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“It’s Daniel,” Dan corrected her. “Dr. Daniel Davenport.”
A slight confused frown edged away the smile on the woman’s thin lips. “I thought for sure they told me your first name was Warren,” she said, referring to the people she’d spoken to on the phone in her quest to secure a physician for Forever.
It was through her efforts, as she relentlessly bombarded the American Medical Association with requests for a doctor, that Forever’s situation, she’d been told, had come to Warren Davenport’s attention. He’d been looking for some place where he could make a difference and Forever needed a dedicated doctor.
“Was there a mistake in the paperwork?” she now asked the young man before her.
The people in the diner seemed to tighten the circle around them. Dan doubted that it was just his imagination at work. Good thing for him that he wasn’t claustrophobic, he thought.
“No, no mistake, Warren was supposed to be here. But there was an accident.” He tried his best to sound detached as the words slowly left his lips. He had no intention of sharing his pain with anyone, least of all a town full of strangers.
“Was he badly hurt?” Miss Joan asked, concerned. He noticed that she still hadn’t released his hand, although she had stopped pumping it.
His throat felt dry, scratchy, as he stoically replied, “He was killed.”
“Oh.” Miss Joan appeared genuinely stunned. “I’m sorry to hear that.” He felt her squeeze his hand in what he assumed was a comforting gesture. “You’ve got the same last name. Was he a relative of yours?”
“He was my brother.” Dan congratulated himself for not choking on his reply.
The woman’s hazel eyes filled with compassion. The same look was mirrored in the eyes and faces of the people standing closest around him. For a moment, he was caught off guard.
Were they all pretending to be sympathetic?
After all, neither he nor his brother were anything to these people. Other than the obvious, that Warren was supposed to have come here to open up his practice, why would any of these people even care that he’d died? They’d never met Warren and as for him, well, they didn’t know him from Adam. How could they pretend to know or feel his pain? “I’m really sorry to hear that,” Miss Joan murmured.
She sounded so sincere, he could almost believe that she meant it—if it didn’t seem so impossible to him. She splayed her bony hand against her chest to emphasize what she was about to tell him.
“I’m the one who wrote to your brother. Actually,” she amended, “I called and wrote letters to the AMA. They finally referred me to your brother.” Her eyes met his and again, he had the eerie feeling that she could look right into him. “We only spoke the one time. But even then, he seemed like a very nice young man to me. Compassionate and caring,” she added.
That described his brother to a T, Dan thought. Warren had been the good brother, he had been the wild one. And now, he thought heavily, he was the only brother. “He was.”
Disappointment entered Miss Joan’s voice. “You didn’t have to come in person to deliver this news. I—we—would have understood.”
Just for a second, Dan saw his way out of this prospective prison sentence. He could just nod, go along with the woman’s interpretation of the situation and leave this speck of a place. Her assumption was his ticket back to New York. No one would be the wiser.
No one but him.
He’d made a promise. A promise to Warren that he would take his place until someone else more suitable could be found. Sure, he’d made the promise silently in his heart because Warren had been killed instantly when the taxi they were in had been slammed into by that swerving SUV.
But he wouldn’t be able to look himself in the mirror each morning if he broke this promise to his dead brother.
Getting through each day was hard enough for him as it was. He couldn’t shake off the mantle of blame for this, for Warren’s death. If he hadn’t prevailed on Warren and dragged him out—
This wasn’t the time, Dan silently upbraided himself. The woman with the X-ray eyes would pick up on what he was thinking.
“I realize that,” he said to the diner owner. “But I didn’t come to tell you about my brother’s untimely death. I came to Forever to take his place. Warren would have wanted me to,” he felt obligated to add. He didn’t want any of the people in town to be grateful to him. He didn’t deserve gratitude.
The solemn mood that had begun to descend over the diner when they heard about Warren’s death suddenly evaporated as Dan’s words sank in.
Not one to leave anything to chance or misinterpretation, Miss Joan asked, “Then you’re going to be our doctor?”
“Yes.” He wanted to add that it was just until another substitute could be found, thereby giving himself the escape hatch he so badly needed. But something prevented him. Maybe he didn’t want to leave himself open to endless attempts to persuade him to think otherwise. Or maybe, since they looked so happy to finally have a physician in their midst, he didn’t want to be the one to rain on their parade.
Whatever the reason, for the time being he kept his qualifying phrase to himself.
The moment Miss Joan heard the word yes, the redhead’s porcelain-fair face broke out in a huge smile that overtook her entire countenance.
“I see that selflessness runs in your family,” she pronounced.
The last thing Dan wanted was to be regarded in the same light as Warren. They were nothing alike. Warren was the good one, the saint. The one who had entered medicine only with the thought of easing pain and giving back.
Dan began to deny Miss Joan’s assumption—and to ask for the use of his hand back—but he never got the opportunity to do either.
Releasing her grip, the ginger-haired woman in the light gray and white waitress uniform managed to surprise him again by throwing her arms around him and enveloping him in a fierce bear hug.
“Welcome to Forever, Doc,” she declared, a slight catch in her voice.
If he didn’t know better, he would have said that he’d just crossed over to the other side, a place from which there was no return. As it was, an uneasy feeling rippled through him as Miss Joan continued to hug him, effectively pinning his arms to his sides. He didn’t like being put up on a pedestal. It only made it that much easier for him to fall.
To his surprise, Miss Joan whispered something against his ear. “Any time you get the urge to just talk, feel free to come on by—day or night,” she invited sympathetically.
For a moment he thought that this animated woman could sense that he didn’t have anyone to talk to about Warren. At this point in their lives, he and his brother had no more family left. Uncle Jason had died two years ago, leaving his rather considerable bank accounts to them so that they could continue to fund their educations. Jason Davenport, their father’s older brother, had taken them in when their parents had died in a plane crash fifteen years ago.
Now there was no family. And no girlfriend, neither his nor Warren’s, in the wings ready to murmur sympathetic words. Warren had been so focused on becoming the best doctor he could, he never made time for a social life. As for him, he’d been too busy going from woman to woman to try to create even a semidecent relationship. Sure, he’d had a boatload of friends in college and during his residency, but the only one he had ever been remotely close to, really close to, was Warren.
Without commenting on Miss Joan’s hushed offer, Dan separated himself from the woman only to find himself besieged by the people who had begun to close in on him when Miss Joan had first approached him. Without advanced warning, introductions suddenly came from all sides. People saying names he hadn’t a prayer of remembering.
But he offered a perfunctory smile and nodded as if absorbing each and every one of them. In his place, he was certain that Warren would have remembered every single one. His brother had been like that. Warren had a knack for names and faces. Not only that, but he could zero in on the individuality of each person he came across.
As for him, well, he was better at remembering pretty women. And even then, it wasn’t always a sure thing.
But this time, as names and greetings swirled around his head like bees swarming around a hive, while various people pumped his hand, Daniel found himself becoming progressively aware of the blonde in the background. She appeared to be quietly watching her friends and neighbors swirl around him. She seemed to have no desire to join in the swarming.
He was surprised that it had taken him this long to notice her. Rather than joining in the throng around him, she was perched on a stool at the counter, her body turned in his direction as if a detached observer to this little show.
Questions sprang up in his head even as he went on making automatic responses to the people around him.
Was she from around here?
He couldn’t put his finger on it, but Dan had a feeling that maybe she wasn’t.
Which brought up another question. Why would someone who wasn’t born here willingly come to this little burg? Was it a matter of penance, the way it was for him? Or was there another reason the blonde had been transplanted?
As far as he could ascertain, there was no military base in the area, so she wasn’t some serviceman’s wife forced to temporarily call this forgotten part of the state her home.
What was her story?
As he pondered the question and debated how best to work his way over to the blonde, Dan suddenly found himself looking into the face of a man who had the easy air of assumed authority about him. The man had on the same kind of uniform as the deputy who had brought him to this place. Something told him that this man wasn’t just another deputy.
And he was right. “I’m Sheriff Rick Santiago,” the dark-haired man told him as he shook his hand. “You need anything, have any questions, come see me and I’ll try to get you the answers and whatever else you might feel you need.”
The offer was a friendly one, sincerely tendered. There was no false air of bravado. What the sheriff said to him next cemented Dan’s initial impression.
“Nobody expects you to remember all these names,” Rick assured him. “It’ll all come together for you after a while.”
Dan forced a smile to his lips. He knew the sheriff meant well, but he had his doubts that he would remember half these names no matter how long he stayed here. And once he was back in New York, not just the names but the people as well would all become a vague blur to him in less than a week.
All except for the blonde, he amended.
The blonde had the kind of face and body that lingered on a man’s mind long after she was physically gone from the room. That would be especially true if they interacted before he left Forever.
Miss Joan seemed to read his mind. He hadn’t realized that she was still this close by.
Before he knew it, the woman had slipped her arm through his and drew him over closer to where the blonde was sitting at the counter.
“That’s Tina Blayne, the sheriff’s sister-in-law.” Turning her face so that only he could see her smile and hear what she had to tell him, she said, “You’ll probably be seeing a lot of her.”
Now how the hell did the woman know that? He looked at her, banking down his curiosity and only looking mildly interested in what Miss Joan was saying. “Oh?”
Miss Joan nodded. “Yeah. Because of her little boy, Bobby. Cute as all get-out, but he keeps coming down with colds and fevers. She’s been running herself ragged, driving over to Pine Ridge every time the poor kid’s fever spikes. That, on top of working and taking classes for her degree, has been taking quite a toll on her. She’s really relieved about you—your brother—a doctor,” she finally settled on, “coming to town. Maybe the poor thing’ll get some sleep now.” She gestured toward the blonde she’d referred to as Tina, beckoning her over. “C’mere, Tina. Meet the new doc,” she coaxed.
Tina had been sitting there, observing from a distance, thinking to herself that the man who had arrived was just too damn good-looking to be much of a doctor. He looked like Hollywood’s concept of a doctor, not the real thing.
If the man actually had a degree, she had a feeling that he hadn’t really earned it. Most likely he’d gotten it by cutting corners. Men who looked like that always cut corners. Always used their good looks and charm to get by. They didn’t have to be good, they just had to smile and sound as if they knew what they were talking about.
She was well versed in the ways—and shortcomings—of good-looking men. Don had belonged to that club and if she hadn’t had the strength of character, a good-looking man would have been her downfall, if not her complete demise.
But, after Olivia, Miss Joan was like a second mother to her. It was Miss Joan who insisted she and Bobby come live with her once Olivia had gotten married to Rick. Miss Joan was also the one who had encouraged her to continue her education online. Once she was on that path, Miss Joan had urged her friends to take her on as an accountant even though her degree and accreditation were still more than a few months in the future.
So, when Miss Joan wanted her to go some place or be somewhere, she was not about to say no to the woman. Even if she would have preferred to beg off. This was Miss Joan and she’d walk through fire for the woman, she was that grateful to her.
Tina slid off the stool and approached the gathering around the new doctor. Miss Joan deliberately signaled for several of the men to step aside and clear a path for Tina. No one said no or ignored Miss Joan. They knew better than that.
“Dr. Daniel, this is Tina Blayne,” Miss Joan said, resting her hands on Tina’s slim shoulders. The next moment, she delicately pushed Tina in closer to the town’s new addition. “I have a feeling the two of you will be seeing a lot of each other,” she pronounced.
Tina looked at the woman sharply.
Miss Joan smiled innocently, as if she had said nothing out of the ordinary. Certainly nothing that Tina should find upsetting.
“I told him about Bobby and how sick he’s been lately,” Miss Joan explained after a sufficient beat had gone by.
Well, Dan decided, he might not want to be here and was here pretty much under duress—even if it was of his own making. But he was a doctor and he liked to think that he was a damn decent one, even if he hadn’t exactly graduated at the top of his class. That outcome had been not because he didn’t know his material, or because he wasn’t skilled at his craft. It was because he’d preferred partying to working on imaginary patients and cadavers. But when it came to the real thing, he was as conscientious as they came.
“Bobby?” he asked. She’d just said the name to him a couple of minutes ago. Referring to who? His brain still felt as if it was throbbing.
“My son,” Tina told him.
“Right.” He had to get his act together. Miss Joan had just told him that, Dan thought. He glanced at the young mother’s left hand. It was devoid of any rings. Divorced? Widowed? In any event, he took the absence of a ring to mean that she was a single mother. Things became interesting again.
“Why don’t you bring him by my office?” Dan told her. “Once I have an office,” he qualified.
“Oh, you have an office,” Miss Joan assured him. “Once you unwind a little I’m sure that the sheriff’ll be glad to take you there. Right, Rick?” she asked, peering around the new doctor’s arm.
“Just say when,” Rick replied good-naturedly.
“He will,” Miss Joan promised in Dan’s stead. She turned her attention back to the guest of honor. “But right now—” she looked around at the faces of the people she had, for the most part, watched grow up over the years, and then loudly declared “—we’re going to welcome ourselves a doctor.”
“About time!” a burly man toward the front of the crowd called out.
Miss Joan laughed and nodded. “I couldn’t agree with you more, Ezra.” She glanced over her shoulder toward two of her waitresses. “Julie, Rosa, see that everyone has a glass—and be sure to fill it. We need to make a toast to Dr. Dan.”
Dan braced himself for whatever was ultimately coming. He didn’t mind being in the spotlight, but he had the feeling that this attention came with a great many strings. He had one hell of a challenge in front of him.
This toast’s for you, Warren, Dan thought. Not me. He knew his brother would have been moved by it. As for him, it just gave him a feeling of anticipation that was far from good.
He sincerely hoped that he was up to the challenge. For Warren’s sake, he was going to have to be.
Chapter Three
“To Doctor Dan!” Miss Joan toasted with enthusiasm, raising her glass of sparkling cider high. “Thanks for setting up your practice here and we all hope that you never come to regret it.”
Dan raised his own glass to his lips. The woman was asking a great deal. More than was possible. If this was only about him, he’d be already regretting it. Already booking a flight back.
But this wasn’t about what he wanted. It was about Warren and what he had wanted. What he selflessly had wanted.
For now, he would make the best of it and muster through.
As the light amber liquid made its way past his lips and down his throat, the taste created a note of confusion in its wake. He’d thought that the waitresses had poured some sort of alcoholic beverage into the glasses that they then distributed to him and the others. One taste negated that impression. Other than a few bubbles and a deceptively yellowish color, what had been poured into his glass fell woefully short of having any sort of a kick.
His drink tasted suspiciously like soda pop.
Dan regarded his glass, unconsciously raising a quizzical eyebrow as he tried to pinpoint just what it was he was drinking.
Seeing his confused expression, Tina leaned into him so he could hear her. “It’s sparkling cider,” she told him, then added, “this is a diner. Miss Joan doesn’t serve any hard liquor here.”
For a moment, he was distracted by Tina’s closeness and the scent of her hair. Something light and floral. And heady.
Dan forced himself to focus on the conversation. Okay, no hard liquor. He could deal with that. But no liquor at all was something else again.
He thought of wine. Entire cultures had wine with their dinner. Dan sincerely hoped that this wasn’t a dry town. “How about ‘soft’ liquor?”
Amusement entered her eyes at the term. “None of that, either.”
“Do they have any liquor at all in this town?”
He wasn’t addicted to drinking, but he wanted to know if it was available should the need arise. There were times, since Warren’s death, that he felt the need to numb himself against the haunting memory of Warren’s last cry of pain and surprise. And, now that he thought of it, a drink at the end of the day after dealing with the good citizens of Sleepy Hollow might not be such a bad idea, either.
“You can find some in Hogan’s General Store,” she told him, giving him the name of the biggest grocery store/pharmacy in Forever. “Mostly, Mr. Hogan sells beer, but if you catch him in a good mood, he’ll take you to where he keeps the top shelf stuff. Whiskey, vodka, whatever your pleasure,” she told him.
Tina was doing her best not to prejudge the new doctor, or sound judgmental. But Don had been a drinker, as well as a closet drug addict. At the time she’d thrown her lot in with his, it hadn’t mattered. She’d been desperate to connect with someone other than the sister who had assumed the role of both mother and father to her. But it mattered now.
Looking back, she realized now that Olivia had worked incredibly challenging hours just to provide for them as well as furthering her law career. But at the time all she could think of was that her sister was never physically there when she wanted her. And Don might have ultimately been a very poor excuse for a human being, but he had been incredibly charismatic when he wanted to be. She had been both lonely and highly impressionable when their paths crossed.
In essence, she supposed she was a victim waiting to happen. But she survived all that, Tina thought, struggling to focus on the positive the way she’d learned to do. Survived, was the stronger for it and had a beautiful son to boot. All the rest of it was in the past and no longer of any consequence.
Since Miss Joan had personally placed a glass of sparkling cider in her hand, Tina raised it now a beat after the others had chanted the toast to the doctor. The pause was part of her effort not to just blindly follow someone else’s lead, even if that someone was Miss Joan. It was all part of the evolution she was determined to go through.
“To your stay in Forever,” she said, altering the toast to something she felt was more appropriate. Dr. Daniel Davenport didn’t have the air of someone who belonged in Forever.
Because of the din, Dan was forced to watch the sexy blonde’s lips to “hear” what she was saying.
Not exactly a hardship, he mused, since her lips were full and, at any other time, would have been decidedly tempting. But he wasn’t himself these days. He still struggled with his grief and the almost oppressively heavy weight of guilt that pressed down on him. Each time he managed to come up for air, to begin to pull himself together, the guilt would suddenly find him, stealing away the very air in his lungs.
Six weeks after Warren’s death he was still caught in an emotional tailspin. A small part of him was the old Dan, the man he’d been before Warren had died because of him. The rest was a pulsating, formless glob of sadness and guilt, viewing everything around him in shades of gray and black.
The first part was mired in denial. The second part was just mired. Both parts, he felt now, would need something stiffer than what was in his glass.
“This is Texas,” he pointed out needlessly to the shapely blonde. “Aren’t there any bars or saloons or whatever the locals call them around here?”
She noticed that he said “the locals,” not “you locals.” Was he deliberately excluding her from being part of Forever, giving her what he must have assumed was a compliment? Or was that just a slip of the tongue that he wasn’t aware of?
“There’s a place on the other side of town,” she told him. “It’s called ‘The Cattlemen.’” The entire building was hardly big enough to be able to sustain the sign that proclaimed its name, but it did qualify for the label of saloon.
“Didn’t think that this town was big enough to have an other side,” the doctor quipped.
That was a definite put-down. Tina took offense for her adopted town. But when she looked at Forever’s newest resident, she didn’t see a smug, superior expression on his face. Instead, his expression appeared unfathomable, as if his heart and mind were elsewhere and his mouth just moved thanks to some automatic pilot setting.
“It is and it does,” she assured him. She gave him a rundown on the establishment’s hours of operation. “The Cattlemen is only open after seven. The man who runs it also owns the barbershop next door and he works there in the daytime.”
“After seven,” Dan repeated incredulously, thinking of the bars and grills located on practically every other corner back in three of New York City’s five boroughs. Most of those establishments opened before noon under the guise of serving lunch. “How long does this Cattlemen stay open?”
Her eyes met his. Was the new doctor a closet drinker? she wondered uneasily.
Her expression gave nothing away as she answered, “Long enough.”
Her response brought an amused smile to his lips. The blonde probably thought he had a drinking problem. Nothing could be further from the truth. He had absolutely no intentions of drowning himself at the bottom of a bottle. For one thing, it wasn’t a solution. Warren still wouldn’t be alive once he sobered up. He was here, in Forever, for Warren’s sake. To make it up to his brother, at least a little—if Warren was up there somewhere, looking down and watching.