The Sergeant's Secret Son
“Did you have any breakfast?” Willadean asked, carrying on her campaign to see that Macy ate. “There’s corn bread and cold ham that’ll just spoil if somebody don’t use it.”
“I had a peanut-butter sandwich, and that’ll hold me till I get to work. I have some microwave lunches I can heat up there. At least the clinic has a generator.” Was Willadean avoiding her question? “You didn’t say what Alex was doing here,” Macy reminded the elderly woman.
“Oh, don’t you remember I told you that I’d be having company coming for my birthday next week? Since Alex hurt his leg, he can’t do that jumping out of airplanes stuff anymore, so he’s interviewing for a job at the recruitin’ station in Florence. And he’ll be stayin’ here long enough to be at the party.” Willadean paused and smiled. “It’ll sure be good to have him back home where he belongs.”
Macy wasn’t certain she could second that, but perhaps Alex would stay busy with storm cleanup, have his interview and return to his base. And maybe he wouldn’t get the job. “I saw Alex last night, and he mentioned the interview,” she said. “He was helping with the tornado cleanup. I noticed he was limping and tended his knee.”
Alex hadn’t told her much at all. He’d just swept her off her feet and all but kissed her senseless. Well, actually…she reminded herself, she’d kissed him first. Then he’d kissed her back. Ten years ago, having Alex pay attention to her would have been a dream come true, but now she had a feeling that it was going to be a nightmare.
Macy couldn’t bear the thought of Alex being so close, even for just a week. With his grandmother only next door, she would be bound to run into him time after time. She wasn’t sure she would be able to handle that. Not after…
No, she wouldn’t think about that.
Cory yanked on Macy’s white lab coat. “He was really big. Maybe a hunnerd feet tall!” Cory said, spreading his arms expansively.
Willadean laughed. “He’s not that big, but he is a good-sized man.” She looked at Macy. “I reckon you’d best go on. Me ’n’ Cory will be busy all morning getting the yard cleaned up.”
“All right,” she said slowly. She reached down to hug Cory. “You be a good boy for Gramma Willadean,” she said, then planted a kiss on his sticky cheek.
Cory kissed her back. “You know I’m always good for Gramma,” he said. Then he turned back to his cereal.
“Cory child will be fine here today just like always. I can find plenty for him to do even if the power stays off.” Gramma Willadean chuckled. “What do you think I done with Alex’s father way back in the days before I had television?”
“I’m sure I don’t know,” Macy said as she turned to leave. And she wasn’t sure of another thing. Did she want Alex Blocker to stay in town, or did she want him to leave? If she thought she could count on him over the long haul, she supposed she’d love him to stay. But then, she didn’t know what she’d do if Alex stayed around long enough to start asking questions about her son.
BLOCK DROVE through streets striped with long shadows painted by the morning sun and littered with fallen branches and tattered leaves. Amazing how such an ugly night could lead into such a beautiful morning. The sky was crystal-clear blue, almost as if the storm had swept it clean.
He breathed deep of the crisp, clean air through his open car window. They might have had a pretty fall in a few weeks, but the storm had taken care of that, ripping most of the leaves from the trees before they had a chance to turn. At least the damage in Gramma’s part of town had been minimal.
Macy had looked gorgeous in the morning light, Block remembered suddenly. She hadn’t looked half-bad last night, either, in spite of her fatigue. But Block had a bad feeling that sunshine would do nothing to improve the appearance of that trailer park today. Still, he couldn’t have stayed at Gramma’s house with her waiting on him when there was so much to be done here. Sure, there was some minor damage at Gramma’s, but it could wait.
He turned the corner and saw what was left of Faron’s Trailer Park. As he’d predicted, the light of day had done nothing to improve the appearance of the trailers turned on their sides, roofs gone, metal twisted and shredded. Seeing it now, he marveled that he’d been able to pull anyone out alive. At least today, the fires that had given the scene such an eerie glow were no longer burning, but the acrid smell of smoke and burning wires still hung in the air.
Block parked at the little strip mall across from the trailer park and wondered where to start, who to see. As he climbed out, he spotted the man from the drugstore vainly trying to lift a huge pecan limb off of his car.
“Hey, buddy,” Block called. “Let me give you a hand with that.”
Now he felt useful. Anything to keep from thinking about his past, his future, or Macy, the girl who’d gotten away. Or wondering why he’d let her.
MACY HADN’T been able to see the damage to the clinic the night before. The walls and the windows were intact, but the gently sloping roof had taken quite a hit. Though she couldn’t tell exactly how badly it was damaged, a large section of shingles had blown away, and one of the pines that had provided welcome shade in the summer leaned against one side. There didn’t seem to be any structural damage to the building, but the tree would have to be felled, and the roof repaired…with money she didn’t have. There was insurance, but the deductible was so high, that Macy doubted it would be of much help. So much for trying to keep the premiums low…
Macy sighed and pushed her car door open. Last night when it was still raining, at least, the interior had remained dry. Maybe she could postpone the repairs until the more serious damage around town had been taken care of. The building might not look pretty right now, but it was functional.
She just wondered how long she could put off the repairs. The clinic barely broke even most of the time. Many of her patients paid what they could, some in produce or jellies and jams, and others depended on less-than-adequate insurance programs. And many times she’d done with less to make sure that her staff was paid. At least, she lived in Aunt Earnestine’s house free and clear.
A vehicle pulled up, and Macy turned around to see if she already had a patient. She was pleased to find a utility truck turning into the parking lot.
“Morning, Doc,” the driver said as he climbed out and tipped his hard hat. “Figured getting your power back on was a priority.”
“Yes, thank you,” Macy said as she stepped out of her own car. Just seeing the power truck was enough to energize her and brighten her day. And her clinic, she thought with a wry chuckle.
Maybe the situation wasn’t quite as desperate as she’d first imagined.
She collected her medical bag and purse and hurried to unlock the front door. If she didn’t hurry, she wouldn’t be organized before the first patient arrived today.
THE HARD WORK kept Block from thinking about the interview scheduled for later that week, or wondering about Macy or the change in the town. He had mixed emotions about Lyndonville. When he was growing up it had seemed such an unfriendly place, and for a kid growing up on the wrong side of the railroad spur, life had not been easy. Yet, people he cared about lived here.
He cut the power to the chainsaw and stopped for a moment to wipe the sweat from his brow. If he’d thought about it, he could have brought a sweatband from his workout clothes, but he’d had to make do with a red railman’s bandana the guy from the drugstore had given him. Funny, he didn’t even know the man’s name.
Block had been one of the first in line to purchase a gas-powered chainsaw when the hardware store opened, and now he was working his way through the town, clearing streets and cutting up broken limbs wherever he was needed. He’d learned to use the saw in the air force, and cutting down broken limbs or cutting up fallen trees wasn’t that much different than creating and setting up an airstrip out of nothing in the middle of nowhere. And he was doing something useful.
He looked up and was surprised to discover that he’d worked his way over to Macy’s clinic. Had his choice of direction been intentional?
A tree, uprooted by the storm, was balanced precariously against the roof. Torn shingles littered the ground like fallen leaves, and there wasn’t a soul in sight who seemed to be doing anything about it. The clinic was busy, though, if the number of cars in the small parking lot was any indication.
Block stepped inside the door and threaded his way through a maze of patients on hard plastic chairs and asked the harried receptionist if she needed the tree taken down.
The woman looked up, a wary expression on her face. “How much?”
Block suspected there were already people out there charging exorbitant fees for work, but he wasn’t one of them. “It’s on me,” he said as the phone rang. “I just want to help.”
“Have at it,” the woman said with a weary smile. She turned to answer the phone.
He hadn’t seen Macy, and maybe he should have checked with her, but the woman hadn’t hesitated when she’d told him to go ahead, so he figured it was all right.
“I’VE TAKEN a throat culture, Mrs. Pelham, but I don’t think it’s…strep—” Macy stopped at the sound of thumping on the roof. If she didn’t know better, she’d swear it was footsteps.
“Sometimes we have squirrels in the attic,” she said to her patient’s mother. If it was a squirrel, it was a very big squirrel, she thought as she wrote out a scrip for an antibiotic. “I’m going to give you a prescription, but don’t fill it until I get the labs back and call you. Chances are, by the time the tests come back, Cassie will be feeling her old self again anyway. Just give her lots of liquids and let her eat if she’s hungry.” She gave Mrs. Pelham, a new mother, a reassuring smile.
Before Mrs. Pelham could respond, the sound of a chainsaw at close quarters ripped through the air.
“What the…!” Macy went to the window and opened the venetian blinds just as a large mass of green and brown fell past the window and landed on the lawn with a thump.
She turned back to Mrs. Pelham. “Do you have any other questions?” Macy asked. “I hate to rush you, but I have to find out what’s going on.”
“No, ma’am, I understand.” The woman gathered up her baby and assorted paraphernalia and turned toward the door.
Macy left the chart on the exam table and brushed past the woman and child in the hall and hurried out to the reception desk.
“Do you know what’s going on?” Macy asked the receptionist as she headed for the door.
Bettina looked up from a phone call and said, “A guy came by and asked if we’d like to have the tree taken down. He said he wouldn’t charge, so I said to go ahead.”
“You didn’t check with me first?”
Bettina gestured toward the teeming waiting room. “I didn’t think I needed to bother you.”
Macy sighed. “You could have warned me. Who is it?”
The receptionist shrugged. “I don’t know. Sure is good-looking, though. He could definitely be Mr. October in some hunk-of-the-month calendar.”
“I’m going out to check on our benefactor, and then I’ll be back for the next patient.”
She stepped outside and shaded her eyes with her hands to see who was up on her roof. With the sun in her eyes, all she could see was a silhouette, but if the silhouette was any indication, hunk was right.
“Hello, up there. Can I speak to you for a minute?”
Chapter Three
Block had wondered when Macy was going to come out and investigate. He’d tried to be quiet as he moved around up on the roof, but a chainsaw was anything but subtle. Block looked down and grinned. “Morning, Macy. Nice day, isn’t it?”
The expression on Macy’s face told him that she was less than pleased to see him.
She glared up at him, one hand shading her eyes and the other planted firmly on her hip. “Alex Blocker, you come down from there right this instant.”
Lord, she sounded like a starchy old-maid schoolteacher instead of the soft and sexy woman he’d kissed last night. Block chuckled and saluted. “Yes, ma’am. I’ll be right down.” He scrambled to the other side of the roof and climbed down the same way he’d gotten up.
Macy was fuming, that was sure. Her arms were crossed over her small, round breasts and one foot was tapping fit to beat the band as Block rounded the corner of the building. Even in that crisp white lab coat, she looked sexy as hell. Block wondered what had her in such a snit. Surely it wasn’t because he was trying to help?
“What can I do for you, Dr. Jackson?” he said, pulling the bandana off and swabbing his damp forehead. “Hot business up there,” he commented while he waited for her to have her say.
Macy seemed to have lost her voice. Her lips were moving, but no sound came out. It wasn’t often that he’d seen Macy Jackson speechless. Even as a pesky kid, she’d had no trouble speaking up. Block liked the idea that he might have something to do with keeping her off balance.
Suppressing a grin, he watched her, enjoying the play of emotions as they crossed Macy’s face. She drew in a deep breath, then finally managed to speak. “It isn’t that I don’t appreciate your offer to help, but this is a medical office,” she said primly. “Is there any way you can manage to do that a little more quietly?”
“Well, I could hack at it a little bit at a time with my pocket knife. I’d be here till Christmas, but you wouldn’t hear a thing. If I had my regulation K-Bar knife, it could go a little faster.”
Macy looked at him for a moment, then broke into a slow smile. “I guess I deserved that,” she said, then suppressed a chuckle. “I was just surprised when I first heard that saw going without any warning. I do thank you for helping out.”
Block’s stomach rumbled. He hadn’t had anything to eat since a sausage biscuit when he’d first come out. “Say, it’s almost lunchtime. How about you take off a few minutes and join me for lunch? Handy’s is open.”
Macy gnawed at her lip, a look of indecision on her face. She looked at Block, then she looked back toward the clinic. “See all those cars in the lot? For every car out here, there are about three people sitting in my waiting room. I’ll be lucky if I get a chance to grab a granola bar between patients today.”
Block shrugged. “Let me know if you change your mind.” He turned and looked back over his shoulder. “I’ll try to be as quiet as that saw will let me. Once I get the branches cleared away so I can see what I’m doing, maybe the rest of the tree can wait till the weekend.” He waved and strode away.
Macy watched as he disappeared around the side of the building. Last night he’d seemed almost diabolic as he’d ripped at the shattered trailers in the flickering light of the gas fires and the strobing blue lights of the police cruisers. Today he seemed like a guardian angel and looked like any other guy. If the guy happened to be about six-four and built like a linebacker.
She managed a wry chuckle. The Alex Blocker she knew was anything but angelic.
“Dr. Jackson?”
Macy looked up to see Bettina looking out the clinic door. “Yes?”
“We have a full waiting room in here. Are you ready for the next patient?”
“Oh, sure. I’m coming.” With Alex Blocker around, she’d better be on her guard and ready for anything, Macy told herself. She wasn’t sure what she was ready for. The next patient, yeah.
Alex Blocker? Maybe not.
BLOCK WORKED at the pine tree, carefully removing one branch at a time until only the main trunk rested on the roof. It had been slow going, but now he was certain that if it shifted, the tree would do no damage to the building.
Block swiped at his brow again with the soaking-wet bandana. He needed some chow, and he’d bet Macy needed a ration of energy just as much. She’d been up most of the night last night, too, and there was only so far a body could go on little sleep and less food.
He knew that too well. He’d done it before.
How could he go and enjoy a big fat burger and fries when she was looking at crackers and a diet soda grabbed on the fly?
He grinned as an idea popped into his mind. Yeah, that just might work, he thought as he climbed down.
He did what he could to make himself presentable, then stepped inside the clinic and had a brief conversation with the receptionist. “Great,” he said after they’d finished. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.” Then he hurried off to lunch.
MACY DIDN’T know how long it had been, but she came to the realization that she had heard no noises from the roof in quite some time. Had she become so accustomed to the thumping that when it stopped the place seemed eerily quiet? Just how long ago had Alex finished?
She started to ask Bettina where Alex was, but realized that she’d been so busy that the morning was gone. She looked out into the waiting area, and she still had an inordinate number of patients. No time for stopping now.
Since she was the only doctor in Lyndonville, she was it. She didn’t get a break until everyone had been seen. She stretched her arms above her head and rolled her neck on her shoulders and forced herself to go to the next exam room and the next patient. Would this day never end?
Every time she came out of one exam room, she hoped that she would not see a new file in the bracket on the door of the next. But there always seemed to be another file and another patient to be seen.
She splinted and wrapped a sprained ankle and jotted notes in the file, then wearily moved on to the next exam room.
Macy was so hungry she could swear she smelled food. Did she dare hope that there was no file in the holder on the door of the next room so that she could grab something to eat?
No such luck. Another folder. Macy sagged. She rubbed her eyes and drew a deep breath. Then she took the chart down, rapped on the door, and stepped inside.
Macy stopped short.
“Have a seat, Doctor,” Alex Blocker said as he gestured toward a feast of burgers and fries and drinks in tall, sweating wax-coated paper cups. “I couldn’t get you to take time for lunch, so I brought it to you.”
“But…” Macy’s mouth watered at the tantalizing aroma of food. “…I have patients.”
“Who haven’t been working on their feet as long as you have. How can you help them if you’re starving and dead on your feet?”
“I—whose file is this?” She held up the manila folder that had been in the rack on the door. “You’re cutting into that patient’s time,” she protested.
“It’s mine,” Alex said. “I came back to have my knee looked at. It’s a very serious case,” he said solemnly. “It might take a long time to treat,” he explained. “But I think I know what will fix it. Lunch!” He looked as pleased with himself as a cat who’d caught a canary.
Macy started to say something, then shut her mouth quickly and pressed her hand to her stomach to stop its insistent gurgling.
“Stop standing there gulping like a guppy and sit down and eat. A serious knee exam can only take so long.” He patted the metal swivel stool by the exam table.
Slowly, Macy followed his suggestion. “Thank you,” she finally managed, unaccustomed to accepting gifts from anyone, especially Alex Blocker. Though her younger brother, Ty, lived in the next county, she had done it all alone for so long. “I am hungry,” Macy admitted begrudgingly. She reached for a crispy French fry and brought it to her mouth.
Alex held up his soda cup. “To you, Dr. Jackson. May you live to cure the rest of the day.”
Macy groaned. “Oh, that was bad, but I get what you mean. And thank you again. This is just what I needed.” She popped the fried potato into her mouth and chewed.
Alex grinned as he watched Macy eat. “I might not be a good toastmaster, or a good cook, but I’m great at cash-and-carryout.” He chuckled. “Your patients might need you, but I checked with the receptionist first, and she told me that there weren’t any real emergencies waiting out there. So, for right now, I’m the doctor, and my prescription for you is to eat and to put your feet up for at least fifteen minutes.”
He slid off the stool he’d been sitting on and pushed it over to in front of Macy. What was he up to now? she wondered as she took a bite of burger.
Alex bent and lifted her feet up off the floor and propped them up on the stool. She started to protest, but Block just told her to shut up and eat. Then he removed her shoes and gave her the best foot rub she’d ever had.
Macy felt as if she’d died and gone to heaven, and if she had retracted her proposal from last night, she’d be tempted to offer it again.
But, no. She and Alex had some issues. Some that Alex didn’t even know about. And until they’d settled them, there was no way they could…what?
Macy had to admit that she’d needed this break, even if she did have a waiting room full of patients. If she’d had the time, she would have crawled onto the exam table and taken a nap, but having an impromptu picnic set up before her was unprofessional enough.
Even if it had been very welcome.
Alex sat across from her, arms crossed over his chest, as she ate. He hadn’t said much, just seemed to enjoy watching her eat. She wouldn’t be surprised if he insisted that she “clean her plate” if she tried to leave one morsel uneaten. As it was, she’d been plenty hungry enough to eat it all.
She popped the last lonely, ketchup-coated fry into her mouth, savoring the salt and tangy condiment on it. Then she blotted her lips with a paper napkin. As she put it on the pile of sandwich wrappings, she breathed a contented sigh. “I didn’t realize how much I needed that.”
Alex arched an eyebrow, but didn’t say “I told you so,” something she’d half-expected to hear. Instead he said, “Sometimes the people who are used to taking care of everybody else need someone to take care of them.”
When was the last time anyone had done that for her? She tried to scratch up some distant memory, but came up with nothing.
Smiling, Alex gathered up the discarded sandwich wrappings and stuffed them into the bag they’d come in. “The world won’t grind to a halt if you take a break,” he said gently, then he paused. “But you might, if you don’t.”
Macy knew she should thank him, but she was out of practice. For too long, she’d been the one in charge, the one doing for others. This was a new role, but one she could get used to.
Alex turned. “I’ll let you get back to your patients now.”
“Wait!” Macy called. “What about your knee?” She had to put something on the chart.
“It’s fine. See.” He put his hands, one still clutching the paper lunch bag, out in front of him and demonstrated with several shallow squats. “It’s fine,” he said as he straightened. Then he reached for the door handle. “Oh, Macy…”
“Yes,” she answered hopefully. Hoping for what?
He reached toward her and touched the underside of her chin and tipped her face up to his. Macy’s pulse did double-time as she moistened her lips, anticipating…. She thought, hoped, that he was going to kiss her, but he simply rubbed the side of her mouth with the pad of his thumb and sent streams of fire racing through her veins.
“There was a little bit of ketchup on your mouth. I figure you don’t want to advertise to your patients just what you had for lunch.” Alex grinned, then opened the door. He saluted, then stepped outside. “Later.”
Macy stood there, frozen for a moment and angry at how her feelings had taken possession of her where Alex was concerned. Then she checked her reflection in the tiny mirror above the sink to see if her passion showed in her eyes. Certain she was presentable, she hurried into the short hallway, just in time to see Alex pause at the reception desk and flash a thumbs-up sign to Bettina.
“Mission accomplished,” he said. Then he hurried out the door.
Macy leaned against the doorjamb and wondered what to make of Alex’s attentions of last night and today—and her own reactions. She had been sure that what had happened that one night in Fayetteville, when they’d cleared C.J.’s apartment, had been a fluke, an aberration, but now she couldn’t help wondering.