Return to Lone Oak (Harlequin Heartwarming) (2 page)

“Nice to meet you,” he said, holding out his hand.

She shoved her helmet under the cast encasing her left arm and took his hand, her shake much softer than he expected. Then she smiled, her eyes sparkling with a zest for life that rocked him with a bone-chilling familiarity.

Trouble, he thought again, as he watched her leave.

* * *

K
ATIE
MADE
HER
WAY
to the front desk to pay for her visit.

“All better now?” Eve asked.

“I’m fixed.”

Eve told her what her co-payment was and Katie pulled out a debit card.

“So what’s the story with the new doc?” Katie asked.

“Ah, Dr. Noah.” Eve’s voice got quieter. “Not bad to look at, is he?”

“If you don’t mind the frown lines.”

“I know. He doesn’t smile a lot. Tortured soul or something. Which is totally hot. I could almost have a crush.”

“Why don’t you go for it?”

“Besides the fact that he signs my paychecks?” Eve shook her head. “I’m not into that ‘I’ve got secrets’ thing. He’d make me nuts.”

“He has secrets?”

Eve looked over her shoulder to make sure no one was within earshot. “He used to volunteer for one of those healthcare missions or something—he was in Africa for a while. Something happened there that he
does not
talk about.”

“How do you know?”

“Any time someone mentions his volunteer work, he immediately shuts them down. Stupid me, I asked him once if something awful had happened there to make him so serious. I was half joking.”

“Did he answer?”

“Not with words. But the look on his face told me plenty. And he’s been even stiffer with me ever since, as if he thinks he’s revealed too much.”

“So you think something happened in Africa.” Katie wasn’t sure why this interested her, but she couldn’t help wanting to know more. Chalk it up to the journalist in her.

“You guys talking about Dr. Noah?”

Eve rocked back in surprise at the middle-aged woman who’d sidled up next to her.

“Mandy, I swear I’m gonna put a bell around your neck.”

Mandy responded with a low smoker’s chuckle. “You know the second you start talking all hushed, I’m gonna wander over here to see what kind of juicy stuff you’re discussin’.” She rested an ample hip on the desk. “So was I right?”

“Who else from Lone Oak has been to Africa?”

“He took a bullet, is what I heard.”

“Who’d you hear that from?”

“His dad.”

“What else did he say?” Eve asked as she ran Katie’s debit card through the machine.

“Very little. I could tell he’s worried as all get-out, though.”

Intriguing. Seemed as if no one knew much about the mysterious doctor’s past.

“Sign this,” Eve said, pointing to a form in front of Katie. “That’s one story I’d love to hear.”

“Yeah, well, lots of luck,” Mandy said as another patient walked up behind Katie to settle her bill. “Time for this girl to call it a day.” She headed back to the opposite side of the office and retrieved her purse from a cluttered desk.

Katie made the appointment to have her stitches removed, wondering if she might be able to drag out any additional information regarding Noah Fletcher’s past on that return visit.

* * *

N
OSTALGIA
SETTLED
OVER
K
ATIE
as she turned the corner onto the street where she’d grown up. The walk from the doctor’s office—which she made barefoot, carrying her skates, just for the sake of the controlling Dr. Fletcher—was nearly the same route she’d taken day after day on the way home from grade school.

She’d turn that corner each day and squint all the way down to her family’s home, to see if her mom, who’d arranged her life so that she’d work only while her girls were in school, was sitting on the front steps waiting. More often than not, if the weather was decent, she was there. Sometimes with a book, sometimes without. Always with a welcoming smile for Katie and her two sisters.

The memory gave Katie some measure of comfort, just as being in their family home often did. No matter how much she raced around the country engaging in the stunts and extreme sports that she loved, coming back home always centered her. Reminded her of the good times, when everything had been simple, happy. That comfort was what had brought her to Lone Oak now, when she was forced to take time off to heal.

When she was still four houses away from the Salinger abode, however, her steps froze. A For Sale by Owner sign was posted front and center in the yard.

No. This wasn’t for real. They absolutely couldn’t sell that house.

She’d known her dad and Mrs. Hale—she couldn’t get used to calling her Claudia—had tossed the idea around now that they were married, but they’d apparently forgotten to fill Katie in on their decision. Or they’d avoided doing so because they knew she’d hate it.

She glanced at the quaint front porch again, wishing for the comfort of her mother’s image, thinking of the love in her face. But the image escaped her. She couldn’t summon it for anything. She gasped for air, squeezing her eyes shut.

The unfamiliar anxiety paralyzed her for a few seconds, until she opened her eyes again and focused on the anger that was burning inside.

Katie headed straight for the offending sign and heaved it out of the ground. Banging the dirt off the poles onto the concrete sidewalk, not caring if she damaged the sign in the process, she dragged it with her to the back door and barged into the house.

“Dad!”

Claudia, her dad’s wife and formerly the family’s housekeeper, hurried in from the living room. “What is it, honey?”

“This.” She pointed to the sign. “No one told me you were putting the house on the market today.”

“We’ve been talking about it for a long time.”

“Seems like you’re not talking any more.”

Wendell Salinger came into the kitchen then, carrying his reading glasses. “What’s going on, Katie? Why’d you pull the sign up?”

“Don’t you think you should tell me about these things first? Talk to me?” She stood the sign against the wall. “Do you have any idea how it felt to walk up to my home and see a For Sale sign in the yard?”

He furrowed his brow in obvious dismay and sat at the kitchen table, nodding to his wife that he wanted some coffee. They apparently had their own private language down, because she understood at once and poured him a cup.

“Where’s this coming from? We’ve made no secret of the fact that we didn’t plan to stay here.”

“I didn’t know it would be today. Nice welcome-home present, there.”

“I apologize for not warning you, Katie. I planned to tell you last night, but you went over to Lindsey’s so soon after you got back that I didn’t have the chance.”

She’d just gone over to her sister’s to say hi, but then she’d gotten involved in a conversation with Lindsey and Zach about his grandma and the toll her Alzheimer’s was taking. Not just on Grandma Rundle, but on the whole family. When Katie had finally looked at her watch, it was after ten and her dad and his wife had gone to bed.

She’d been relieved, actually. Not because she’d expected any kind of announcement about the house, but because she still wasn’t used to her father being married to another woman. She would
never
be used to that.

“Katydid, Claudia and I are moving. We’ve found a much smaller house that we both like and we’ve put an offer on it. As soon as this one sells, the new one will be ours.”

“I don’t understand how you can sell this place.” She sat down on the chair across from him, arms crossed, hating the emotion that made her voice crack. “We’ve lived here practically since I was born.” She looked around at the walls, the floral wallpaper, thinking it was all so familiar that she’d never really noticed the details of it.

She didn’t dare say this was her mom’s house, because as uncomfortable as she was with her dad’s marriage to Claudia, she wasn’t out to hurt her. Until he’d gone and fallen in love with her a year ago, Katie had cared about Claudia just as much as everyone else did. It was harder to be welcoming now, but she made an effort not to be mean and not to let her know how much it upset her.

“This has been a good house for our family, but now our family has changed. And it’s time for other things to change, as well. What could Claudia and I possibly need four bedrooms for?”

“It’s nice to have my room back when I come home.” Sometimes she felt as if her room here was more “home” than the bedroom in her apartment in St. Louis.

“We have a spare bedroom just for you at the new house. You can even help us decide how to decorate it.”

She couldn’t bear to think about being a third wheel in their new house. She couldn’t care less what color they painted the walls. She’d be more comfortable staying in a hotel in Topeka.

“Why are you so against this, Katie?” her father asked. “You don’t come home more than a handful of nights a year.”

Katie leveled a look at Claudia, hesitating to get into this with her present. “Can we talk alone, Dad?”

“Honey, Claudia’s my wife now. She’s part of the family.”

“It’s okay,” Claudia said. “I need to finish tidying up the bedrooms, anyway. Just in case we get a call to show the house.” She glanced at the sign by the back door, as if to say that wouldn’t happen without the sign being returned to the yard. Which, of course, was Katie’s hope, regardless of whether it was rational or not.

Claudia left the room and went upstairs.

“This is Mom’s house, Dad. How can you just sell it off?”

“It’s been fourteen years since she died. How can you ask me not to? Do you really think that’s fair to Claudia?”

Katie shrugged, knowing full well she was acting like a sullen child but unable to stop herself. There was too much at stake here to just walk away without making her feelings known.

“Do you really think selling it’s fair to the rest of us?”

Her dad leaned an elbow on the table, pinching the bridge of his nose with his fingers. “I’m afraid I still don’t understand, Katie. Why are you so upset about this?”

She jumped up and began to pace. Part of her knew what she was asking for was unreasonable, but there was the other part, screaming out for her to do something about it. Begging her to do everything in her power to keep the house in the family. If she had the extra money, she’d buy the thing herself, just to have it whenever she came back to Lone Oak.

“I’m just...attached to it. Okay?”

“I can see that. I never realized you felt this way. You trucked on outta town the day after you graduated high school and barely stayed at home
before
that. I never would’ve guessed you had any affection for anything here.”

It was clear in that instant that he included himself in the list of things she apparently hadn’t cared about. She was sorry for that. That hadn’t ever been the message she’d intended to send. In fact, she hadn’t been trying to send any message at all. She’d just been coping, as best she could, with an event that had rocked their family in so many ways that they were still uncovering the effects.

Her mother had been the heart of the family, and when she’d been killed by a drunk driver each of them had flailed in his own private way. Katie’s method of dealing with her pain had been to get out and live her life. It was still her method today. Whenever she caught herself feeling down about her mom—or anything else, for that matter—she sought out an adventure to prove just how much she was
living
.

“Talk to me, Katydid. Make me understand.”

Talking about it made her squirm, but so far
not
talking about it had gotten her nowhere. She was going to have to try to explain something she didn’t fully understand herself.

She turned around, using the counter for support, unsure of what to say. “This house is where all my happiest memories are,” she said at last. “Growing up with a mom and a dad and Lindsey and Savannah. We were a normal family that did normal things, happy things. Not the poor Salinger family who’d suffered an awful tragedy. Life was so good back then.”

“It was.” His smile was bittersweet.

“No matter how crazy my life gets now, no matter where I fly off to, I know I can always come back here to get that feeling of...
home
. Contentment. Happy family. Good memories. This is the only place in the world where I feel that way, Dad.” She hugged herself. “And now you’re going to sell it to the highest bidder.”

He didn’t say anything.

“I can still remember Mom here in the kitchen, rolling out cookie dough for us girls after school. She wore that awful apron.”

Her dad chuckled softly. “The one with the rubber chickens all over it. Savannah gave that to her for her birthday one year.”

“Savannah always did have horrible taste.” Katie looked up, meeting his gaze across the room. “I’m afraid we’ll lose all of that if you sell this place.”

He stood and came over to her. Nudged her chin up with his knuckle, forcing her to make eye contact. “We won’t lose any of that, Katie. We all have it inside.”

She shook her head, tears filling her eyes. “It won’t be the same.” She took several steps away from him. “Look at the wallpaper. Mom spent hours hanging it. Lindsey and Savannah helped her and I had to sit at the table in the middle of the room, coloring pictures so that I wouldn’t make a mess of the glue.” She sniffled sadly. “Someone else will come in here and just tear the paper off without a thought.”

“With good reason,” he said, amused. “I’m betting it’s been out of style for ten years, at least.”

Katie glared at his attempted levity. How could he be lighthearted when she was so upset?

He turned serious. “I have to do this. That part of my life is over, and my new wife shouldn’t have to live surrounded by the memories of my first wife.” He reached out and took her shoulders firmly in his hands, forcing her to look at him again. “I’m sorry, Katie, but I’m selling the house. The sign’s going back in the front yard. If you don’t put it out there again, I will.”

He waited, eyeing her resolutely. Feeling defeated and knowing she couldn’t win this battle, Katie went over to the sign and picked it up. As she focused on the handwritten phone number that had signified “home” for so long, her throat nearly closed on her. She hurried outside as the tears spilled down her cheeks.