“I love you,” he said huskily.
She couldn’t speak for the emotion clogging her throat.
“I don’t want to hurt you.”
“I know.” She didn’t want to hurt him, either. But she would.
She pushed the knowledge to the back of her mind as Daniel, his gaze holding hers, pushed inside her. She felt herself stretch, felt her muscles tense. He withdrew. No sooner did she relax, than with one swift, sure stroke, he plunged himself into her.
Linsey gasped. Her nails bit into his buttocks, and tears sprang to her eyes.
He didn’t move. She didn’t want him to. The last thing she’d expected was for him to hurt her.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered, his voice thick. “I’m sorry.”
He kissed her eyes, her nose, her mouth with such tenderness that she almost wept. Gradually his tender homage eased the pain. She hardly noticed it when he began to move again.
He kept the pace slow, sliding in, out. A wondrous pressure began to build. Linsey tightened her legs around him, let herself fall into his rhythm, let him take her higher, higher. A delicious dizziness crept at the edges of her vision. Stars began to dance in her head.
He thrust harder into her. She arched against him, panted his name. Oh, God . . .
With a final plunge, Daniel cried out. Linsey released a keening wail as the world exploded into blinding color and feeling. Straining against him, she absorbed every last drop he spent into her.
At last, limbs trembling, heart thundering, Linsey fell back, feeling as if she were melting against the ground. Daniel collapsed atop her, as limp as she.
They lay entwined for what seemed forever, body sated and hearts full, when Daniel finally murmured, “Woman, I think you’ve drained the life right out of me. I can’t move.”
“This has been wonderful, hasn’t it? And you know what?” She gave a giddy giggle. “I got to do something I’ve never done before.”
“That was obvious—but what you lacked in experience, you more than made up for with eagerness.”
“You must think me shameless.”
“I wouldn’t have you any other way.”
A slow, satisfied smile spread across Linsey’s face. Staring at the endless blanket of stars, the glowing moon, she combed her fingers through his silky hair and asked, “Have you ever come to a point in your life when you think, ‘If it never gets better than this, I’ll die happier than I deserve?’ That’s how I feel when I’m with you. I wish I could take that feeling and put it in my pocket and carry it with me wherever I go.”
“I’m at that point right now.” She felt him grin.
He shifted, starting to relieve her of his weight, but she wouldn’t let him. Sighing her contentment, she pulled him close, wishing it could be closer, wishing she could take him with her when she left this earth.
That wasn’t possible, of course. Nor would she really want to deny others his incredible skills—as long as they didn’t extend beyond doctor-patient relationships. Even she wasn’t generous enough to want him to find another woman too soon after she was gone.
“God, I love your hair,” he muttered against her neck.
Linsey smiled. “I’m wounded, doc. And here I thought you loved me for my wit and charm.”
“I do, I do. And your luscious breasts and your tiny waist and your gorgeous legs . . .”
As his hand trailed up her bare leg, she laughed, just for the sake of laughing, and threw her arms around his neck. “I declare, we’ve gone completely daft. It’s freezing out here . . .”
“Funny, I was thinking how warm it was. If you’re cold, though, I know of a very nice way to heat you up.”
“And here we are, on the banks of Horseshoe Creek, where anyone can stumble upon us. What were we thinking?”
“Nothing. Everything.” He brushed a curl off her brow, then let his fingers trail along her cheek. “The last thing I seem capable of doing around you is thinking. Since the day I’ve met you, you’ve turned my world upside down. Blame it on your smile. On the light in your eyes. Hell, blame it on the moon for all I care. I just know I’ve never felt so damned alive in my life as I feel when I’m with you.”
After a long, drugging kiss, he laid his head upon her breast and sighed, seeming in no hurry to dress despite the damp evening chill.
With Daniel’s body a warm and comforting weight upon her, Linsey continued watching the stars, unable to believe how incredibly complete she felt. If this was the way her father made his wives feel, it was no wonder they’d chosen to stay with him. She felt the same way about Daniel: anywhere he went, she would gladly go. Of course, she’d never leave her children behind, the way her parents had done.
Not that children would ever be a part of her future—but for however much time she had left, she wanted to spend it here, with Daniel, in his arms. Loving him. Seeing him smile. Hearing him laugh. Even watching him get riled filled her with a peculiar excitement. Who’d have ever thought that one day, she’d feel so thoroughly and completely loved by the man who’d once hated her with equal passion?
The thought dimmed Linsey’s peace. “Does this mean you’ve forgiven me?”
“For what?” The lazy question rumbled against her breast.
“For everything. For Addie, for . . .” her voice dropped to a halting murmur. “For your fellowship.”
Daniel grew still. Then he raised his head to look at Linsey. After the passion they’d shared, that was the last question he expected to hear from her, and damned if he knew how to reply. But he knew one thing—he couldn’t fool himself into believing that the same woman who went around taking care of people could have deliberately ruined his career.
Scooting up, Daniel tucked her head under his chin and drew her close. Her cheek rested on his chest. Her warm breath caressed his sweat-dampened flesh.
“There was a time when that fellowship meant everything to me. I would have lied, stolen, and cheated to get it, and probably did all three at one time or another,” he confessed. “It’s not something to be proud of, but there it is. I just wanted so badly to have the power to give others a fighting chance to live their dreams. I wanted to be a part of that ‘something bigger’ that you talk of, to know that I could make a real and lasting difference.”
“And now?”
“I don’t know, Linsey. But I feel as if somewhere along the way, I lost sight of the reasons I wanted to become a surgeon in the first place. They seem to have gotten lost in some . . . quest to prove I could do it, despite all the odds.”
“Ambition isn’t a bad thing, Daniel.”
“It is when other people lose at the expense of another’s win. You don’t go into medicine to prove a point; you go into it because you love to beat the odds. Because you want to make a difference. Because you want to preserve human life. But maybe life isn’t worth saving, if it isn’t going to be lived.” If he’d learned anything from Linsey over the last month or so, it had been that.
He leaned back and tipped her chin up with his knuckles. “So maybe losing that fellowship was the best thing that ever happened to me. I never would have come to appreciate the things I’ve taken for granted—and I never would have fallen in love with you.”
“So you do forgive me?”
“Sweetheart, there’s nothing to forgive.”
In one swift motion she had him pinned to the ground and rained kisses over his face until they were both laughing. Daniel didn’t realize what a burden he’d carried until the words were out of his mouth, until he’d let go of the blame.
Then Linsey cupped his face in her hands and placed a kiss on his mouth so tender that he swore his heart melted. One kiss became two, then three, long, deep, intoxicating kisses that stirred his desire all over again. It amazed him how much he wanted this woman. Tonight. Tomorrow night. Every night, for as long as they both lived, he wanted her. With him. Beside him. Atop him. And if that meant giving up all that he’d worked for, and settling for a country practice with his c
antankerous father so he could support her and the family they might have, then so be it. There would always be other dreams.
There would never be another Linsey.
“So, do you think you could be happy spending the rest of your life with a fellow who gets paid in chickens?”
Linsey giggled. “Surgeons don’t get paid in chickens.”
“No, but drug store-owning country doctors do.”
She stilled upon his chest. “What do you mean? What of your dream to go to the university and become a famous surgeon?”
“Being with you is more important than studying at Johns Hopkins.”
Linsey reared back and swatted at his shoulder. “I can’t believe I’m hearing this from you! You would dare throw away something you’ve wanted and worked for your whole life, for a woman?”
“Not any woman—only you.”
If anything, the reply made her madder. “Let me tell you something Dr. Sharpe. No woman worth her salt would ever expect the man she loves to give up something that means so much to him. A woman supports her man’s dreams. She becomes his helpmate and he becomes hers. If she doesn’t, then he’d best find himself another woman.”
“Are you saying you want me to get my degree?”
“If you do not continue your schooling, if you do not get that surgical degree and start your own practice, you are not the man I thought you were—and I want nothing more to do with you.”
Grinning like a lackwit, he tumbled her to the ground and kissed her soundly. “Damn, but I knew you’d make me a splendid wife.”
She stared at him in numb disbelief. “What did you say?”
“I said, you’ll make me a splendid wife. My dad always told me that a wife would just drag a man down, but I don’t suppose my mother was anything like you.”
Linsey sat up, pulled her chemise closed, and began tying the ribbons.
A dull sense of dread spread through Daniel when she said nothing. She wouldn’t even look at him. “Linsey?”
At long last she lifted her head, and the bleakness in her eyes stole his breath.
“I love you, too, Daniel. I wonder if there was ever a time when I didn’t love you,” she whispered, “and I can think of no greater honor than becoming your wife. But I can’t marry you.”
It was hard to speak for the crushing pressure on his heart, but somehow he managed. “Why not?”
“It just wouldn’t be fair to make you a widower just after you’ve become a groom.”
A widower? What the Sam Hill—
He fell back onto his coat and shoved splayed hands through his hair. “For chrissake, not this foolishness again! I thought you’d come to your senses!”
“Please, don’t make this any harder than it is—just stop fighting fate and accept the inevitable.”
He pinned her with a steely-eyed glare. “Like you are?”
“What?”
Daniel snatched his trousers from the grass and pulled them on with short, jerky movements. “You’ll fight for your sister, you’ll fight for your friends, you’ll even fight for me, but you won’t fight for yourself. Just what the hell are you afraid of, Linsey?”
Her body snapped back if he’d struck her. Goddamn, he was sick of trying—and failing—to convince her that these fears were completely unrealistic.
She recovered an instant later, plucked her blue silk bridesmaids dress from off the ground and held it close to her. “There are some things in life that you just can’t fight. Love is one; death is another. I thought you of all people would know that.”
“All I know is that I’m tired of watching you put your faith in something that doesn’t exist. These damned superstitions of yours have done nothing but ruin people’s lives, and until you can see that, we have no future.”
“Oh, Daniel, don’t you see?” She shook her head slowly. “We never did.”
Chapter 20
The hand—man’s first tool and weapon—signifies power, both physical and spiritual, and is known to possess healing virtues.
Daniel threw himself into his work, driving himself from dawn to dusk, seeking to keep himself so occupied that by the time he fell into bed, he was too exhausted to think. He’d taken over some of his dad’s patients, filled in for Dr. Chelsey in the next county, and even helped out at the hospital in Iron Bluff when the death of their physician left them shorthanded. The nonstop pace left him looking like hell warmed over and feeling twice as bad, but he didn’t care. The one time he had let himself care, his heart had been ripped from his chest, stomped on, then shoved back in.
His dad had been right all along: let a woman become a part of you, and she’d drain the life right out of you.
As if thinking about the man had summoned him, Daniel, Sr., appeared in the doorway of Daniel’s office just as he unlocked the glass-fronted supply cabinet. When had his dad gotten spectacles? Daniel wondered, noticing the gold-rimmed lenses for the first time. He quickly averted his gaze. The eyewear only served to remind him of the amulet Linsey wore and all that had torn them apart.
“You going out again?” his dad asked.
“Just making the rounds today.”
“And avoiding the books. They don’t have lice, you know.”
Daniel spared a brief glance at the stack of textbooks and journals taking up space on his office shelves. He could hardly bring himself to look at them, much less open one up. Why bother? He’d never make it into Johns Hopkins anyway, and even if he did, what was the point? He’d probably fail at that like he’d failed at everything else. Turning his attention back to his bag, Daniel shoved a roll of bandages into it. “I don’t have time to study.”
“You had best make time, Junior . . .”
Daniel rounded on his father. He couldn’t take it—not now, not with the wounds of Linsey’s rejection still so fresh and raw. “Don’t call me that! Call me Daniel or Dan—or better yet, call me son if that’s anywhere in your vocabulary. But for chrissake, don’t call me Junior again.”
Daniel, Sr., reared back. “What the Sam Hill has gotten into you, boy?”
Daniel let out a wild laugh. “You can’t even say it, can you? Have I been such a disappointment to you that you won’t even acknowledge that I’m your own flesh and blood?”
The old man’s eyes narrowed. “What kind of talk is that? Of course you’re my flesh and blood.”
“Then why don’t you say it?” Daniel cried. “Always calling me ‘Junior’ as if I’m no match for you. Never your equal, always beneath you.” Daniel swallowed a raspy knot of emotion. “Just once I’d like to hear you say I’m as good as you.”
“You won’t, because you aren’t.”
To Daniel’s deep shame, he felt his eyes go damp. He swiftly buckled his bag, needing to get out of here, away from the one man whose approval he’d always sought and never gotten, before he unmanned himself.
He’d just reached the door when a biting grip around his arm pulled him to a stop.
“You aren’t as good as me; you’re better. As a man, as a doctor . . . hell, boy, you’re better than I’ll ever be.”
Daniel’s system went into shock.
The grip loosened, then fell away. “You’ve got a way about you that makes people trust you. That makes ’em want to do right by you. You just don’t use it. Why do you think I push you so damn hard?”
“Because you can’t stand seeing someone idle?”
“Well, that, too,” he admitted gruffly, “but it’s mostly because you’ve got the gift. I wouldn’t have been much of a father if I’d let you throw it away—like I did.”
“Yeah, I know. You couldn’t build a surgical practice because you got a woman with child and had to marry her.”
“I didn’t have to marry your mother; I wanted to.” Daniel, Sr., wandered into the room, paused at the window, and tucked his thumbs into the pockets of his vest. “Your mother was the prettiest thing this side of Sweetwater, and I wanted her from the time I was old enough to set a razor to my chin.
She used to let me practice on her when I got bit with the doctorin’ bug; and after we got hitched, there wasn’t a day that went by that she didn’t have my instruments packed and my patients lined up. I couldn’t have asked for a better nurse.
“After the war, all these damned medical association rules and regulations started coming into effect. Your mother pushed me to get the proper licenses so I could perform surgery legally. The more she pushed, the more inept I felt. It just tore us apart, and there didn’t seem to be a damn thing either of us could do to make it right.”
“Why didn’t you just get the licenses?”
He didn’t reply for a long while; just stared out the window at a pair of blue jays diving for worms. Finally, in an almost inaudible voice, he said, “Because I can’t read.”
“What?”
“You heard me,” his dad barked over his shoulder, “I can’t read.”
Daniel fell back against the door frame, feeling as if the foundation he stood on had given away beneath his feet.
“Why the hell do you think all those bottles in there got pictures on ’em?” He jerked his thumb toward the apothecary.
Daniel couldn’t reply. He’d always thought his dad put the symbols on the pharmaceutical containers as another prod to get him into medicine. He’d had no idea.
“I’ll tell you why: because I don’t know A from Z. I know numbers, and I know symbols. I even know how to spell my name, but I can’t read the label on a damned tinned beef can.”
“But you went to college,” Daniel finally managed to say. “You got your physician’s certificate—you were a field surgeon in the war!”
“How much book learning does it take to saw off boys’ arms and legs?”
Daniel knew his father had done much, much more than that in the hospital camps. He might only have been in short pants at the time of the War Between the States, but he knew that a lot of men owed their lives to his father’s skills with a scalpel.
“I apprenticed my way into doctoring, Daniel. In my day you didn’t need any book-learning; you just hitched up with a doctor and did the job like he taught you. Half the time, a man didn’t even need a license to practice medicine; he just hung a shingle and practiced. There were more damn quacks coming out of the woodwork than you could shake a stick at. And there wasn’t a thing I could do about it, except treat my patients the best way I knew how and pray for the best.”
Loving Linsey Page 26