LITMIR.BIZ

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and heartbroken she might be on the inside.

      “But I guess this is just my life now.”

      “While you’re here, you mean?” Jordan asked, her tone saying she’d picked up on the undercurrent of dismay. “It can get more exciting here. Fieldwork can be pretty dangerous—not that you’ll be doing any of that over the winter. Are you nervous about staying?”

      “For the winter?” Lia popped her head out of the treatment room to make certain no other patients had come in while they stood there chatting. “Not really. I’ve decided it’s adventurous and as my life is no longer going to be neurosurgery exciting, and even if my cabin is freezing compared to the rest of the station, it’s adventure time and I should enjoy the memory-making.”

      “I’m going to come back to that whole life-without-adventure thing, but right now…your cabin was really that cold last night?” Jordan asked. “Inside the station never seems much colder than being at home.”

      She had a point. Lia didn’t feel colder in the clinic, but no, her cabin had been colder. “Maybe I was just really tired. But honestly, I was always a little bit cold when I worked in London, and that was before I spent time in Portugal. Maybe the warm temperate climate had made me go soft.”

      Jordan snorted her disbelief, a testament to how well Lia had played the self-assigned role of all things unsinkable. “You’ll do more than waste away in a little village. Maybe you can work part-time in Porto.”

      All Lia could think to do was nod. “Maybe.”

      But even if the authorities were still unsure if her father would return and take over the vineyard, she wasn’t confused about it. Once he lost interest in something, that was it. Her mother. His second and third wives. Her—not that she could remember him ever having interest in her. Just the opposite. Disappointment that she wasn’t male, and all the assurances that she’d never inherit. A point that had left her further confused when the lawyers had said, with him gone, she was the one indicated in his paperwork to manage Monterrosa Wine.

      But that strange surprise had faded when they’d informed her that as soon as she married it would be her husband who actually inherited the vineyard. At that time, she’d thought that would be West. Now she might never feel comfortable enough to marry, not if she could be as wrong about West as she had been. A man who wanted her to believe he loved her? She’d probably fall for it without a drop of sense.

      “But considering the village is called Monterrosa, I feel my first responsibility is to them, the people who have been loyal to Monterrosa Wine since the time of titles.”

      “Who was assigned Nigel Gates yesterday?” The question came from the lobby area, immediately shifting both of their attention from the spiky conversation.

      “Tony?” Lia mouthed the question to Jordan, not yet able to identify people by voice.

      Jordan nodded, then mouthed back, “West had him.”

      They both eased off the counter where they’d been leaning and drifted out to the lobby in time to see West coming out of the room where the autoclave and irradiators lived.

      “I had him, but he never showed. It’s in the file,” West said, glancing toward the two of them, but focusing again on the medical director. “I was here with a broken arm an hour after end of shift, and he never made an appearance. Called up to the BAT twice before that, no answer.”

      Nigel was being uncooperative. Figured.

      “BAT?” she whispered to Jordan, staying out of the conversation between Tony and West, despite staying to listen in.

      “Big-ass telescope,” Jordan filled in. “There are a lot of goofy acronyms around here.”

      Lia nodded, but as it now all made sense, she had to join in the conversation. She could be an adult about this. She had to learn how to coexist with West at the station for several more days, couldn’t spend the whole time avoiding him.

      “Nigel is in a big hurry to get the telescope calibrated before the night sky appears. I guess it takes a lot of time and effort,” she said, because she had picked up that much from the man’s single-minded but strangely nonconversational conversation. “He’s not going to take time away from that telescope without being forced.”

      “Why do you say that?” West asked, his voice growing quiet and sober enough that she had to look at him.

      “We spent two days traveling with each other, talking and getting to know one another.” Even if it was more like she was just there, listening to him talking to himself about his plans, she’d heard enough. “He’s got a fire in his belly.”

      She immediately heard how it sounded—like she and Nigel had developed more of a connection than they had, and while seeming less pathetic, like someone who was still able to connect to another man appealed, West only had to meet Nigel to know how inaccurate that assumption would be.

      “What’s the goal? A study of some kind?” Tony asked from the doorway of his office where he continued to loiter.

      She could only shake her head. “I couldn’t tell you. He told me. In detail. But it was more like me listening to him thinking out loud than conversation. I mostly understood his drive. He said he’ll never get this kind of unrestricted access to a large telescope again, and his future plans ride on proving some theory. He’s not coming out of there without pressure. And it’ll probably get worse once the night sky arrives.”

      West moved on. “I’ll call up there again, and if he doesn’t answer, I’ll take equipment and go.”

      The way he turned his body away from her made it clear her part of this conversation was over, and she turned to Jordan, and tried to pretend she didn’t see worry in her friend’s eyes.

      West got on the radio, and after a moment, he was speaking into the mic, calling Nigel by name, but no response came but static and silence.

      “He can hear it broadcasting over the whole building?”

      “It’s basically a big dome with a room built on for entry. If he’s with the telescope, he should be able to hear the radio.”

      And why would he answer West today when he hadn’t yesterday?

      She stepped away from Jordan and, although the last thing she should do was get close to West, stopped a couple feet down from where he stood with the radio. “Let me try. He might answer me.”

      A few moments after she made the call and announced who it was, Nigel answered.

      “Lia, busy right now.” He mumbled something else, something about cycling and whatever that was, but it was an opening.

      “It’s really important that I get your baseline and type your blood, just in case there is some kind of emergency this winter and we’re all cut off from evacs. Maybe you can make up the time later.”

      “Time is fixed, it cannot be made up.”

      “Okay, but it can be saved. If I get dinner delivered to you later, you won’t have to come down to the galley and take time away, just keep working.”

      He was silent a moment, and then agreed, “Fine. But be quick.”

      Right. She rang off and then looked back to Jordan. “Want to come with me?”

      Jordan nodded, but West interrupted, stepping over to take the radio from her hand. “He’s my patient. I’m going. You don’t need to go. Just send the dinner later.”

      “If he’s going to be a problem child for the winter,” Tony interjected, “Lia needs to reinforce her relationship with him and learn where to find him when he refuses to come down.”

      West’s answering grunt had all eyes on him, but he stared at Lia for several long seconds before he nodded. “Lia can come with me if she wants to.”

      She definitely didn’t want to, but she also didn’t

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