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* * *
“I...JUST...DON’T...GET...IT,” Noah panted between punches on the heavy bag an hour later.
On the other side Brandon held the bag as he continued his rain of jabs and strikes on the worn leather. “Look, man, I’d like to help you, but women troubles are not really my thing.”
“We haven’t even made it to troubles yet, she just straight-out refuses to even have dinner with me because I’m an MMA fighter. It’s actually kind of prejudiced.” Noah threw one final jab, then hit the mat at his feet in push-up position. “I mean, it’s like she assumes fighting is all I am.”
“Isn’t it?” Brandon asked, adding a stack of weights on his back.
Noah struggled with the last two, his forearms burning after the intense twenty-minute circuit set. “No way.”
He wondered what his coach would think if he knew about the outreach program. Since coming to Brookhollow, he’d made some great friends, Brandon and his brother Jordan included, but he was careful about what he chose to reveal about himself.
The families he’d met in the small town were so different from his own. They were supportive of one another, divorce was rare and his friends... Though they’d had their struggles they had never had to wonder where their next meal would come from or have to help their passed-out father to bed after far too many drinks.
Revealing the good he was trying to do would only spark conversation about the bad in his past. And he’d moved away from that. He wanted his friends to see him as the man he was now.
“I’ve got other things going on,” he said noncommittally as he rolled onto his back and brought his left knee and right elbow together in a crunch.
“The thing is,” Brandon admitted, “I’m not getting your attraction to her.”
“You’re kidding, right?” How could the men in this town be so blind to Lindsay’s appeal? She was smart, beautiful, kind... Impossible to reach. He was no stranger to chasing a pretty woman, but he’d believed her when she’d said she wasn’t interested. He just wasn’t sure he could accept that answer. Not this time. Not with her.
“Okay, maybe I’ve pegged her wrong. So enlighten me. What does it for you?”
“For one, she’s a knockout.” Noah did his twentieth crunch and his stomach started to burn. He loved that feeling, so he pushed on.
“I’ll give you that. She’s definitely one of the more attractive women in town,” Brandon said.
Noah let out a deep breath as the crunches got tougher and his abs hardened.
“And she’s educated,” he huffed, recalling how Brandon’s sister had filled him in on all the details on Lindsay the first night he’d noticed her at Bailey’s Thursday-night self-defense class at Extreme Athletics.
“She’s amazing with her patients.”
“Okay, so, maybe it’s a Florence Nightingale syndrome. You get hurt a lot, she has morphine?”
Noah shook his head as he stood. His buddy would never get it. Once opinions and stereotypes were formed in small towns, they were tough to shake. And Lindsay fit a clear stereotype in Brookhollow. He knew firsthand how annoying it was to be pegged a certain way and never given the benefit of a doubt. That was why he kept his past a secret from his friends. “Never mind.”
“Okay, maybe I can see why you like her, but, man, she does not like you,” Brandon said, tugging off Noah’s training gloves and unwrapping his hands.
“Believe me, I’ve noticed.”
It only made him want her to even more.
His entire life he’d met with challenges and adversity and he’d been successful in overcoming a lot. Could he meet the challenge of the five-foot-two, brilliant blonde who held firm to her own prejudice about him?
* * *
LINDSAY CRINGED AT the sound of the clinic door opening. The fourteen-hour shift continued with no end in sight. Her feet ached, even in her practical nursing shoes, and the last thing she’d eaten was half a protein bar as she’d rushed from one patient to another.
All she wanted was a cigarette, but each time she reached into her purse for her emergency pack, she heard her niece’s teary plea.
This day couldn’t end soon enough.
As she turned toward the door she almost wished it was another infected six-year-old as her eyes met Noah’s. What was he doing here again?
“Noah, if you have another self-inflicted injury—” She stopped when her gaze fell to the picnic basket he carried, the smell of fried chicken from Joey’s diner on Main Street filling the tiny waiting room.
Several patients, who’d been waiting hours to see a doctor, stared longingly at the basket and she had to swallow to stop from salivating.
“You brought your dinner into a medical clinic where people have been waiting for hours to see a doctor?” Talk about insensitive.
“It’s not for me,” he said, moving the magazines aside on the waiting room table. Setting the basket down, he opened it.
Lindsay’s eyes narrowed as she watched him remove two large buckets of the chicken and a stack of paper plates and napkins...and Tina’s famous potato salad...
Her weakness.
“Everyone, help yourselves,” he said, opening a grocery bag and handing out apple juice to the kids.
The waiting, hungry patients didn’t need any more prompting as they passed around the plates and the food.
Huh, that was...unexpected. And a little bit fantastic.
He took a smaller container from the basket. “Here. I wasn’t sure if greasy, fried food was your thing, so I brought you a BLT, with a side order of potato salad.”
Above and beyond. Who would have thought?
“Thank you. This was really nice of you.” She hesitated, still a little dumbfounded, but more than a little starving.
“Take a few minutes to eat. They are.” He nodded to the group devouring the impromptu food delivery.
“Okay.” She headed down the hall, but paused when she noticed he wasn’t following her. “You coming?” Her question must have surprised him as his eyebrows shot up.
He smiled. “No, you’re busy. I just wanted to stop by to take care of the pretty lady who’s taking care of everyone else.”
She felt her cheeks go red. “Well, thank you. Again.”
“Anytime,” he said over his shoulder as he left.
Unwrapping the sandwich where she stood, she watched Noah cross the parking lot to his motorcycle. So dangerous, so carefree—he really was the kind of man who preferred to live life on borrowed time.
She could never be with a man like Noah, but she had to admit, with each delicious bite of her BLT, she was beginning to feel huge regret about it.
CHAPTER THREE (#ulink_1491f459-751f-592b-8a9c-0108dc3413c6)
LINDSAY YAWNED AS she shut down her office computer. The children with chicken pox and the men with poison ivy had all been treated and she’d finally been able to lock the walk-in clinic doors. If she couldn’t smoke, a glass of wine and a bubble bath were the next best thing waiting for her at home.
She stood and was about to turn off the clinic lights, the last one to leave, when she noticed the half BLT she’d left on the desk four hours ago.
Immediately her thoughts went to Noah. He was trying. But, unfortunately, she didn’t see a way around his career. It was too bad, she thought, because there was no denying the spark between them.
Sighing, she tossed the now-soggy sandwich into the trash and pulled the plastic bag out and tied it.
Carrying the bag outside, she tossed it into the large garbage bin. Then, back inside, she set the alarm.
“All doctors and nurses report to Emergency stat,” came the call over the clinic’s PA system as the alarm started to beep.
Lindsay groaned. So close...
After disarming the security system, she made her way quickly down the hall toward the elevators. Emergency was on the third floor and after hitting the button, she shook herself awake. Double shifts were not uncommon, though emergency stat orders were.
And there was no questioning the severity of things as the elevator doors opened and she stepped out into the hall. An ambulance stretcher whizzed past her, followed immediately by a second.
Her heart raced. An accident? Outside, she could see the flashing lights of the ambulance and the fire truck, and her mouth went dry. She rushed to the nursing station. “What happened?” she asked Kimberly-Ann, one of the ER nurses on duty.
The woman looked pale as she shook her head.
“Kimberly-Ann!”
A man she didn’t recognize, wearing a Brookhollow Police Station jacket, spoke. “There was a collision on Highway 14. A transport truck lost a load of plywood.” He paused. “I’m Sherriff Matthews, the new...”
Lindsay didn’t care who he was. She shot into motion, heading toward one of the operating rooms where the two doctors on staff were talking to the paramedics.
She was a step away from them when, from behind, an arm wrapped around her waist, preventing her from going farther. She whipped around, freeing herself. Noah, in his firefighter uniform, grabbed her arm, keeping her in place.
“What are you doing?” she demanded.
He swallowed hard, his expression dark. “I don’t think you should go in there,” he said firmly.
Oh, no. “Why not? Who did they bring in?” Her mouth felt like sandpaper and her knees buckled slightly.
He hesitated.
“Who is it, Noah?” She broke away from him, ready to run to the operating room.
“Nathan and Rachel.”
Turning, she made to sprint toward the double doors leading into the first operating room, but Noah’s strong arms around her waist lifted her off the ground and moved her away.
“Let me go.” Frantically she struggled, but his hold tightened. “I have to get in there...all nurses...” This was her job, dammit, and it was her family in there. “Let go!”
“No. You can’t keep a straight head in this situation.”
“Put me down.” She pushed against his arms as Kimberly-Ann stepped in, the new Sherriff beside her.
“Dr. McCarthy said not to let you go in...not yet.”
The struggle left her and her body went limp in Noah’s arms. It was serious... They weren’t okay... They weren’t letting her in. That only meant one thing.
She broke out of Noah’s grasp, but he stood guard, blocking her access to the hallway.
“How bad are they hurt?” She didn’t recognize her own voice as she asked the question.
“Lindsay...”
“How bad!”
His gaze and shoulders dropped simultaneously. “We were first on scene. There was nothing we could do for Nathan.”
Her chest tightened and she couldn’t catch a breath as the room spun around her. What exactly was he saying?
“Paramedics confirmed time of death when they arrived,” he said gently. “I’m so sorry, Lindsay.”
“Here...sit,” Kimberly-Ann said as she took her arm and they tried to help her to a chair.
She fought them. “What about Rachel? Where are the kids?” Her stomach turned and she swallowed to keep from vomiting.
“The kids weren’t in the van.”
A sob of relief escaped her and her hand flew to her mouth.
Noah hesitated, casting a glance toward Kimberly-Ann before saying, “Rachel is in critical condition. It doesn’t look good...” His hands were rubbing her arms, but she felt nothing.
His voice faded as her mind reeled. Nathan—dead? Rachel—critical? How? How was it possible that this could happen? She’d seen them two days ago...
The kids... Thank God they hadn’t been in the vehicle. She dove for the trash can behind the ER desk, emptying the contents of her stomach.
Noah was bent at her side as she fought to catch her breath. “How...how...what...I need to...”
“Just breathe...” He glanced at Kimberly-Ann. “Is there something we can get her?”
“I need...to...to see Nathan.” She stood and tried to move past him. Nathan couldn’t be dead. That was ridiculous... He had five children...five small children. Another sob escaped her. “I need to go in there...”
Noah wrapped his arms around her tightly and pulled her against him on the floor. “Not yet,” he whispered.
She clutched the fabric of his jacket and buried her face in his chest as her tears soaked the front of his shirt. “I need to see him.”
He hugged her tighter. “I’m so sorry, Lindsay. There’s nothing you can do for him.”
* * *
LINDSAY CLIMBED THE stairs to the living quarters of the B and B three hours later. The house was silent in the 3:00 a.m. darkness, the only light escaping beneath the bedroom door of the nursery, where she knew the twins’ butterfly night-light provided the toddlers a sense of comfort while they slept.
Her eyes were heavy and her legs were cement blocks as she walked down the hallway toward the room that had been Rachel and Nathan’s. A room they would no longer sleep in...
Rachel had passed away an hour ago. Her struggle to survive the heavy brain trauma she’d suffered in the accident had been a fight she couldn’t win, and her soul had joined her husband’s.
