The Texan Way
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Diana Palmer
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34
CHAPTER ONE
âHOW ARE YOU TODAY?â Drew Morris asked his first patient of the day, smiling in his usual remote, but kind way. âMr....â He glanced at the file, glanced at the patient, bit back a curse and smiled in a different way. âExcuse me just a minute, will you?â
Before the patient could say a word, Drew was out the door and marching down the hall to his receptionistâs desk. He threw the file down in front of her with curt irritation.
âI said Bill Hayes, not William Haynie,â he said shortly.
Kitty Carson grimaced, and the green eyes behind her large wire-rimmed lenses winced. âSorry, Dr. Morris,â she stammered, jumping up to thumb through the files until she found the right one and handed it to him. âIf Mrs. Turner was here, I wouldnât get so rattled,â she defended, mentioning the office nurse who was off sick today.
âBad way to start off the day, Ms. Carson,â he muttered and went straight back to his patient.
Kitty sat down, hard, letting out the breath sheâd been holding. The former receptionist, Mrs. Alice Martin, had retired two weeks previously, and Kitty had been hired through a local professional agency in Jacobsville, Texas, to replace her. She hadnât met Drew Morris when she applied for the job, which was a good thing. If sheâd met him first, she wouldnât be working here.
On the other hand, it was nice to be treated like a normal employee. She was asthmatic, and in at least one job, her well-meaning boss had been so wary of triggering an attack that he actually had another girl in the office ask her for pressing work. He was sweet, but her asthma wasnât brought on by emotional upheavals; it was triggered by pollens and dust and smoke. Probably since Dr. Morris did some pediatric work, he knew more about asthma than any routine employer. An increasing number of children seemed to have the chronic illness.
She pushed back a wisp of dark hair that had escaped the huge bun at her nape and stared blankly at the file heâd given her. She got up again to replace it, but by then the phone was ringing againâboth lines.
It wasnât that she couldnât handle the pressure of a busy doctorâs office, but she did wish heâd take a partner. He had no life at all. He worked from dawn until dusk daily through Saturday, and on Sunday he had an afternoon clinic for children. He did minor surgery through the week as wellâtonsils and adenoidsâand he was always willing to stand in for other doctors in the local hospitalâs emergency room on weekends. No wonder Mrs. Turner had come down with the flu, she mused. It was probably exhaustion. It didnât surprise her that Dr. Morris wasnât married, either. When would he have the time?
Heâd been married, though. Everyone talked about his eternal devotion to Eve, his wife of twelve years until her untimely death of cancer. No woman in Jacobsville ever set her cap at Drew because of the competition. His marriage had been one of those rare, blissful matches. It was said that Drew would much rather have his memory of it than any new relationship.
Not that Kitty was interested in him that way. She had her eyes on a local cowboy named Guy Fenton, who was something of a rounder but a nice man when he wasnât drinking. Heâd broken a bone in his hand the day after Kitty started working for Drew. Heâd known Kitty for years, but only then had he noticed that sheâd grown up. He seemed to like her, too, because he teased and picked at her. He had a habit of stopping by the office at lunchtime to talk to her, and heâd just asked her to go to the movies with him on Saturday night. She was so flustered that she was all thumbs. Dr. Morris, she reflected, had no patience with the course of true love.
By lunchtime, sheâd dealt, calmly and efficiently, with two emergencies that required Drewâs presence at the local emergency room, and a waiting room full of angry, impatient people. Her soft voice and reassuring smile defused what could have been a mutiny. She was used to calming bad tempers. Her late father had been a retired colonel from the Green Berets, a veteran of Vietnam with a habit of running right over people. Kitty, an only child, had learned quickly how to get along with him. He was difficult, but he was like Drew Morris in one respect; he never overemphasized her asthma attacks. His very calmness helped avert many of them. But if they led her to the emergency room, he was always the soul of compassion.
Her mother was long dead, so there had been just the two of them, until six months ago. She still missed the old man terribly. The job sheâd left to come here had held just too many memories of him. Her father had known Drew, but only socially, so there were no close associations with him in this office.
âDonât daydream on my time,â a harsh voice called from the doorway.
She jumped, glancing toward Drew, whose dark eyes were filled with dislike. âIâm...on my lunch hour, Dr. Morris,â she faltered.
âThen why the hell are you spending it staring into space? Go eat.â
As she got up, she caught her sleeve on the knob of the middle desk drawer and was jerked back down onto the chair.
âOh, for Godâs sake...!â Drew moved forward and caught her just as the swivel, rolling desk chair crashed to the floor. He stood her upright with an angry sigh and noticed at the same time that the buttons on her bulky gray cardigan were done up wrong.
âYou are an albatross,â he muttered as he undid buttons, to her shocked surprise, and efficiently did them up again, the right way. âThere. Iâm amazed that the agency would risk sending me a receptionist-stenographer who canât even button a sweater properly.â
âI usually can,â she said nervously. âItâs just that Guy asked me out. Iâm a little unsettled, thatâs all. Iâm sorry.â
His dark eyes cut into hers. They were alarming at close range, big under a jutting brow. The pupils were black-rimmed. âGuy?â he asked curtly.
âGuy Fenton,â she said with a demure smile.
His eyes narrowed. âBroken metacarpal, left hand,â he recalled with a frown. âWorks for the Ballenger brothers out at their feedlot. And drinks to excess on weekends,â he added firmly.
âI know that. He wonât drink when heâs with me, though. Weâre just going to a movie,â she said, and began to feel as if her father had come back.
His eyebrows lifted. âDonât you date much?â
She flushed. It was too much work to explain that she didnât, and why. Her father, God rest his soul, had terrified most of the shy young men sheâd brought home. Eventually she stopped bringing them home. The thought flashed unwanted through her mind that her father would have made mincemeat of Guy Fenton. She wondered how he would have stood up to Dr. Morris, who was quite obviously the offspring of adders and scorpions.
The thought almost brought a laugh from her pretty mouth. She barely bit it back in time and transformed it into a cough.
âWatch yourself,â Drew said. âFentonâs trouble, any way you look at it. His ex-girlfriend would eat you for breakfast.â
âEx-girlfriend?â
He glanced impatiently at his watch. âI have rounds to make. I donât have time... All right, his girlfriend dropped him because of the drinking, but she still feels that heâs her personal property and she doesnât like him seeing other women.â
âOh.â
âIâll be back at two,â he said, shedding his white lab coat as he headed to his office. âHow many more appointments do I have?â he asked without looking back.
She picked up her pad and followed him, almost running to keep up with his long-legged stride. She read them off. She managed to run right into him as he barreled back out into the hall, dignified in a gray vested suit and red striped tie. He made another impatient sound and ran a hand through his thick dark hair, making it just a bit unruly.
âDo you have to walk into me every time you come down the hall?â he muttered.
âSorry. New glasses.â She grinned gamely and pushed them back on her nose again.
He kept walking. âIf I run a little late, make the usual excuses.â He turned with the doorknob in his hand. âAnd try to keep the files straight, will you? Iâm all for true love, but I have a practice to run.â
He went out while she was still searching for a reply.
HE GOT INTO his new black Mercedes and slammed the door impatiently. The girl was going to have to go, that was all there was to it. She was a positive disaster when she wasnât trying to get involved with a man. Fentonâs presence was going to make her into an accident waiting to happen.
He started the car and pulled out into traffic. Really, it was too bad that she had no one. She needed looking after. She was all thumbs when he spoke harshly to her, and she drank far too much coffee. She couldnât seem to button blouses or dresses or jackets with any degree of competency. Once sheâd come to work wearing two different shades of ankle-high hose, looking like a refugee from two-tone body tanning.
A faint smile touched his firm mouth. All the same, the patients seemed to like her, especially children. She was good with asthmatics, too, possibly because she was one herself.
One day when his nurse had been out sickâfunny just how often Mrs. Turner was sick lately, he musedâheâd come to get a small patient from the waiting room and found her sitting on Kittyâs lap while she typed up forms. The child had a sprained wrist and had been wailing, accompanied by a grandmother who didnât seem to care much whether she was seen or not. Kitty cared all too much.
The memory touched him in a way he didnât like. His late wife, Eve, had been sensitive like that. Sheâd loved kids, too, but theyâd lost the only one Eve had been able to conceive due to a miscarriage. Despite their lack of offspring, it had been an idyllic marriage. He missed Eve. He still spent holidays with his in-laws. It was like being near her. He didnât date and he didnât want involvement, despite the unending efforts of local people to set him up with eligible young women. His twelve years with Eve were precious enough to last him the rest of his life.
Kitty, with her foibles, wasnât enough to threaten his peace of mind, but if she kept mixing up patients, she was going to endanger his practice.
On the other hand, if Fenton was really interested, she might be the making of him. A man in love was ready enough to give up bad habits. Everyone knew that Fenton drank to excess; no one knew why. Drew had tried to drag it out of him while he was putting the manâs hand in a lightweight cast, but he couldnât make him talk. Fenton just ignored him.
The tall, gangly cowboy didnât seem as if he were Kittyâs sort of man, really. He might like her, but he had a reputation and he dated a variety of women. Kitty was naive. She could get into real trouble there, if Fenton was just playing around. And he didnât seem the sort of man to worry overmuch about Kittyâs asthma. Drew himself pretended that it didnât exist, but he kept a close eye on her just the same. Heâd talked with her own doctor and discovered that in the past sheâd had to be rushed to the emergency room with those attacks, especially during heavy pollen levels in spring.
The hospital loomed ahead in the gray misting September rain and he put Kitty and her problems right out of his mind.
GUY FENTON WAS TWENTY-NINE, dark-headed and gray-eyed with a lean physique and a wandering eye. He wasnât handsome, but Kitty found him very attractive. Actually she found his attention attractive. In her young life, attention had been a luxury. She was making up for lost time.
Sheâd bought new makeup and learned how to apply it. Sheâd given up her high-necked blouses and started wearing things that were flimsier, looser. She wore her hair in a braid coiled around her head instead of in its former tight bun. And sure enough, Guy had noticed her and asked her out to this great movie.
The thing was, she was watching it, and he was leaning over the next row of seats talking to Millie Brady, a cute little redhead who worked in the local bank where Guy did business.
Kitty was feeling left out and miserable. Sheâd worn a pretty pink-and-gray-plaid skirt with a nicely fitting pink sweater, and her hair had been curled and intricately pinned up. She looked very nice indeed, glasses and all. But that didnât make up for the sort of personality that little Millie had in such abundance. Perhaps Millie hadnât been raised in a military environment where her life was filled with orders instead of affection.
Even now, Kitty found it difficult to interact with people. She had very few social skills. Sheâd had classes at business school in human relations, but that hardly made up for a lifetime of being loved and wanted. Even if the late Colonel Carson had been a well-respected military war hero, heâd been a dead bust as a loving parent. In his way, heâd been fond of his daughter, but heâd lived in the comfort of past glories, especially after his wifeâs death.
She sighed without knowing it. If sheâd stayed home, she could be watching one of her favorite television programs, about a duo of detectives tracing down exciting phenomena. Instead she seemed to be double-dating with Millie.
She tapped Guy on the shoulder. âIâm going to get some popcorn,â she said.
He didnât even look her way. âSure, you go right ahead. Now, Millie, let me explain to you how that roping is done. Itâs sort of tricky...â
He was going on and on about how to sit a quarter horse while bulldogging a calf in the rodeo ring. Although Kitty liked him, she couldnât have cared less about horses and ranching. She was a city girl.
She went to the snack bar, paused, and suddenly turned and walked right out the front door. She only lived two blocks from the theater. It was a cloudless summer night and the air smelled nice.
Just as she made it to the corner, a carload of bored teenage boys pulled up to the curb, with the windows open, and began to make catcalls.
She tried ignoring them, but they only got louder, and the car began to follow her. She wasnât frightened, but she might yet have to go back to the theater. It would be the perfect end to a perfectly rotten date.
Furious at her predicament, she whirled and glared straight into the eyes of the boy in the passenger seat. âIf you want trouble, youâve come to the right place,â she assured him. She dug into her pocket for a pencil and pad and walked right to the back of the car to write down the license plate number.
When they realized what she was about to do, they took off. One of the real advantages of living in a small town was the fact that most cars were instantly recognizable to the local police; and they knew where the owners lived. A license plate number would make the search even easier. But these guys werenât too keen to be located. They left rubber on the street getting away.
She stood staring after them with her eyebrows raised, the pencil still poised over the blank paper. âWell, well,â she murmured to herself. She made a check on the paper. âThatâs one for my side.â
She turned the corner and walked briskly to the alley that cut between one street and another. It took her right to her apartment house. She went inside and up to her small apartment, muttering furiously to herself all the way. Some great date, she thought furiously. Not only had her date ignored her, but sheâd been catcalled on the street like a streetwalker.
âNo wonder Amazons only used men for breeding stock,â she told her door as she inserted the key in the lock.
She went into her lonely apartment, locked the door and unplugged the telephone. She had a small glass of milk and went to bed. It was barely nine-thirty, but she felt as if sheâd worked hard all day.
Somewhere around eleven she heard knocking on her door, but she rolled over and pulled the pillow over her head. Guy Fenton could stand there until hell froze for all she cared.
THE NEXT MORNING she went to church, surprised to see Drew Morris there. He went to the same church, but he didnât often attend services, due to his erratic schedule. Several times sheâd seen him check his beeper and leave right in the middle of the offering. A doctor couldnât be certain of any sort of normal social attendance, especially a family doctor who specialized in pediatrics. It must make his weekends nerve-racking, she thought.
After the service, he stopped her on the sidewalk, his face somber.
âWhat happened last night?â he asked abruptly.
Her eyebrows arched. âWhat?â she exclaimed, shocked.
âI saw you,â he said impatiently. âYou were walkingâno, you were runningâdown an alley, alone, about nine-thirty last night. Where was Fenton?â
âEnjoying his date. Sadly it wasnât me.â
âI beg your pardon?â
âHe likes Millie,â she explained. âShe was sitting in front of us, and sheâs much more interesting to talk to than I am. She actually likes rodeo.â
Her tone tugged a corner of his mouth up. âImagine that!â
âI hate cattle,â she said.
âOur economy locally would suffer if we didnât have so many of them,â he said pointedly.
âOh, I know that, but I thought we were going to see a movie,â she muttered. âIt was a fantasy movie,â she recalled wistfully, âwith a computer-created dragon that looked so real...â She flushed at the amusement in his eyes. âI like dragons,â she said belligerently.
âIâm partial to them myself.â
She shrugged. âIâll see it another time,â she murmured. âIt wasnât important.â
He barely heard her. He was amazed to find himself outraged on her behalf. Kitty wasnât bad-looking at all. She had pretty legs and a neat little figure. She was intelligent and she had a fine sensitivity that was refreshing.
Millie, on the other hand, was a born flirt and something of a man-eater. She had a reputation locally for stealing men away from their girlfriends. She and Guy Fenton were a match made in heaven. Poor Kitty.
âI have to go,â she said with a quiet smile.
She walked to the small used foreign car she drove, patting its white hood affectionately before she got in and started the engine. Dr. Morris was so nice, she thought, smiling as she watched him get into his Mercedes. He was a handsome man, too, and despite his impatience and sometimes unexpected bursts of temper, she liked him. If she wasnât careful, he could become very important to her, and that would never do. He lived with a beautiful ghost. No mortal woman could ever compete with his Eve.
She spent an uneventful day watching old movies on television and went to bed early. Guy Fenton didnât phone. She didnât really expect him to. She decided to write him off as a bad experience and get on with her life.
SHE LEARNED THE office routine slowly but surely as the summer ended and autumn began. As the weeks slipped away, her filing improved, too. So did her people skills. She got to know the patients who came in regularly, and as the holidays approached, she found herself on the receiving end of all sorts of delicious recipes for turkey and dressing and pies.
She noticed that Guy Fenton didnât come back to have his cast off and mentioned it to Nurse Turner, to be told that heâd gone to the emergency room for the procedure. She supposed heâd been too embarrassed about their disastrous date to come to the office. It was history, anyway.
She accepted jars of preserves with enthusiasm. She didnât bother to put any of her own up, as she had nobody to cook for except herself. Thanksgiving and Christmas came and went and she spent them alone, having no close relatives to consider. Dr. Morris, as usual, went to his late wifeâs family for both occasions.
Winter turned slowly to spring and Kitty began to feel like part of the office furniture, in the nicest possible way. Dr. Morris had started calling her âKitty Cat,â to the amusement of some of his smaller patients who wanted to know if she could purr.
She marveled at the change in Dr. Morrisâs treatment of her. His gruff, abrupt manner at first had given way to a casual friendliness that stopped just short of affection. He was forever dressing her, though, unfastening buttons and doing them up the right way, righting hair bows, grimacing when she wore one dark blue sock with one dark green one because she couldnât see the difference between dark shades.
âI canât wake up on time,â she muttered one day when he was rebuttoning her patterned blazer on a nippy day. âIâm always in a rush when I leave home.â
âGo to bed earlier,â he advised.
âHow can I? The neighbors below me have one of those monster sound systems,â she muttered. âThey like to listen to it until the wee hours. My floor vibrates.â
âComplain to the landlord,â he persisted.
âThe landlord lives in Kansas City,â she said irritably. âHe doesnât care what they do if they pay the rent on time.â
He smiled wickedly as he finished the buttons and dropped his hands. âBuy a set of drums and practice constantly. Better yet, get bagpipes.â
Her eyes brightened. âBut I have a set,â she said, laughing at his amazement. âThey belonged to my fatherâs cousin, and we inherited them when he died. I never learned to play them.â
âNo better time to practice.â
She chuckled. She hadnât thought of her taciturn boss as a kindred spirit. âIâll get them out tonight and see if the moths have eaten them.â
âDo you have Scottish ancestry?â he asked suddenly.
âYes. Clan Stuart.â
âMy motherâs forebears were Maxwells,â he mused. âThey came over just after the Revolutionary War.â
âI donât know anything about mine,â she replied. âDad was too busy talking about wars to care much about ancient history. He was a retired colonel in the Green Berets. He served three tours of duty in Vietnam.â
He searched her eyes quietly. âYou poor kid.â
She flushed. âWhy do you say that?â
âYour mother died when you were in grammar school, didnât you say?â
She nodded.
âJust you and the colonel and the war,â he pondered aloud, dark eyes narrowing. âIâll bet he scared the hell out of any prospective dates.â
âYou donât know the half of it,â she murmured, recalling some fraught encounters. âHe tried to teach one of my dates a hand-to-hand combat move.â She grimaced. âHe accidentally threw him out the window instead. Fortunately it was open at the time and on the first floor. He actually left his car, he was in such a hurry to get away.â
He tried to smother a laugh. âI get the idea.â
âDad loved me, in his way,â she continued wistfully. âAnd I loved him. But I didnât like growing up like a soldier.â
âTaught you everything he knew, Iâll bet.â
âOh, I could win medals in target shooting and karate,â she agreed. âBut it would have been so much nicer if I could have learned to cook and sew. I liked those âsissyâ hobbies, even if he didnât. I had to sneak over to my girlfriendâs house to knit, for Godâs sake!â
âBut you miss him, donât you?â
âOh, yes,â she confessed. âEvery day. But he was a horrible father.â
âIâm not surprised.â He checked his watch and grimaced. âIâve got to get going. Iâll be late for rounds, and thereâs a hospital board meeting tonight.â
âYouâll be medical chief of staff one day,â she said proudly.
He chuckled. âNot if I start being late for meetings.â He heard her sighâactually heard it, with its accompanying wheeze.
His eyes narrowed thoughtfully. âUsed your preventive medicine?â
She gaped at him. âWhat?â
âYour nedochromil sodium,â he replied, and then added the brand name she was prescribed.
âYes,â she said shortly. âThat and the albuterol as well. Religiously. I donât like ending up in the emergency room.â
âSee that you keep using them properly. Youâve got a wheeze.â
âCold nights and warm days for a week,â she said.
He shrugged. âYes. Iâve noticed the increase in my little asthmaticsâ visits.â He picked up his jacket. âIs the medicine giving enough cover?â
His concern touched her, but she wasnât going to let him know. âYes, sir.â
âGood.â He checked his watch, nodded and left her in the waiting room as he went out the back way to his car. She felt a warm glow at the personal conversation theyâd had. Nothing in their relationship had been the least personal until now.
But when she realized what she was thinking, she clamped down hard on her wandering attention. Sheâd have to be crazy to let Dr. Morris get under her skin. Even crazier than sheâd been to go out with Guy Fenton.
Dr. Morris was just being the ideal boss, concerned for his workersâ welfare, she told herself. So sheâd better concentrate on just doing her job and not trying to make intimate comments out of impersonal observations about her health. He was a doctor, after all. It was natural for him to be concerned with someoneâs health.
