survey the view from the back window.

  “The yellow signs with the black arrows that point out the turns and curves. They all have holes in them like they’ve been victimized by big metal-eating moths. At first I thought it was my imagination, but it’s not. There are holes in every single one of them.” She pointed. “There! Another one.”

  “Oh. That.”

  “Oh. That,” she mimicked impatiently. “Don’t you think it’s a little weird?”

  “No, but then, I grew up here.” Joshua shifted uncomfortably as he confessed, “I put my share of holes in these signs. Actually not in these particular signs, as I recall.”

  An uneasy suspicion began to take root in Victoria’s mind. “Joshua, how did you put holes in signs?”

  “With a gun,” he answered bluntly. “We shot them from moving cars for target practice.”

  If she hadn’t been driving, Victoria would have gaped at him. Instead, she gaped at the road. “You shot poor, defenseless road signs for fun?”

  “Well, not anymore.”

  “But you did.”

  “I did.” Not that he was thrilled to admit it. “Obviously, someone else still does.”

  “Why?” she asked incredulously. The whole concept was like a foreign language to Victoria—incomprehensible. “From a car no less! On roads like this!”

  “Guns and mountain men go together. We were the original survivalists. In Texas they play cowboys and Indians. In Tennessee we play moonshiners and revenuers.”

  “I don’t believe that for a minute. Why did you do it? You don’t look like—”

  “Like I could be young and stupid and drunk and angry? Well, I was angry a lot when I was younger. I was angry until I got off the mountain.”

  “Why’d you come back?” Victoria asked quietly.

  “I don’t like crowds. Turn here.”

  Automatically, Victoria slowed the truck and flipped the blinker, but she came to a complete stop before she turned. Victoria pursed her lips and looked at the bumpy, twisted gravel road. “Are you serious? You call that a road?”

  “If you’re worried about the truck, maybe we should go home and phone the woman,” Joshua suggested hopefully. “No sense overheating the engine in this old thing.”

  Grinning, Victoria said, “You’re not going to discourage me, Joshua. I’ll climb a lot bigger hills than this one if that’s what it takes to get what I want.”

  “And what is that?” he asked.

  “A life,” Victoria told him as she punched the gas pedal and drove the truck onto what bore more resemblance to a washboard than a road. “Which patient is this?”

  “Naomi Marlowe.”

  “Pretty name. There is a Marlowe’s Wash-O-Rama in Bodewell. Is she related?”

  “Yes and no.”

  “Well, which is it?”

  “Naomi’s one of the Mention Marlowes. They don’t speak to the Bodewell Marlowes, but they are definitely related if you take the family tree back to about 1860, when the feud started.”

  “How do you know all of this?”

  “My grandmother is something of an authority on the bloodlines and family feuds in this area.”

  “In this day and age you expect me to believe that there is still a family feud that has been going on since the Civil War?”

  “On the mountain we don’t forget. We don’t forgive. You betray us once. You might betray us again.”

  “That’s a little harsh, Joshua.”

  “Folks who settled this area were hard people, Victoria. They had to be. They were nonconformists; they didn’t fit in or want to try. Many of them had been run out of work by slavery, which took all the jobs for an honest hardworking man in the flatlands. East Tennessee was overwhelmingly Union.”

  “Tennessee’s a Southern state! They joined the Confederacy.”

  Joshua shrugged. “They were the last to secede
and the first to be readmitted. One county furnished more federal soldiers than it had voters. To make a long story short, the Mention Marlowes sided with the Union, and the Bodewell Marlowes are descended from the brother who fought for the South.”

  “You’re kidding, right?”

  “Dead serious … even though no one’s killed anyone since about 1936, when Harlan Marlowe shot James Marlowe in a driveway dispute. Ah, here we are!”

  By the time she came to the end of a narrow dirt driveway and found the house which was hidden by a screen of trees, Victoria still hadn’t decided if he was teasing her. Bracing herself, Victoria murmured, “This doesn’t look so bad.”

  Clothes hung limply on a line stretched between two wooden posts. The barren brown rows of a played-out garden were a small distance away from the clothes, and a shed nearby looked ready to fall over at the gentle push of one finger. Both the shed and the house were sided with roof shingles.

  Victoria killed the engine and took a deep breath. “Okay, let’s go.”

  “You go. I’ll wait out here and catch twenty winks.”

  Turning on him, Victoria ordered, “Think again, Joshua Logan. You just spent close to half an hour convincing me that these women are going to be suspicious of me no matter what I do. You were born on the mountain, and that ought to count for something. So you get out of this truck and come with me. Having you along might even get my foot in the door.”

  When he hesitated, Victoria noticed the dread in his expression. What on earth did he have to be apprehensive about? “Joshua, it’s just a visit. Help me do what I came to Tennessee to do. These women need me, or someone like me.” She touched his arm, gently resting her hand until he could feel the weight of it. “And I need this practice. It’s all I have.”

  “I’ll knock,” he finally agreed, wishing he hadn’t helped her unload her damn truck when she moved in. Regardless of where she grew up or came from, he knew she was telling the truth about the practice. He pulled the door handle and got out. Resting a forearm against the roof of the truck, he leaned back in and told her bluntly, “But I don’t shake hands, and I wait on the porch. Understood?”

  Stunned, Victoria realized that Joshua was serious. This wasn’t simply a male aversion to being stuck in a room full of baby talk. Something about these visits spooked him. Genuinely spooked him. Grateful for his help under the circumstances, Victoria smiled and said, “All right. Let me get my things.”

  Quickly, Victoria got out and retrieved her medical bag and Naomi’s file from the cardboard box on the backseat. By the time she returned her attention to Joshua, he stood at the edge of the porch, hands on his hips.

  “Hello!” he shouted, and when the front door opened he climbed the steps.

  Victoria walked up beside him, surprised at the tension she could feel in the air. She wondered if it was coming from the woman or from Joshua. Calmly, she caught and held the wary gaze of the blonde behind the screen door as she asked, “Naomi Marlowe?”

  “What do you want? I haven’t got the money to buy anything.”

  “Only a flatlander fool would come hell and gone up this mountain to sell you somethin’,” he told her.

  Victoria’s eyes widened at Joshua’s curt response and the subtle change in his speech. His voice had always been rich and strong, but now had an edge to it that proclaimed him a native son. The woman they’d come to see noticed it too and gave the duo on the porch a little more respect when he made introductions.

  “I’m Joshua Logan, and this is Victoria Bennett. She’s an associate of Dr. Grenwald’s.”

  “I paid my bill,” Naomi told them, and started to close the wooden door.

  “It’s not about that, Naomi,” Victoria told her quickly. The door stopped closing, and Joshua listened as she continued in a warm, natural way that was full of confidence, yet reassuring and nonthreatening. “Dr. Grenwald has asked me to complete the files on some of his patients. I’m a midwife. I wondered if we could talk for a few minutes?”

  “Midwife?” Naomi asked, straightening a little and opening the door wider.

  Joshua mentally tipped his hat to Victoria. She’d managed to melt the iceberg a tiny bit. He waited to see how far she could get.

  “Yes. I’m opening a practice in this area, and Dr. Grenwald is my backup physician.”

  “Bodewell’s a long way.”

  “Just my main clinic is in Bodewell. I’ll be seeing patients in Mention on Tuesdays. I handle deliveries at Bodewell Hospital.”

  “My heart’s set on havin’ this baby at home. That’s what Ma did,” Naomi said as her sharp eyes moved over Victoria, noting the medical bag. “I’d feel a heap better if I had a granny with me.”

  Knowing the term “granny” was synonymous with midwife to the people in the community, Victoria explained, “I’m sorry, but I can’t attend home deliveries.”

  Naomi’s face fell.

  Victoria continued gently. “The hospital won’t support my practice if I do.” Victoria broke off as if just remembering something. “They did agree to dedicate one room for an alternative birthing center, which is more like a home setting, if that’s what you’re interested in. Mother and baby can usually go home in about twelve hours. It’s cheaper too.”

  Perking up, Naomi asked, “How much less?”

  “Maybe I could come in? I could answer your questions about the ABC room at the hospital, and you could help me complete this file.”

  When Naomi agreed, Victoria explained that Joshua didn’t want to offend, but he really needed to stretch his legs. Would Naomi mind if he waited outside? Shortly, Joshua was left standing on the porch, exactly where he wanted to be. He breathed a sigh of relief. If the other visits went as smoothly, he might actually get home without picking up any more emotional echoes for his collection.

  Lately, the only emotions he was interested in were Victoria’s, and she kept them hidden, where he couldn’t touch them. He knew as much about her as any Joe off the street. She’d been through a bad divorce, and she wanted a life of her own, separate from her past.

  Absently, he rubbed his arm where her hand had rested, and wondered what to do about Victoria.

  “Not a bad day’s work,” Victoria told him as she pulled up alongside his house. “I think four of the six are going to come into the clinic next Tuesday. Thanks for the help.”

  “You’re welcome.” Joshua forced himself to get out of the truck without asking Victoria for a date. All day the thought had been on his mind. Ever since she came out of Naomi’s house, eyes shining and wearing a smile that would have lit up New York.

  He wasn’t sure he’d be able to take many more days like this one—cooped up in the truck with her fragrance hammering away at his resolve. She smelled like cinnamon and spice. And sex, if he told the God’s truth. He couldn’t explain it, but his attraction to Victoria went way beyond incredible perfume.

  When the other truck door slammed behind him and he heard Victoria’s footsteps, he closed his eyes. Hadn’t he suffered enough today? The woman had touched him every three seconds, asking for or lending support, inviting him to share a joke, pointing out a clump of wildflowers that refused to give in to the change of seasons. None of those touches had been remotely sexual, and every one of them had made him intensely aware of her as a woman.

  “May I come in and borrow your phone? I won’t have one until next week, and I wanted to check the messages at my office.”

  “Since when have you needed an invitation to come inside?” asked Joshua, resigned to the inevitable.

  “Since you made such a fuss last time!” Victoria told him. “Besides, you weren’t living here then.”

  “What difference does that make?” Joshua made a sound that was clearly intended as a snort of disbelief, and he unlocked the door. “You waltzed into the old cabin too, and I was living there then as I recall.”

  Victoria ignored his remark, knowing he was right. “May I borrow the phone or not?”

  Sometime withi
n the next fifteen minutes he was going to kiss her, and to hell with whether or not it was a good idea.

  FOUR

  Pushing open the door with one hand, Joshua reached out and straightened the collar of her dress with the other, his thumb brushing against soft, warm skin exactly as he planned. The moment was electric. Joshua was fascinated by the differences between them, the contrast of dark and light. He’d definitely been celibate for too long.

  “You can borrow anything you want,” he said. Slowly dropping his hand, he added, “Except the bed, although I might be willing to share.”

  Victoria felt the heat of a blush roar through her. All day he’d been friendly but withdrawn, as if he were keeping himself separate from the world around him. Now his eyes met hers, and he held her gaze, creating a wordless intimacy. Suddenly the butterflies in her stomach woke up and started a frantic pounding against her rib cage, drumming a sensual red alert along all her nerve endings. With one look he’d cut through the polite, professional demeanor she’d managed to maintain. With one touch he’d cut through her efforts to forge a harmless friendship.

  She probably had a better chance of holding back the sunrise than keeping thoughts of being kissed from her face, because that’s all she could think about. An engraved invitation couldn’t have been more plain than the way her tongue darted out along the edge of her lips, and yet he waited, letting the silence between them build a tension that threatened to snap at any moment.

  Nervously, she lowered her eyes, but got only as far as his mouth. She swallowed. Why did the man have to be so big, so gorgeous, so slow to take what he wanted? What was it about him that made it so difficult for her to hide her attraction? She’d had years of practice at pretending to be indifferent to sexual attraction, of convincing herself that she was better off alone. Now she blushed and her nipples got hard because a man stared at her with lust in his eyes.

  Then why doesn’t he do something about it? A certainty in Joshua’s expression convinced her that it was only a matter of time. He enjoys the waiting, the tension. He likes to tease. Victoria began to worry, not about if he was going to kiss her, but whether or not she could outlast him.