LITMIR.BIZ

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Dr. Daley,” she said, glad her voice came out strong and firm. So much for being the only doctor in the valley.

      “Dr. DeVane.”

      “I’m sorry about your brother.” She squared her shoulders as if he might fight her on her right to feel anything for Henry. He had in the past.

      “Thank you,” was all he said, but his expression slid to one with a chilling lack of emotion as he tucked the paper he had been reading into his shirt pocket.

      “Are you here about the people from Mountain High?” She gestured down the hallway toward the treatment rooms.

      “I am.”

      “Did Mr. Hancock restart the program?”

      “No.” The clipped response demanded no further questions.

      But she ignored it. “Then who—”

      “I would have thought you’d know I was on the ranch,” he said before she had a chance to finish what she was about to ask.

      The sharp tone of his words almost made her laugh. He had disliked her for so long it didn’t bother her much anymore. And now that Henry was gone, she realized, it didn’t have to bother her at all. “I’m the last stop on the gossip network.”

      A loud wail filled the hallway.

      “Does this clinic have the facilities to see these patients or should I take them to a bigger town?”

      She thought of her first week of emergency medicine rotation when the great Dr. Daley had yanked his younger brother from her care and taken him to another hospital.

      “I’ll see them and if you don’t like what I have to say, Kalispell is about two hours away—each way—from the ranch.”

      She lifted her chin, but he said nothing.

      Into the silence, the patient wailed again, this time holding the quavering tone like a coyote announcing territory.

      “I have patients to see.” She headed toward the keening.

      “There’s nothing wrong with her ankle.” His voice was a low rumble behind her.

      “I get to decide that,” she said without turning.

      As she walked toward the room, she found herself wondering why the highest and mightiest emergency medicine physician in the Midwest was tucked away on a ranch in Montana.

      “Hello. I’m Dr. DeVane,” Maude said as she pushed back the curtain in the room where the woman sat with one foot elevated on a pillow.

      Ms. Stone greeted her and then shifted to fidget with the bright white sheet the way one might expect a nervous queen on her throne to tend the folds of her velvet gown.

      “Tell me what happened, Ms. Stone.”

      “What happened is that seminar leader made me break my ankle.” She put her head back and her arm over her face.

      Seminar leader? She called Dr. Guy Daley a seminar leader?

      “Let me take a look at your ankle, and then you can tell me how you were injured.”

      Maude lifted the sheet and the ice pack to see a pale, puffy ankle.

      “It all started…”

      It all started was usually not a good place to begin.

      “…when my father—”

      “Why don’t we start with when you injured your ankle?”

      After listening and examining, Maude had to agree. Guy Daley’s assessment was probably correct. There was no injury, but in case there was some unseen problem, she gave the patient the benefit of the doubt. “We’ll get some X-rays.”

      “Thank you so much, Doctor.”

      The long, low moan the woman gave out this time had Maude biting her lip and hurrying out the door, grateful she had somewhere else to be. Abby should have a set of vitals and a brief history from Jake by now.

      “Really? X-rays?” Guy Daley put out his hands to fend her off as she nearly plowed into him.

      She sidestepped and exhaled a huff of air to short circuit the emotions her brain was trying to make from the smell of clean cotton and male pheromones. “This clinic may be in the back woods, but we treat the patient’s privacy as a serious matter.”

      “Don’t let that seminar leader tell you what to do, Doctor,” Ms. Stone called from the treatment room.

      Guy pulled her away from the doorway.

      She frowned down at where he held her arm and then up into his face. His dark gaze challenged her and then he let go. “I suspect Ms. Stone is looking for sympathy.”

      “If she’s not injured, why did you bring her here?”

      “She wanted to see a doctor. Jake and Bessie are the only people out here that know I’m a physician—and you.”

      The level gaze he aimed at her told Maude he wasn’t about to expound. This time she didn’t challenge him.

      “You can have a seat—” she started.

      “—in the waiting room? No, thank you. I’ll be back after I see to a few things.” He immediately walked toward the exit. The arrogance that should have been in his step was missing.

      She wondered if he had secrets as desperate as her own.

      “Dr. DeVane?”

      Maude turned as the nurse approached her. “Yes, Abby.”

      “You might want to come right away.”

      CHAPTER TWO

      GUY SLIPPED OUT into the warming wind of the early afternoon. He had seen the questions in Maude DeVane’s eyes, and he had no intention of sharing his grief with someone whose loss could be measured in dollars. He kicked a pebble with the toe of his boot and stepped off the curb to cross the wide street.

      He remembered the feel of her responsive lips beneath his. Five years ago, for one brief moment he had wanted to be wrong about her. He rubbed the back of his hand across his mouth. He wouldn’t be surprised if Maude DeVane still held out hope that Henry had somehow left the ranch that had been her parents’ to her.

      As he reached the far side of the street, he stopped in front of the diner and slid the letter that had arrived in this morning’s mail from his pocket.

      To Whom It May Concern: the letter began. Kelly was right about his parents. This letter was from their attorney, most likely at his mother’s behest. Any and all persons now occupying the Whispering Winds Ranch shall vacate…

      Nice bluff, Mother. His parents had no control over Lexie’s inheritance, but that didn’t stop them from trying. As the firstborn son, Guy had been the only focus of their attention. Everything he did mattered. Everything Henry did was irrelevant. Guy had tried to shield Henry as much as he could, but Henry was only eight when Guy went off to college. After Guy left, Henry accelerated his campaign to get their parents to notice him. By the time Henry got out of high school, he had already begun a series of extreme adventure trips that would ultimately take his life.

      Now Lexie’s grandparents wanted control of the ranch. If Guy thought for a moment they had forgiven Henry for fathering a child at age fifteen with a casual acquaintance, he might think they were trying to protect Lexie. He knew his parents well enough. If there was wealth they could control, they thought it some sort of negligence not to try.

      Guy tossed the letter into a nearby trash can, and headed down the block. “Stop at the hardware store,” was Bessie’s plea to anyone from the ranch who went to town. There was always something at the cluttered, dusty old store the ranch needed.

      “Hello, Mr. Daley.” The storeowner smiled at Guy and furrowed his well-trimmed

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