by Linda Turner
“Hopefully, gotten rid of that obnoxious woman and her worm of a nephew,” he laughed. “That is what you wanted, isn’t it?”
“Oh, my God, yes! Mildred has been trying to set me up with Benny for months, long before he even moved to town. I kept telling her I wasn’t interested, but it was like talking to the wall!” Thrilled that the pressure was off, she pulled back to grin up at him. “Did I say thank you? You’ll never know how much I appreciate this.”
“My pleasure,” he chuckled. “Anything to help a lady. So, now that we’re a couple, when are we going out?”
His blue eyes laughed into hers, warming her all the way to her toes and setting alarm bells clanging in her head. “Turk—”
At her warning tone, he pressed a hand to his heart and sighed. “Be still my heart. I love it when you say my name that way.”
“Turk!”
“You did it again. Tell me you’re crazy about me. You know you are.”
She just barely bit back a grin. “You’re terrible, do you know that? I’m trying to be serious—”
“So am I, sweetheart. You’re just playing hard to get.”
Across the square, Evelyn watched Rachel and Turk laughing and talking, and she couldn’t have been more pleased. “Lookie there, boys,” she told her poker-playing buddies. “Can you believe it? I do believe our Rachel is flirting with the new doctor in town and she doesn’t even know it.”
“Well, don’t tell her,” Lawrence said.
“God, no!” Harvey agreed. “You know how she is. She’ll deny it, then avoid the man altogether because—”
“She doesn’t want a man!” Evelyn and Lawrence said together, grinning.
“Poor baby,” Harvey chuckled. “She just doesn’t realize that’s exactly what she needs.”
Her eyes still trained on her granddaughter, Evelyn laughed. “And she can’t avoid this one. He lives right next door!”
“And he’s a doctor, hmm?” Harvey said, studying Turk. “I think I’ll go check him out.”
A frown knitting his brow, Lawrence nodded. “Good idea. We need to make sure he’s not anything like that jerk of an ex-husband of hers. She’s been hurt enough.”
“Just be subtle!” Evelyn called after them. “Don’t scare him off. He’s a nice guy!”
“Hi, sweetheart. Have you got some brownies for a couple of old men?”
Whirling, Rachel grinned. “Of course I do! And you’re not old men. Where have you guys been? I expected you hours ago.”
“Harvey doesn’t move as fast as he used to,” Lawrence said with twinkling eyes. “Of course, he’s older than I am, so that’s to be expected.”
Harvey rolled his eyes. “I’m three weeks older than the old goat, for God’s sake! Ask anyone—they’ll tell you I look ten years younger!”
“Yeah, right! And I’m the Easter Bunny!” Pointedly looking at her companion, he lifted a gray brow. “So aren’t you going to introduce us to your friend?” Not giving her the chance, he extended his hand for a shake. “You’re new in town, aren’t you?”
“Of course he’s new,” Harvey retorted. “If he wasn’t, we’d know him. I’m Harvey Snyder,” he told Turk. “And this is Lawrence Jones. And you’re…?”
“Turk Garrison,” he said, grinning as he shook hands with the two of them. “I bought the house next door to Rachel.”
“Oh! You’re the one with the Dumpster out front?”
“With the dog that ate Evelyn’s pie?”
He chuckled. “Guilty as charged.”
“So you must be—”
“The doctor,” Turk supplied when Lawrence hesitated. “That’s right. I just opened a clinic in the Hunter’s Ridge Center on Main Street.”
“A doctor, huh?” Harvey said, his brown eyes sharp with interest. “I bet there’s a lot of women out there chasing you.”
“Harvey!”
“Well, it’s true, isn’t it, Turk?” he said, defending himself. “Women are looking for a good man to support them in the manner in which they want to be accustomed. Nothing wrong with that. They’re the one’s having babies and raising them. That’s a heck of a lot easier when they have a husband who brings home a good salary.”
“It takes a lot of money to raise kids,” Lawrence added, straight-faced. “Do you know how much it cost to go to college nowadays? I don’t know how anybody does it!”
“And what about clothes? Have you priced a pair of jeans lately? Imagine buying jeans for three or four boys who are always growing like weeds and rough-housing and tearing their clothes.”
“Guys!”
Grinning at Rachel’s protest, Turk only encouraged them. “And don’t forget food. Can you imagine feeding three growing boys for eighteen years! And they’ll want cars…and MP3s and cell phones and—”
“Speaking of children, Harvey, I thought you were going to the Texas game with your son,” Rachel said smoothly, changing the subject. “Or was that next weekend?”
“No, it was today, but he had to cancel. He’s got some kind of stomach bug, so he’s at home in bed.”
“He needs a wife like Rachel,” Lawrence said. “She’d take care of him, make chicken soup for him, baby him—”
“Lawrence—”
Ignoring her warning tone, he added, “A fella can’t go wrong with a woman like Rachel. Have you tasted her fried chicken?”
“No, I can’t say I’ve had the pleasure,” Turk said, giving Rachel a pointed look. “She hasn’t invited me to supper.”
“Then you buy the chicken and invite her to come to your house and cook it,” Harvey suggested. “You can’t turn him down, Rachel. What’s the poor man supposed to do with raw chicken? You can at least teach him how to cook it himself.”
“Now, there’s an idea!”
“No!” Rachel said firmly, struggling not to laugh. “Turk and I are just neighbors! We’re not dating!”
“Well, you can change that easily enough,” Harvey retorted. “Ask her out, Turk. She’s got a birthday coming up. Take her dancing.”
“You’d better know what you’re doing,” Lawrence warned. “She’s good. Of course, it doesn’t matter if you can dance or not—all you have to do is two-step and you can hold her all night long. I know—that’s what I used to do.”
“Lawrence!”
“Well, I did. There’s nothing wrong with that. I bet Turk’s done the same thing. Haven’t you, Turk?”
He shrugged, grinning. “A man’s got to do what a man’s got to do. So, sweetheart, when are we going dancing?”
Torn between exasperation and amusement, she rolled her eyes. “Why isn’t anyone listening to me? We’re not—”
“Dating,” he finished for her with a laugh. “Yes, I know. So when are you going to change that?”
A customer walked up then and she jumped at the chance to wait on them. “Gotta get back to work. Goodbye, Turk. Bye, guys.”
“Don’t worry,” Harvey said in a voice loud enough to carry to the end of the block, “She’ll come around. Just give her some time.”
With heat singeing her cheeks, she didn’t dare look at Turk. But then again, she didn’t have to. She could hear him chuckling as he walked away.
Over the course of the next week, Rachel told herself that she didn’t care how much time Turk gave her, she wasn’t going out with him. But the man was damn sneaky. She didn’t know how he arranged it, but it seemed like every time she turned around, she was running into him. His basket nearly collided with hers at the grocery store, he was behind her in the drive-thru at the bank, and every morning, he showed up at the bakery for a doughnut and coffee before going to his clinic. And of course, the last thing she saw every night when she went to bed was the glow from his lighted windows.
Did he know he was getting to her?
She could feel herself weakening, which made her even more determined not to go out with him. She just had to stand strong, she told herself. She wanted a baby, not a relationship with a man…especially a man l
ike Turk, who could steal a woman’s heart with just a wink and a grin. She didn’t want her heart stolen, didn’t want to fall in love again. Not with Turk, not with anyone. If she could just remember that, she’d be fine.
So she kept her distance, distracting herself as much as possible. She spent just about every evening playing poker with her grandmother and the “boys,” preparing for the tournament in Austin, but it did little good, and it was all her fault. At the tournament, she couldn’t concentrate—her thoughts kept drifting to Turk—and they were soundly trounced.
“I’m sorry, guys,” she told them as they headed home. “I don’t know what got into me. I couldn’t focus.”
“You know, I’ve heard that’s a common problem in women your age,” her grandmother said dryly. “It has something to do with hormones…and falling in love.”
“I’m not falling in love!” she retorted. “I’m just distracted.”
True, the distraction was six foot two and had the most incredible blue eyes, but no one said a word. They didn’t have to. She knew exactly what they were thinking.
Frustrated, she returned home, more determined than ever to ignore the man. But just when she thought she could hold him at bay indefinitely, he came into the bakery one morning and caught her completely off guard. “Hey, sweetheart, what are you doing Saturday? There’s a charity bowl-a-thon at Oak Park Lanes to raise money for MS. I thought maybe we could go together.”
She had to give him credit—he raised his voice just enough so that it carried to the far corners of the bakery. Every customer in the place sat up straighter, waiting expectantly for her to turn him down flat, just like she always did. Swallowing a curse, she wanted to kick him. Why did he keep doing this? Surely he had to know that everyone in town was talking about them—bets were being taken at Freeman’s Barbershop down the street, and the latest odds were in her favor. Why couldn’t he accept the fact that he was wasting his time?
“I can’t,” she retorted. “I’m having dinner with my grandmother. I promised I’d take her to her favorite Chinese restaurant.”
“Don’t you go worrying about Evelyn,” Harvey said from his favorite table near the front windows. “Lawrence and I will take her to dinner. You go raise some money for MS.”
Trapped, she swallowed a silent groan. So now what was she supposed to say? No, thanks, I don’t want to raise money for MS? She’d sound like a Scrooge, and in the time it took to make another batch of doughnuts, the news would be all over town that she’d refused to participate in one of the biggest local fund-raisers of the year.
Her gaze met Turk’s, and the instant she saw the wicked humor glinting in his eyes, she knew she’d been set up. The rat was aware she wouldn’t be able to turn him down, and he was loving every second of it!
It would have served him right if she’d told him to stuff it, but they both knew she wouldn’t do that. Left with no choice but to give in, she gave him a look that promised him she’d deal with him later, in private, and said, “Then I guess we’re going bowling.”
Everyone in the bakery broke into applause.
Chapter 7
The clinic was three blocks away, and Turk found himself laughing the entire way. Oh, yeah! He couldn’t remember the last time he’d worked so hard to convince a woman to go out with him. He’d finally worn her down, charmed her out of her socks, make it impossible for her to resist him. And she was his! It was just a matter of time.
Don’t go patting yourself on the back, goofball, his common sense drawled in his ear. The only reason the lady agreed to anything was because you put her on the spot in front of God and everyone. A charity, Turk? C’mon! What else could she do except accept? That was brilliant…and shameless!
He grinned wryly. Okay, so he’d had to twist her arm to convince her to spend some time with him—which meant she’d really won this round, not him. Swallowing a groan, he couldn’t help but laugh. When had this become a game between them? And why was he so intent on winning it?
He didn’t have an answer and wasn’t sure he wanted to come up with one. He reached the clinic then, and there was no time to daydream about Rachel. The second the clinic was open for business, the first patient came in—a new mother with a baby with an earache. He’d hardly assured her that her baby was going to be fine, then written out a prescription, when a construction worker with a broken arm rushed in. The day had begun.
In his element, Turk moved from one patient to the next, and always took a few minutes to visit with each when the doctoring was done. In the process of getting to know the new Methodist minister, who had brought his son in for strep, he had just started to tell him about his own recent move to Hunter’s Ridge when his nurse suddenly knocked on the door.
“I’m sorry to interrupt, Dr. Garrison,” she said quickly, “but we have an emergency in examining room two. A burn victim—”
Surprised, he said, “I’ll be right there.” Giving the minister a grimace of a smile, he said, “I’m sorry to cut this short. If the prescription doesn’t do the trick—”
“We’ll be back,” the reverend assured him. “Thanks for your help.”
His thoughts already jumping to the next patient, Turk rushed down the hall toward examining room two, throwing questions at his nurse with every step he took. “How bad is the burn? Where is it? How did it happen?”
“The patient’s a twenty-five-year-old single woman from Dallas who came into town to surprise her boyfriend,” she said quickly. “She was getting dressed in her hotel room this morning when she accidentally dropped a full cup of hot coffee and spilled it on her right arm.”
“And she didn’t call an ambulance?”
“Apparently, someone at the hotel did call 911, but she refused to go to the hospital. She didn’t want to make a fuss. Claimed she could take care of the matter herself.”
He swore at that. “Don’t tell me—she put some aloe vera on it, didn’t she? When did this happen?”
“Several hours ago.”
Wondering what kind of masochist would wait hours to get treatment for a serious burn, Turk knocked briefly on the examining room door, then pushed it open the second a feminine voice softly called, “Come in.”
“I’m Dr. Garrison,” he began, only to stop short at the sight of the woman sitting on the examining table. “What are you doing here?”
Far from intimidated by his sudden glare, Laureen Becker laughed. “Is that anyway to say hello, sweetheart? I need a doctor. Where else would I be?”
“My nurse said you were in town to visit your boyfriend,” he retorted coldly. “If you were talking about me, you’ve made the trip here for nothing. I’m not your boyfriend and never will be.”
“He’s just teasing,” Laureen told his nurse, who’d followed him into the room and stopped short at Turk’s greeting. “He hates showing his real feelings.”
“These are my real feelings,” he snapped. Scowling, he stepped forward to examine her arm. “What have you done to yourself?”
“It was an accident. I spilled coffee—”
Turk took one look at her arm and knew there was no way she could have accidentally spilled coffee that high on her arm. In fact, it looked as if she’d deliberately poured the coffee high above her elbow so that it would run down her arm.
If he hadn’t known how driven she was to become Mrs. Turk Garrison, he would have thought his imagination was working overtime. But over the last few weeks, she’d tried time and time again to push her way into his life, completely ignoring the fact that he wanted nothing to do with her. He wouldn’t put anything past her.
Glancing at her sharply, he said, “You did this on purpose, didn’t you?”
Not the least bit worried that she hadn’t fooled him, she smiled. “I had to see you, darling. And you didn’t return my phone calls. What else is a woman in love supposed to do?”
Turk’s nurse had moved to his side to help him dress the wound, and though she never so much as blinked in response to Laureen�
��s confession, he could just imagine what she was thinking. “Nancy, I’ll take this from here,” he told her stiffly. “I need you to check on Mrs. Carson and tell her I’ll be right with her.”
He didn’t have to tell her twice. Excusing herself, she practically ran out of the room, and Turk couldn’t blame her. He wanted to do the same thing. Unfortunately, Laureen had a pretty nasty burn, and he couldn’t just abandon her.
“You didn’t have to come up with some silly excuse to make her leave, darling. You should have just told her the truth—you wanted to be alone with me. See…I knew you wanted to see me. You’re just playing hard-to-get.”
Trapped, furious, he never took his eyes off her arm as he carefully treated and bandaged the wound. “You’ll be lucky if you don’t have a scar,” he said flatly as he finished and stepped back to strip off his gloves. “There. You got what you came for. You got to see me. Satisfied? Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have other patients to see to.”
“Darling, don’t be that way. Let’s go to dinner later and talk. We need to catch up—
“No, we don’t,” he snapped, shrugging off her touch when she tried to take his hand. “Don’t you get it? There is no us! How many times do I have to say it before you get it? There’s no us, no we. We aren’t a couple, we’re not dating. I hate to be ugly, but I don’t know any other way to make you understand that I’m not interested in being friends or lovers with you. Leave me alone.”
“I can’t, sweetheart. I love you. And you’ll love me, too, when you let down your guard. Now, about dinner, there must be a decent place to eat in this backward little town. Or I could cook for you,” she decided, smiling in delight at the idea. “I make a fabulous lasagna. Give me the keys to your house, and I’ll have everything ready by the time you get home this afternoon. Do you want to eat first thing or make love? You’re tense, sweetheart. Maybe you should have a massage first. Just to help you relax—”