by Susan Stoker
His smile faded, he swallowed hard and pushed off the door jamb to stand. “I know you don’t owe me a damned thing, and I’m sorry for being an ass yesterday—but I need you to look at Brady and tell me what the hell is wrong with him.”
“I was an ass too, and I apologize.” Melanie took a step toward him, feeling relieved that he was asking for her help so she wouldn’t be intruding. “I’d be happy to examine him but my medical licenses are for Texas and California, so I can’t treat him. I’m an emergency medicine specialist, not an internist, so I don’t know how much help I’ll be either.”
He tipped his hat back, put his hands on his hips and held her eyes. “You’re just about the smartest woman I’ve ever met and I’m tired of wasting time with the doctors Lucy has taken him to. I know you can figure it out.”
A strange liquid sensation, pleasure at his words, washed through her and the corners of her mouth lifted. Get a grip, Melanie, you’re not begging for scraps of attention from this man anymore.
Brock’s eyes got glassy and he swallowed hard. “This is an emergency, because he’s getting sicker by the day and I can’t stand to watch it anymore.” His eyes softened, pleaded with her as he stepped forward, and put his hand on her forearm. “Please just say you’ll try.”
“Of course I’ll try to help.” The words flew from her lips before she could stop them.
He smiled and his hand grazed up her arm leaving a trail of goosebumps to her bare shoulder before he cupped her face in his warm palm and she fought the urge to snuggle her face into it.
“I should’ve gone for the smart girl, because I’d have been a lot better off. Especially since she’s the prettiest girl now too. It’s my loss because I was such a knucklehead back then.”
Melanie didn’t know what to say, but her whole body buzzed when his eyes dropped to her mouth, before his hand fell away. It still buzzed as he stepped back from her and smiled.
“It’s convenient you’re here, because Brady is in the van. I’ll get him,” he said as he turned and walked out leaving her stunned and staring behind him.
The electricity and water wasn’t even on in this office. She didn’t have her stethoscope. But she was sure, like the other equipment she’d seen in the exam room, Dr. Carter’s was probably still in a drawer somewhere too. Maybe in his office, she thought, walking out of the storage room. When he wasn’t using it, he usually kept it in his right desk drawer.
Melanie hadn’t gone into his office when she arrived, because knowing he died in there made her stomach ache. Opening the door, she forgot about the electricity and automatically flipped on the light switch like she’d done a million times before. His office was always the darkest room in the building because of the blackout drapes on his window, and Jonas said he liked it that way.
Well, she needed to be able to see so she walked to the window and shoved back the curtains. Dust particles floated through the air and Melanie fought back a sneeze, but finally managed to get them tucked behind the chair next to the window.
She went to the desk and sat down and grabbed the right drawer but stopped when her eyes fell on the open folder on Jonas’ desk. At the top of the very thick folder she saw the patient’s name—Brady Cooper—and a chill snaked down her spine.
Had Brady been the patient who he’d come in to see the day he died?
It would seem so, since that particular file was open on his desk. His silver pen sat beside the folder, and a sheaf of papers was under it. Lifting the folder, she saw the papers were computer printouts on vitamins and minerals.
Did Jonas think Brady had a vitamin deficiency?
The only way to know would be to read through this voluminous chart and that would take hours. Since Dr. Carter’s last contact with the child would have had to be when he was four years old, her time would probably be better spent getting current information from Brock, and doing an initial assessment. Reading the file first could cloud her judgment anyway.
“Dr. Fox, this is my son Brady,” Brock announced as he stood behind him in the doorway, his hands on the boy’s shoulders. “I’m sorry I didn’t get to introduce you to him yesterday, but we were a little preoccupied.” Brock urged him into the office and followed.
Melanie got up, walked around the desk and the end of her sandal hooked on a wrinkle in the carpet. She gasped as she lost her balance and the corner of the desk came at her fast, but Brock was faster because he caught her shoulders to hold her up. Melanie wished he’d have been here to save Jonas the day he probably did the same thing.
“I see your transformation didn’t take away your clumsiness,” he said with a laugh, as his fingers dug into her flesh. “I’m glad, because it’s kind of cute and reminds me you’re still the same girl under that shiny new exterior.”
A funny thing about that clumsiness. Melanie had only ever been afflicted by it when she was around Brock Cooper, who seemed to make her trip over her own feet. But she wasn’t going to tell him that, she thought, as she stepped back and his hands fell to his side.
“I just realized there’s no electricity in this building. Let’s go out to my ranch, and you can check him out there. Do you have time?” Brock asked.
Melanie really had to get back to her mother’s to straighten the house, make the beds, and help her mother wash up. Aunt June couldn’t do all that or help her get dressed with a broken arm. That is why Melanie was in Sunny Glen. But Aunt June did insist she had things under control until Melanie got back from breakfast with Mrs. Carter…and it was still early.
She just couldn’t make herself pass up the opportunity to see how Brock lived these days. To see him in his new element.
“It’s still early, so I guess so,” Melanie replied, and a little excitement sprouted in her chest.
Chapter Seven
‡
The exceptionally quiet child watched warily as Melanie finished her exam at his toes, then stood. He hadn’t said one word throughout the exam. He just nodded when she asked him a direct question, which was really odd. As weak as he appeared to be though, it might not be odd at all. Her exam proved nothing except his hair and skin was dry, he was dehydrated, yet his face was flushed.
“Well, Brady, it looks like you’re going to be as big and strong as your daddy one day,” she said with a gentle smile, hoping to engage him to get a feel for what he was thinking behind those deep blue eyes that matched his father’s. When his lips curved just the slightest degree at the corner, but he didn’t open his mouth, she asked, “What do you want to be when you grow up? You want to be a sheriff and a cowboy like your daddy?”
He shook his head from side to side, but didn’t speak. Use your words kid, I want to talk to you. “Fireman, then?” she asked, and he shook his head again. Melanie shrugged and held up her hands. “I’m out of guesses. What do you want to be?”
Brady’s eyes slid up to meet his father’s and Brock cleared his throat. “He wants to be a doc—” Brock started, but she shot him a warning look.
If his parents continued to fill in answers for him, this child would never learn to answer for himself. She wondered if that was how things went down during the visits to the twenty or so physicians he’d seen for this problem. If so, that’s probably why no definitive diagnosis had been reached.
“What do you want to be Brady?” she asked again, meeting his eyes and holding them.
He looked away to mumble. “I want to be a doctor like you. But I’m probably sick too much. I can’t even go to school.”
God, the frustration in the six-year-old’s voice, the resignation ripped at her insides.
“Well, I’m going to figure out what’s wrong with you, so you’ll be sick of school very soon. And if you end up going to medical school, I know you’ll be sick of it by the time you finish,” she replied with a laugh.
“Brady, you want to take the golf cart out to the pasture to pet Lorrie?” Brock asked, and Melanie had never seen a kid perk up so fast. He sat up on the sofa and his formerly li
stless eyes sparked with excitement.
“Yes, sir!” he replied, having no trouble finding his words now.
“Promise you won’t go inside the pasture. Just get some carrots out of the refrigerator to take with you and he’ll come to the gate. Feed them to him like I showed you.”
Showing energy he hadn’t shown before, Brady pushed up from the sofa and wobbled a second, then found his balance and ran toward the kitchen. Brock watched him and his face relaxed, but his eyes were worried when they swung back to Melanie.
“What do you think?” Brock asked quickly.
“I think I need more information and to read his chart more thoroughly. I flipped through the file, but it stopped when he was four. Is that when he started seeing other doctors?”
“He was seeing other doctors even before Dr. Carter died. So many doctors and so many tests, all of which came back mostly normal according to Lucy. He had chickenpox right before he turned three and ended up in the hospital for a week with pneumonia,” Brock replied, his jaw tightening. “He’s been sick ever since but it’s gotten a lot worse lately.”
“They would’ve treated him with breathing treatments and antibiotics which would’ve taken care of that. That can’t be what’s going on with him now after three years.”
The two times Dr. Carter had seen Brady during his third year only outlined the symptoms the child was having, not a diagnosis. He’d treated those symptoms and ordered tests during their last consult, evidently right before he died. Maybe Melanie needed to go back to the office and dig through his desk to see if she could find the lab reports. Perhaps the appointment he had at the office on the day he died was to discuss his findings with Lucy.
“Brock, do you have access to his medical records from the other doctors who’ve seen him since then?” That would probably tell her a lot more than the sparse information in Dr. Carter’s file.
His shoulders tensed. “I have joint custody and I’m his father, so I assume I’d have access,” he replied gruffly. “But I couldn’t tell you the names of all the doctor’s he’s seen, because Lucy didn’t include me in those appointments. She only told me what was said. I do know a lot of tests were run because I got the bills for them.”
“You can probably get the doctor’s names from those bills,” Melanie suggested, wondering why in the hell he hadn’t insisted on going with Lucy and Brady. Probably because he was a man, and it was easier just to let her handle it. She hoped he realized what a big mistake that was in hindsight.
“I know what you’re thinking,” he said gruffly, his eyes narrowing.
“What am I thinking?” she replied, a little shocked.
“You’re judging me—I do give a damn about my son, and you can’t judge me any harder than I’m judging myself right now.” He shoved a hand through his dark, wavy hair then scrubbed his hand over his face. “My only excuse is that I was working two jobs—the ranch and the sheriff’s office—to support them. I couldn’t just take off to go to all those appointments, and I trusted Lucy to do what was best for him.”
The heartache and self-castigation in his voice, the fear, ripped a hole in her stomach as she stepped forward and put her hand on his shoulder. “Brock, I’m not judging you. That won’t get us the answers we need about Brady’s illness.”
“I don’t know if anything will,” he replied darkly, and his Adam’s apple bobbed as his eyes filled. “Before it’s too late anyway. Something bad is going on with him. I feel it in my gut,” he informed, pounding a fist at his sternum.
She slid her hand up to his face and the scratch of his beard stubble abraded her palm sending fire streaking up her arm.
“It’s not too late, I promise. I do know after examining him that he’s listless, dehydrated and he seems to have a balance problem. His face stays flushed, and his hair and skin are dry. Those are clues, and I’ll start doing research as soon as I can get to a computer with internet. My mother doesn’t have internet at her house, so I’ll have to go to the library.”
“I have internet and a computer you can use here,” he offered quickly, his intense eyes meeting hers. “Or you can use the computer at the station when I’m there. In fact, I need to head over there right now.”
“I need to go back home first. I’ll walk over after I fix the crazy ladies lunch,” she said with a smile.
His dark brows crashed together. “Yeah, that’s something else we need to talk about. You may want to have your mother checked out by a psych—”
“I have it on good authority that she’s not crazy—she’s eccentric,” Melanie said with a laugh. “And you may have a rude awakening if you try to stop her from practicing her religion again. She’s been around for half-a-century and will do whatever the hell she pleases.”
“Well, religion or not, if she pleases to walk down Porter Street in her birthday suit again, she may wind up in a jail cell and be explaining herself to the judge,” he replied, and his lips twitched. “I think she traumatized old Mrs. Lawrence, who’s been around three-quarters of a century. Probably because she caught Mr. Lawrence watching with binoculars at the window.”
“Maybe you should arrest him for being a Peeping Tom?” Melanie suggested with a lifted brow. “Or tell her that just because she’s three-quarters of a century old, doesn’t mean she owns this town.”
She remembered Mrs. Lawrence, who was just about the busiest body in town—and the meanest to kids who had the misfortune of having to walk on the sidewalk in front of her house on the way to school. Melanie was among that number.
Stop stomping in my flowerbed you heathen. The only issue was her flowerbed encroached on the sidewalk, which Melanie finally pointed out to her one day and almost got whacked with a rake if she hadn’t been faster than the old hag. From that day on, she made a point of walking right through the middle of that flower bed, before getting in her morning jog with the old lady chasing behind her to the corner.
“But she pays taxes, and in turn, my salary,” he said with a chuckle, and Melanie’s eyes whipped to his to see the storm clouds gone and a sparkle there.
“Well she doesn’t pay you enough to put up with her, I’m sure. Maybe you should talk to the mayor about increasing her taxes, and in turn, your salary,” Melanie replied with a grin, and her knees went a little weak when he grinned too and that dimple in his left cheek appeared.
“I may need you to act as my agent, because the mayor and I don’t always see eye-to-eye,” Brock replied.
“That could be because he’s just a little over five feet tall. Try sitting down when you talk to him,” Melanie said, with a chuckle as her eyes slid up his chest, along the column of his tanned throat to finally meet his eyes.
Brock Cooper was definitely a lot over five feet tall, probably six-two, and that was something she’d always lov—liked about him. He was just so masculine, alpha and…yummy.
That grin popped out, the dimple appeared and girls dropped their panties. Melanie would’ve dropped hers in a heartbeat if he’d have been interested. Back then, if she had, he probably wouldn’t have even noticed. She wondered if he’d notice now.
Brock’s eyes dropped to her mouth and she licked her lips as a thick tension formed between them. She noticed the slight increase in his breaths, the uptick in the pulse at his throat and the flare of his nostrils as his hands gently closed on her shoulders. When his mouth gravitated toward hers, her heart skidded to a stop and she tensed.
“What are you doing?” she asked, her voice a whisper of sound, because her heart choked off her vocal chords.
“What I should’ve done twelve years ago,” he growled, as he pulled her into him. “What I’ve been wanting to do since I saw you again.”
His hot lips touched down on hers, and Melanie’s knees melted. She put her hands on his upper arms to hold herself up, and his muscles flexed under her fingers as her body went liquid under the hot pleasure that flowed through the connection of their mouths. Her childhood fantasies of this moment bore zero resemb
lance to this moment, she thought, as she slid her arms up to his shoulders then circled his neck.
Brock’s arms closed tightly around her waist and he leaned her back, kissed her harder, his tongue pressing at the seam of her mouth. A buzzing sensation zipped along her folds to electrify the bud at the top of her thighs, as she opened her mouth, his tongue rasped over hers and he moaned into her mouth.
Melanie shoved her hand into the thick mass of hair at the back of his skull and held him closer, kissed him deeper as heady desire washed through her and she mewled. His arms at her waist loosened, his hands glided down to her ass and he lifted her against him, held her pelvis to his and circled his hips to grind his impressive erection into her stomach as he devoured her mouth. This—this is what she’d always wanted from him, but didn’t know it. And more—so much more, she thought, wiggling her hips in time with his as moisture flooded down her body.
The back door slammed, Brock’s fingers dug into her ass deeper and he moaned as he sat her back on her feet, and dropped his chin to his chest.
“I ran out of carrots,” Brady announced at the doorway to the living room, and Brock took a step away from her, then turned. The air between them went cold, and a strange sense of loss gripped Melanie, as she turned to face Brady.
“Daddy why are you wearing lipstick?” Brady asked with a giggle, and Brock’s eyes widened as he wiped the back of his hand over his mouth then slid it across the leg of his jeans.
Melanie bit back her own giggle as Brock’s face turned red and his mouth flapped a couple of times. “Just get your stuff. I’ve got to drop you back off at home and go into the office.”
Chapter Eight
‡
“What are you smiling so much about? You’ve been grumpy as hell since you got back to town,” Merry Fox asked, being grumpy herself.
Her mother’s mood was probably a direct result of Melanie parking her on the couch when she got home and found her trying to climb the stairs on her butt to go get her incense so she could meditate.