Kate Bridges - The Surgeon

Judging by the murmuring and shuffling of feet, the crowd had lost their interest in John and Sarah. She stiffened her posture with pride.

When she turned around, a step higher and almost eye level to his handsome dark face and searching gaze, he added, “You still have to eat. There’s a great steakhouse around the block.”

The corner of his mouth twisted with a little smile. What would it be like to kiss that generous mouth?

“I don’t think I’d be good company.” She raced up one step and he followed by one.

“Better company than those two women.”

His gentle attempt to make her smile worked. Why should she run for cover? Who were they to treat her like that?

A teasing gleam twinkled in his brown eyes. Maybe she should keep her distance from John. He’d already rejected her once.

“Steak sounds good.”

“If I can calm down long enough,” John said an hour later over dinner, “I’ll go to Mrs. Lott and Mrs. Thomas, and explain what happened. That you were caught in the middle of an idiotic game between my men, and brought here under false pretenses.”

Sarah watched the golden candlelight flicker over the bridge of his nose and cheekbones, over the short wave of brown hair. The shadow of a beard and mustache added to his brawny appearance. Yet a white silk shirt draped from his wide shoulders, in soft contrast to his rough masculinity.

“I think that they think that once I met you…I no longer wanted—” he swallowed “—to marry you.”

Sarah cut into her rib eye steak. “I’d prefer to explain it to them myself, thank you, when the time is right.” She arched her shoulders against her high-backed chair, loosening the tension in her muscles. “But I’m no longer sure it’s worth it.”

John glanced over her ruffled blouse all the way down to her cinched waistline. She was covered from wrist to throat by fabric, but somehow John’s heated glance made her feel as though her clothing was totally improper. How did he have that ability to make her so aware of her own sensuality?

“The rumors are spreading. Unfortunately, it’s worth your reputation.”

Her heart pounded in an offbeat rhythm. She knew he was right, but she wouldn’t allow panic to set in.

He slid his empty plate away. “And as far as being caught this morning—together like we were—let me try to explain that to them, at least.”

“Could you try to explain it to me first?”

She captured his attention with the remark. He laughed softly. “I see your point. Maybe it’s best if we don’t try to explain it at all.”

He swirled his glass of white wine with one large hand, gazing into its depth. His fingers, long and lean, were tinted from the sun and exceptionally clean and trim. His hands were beautiful; a captivating paradox to the rest of his rough-and-rugged presence.

Then he sipped his wine, calling her attention to his well-defined lips. She wished she would stop noticing everything about him.

“What brought you here, Sarah? I mean, besides my so-called letters. Why did you come?”

Her body felt heavy and warm. This was her opening to speak of Keenan, but how could she reveal her brother? She didn’t know who to trust in this town, and the more she kept her mouth closed, the better off she’d be.

“I think I’ve been waiting for this opportunity for years, but wasn’t aware of it.”

John gave her a quizzical look. She noticed a few other women in the room dining with their spouses, glancing in his direction. John seemed unaware of the envious gazes afforded to Sarah.

She finished with her plate and gently sipped her wine, welcoming the fruity taste on her tongue. “My mother passed away after a long bout with tuberculosis.”

“Mmm,” he said sympathetically, nodding his head. “That can be an awful decline. Did you have help?”

“There was no else at home—my father had passed away several years ago himself and…”

…and Keenan no longer lived with us.

John asked more questions about her life in Halifax, and the more answers she gave, the more he wanted to know.

She felt awkward at exposing herself, but flattered by his interest.

While they ate sweet plum dumplings, she asked, “Why did you become a doctor?”

A melancholy flitted across his brow. “Because of my family.”

“They urged you?”

“No.” His voice quaked. “Because of what happened to my family. My two younger brothers and one sister were very young…. They contracted typhoid and unfortunately didn’t pull through.”

Sarah winced, letting him go on, lulled by the serenity of his voice and this quiet, shared moment.

“There was nothing any of us could do to help. A few years later, I enrolled in medical school…”

“…because you never wanted to feel that helpless again.”

He nodded in surprise that she’d finished his sentence. The candlelight flickered, her throat ached with sympathy, and he quickly went on to another topic.

Later, after they finished eating and were strolling back to the boardinghouse, she still felt a connection, as if he’d opened up and told her things perhaps he’d never said before. What an awful thing to lose his sister and brothers the way he had. Sarah couldn’t help but admire the man John had become because of it. A doctor. Who else did she know who could reach beyond their own grief to see so clearly to the other side?

A purple half moon followed them, casting misty shadows on the uneven road. The scent of prairie flowers mingled with the scent of falling dew, and the lowing of cattle miles away nestled them in an intimate hush.

They were content to walk speechless in the tranquility. When they passed a streetlamp beside a deserted alley, Sarah stopped beneath it to say good-night.

She tilted her face upward and shivered in surprise when John cupped his fingers beneath her chin.

Riveted by the feel of his skin on hers, she parted her lips.

He fingered the cameo brooch at her collar. “This is pretty,” he whispered, then bent his head and kissed her.

It was an arousal, like a floating cloud of wispy lips brushing hers. She closed her eyes and let him draw her close against his muscled chest. Inhaling the scent of his clean skin and faint cologne, not able to breathe enough of him, she responded with an awakening.

The kiss was extraordinary. Supple and rich. She felt him growing urgent as he wrapped his heavy arms around her waist and shoulder. She responded with a torturous, teasing pleasure. Their tongues met timidly, like an exploration, then grew heated in desire…in the certainty of what could happen between them.

If they let it.

Awed by the feeling of being in his arms, of knowing who he was and where he came from and how he’d rescued her this evening, she lost herself in the universe of his body.

Why had it all been a hoax?

Why had she been denied the good fortune of becoming John’s wife?

It seemed like they had only started when John ripped away from her aching body. Although his gaze was hungry and his lips swollen from their kiss, he drew away farther. His mouth quivered with unreleased passion.

His words were a murmured plea. “Good night, mail-order Sarah.”

For three days, sandwiched between his busy calls, John tried not to think of Sarah, the intimate evening they’d shared, or the tempting kiss. Why was it when it came to his work, he could make a judgment call in seconds, but when it came to Sarah, he wasn’t sure where he stood or what he wanted?

He was much safer dealing with his men.

On Monday he was busy changing burn dressings on the two constables who’d suffered in the forest fires. Fortunately the fire was under control and their burns healing.