had.
Or crying, he thought. Yeah, crying over something he never knew he had. Damn, that was a good line. He needed to write that down.
“When you hit Main Street, take a left,” the lady doctor called.
Gabe looked back at her. She had a cell phone to her ear and was muttering stuff about “the patient” to whoever was on the other end. Someone at the hospital, he presumed. Looking at her, he got that tight feeling in his belly that always made him nervous as hell. He didn’t like being nervous. It wasn’t his natural state. “Got it,” he said. He took the left, then said, “How far to the hospital?”
“Ten minutes if the traffic’s bad. Five if it’s good. And by traffic, I mean kids on bikes, tourists on foot and the occasional misbehaving bovine. It’s actually only 3.1 miles, but that’s as the crow flies. Still, it would have taken longer to wait for one of the volunteer firefighters to get back to town and drive the ambulance out there than to drive him ourselves, so—”
“Do you always answer a four-word question with a forty-word reply?”
She frowned, lifting her head to meet his eyes in the rearview mirror. “It was a five-word question.”
“I stand corrected. Still—” He broke off when he heard motion, and glanced back to see the boy twisting and thrashing.
“Should I pull over? You need a hand?”
“I’ll let you know.” She leaned over the boy, and her hair, which was pulled back in a long, red and curly ponytail, leaned over with her. “Take it easy, Marty,” she said. “You’re okay. You just had a particularly stubborn asthma attack, but you’re just fine. You have to try to relax, though. Relax and breathe slowly.”
Her voice was like silk, Gabe thought. Soft and comforting, while still managing to be firm and strong. A patient wouldn’t be likely to argue with a voice like that.
“Right at the next light,” she said.
“What?” He was totally off track. “Oh. Got it. I see the signs now, anyway.”
“Good. When you see the hospital on the right, go to the second driveway. That takes you right to the E.R.”
“Okay.”
“Easy, Marty. We’re almost there.”
“Doc?” The kid’s voice was slurred. “Doc-O?”
“Yeah, it’s me.”
“Am I real bad, then? I am, ain’t I?”
“Your grammar is in critical condition, but your body is fine.”
“It is? I think I hit my head.”
“I’ll take a look, but your head is the hardest part of you, kid.”
The young man laughed softly, and Gabe found himself smiling behind the wheel even as he turned and drove around to the E.R., stopping right in front of the double doors.
The doors opened, and two men with a gurney between them came straight to the back of the SUV. They didn’t do a double take when they saw the huge limited edition Ford, so Gabe assumed they were used to seeing it.
He didn’t like flashy cars. He didn’t usually like the people who drove them, either. And yet he found himself enjoying both this car and the woman inside it.
She got out, and started to follow the gurney and her patient inside, but at the last minute she glanced over her shoulder at him. “You can park it and wait, or take it back to the soccer match. Thanks for the help.”
“You’re welcome.” She was gone before he could add, “I’m Gabe, by the way.”
Not that she probably gave two hoots what his name was.
However, it occurred to him that if anyone knew about the population of Shadow Falls, teenagers included, it would be the local doctor. And depending on how long she’d been there, she might know even more than that.
Carrie emerged from the treatment room and was met in the doorway by Marty’s parents. “He’s fine. I promise,” she said.
Janine Sheffield sagged in visible relief. Gary, her husband, closed his eyes briefly. “Can we see him?”
“Absolutely. And you can take him home, too. He has a mild concussion, from hitting his head when he went down. Keep an eye on him overnight. Give him another nebulizer treatment tonight, and one in the morning. I don’t expect any problems, though.” She took a step back and held the door open for them.
They headed in, and Carrie let the door fall closed behind them, then spotted the handsome stranger sitting in the waiting room, caught his eyes and lifted her brows. “You waited.”
“I didn’t want to leave you stranded. The kid’s okay, I take it?”
“Yeah, he’ll be fine.”
“I’m really glad to hear that.”
He meant it, she thought. Okay, so he was a hippie, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t like kids. Carrie frowned. And he was a stranger in town and there was a kid missing. Was that anything to worry about? She had to wonder. But no, she was not going to start buying into the kids’ dramatic theories. Kyle had run away, end of story. The searchers wouldn’t find anything in the woods. Kyle would turn up sooner or later, and Carrie would be near the front of the line to give him a good lecture about the needless scare he’d given the entire town, to say nothing of his poor parents. She hoped he would be grounded for a year, frankly.
Meanwhile, the good-looking stranger was still waiting there, and looking better by the minute, in fact. The more she looked at him, the handsomer he got. What was up with that?
“If you’re all set here, come on,” he said, “we should get back to the game.”
“Match.”
“Sorry?”
“In soccer it’s a match, not a game.”
He lifted his brows.
She closed her eyes and shook her head. “Sorry. I’m irritating that way. Come on.” She turned and started for the exit doors. “Where did you park The Beast?”
“I took a chance and put it in a reserved spot,” he said. “I figured with wheels like that, everyone would know they were yours.”
“Not mine.” She held the door open until he joined her outside, then fell into step beside him. “My son’s. It’s his pride and joy.”
“I’ll bet. Not too many kids can afford to drive around in something like that.” He extracted the keys from his pocket, aimed the key ring at the shiny red SUV and hit the unlock button, then held them out to her.
“Oh, he can’t afford it, either, believe me. It was a gift.”
He held out the keys, but she shook her head. “Do you mind driving? I’m not real comfortable
