LITMIR.BIZ

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all her heart that this day had never happened. When she’d gotten out of bed this morning, all she’d had on her mind was to get her yearly physical out of the way, work at the café until closing time, then go home and start a new quilt to sell to one of the gift shops in Gatlinburg.

      She rubbed her temples with her fingertips. How had everything gotten so complicated? So humiliating?

      Sighing heavily, she leaned back in the chair and closed her eyes. As soon as she drove Jeremiah back up the mountain to the cabin he was renting, she’d make some excuse about temporary insanity running in her family. Then she’d go home and hope with all her heart that she would never have to face him again.

      After Dr. Braden had given him a shot in the knuckle to numb his thumb, Jeremiah sat on the examining table and watched the man carefully remove the fishhook from the fleshy part of his thumb. But instead of concentrating on what the doctor was doing, his mind was on the conversation that had taken place in the waiting room.

      “You thought I was here for an entirely different reason than having a fishhook taken out of my thumb.” It wasn’t a question, and if he was any judge of character, Jeremiah knew Dr. Braden wouldn’t try to deny it.

      The man met Jeremiah’s gaze head-on. “Yes.”

      “I don’t guess you’re at liberty to tell me what that reason was?” Jeremiah watched Braden cut the barb off the end of the fishhook, then pull the rest of it out of his thumb.

      “No, I can’t discuss it,” Dr. Braden said, applying a generous amount of ointment to the wound. “Let’s just say I was wrong in my assumption and leave it at that.”

      Jeremiah smiled. “In other words, if I want to know, Katie’s the one who’ll have to tell me.”

      The doctor grinned as he wrapped gauze around Jeremiah’s thumb. “That’s about the size of it.” He taped the bandage in place, then stepped back for Jeremiah to stand up. “I’m assuming since you just got out of the military a tetanus shot won’t be necessary?”

      Jeremiah frowned. He wasn’t at all comfortable being the talk of the town. “Let me guess, Harv told you I was in the marines.”

      Braden nodded. “Don’t be too ticked off at old Harv. Having everyone know all about you is one of the hazards of living in a town the size of Dixie Ridge.” He laughed. “When I moved here from Chicago five years ago, having everyone know who I was or what I was doing was one of the hardest things for me to get used to. But it didn’t take me long to figure out it’s their way of letting you know they care about you and want to make you feel like you’re part of the community.”

      “I’m sure that was an adjustment.”

      Jeremiah refrained from telling the good doctor there were two sides to every scenario. It had been his experience that small-town gossip was far more destructive and alienating than it had ever been accepting.

      As he prepared to leave the treatment room, Dr. Braden pointed to Jeremiah’s thumb. “You don’t want that to become infected. Let it heal for a few days before you go fishing again.”

      “Thanks. I’ll do that.”

      Following the man out into the hall, Jeremiah stopped at the reception desk to pay for the doctor’s services, then walked into the waiting area where he’d left Katie. As soon as he entered the room, he couldn’t help but notice the apprehension in her aquamarine eyes.

      “Is everything all right?” she asked, rising to her feet.

      He nodded and held up his left hand. “The hook is out and I’m ready to go.”

      “Good.” A sudden clap of thunder caused her to jump. “I need to drive you to the cabin and get back down the mountain before the storm hits.”

      As they walked across the parking lot to her SUV, Jeremiah frowned at the sight of dark clouds beginning to appear over the top of the mountains west of Dixie Ridge. It had rained almost every day for the past two months. Sometimes it was just a light shower, but other times storms came up from the other side of the mountain and dumped several inches of water in a very short time. It looked as if today it would be the latter.

      “Does it rain like this all the time, or is this a particularly wet year?” he asked, sliding into the passenger side of the Explorer.

      “It’s been a pretty normal year,” she answered as she started the truck and steered it onto the road leading out of Dixie Ridge. “Here in town we average about fifty inches of rain a year. But up on top of Piney Knob the average is more like sixty inches.”

      “That’s a lot of rain.”

      She nodded. “A meteorologist could explain it better than I could, but it has something to do with the clouds coming over the mountains.”

      “I guess that explains why the creek regularly floods the ford across the road just south of the cabin,” he said, thinking aloud.

      She drove a little faster when fat raindrops began to plop on the hood and windshield of the SUV. “And that’s why I need to get back down the mountain as soon as possible. If I don’t, I’ll have to wait to cross the creek after the water recedes sometime tomorrow.”

      He wasn’t entirely comfortable taking the hairpin turns leading up the side of Piney Knob at the rate of speed Katie was driving on the rain-slick roads, but Jeremiah decided it was safer to keep his mouth shut and not distract her. Only after they were on the other side of the creek did he breathe a little easier. The water was higher than its normal ten inches when she eased the truck across the ford, but it hadn’t risen to the point where it would flood out the engine when she crossed it on her way back down the mountain.

      “Do me a favor,” he said when she pulled to a stop in front of the cabin. “Don’t drive like a bat out of hell when you go back down the mountain.”

      Before she could take him to task over his criticism of her driving, he opened the passenger door, got out and sprinted through the increasingly heavy rain to the porch. By the time he climbed the steps and turned back to watch her leave, the taillights of the SUV were already disappearing around the curve of the driveway.

      Jeremiah shook his head as he pulled his key from the pocket of his jeans to let himself inside. “Women! She’ll probably drive even faster just because I told her to take it easy.”

      He removed his boots and left them on a mat by the door, then padded over to the fireplace on the opposite side of the great room in his sock feet. Even though it was June and fairly warm, the rain had caused the outside temperature to drop considerably and drenched as he was from his run through the rain, a fire would chase away the chill and feel good by the time the sun set.

      As he placed a couple of logs on the grate and put kindling around them, he thought about Katie driving back down the mountain. He didn’t like the idea of her navigating the dangerous road in this kind of weather, and he could kick himself for not telling her to call when she got home to let him know she’d arrived safely.

      His heart stalled. Now, where had that come from?

      Katie was nice enough, but he didn’t really know her. And besides, she wasn’t his to worry about. Nor did he ever intend for her to be.

      He’d spent most of his adult life avoiding her type like the plague. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t be concerned for her well-being, did it? He’d be just as bothered if it was Harv driving back down the mountain in a driving rain.

      Satisfied that he’d discovered the explanation for his uncharacteristic anxiety, he rose to his feet and pulled his wet T-shirt over his head to drop it on the hearth. He’d wait a reasonable period of time, check the phone directory for her number, then call to make sure she’d made it down the mountain without incident. Once he’d done that, he could go about his business with a clear conscience.

      Pleased with himself for coming up with a reasonable solution, he unbuckled his belt and popped the snap on his jeans. But just as he started to lower the zipper,

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