LITMIR.BIZ

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me wipe off the chocolate.” She snatched a napkin. “You don’t need to do that. You should stay here and visit with people.”

      She hoped there wasn’t a desperate edge in her voice. The last thing she wanted right now was to be alone with him.

      He ignored her. “Here we go.” He hoisted Kristie, hands now clean, to his shoulder. “Hold on tight.” He started for the archway, bouncing her so that she giggled and clutched his hair.

      Managing a meaningless smile for anyone who might be watching, Rebecca followed.

      They trooped up the wide staircase. At the top, she nodded toward the door next to hers. “This is Kristie’s room.”

      “Duck your head, Kristie.” He stooped under the door frame, earning another giggle, and plopped Kristie on the white single bed with its bright quilt. “Ready for bed.”

      “Wound up, you mean.” Rebecca pulled back the quilt. “In you go, and say your prayers. It’s way past bedtime, and you have school tomorrow, remember?”

      Kristie pouted. “Don’t want to go to bed. Don’t want to go to school.” She bounced. “I want to stay at the party.”

      Rebecca could read the warning signs of a disturbed night. “Kristie…”

      Brett sat down on the edge of the bed. “You’re not going to tell me this girl goes to school, are you? What are you…fifth grade? Sixth?”

      Kristie giggled, not seeming to notice that he was putting her down on the pillow, tucking the quilt around her. “I’m in kindergarten.”

      “Wow!” He managed a suitable look of surprise as he clicked off the bedside lamp, leaving the room bathed in the soft glow of the night-light. “So how do you like kindergarten?”

      “Okay, I guess.” She looked down. “Sometimes Jeffy takes my crayons. And he says I’m a…a carrottop.” She said the word as if it were monstrous.

      Rebecca’s throat tightened. She’d known something was wrong at school, but Kristie had been stubbornly uncommunicative about it. Now she’d blurted it out to Brett on the basis of a five-minute acquaintanceship.

      “Do you know what a carrottop is?” Brett smoothed her red curls.

      She nodded solemnly. “Grandma had some carrots in her garden.”

      Brett lifted a springy strand of red. “I’ll bet she did, but Jeffy was talking about your hair. Because he thinks it’s the color of a carrot.” He glanced up at Rebecca, smiling. “Aunt Rebecca had hair this color when she was your age, and I always thought it was the prettiest hair color in the world. Maybe Jeffy thinks so, too.”

      Rebecca’s heart gave a ridiculous thump. He was talking nonsense to soothe Kristie, of course. She couldn’t let it affect her. Couldn’t let it bring back sharp, evocative images of a much younger Brett. He wasn’t that person anymore. And she wasn’t that little girl.

      “But he teases me.”

      “I’ll tell you a secret.” Brett leaned close to the child and lowered his voice to a whisper. “Boys only tease girls they like.” He looked up at her again, eyes laughing. “Isn’t that right, Aunt Rebecca?”

      She kept smiling by sheer effort of will, heart thumping. “That’s right.”

      She wasn’t the child who’d idolized him any longer. But she’d have to do something about the ridiculous way her heart turned over every time he smiled at her.

      Chapter Two

      Memories assailed Brett as he poured a mug of coffee in the sunny kitchen of his parents’ house the next morning. Memories of himself and Angela, back when she’d been the most important person in his world. He had to smile now at that infatuation. Angela didn’t seem to have grown up at all since then. It was Rebecca whose maturity astounded him.

      Mitch and Alex hadn’t changed, though.

      He smiled, thinking of them, but a shadow tinged his mind. He could keep his problems a secret from most people, but he couldn’t withhold them from Alex and Mitch.

      Still, their support was one thing he knew he could always count on, no matter what. The three of them had faced death together, once upon a time. That had created a bond nothing could break.

      His mind drifted back to the party the night before. Rebecca had been right— Mitch and Anne really were meant for each other. The fact that they’d be starting married life with a ready-made family of her adopted baby and his foster son just seemed to add to their glow.

      Alex was another story. Brett frowned down at his cup. Alex might be able to hide his pain from other people, but not from him. He’d give anything for a look at Alex’s medical charts. He owed Alex—owed him a lot. If there was a way he could make up for the past, he’d like to find it.

      He put down the coffee. Somehow everything—every concern, every conversation, even every thought, led him straight to the clinic. Rebecca was probably wondering why he wasn’t there already, and she wouldn’t hesitate to tell him so. If he’d known pesky little Rebecca would turn into such a beautiful, determined young woman, maybe he’d have stayed in touch.

      Or maybe he’d have avoided her like the plague.

      He didn’t owe Rebecca an explanation, regardless of whether she agreed. But he certainly owed one to Doc, easy or not—and it was time he paid him a visit.

      He drove out to the corner, then turned uphill. In Bedford Creek you were always going either up the mountain or down toward the river. There wasn’t anything between. The town was wedged tightly into the narrow valley, with mountain ridges hemming it in.

      The new tourist brochures his mother had sent him described Bedford Creek and its mountains as the Switzerland of Pennsylvania. People had obviously tried to live up to that billing, decking houses with colorful shutters and window boxes. Now, the boxes overflowed with marigolds and mums.

      Apparently the publicity campaign was working. Strangers slinging cameras dotted the sidewalks, and a line waited to board the old-fashioned steam train for a jaunt through the mountains to see the autumn foliage. In another week or two the woods would be in full color, and the place jammed.

      Doc Overton’s clinic sat at the top of the hill, its faded red brick looking just the same as it always had. Brett’s first glimpse of the familiar white clapboard sign swamped him in a wave of nostalgia. He pulled into the gravel lot and got out of the car slowly.

      What had led to that promise he’d once made Rebecca about becoming a doctor? One of those early visits, when Doc thumped him and patted his head and told him he was fine? Or when Doc had responded to the interest he’d shown in some procedure, taking the time to explain it to him? Whenever it had been, Doc Overton had certainly been part of it.

      It had been too long since he’d been back, too long since he’d let Doc know how much he appreciated his mentoring. That had to be a part of the talk they needed to have. He took the two steps to the porch and opened the door.

      New wallpaper decked a waiting room that was far more crowded than he ever remembered it being. It looked as if he’d have to postpone their conversation. Clearly Doc wouldn’t have time for a talk this morning—not with all these patients waiting.

      He didn’t intend to rush this conversation. Telling Doc the changes he wanted to make to the future they had once planned wouldn’t be easy.

      Maybe the best course was to see Doc and arrange a time when they could be alone, uninterrupted. He exchanged greetings with people he knew as he edged his way to the desk.

      He nodded to the receptionist, wondering if she was someone he should remember. “I’m Dr. Elliot. I’d like a word with Dr. Overton when he has a moment.”

      “Brett.” Rebecca appeared from behind the rows of files, looking startled. “I didn’t expect to see you so soon.”

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