Return to Lone Oak (Harlequin Heartwarming) (9 page)

The question hung in the air like a heavy fog, as he tried to think of an answer.

“I don’t know when I last had honest-to-goodness fun. I haven’t been much in the mood.”

“That’s sad. Is it because of what happened to you?”

He didn’t answer for a while, focusing on the sweetness of the rose’s scent instead. “I lost someone close to me not too long ago. I’d planned to marry her.”

Katie’s eyes widened. “Oh, Noah. I’m really sorry. Even though that doesn’t help a bit, does it?”

He met her gaze. “You’ve been through that, too. The ‘I’m sorry’s’ that make you want to scream.”

Katie gazed off into space, nodding. “I know people mean well when they say it. And really, I do mean it—I’m sorry you’ve had to go through something like that. It sucks. But what can a person say?”

“There’s nothing.”

She nodded. “What happened to her?”

He shook his head, unable to speak.

“How long ago did she die?”

“Almost a year ago.”

Katie plucked strands of grass and ripped them, one at a time, before dropping them back on the ground.

“The only reason I mentioned her death is to let you know you’re not the only one who may be dealing with some pretty painful things. I can tell you still think about your mom a lot.”

“It seems to be emphasized this time at home. Selling the house has forced the issue and I just can’t get her off my mind.” She ripped another piece of grass into tiny shreds. “I’m really tired of being so down, honestly.”

“It doesn’t seem like your usual mood.”

“What about you? Are you always so down?”

He smiled, noticing how the blue in her eyes seemed to darken with the approaching dusk. “I imagine I’m somewhat more serious than you, even before I met Leah.”

“Leah, huh? Was she as uptight as you?”

He tried to smile at the provocative question, but he couldn’t pull it off. “Actually, she was a lot like you in many ways. She loved adventure, was spontaneous, full of life.”

“Sounds like I’d have liked her.”

“You would have.”

“What I can’t imagine is
you
liking her.”

“You can’t always help who you care for, I guess.”

“I guess. I don’t really know much about that. I’m not one to give advice, but you really should find something you like to do for fun. And do it.”

He tried to imagine what he might do, but nothing came to mind. “You’re probably right. I’ll give it some thought.”

“This topic is depressing. Want to go out for a shake?”

“A shake?”

“You know, ice cream, sugar-filled flavoring, some milk? Mixed and served with a straw?”

“Empty calories.”

“Exactly. Come on, you can drive and I’ll treat.”

“Do you really want ice cream?”

“A shake. Yes. Really.” She looked at him as if he was the odd one. “But if you’re too good for the Dairy Delight, it’s no big thing.”

“Why do you say things like that?”

She shrugged, shooting him an innocent look.

Noah stood and held out a hand to help her. “Not only will I drive us there, but I will prove to you I can embrace my inner child by buying the milkshakes for both of us.”

With Noah’s help, Katie pulled herself up. “
That
is a fabulous idea.” He didn’t immediately drop her hand as they walked to his Tahoe.

CHAPTER EIGHT

T
HE
D
AIRY
D
ELIGHT
was chock-full of people. Even though the sun had set, the temperature was still ninety-two degrees, according to the Lone Oak Bank and Trust sign across the street. As they approached the place, Katie figured about half the town had come out for ice cream tonight.

She opened the door, but Noah pulled her back. “I’m treating, remember? You stay out here, out of the chaos. We can get one of the outdoor tables.”

“How could I forget you’re treating? Something tells me it’s not every day you buy a girl a drink.”

“It’s not every day I’m harangued into visiting Dairy Delight.”

Katie could swear his lips curved into the beginnings of a smile, something she’d rarely seen on him.

“What would you like?” Noah asked.

“I thought we were having milkshakes.”

“What flavor?”

“Surprise me.”

He looked at her for a moment, then headed inside with a shrug.

As a group of teenagers left one of the outdoor tables, Katie snagged it and sat down. She sat there people watching, trying not to think about the fact that she was out with Noah. It had seemed natural for them to come out for a drink when she’d asked him. But now it was starting to feel too much like a date.

She wasn’t against dates at all. Normally. Something about Noah made her leery, though. Possibly the fact that she couldn’t use an exciting activity as an excuse for accepting. Half the time, dating was a way to go out and do something fun. Watch a scary movie, take a picnic out on a boat, water ski.

She was with Noah simply because she’d enjoyed talking to him and she was starting to like him.

“One ultra-deluxe surprise milkshake,” he said from behind her.

“That’s huge. And you acted like such a milkshake novice.” Katie used both hands to take the cup from him. “What flavor?”

“You have to guess.”

Katie put in her straw and drank. “Easy. Strawberry.”

“Not just strawberry. There’s banana in there, too. Hope you like it.”

“Love it. Next time, I get to surprise you.”

“Next time, huh?” Noah sat on the bench beside her and stuck a straw in his milkshake.

“I’m hard to resist. What kind did you get?”

“Berry mix, which is blueberry, raspberry...”

“And blackberry.” She laughed.

“You know your milkshake flavors.”

“A girl’s gotta have expertise in something.” She took a drink. “I have to admit, I’m surprised. I’d pegged you for the vanilla type.”

“That should teach you.”

“I’ll consider myself taught. Or something.”

“Every time I see you, I notice a new scar. What’s this from?” He ran his finger lightly over her left shoulder blade. Her thin-strapped tank revealed most of the mark, but parts of it, she knew, were hidden under the pink cotton.

“That,” she said, trying to see it over her shoulder, “was lucky. I wiped out on a surfboard and rammed into some coral with my shoulder.”

“That’s lucky, is it?”

“It beat ramming my head against it and ending up with a concussion or worse.”

He took several sips of his shake, then nodded. “I guess if you look at it that way.”

“That way is much better than worrying about what could’ve happened.”

“So tell me,” Noah said, “when did you start with all the daredevil stunts?” He seemed a little uneasy, as if it was a strain to make idle conversation.

“When I was born.”

He raised his eyebrows doubtfully.

“Really. My mom used to tell stories about me climbing on top of the refrigerator before I was three years old.”

“The poor woman.”

“Yeah. I probably put her through a lot.”

“Don’t we all?”

“You? No way.”

“I was nothing like you, I’m sure.”

“I didn’t start the really fun stuff until after my mom died.”

“What kind of ‘stuff’?” he asked. He looked as if he might not really want to know. “The climbing up on the roof?”

“I guess that was when I first made it up there.” She nodded, impressed he’d picked up on that. “As for sports, I started out easy. Snowboarding, skiing, skateboarding. A couple years later, I started white-water rafting.”

“Lots of rapids around these parts.”

“A sarcastic side,” Katie said, studying him in surprise. “I like.” She rotated her cup on the table. “I went to Colorado with a friend’s family.”

“How old were you?”

“Probably sixteen.”

He frowned. “Anything else you tried before starting at the magazine?”

“Hang-gliding. Bungee jumping. My dad nearly had a stroke when he found out about that one. Storm chasing.”

Noah shook his head slowly, looking puzzled. The kidding mood that had lasted for all of five seconds was gone. “I don’t get it. Why would you want to risk your life on a regular basis?”

Katie stared at him, sipping her shake. Now she put it down. “Don’t tell me volunteering in Africa was a risk-free endeavor.” She sensed he was really bothered by her tendency toward adventure, but she couldn’t figure out why.

“That was different. The purpose wasn’t to risk my life, it was to accomplish something.”

“Who’s to say I’m not accomplishing something when I’m flying off the side of a mountain?”

“And what would that be?”

“Living.”

Katie slid her shake to the side and leaned her elbows on the table, clenching her fists together. “I learned long ago, you never know what might happen tomorrow.”

“Why does living have to involve physical risk?”

“That’s what I like to do. I like to feel the fear. Better yet, I like to overcome that fear.”

He tossed his shake—which he’d barely started—into a nearby trash barrel. “What about the people who care about you? Your family? Do you ever think how much you worry them? What would happen to them if you got yourself killed?”

There was anger in his words and Katie couldn’t for the life of her see why he was mad at her. Hadn’t they just been having a semi-philosophical conversation? This felt personal.

“Should I live my life in a safe little box, maybe in a sleepy small town like Lone Oak, just to keep my family happy?”

“Life here doesn’t have to be dull.”

“You’ve already had your fun. You went out and did what you wanted to in Africa and wherever else your noble cause took you. Now you’re ready to settle down and hide. Some of us are still into living life to the fullest.”

“Like I said, my dangerous work had a purpose.”

“I suppose your family worried less, since you were saving lives and all.”

Noah ran his hand over the stubble on his face. His eyes were dull with fatigue, but that wasn’t Katie’s fault. He was the one who’d started attacking her lifestyle.

“Why do you act as if the way I live will affect
you,
anyway? It has nothing to do with you.”

His jaw tensed and he looked away. “You’re absolutely right. We should get going.”

Katie stood. “We should.” She stalked off to his Tahoe and waited for him to unlock her door.

They rode the short distance back to the Salingers’ house in silence. Katie sat wondering what had just happened. When he pulled into her dad’s driveway, she wasted no time. “Thanks for the shake.”

She got out and shut the door before Noah could say a word.

* * *

S
HE
RATTLED
HIM
, plain and simple. And Noah didn’t know if he was angry primarily at himself or primarily at Katie. Himself, because he’d let her see how bothered he could be if he thought about what she did for a living. Or for fun. Katie, because she lived on the edge in a way that scared him to death, made him worry. For her, for her family, for anyone who cared about her.

Why should he care? He wasn’t part of her life. There might be a slight attraction to her, but that meant nothing. It was just that he understood the grief she lived with and he knew how hard it was. Wanted to help her through it.

But he sure couldn’t afford to get involved with someone like Katie again. Not romantically. Love with an adventurous soul wasn’t for the faint of heart. He’d learned that lesson far too well.

It didn’t matter what he felt in his heart. This time, he was listening to his head, and his head said stay away.

* * *

“S
TAND
BACK
, D
AD
.
Let me do this part,” Noah said. He fought with the crank on the lift to lower the two-year-old boat into the water.

“I’ve let you do everything other than hold the door open. What’s with you? You’re treating me like some delicate woman.”

“You don’t need to do the heavy stuff. Once we get the boat in the water, you can take over.”

His father glared at him and Noah knew he’d offended him. Tough. It was better than having him strain a muscle or overwork his heart—or worse.

“If we’re going to fish together, you better set aside the dictatorship. You forget who taught you to do all this,” Ivan said grumpily.

“I remember perfectly well. That’s why I invited you.
One
of the reasons,” Noah added quickly.

This experiment had two purposes. First, he was at a loss when it came to the subject of things to do for fun, as Katie had suggested. He wouldn’t normally follow advice from such a person, but this made sense. He had nothing in his life, right now, except work, reading up on research, taking care of his parents and preparing to move into his own home. Oh, and jogging. He did enjoy that, to an extent, but he wouldn’t exactly call it fun. So why not try fishing. He’d done it lots when he was growing up.

The second reason for taking his dad on this outing was that getting
him
back into fishing might slow him down a little, get him to relax. Lower his blood pressure, if it needed to come down. Noah actually didn’t know much about the fine points of his dad’s health, because his dad never shared such information. Most likely so that Noah wouldn’t intervene.

If they could enjoy some time together out on the water, it’d be a bonus.

The boat touched the surface of the water and Noah kept on turning the crank until it completely cleared the platform.

“You going to let me get in now?” his dad asked.

Noah stifled a chuckle. “Just be careful. Take it slowly.”

“Yes, Mama,” his dad said this with another glare.

So maybe enjoying some time together out on the water wasn’t going to happen, after all.

The older man climbed in and pulled his keys out of his pocket.

“Think it’ll start?” Noah asked.

“Yes, I do. It’s in perfect condition.”

Noah waited, knowing his dad hadn’t been out in it since the summer he’d bought it. It started right up, though. The noise of the motor echoed off the walls of the small boathouse.

“Meet you at the dock,” Noah hollered. He shut the garage door and headed outside through the regular door.

His dad guided the boat up to the dock and Noah climbed in.

“Let’s see how this thing moves,” his father said.

“I have no doubt it can move.”

They motored along at a good pace and Noah tried to pick out familiar landmarks on the shore. It’d been years since he’d been on the river—since he was in high school, in fact, and now nothing looked the same. Of course, then he’d just had a canoe.

“Why don’t you fish more often?” he asked his father.

“Time, mostly. It gets away from you.”

“I don’t know how you’ve been handling the workload at the clinic, to be honest.”

“Long hours. A patient wife.”

“I’ve been thinking,” Noah began, though he hadn’t planned to have this conversation just yet. “Maybe it’d be wise for us to look at bringing a third doctor on board.”

There was no response to this, and Noah wasn’t sure he’d heard. Then his father looked at him, straight on.

“You’ve got lots of plans, don’t you?”

“What’s that supposed to mean? All I’m getting at is, we could use some help.”

“
You’re
my help. We’re doing fine.”

“We’re doing fine, if an hour wait is acceptable for our patients.”

“That’s the worst-case scenario, and you know it.”

“We could build the practice to be the best in the area, Dad.”

“We’re the only practice in town.”

“You’ve been resting on that for too long. People won’t hesitate to drive ten miles down the road to see a Layton doctor.”

“They will if they know anything about him. He’s a quack. Acupuncture, Chinese herbs... I don’t even know what all he’s passing off as medical care over there.”

Noah tapped his fingers on the edge of the boat, trying to summon extra patience. “You might be surprised how popular alternative health care is becoming. We could stand to open our minds a bit on the subject.”

His dad gave him a horrified grunt. “What are they teaching these days at med school?”

“Same things they were teaching in your day, Dad.” This wasn’t the time to argue medical philosophy. “Back to our practice, though. We’re booked. Every day.”

“And I’m thankful for it.”

The discussion was going nowhere. Plus, it was defeating the whole purpose of being out on the water. They hadn’t brought any fishing gear today. This was just to see how the boat did after two years off—a test run of sorts.

“This isn’t the end of our discussion,” Noah said. “We need to do something so you won’t have to spend ten hours a day at the office.”

“Whatever you’re trying to pull, you can stop anytime. Try to remember, I did just fine all those years you were away.”

“But you’re older now.”

“You’re worse than your mother. Where did you learn to nag?”

Noah shook his head and faced the water, making a mental note that in order to relax, he was probably going to have to fish alone.