The Wedding Planners of Butternut Creek (20 page)

“Than she’d let me tell her what to do,” Adam finished. “But you’re not her brother. I really need you to help.”

“You’re asking me to watch over a woman that hates me.”

“Doesn’t hate you, exactly.”

“She has a deep abiding love for me that she shows by not talking to me?”

“Just take care of her, okay? I really need this. She does, too. Besides, you have a way with women. Maybe you can get her to listen, force her to rest and eat or at least suggest that. Tell her she needs sleep to be sharp. You know. Whatever works. I really need this. I worry about her. She could have a relapse.”

Gabe still stared. “I think you overestimate my way with women. My amazing charm hasn’t exactly swept your sister away.”

“Please. When she’s wrapped up in a project, she pushes herself into exhaustion and beyond. That’s what happened in Kenya. For being such a smart person, she has little common sense and few survival skills.”

Gabe considered the plea. He didn’t want to agree because he didn’t know if he could carry through. Hannah would fight him every minute and for every inch of control. It would be horrible and messy and not a bit of fun…

Okay, it might be fun. It might lighten life around here to spar with Hannah, might give a little interest to the day since he couldn’t be out helping others and searching.

He pretended to consider Adam’s request because he hated to give in too quickly. Someday he might need a favor from him. Finally, he shrugged and said, “Okay, I’ll try to watch over her, keep her from wearing herself out. I’ll bring her home when this is under control. I’ll have to get my truck fixed or rent something, but I’ll take care of it. And her.” He cringed. “If I can.”

“Don’t let her know,” Adam warned. “Whatever you do, don’t let her know I asked you to do this.”

“You’re a real profile in courage.”

“I know my sister. This isn’t only to cover my involvement. You don’t want her to know you’re watching out for her, either. She’ll be furious with everyone involved.”

“I’m pretty sure your sister will figure this out. She’s pretty smart, you know.”

Actually, she might be grateful and consider Gabe’s efforts a sign of his deep devotion—although he had yet to show any. More likely, she’d see them as a suggestion from her brother or even stalking on Gabe’s part. None seemed likely to end happily ever after. He wasn’t looking for that ever-after thing but he really hated her you’re-such-an-idiot point of view. Maybe he could convince her he wasn’t a stupid jock but a good guy with a brain that, if not as huge as hers, did have a few functioning cells.

Making certain Hannah didn’t wear herself out counted as a humanitarian effort. Maybe, in addition, Gabe could undertake an investigation to find the woman in the photo. He’d caught a flash of her when she took care of that little girl, even a bit of gentleness when she’d swabbed his face.

If following Adam’s orders gave him an excuse to find her, he would. If necessary, he’d even toss Adam to the lions—in this case, to his sister whom they all feared more—and tell Hannah the whole thing was not Gabe’s idea. He’d only done it as a favor to a friend.

Having accepted the challenge and after everyone finished lunch and left to clear rubble, Gabe meandered back to the converted gym and strolled to the line of waiting patients.

“How’s Dr. Jordan doing? Can you set her up for a lunch break?”

“Sure,” Abraham said. “Won’t send anyone to her after she finishes with this patient.”

Gabe settled on a chair and prepared to watch and wait. He knew good and well she wouldn’t leave on her own.

Hannah handed a prescription to her patient, then turned toward the chair where the next one waited.

Gabe. Terrific. She closed her eyes, then opened them. He’d stood and now walked closer. “You’re still here,” she said, hoping her voice sounded less pleased about his reappearance than she felt. “Need your bandages checked?”

“Sure,” he said.

As he closed the distance between them, she wanted to close her eyes again, to shield herself from all that perfection in motion. She couldn’t. “Actually,” she said in her best professional voice, “it’s too early to recheck them.” She studied the gauze covering his wounds. “I don’t notice any obvious draining on the gauze or redness around the site.”

“Okay. How long before I can do real work?”

“I’ll check you over tomorrow morning. If everything’s healing well, I’ll approve you for contact with patients but not work in the disaster area yet.”

At his disappointed expression, she said, “Gabe, it’s too dangerous for you. Far too great a chance of infection unless we covered your lacerations with polyurethane.”

She glanced toward the chair. Empty.

“Where’s my next patient?” she called to Abraham.

“He’s not going to send one. It’s your lunch break.”

“I don’t…,” she began.

“Might as well give up. I’m not going away and Abraham’s not going to send you another patient until you get something to eat.”

“Did you bribe him?”

“No, I told him he’d be helping the cause of young love.”

She snorted. “We’re hardly young and we certainly aren’t in love.”

“He liked being in on the secret romance.”

It hurt to admit it, but he was right. Oh, not about the secret romance but about her needing a break. This is how she’d started her downward spiral in Africa. She hadn’t eaten enough, hadn’t rested. She’d carried the entire country on her shoulders in an attempt to save it, her health had failed, and she’d had to leave. Shouldn’t she have learned something from that? Obviously, she hadn’t.

“All right.” She strode ahead of Gabe across the gym and into the hallway before she realized she had no idea where the food might be located.

“This way.”

Before he could reach out to take her arm, she headed that way. She knew she could be a jerk but today—well, today she was really tired and couldn’t seem to stop herself. She did need to eat.

Why was she such a grumpus she couldn’t accept support or care or even kindness? A character defect. Adam had told her that often. But did she have to wear it like a badge only because she always had?

Gabe never minded an extra meal. As he finished a sandwich and started on a piece of pie—apple this time—he watched Hannah. She didn’t speak but shoved down more food than he’d thought she’d ever be able to.

Then, when she finished her sandwich, she smiled at him.

Wow. That was a surprise.

“Thank you. I needed to eat. I appreciate your bringing me here.” With those words, she stood, bused the tray, and headed back toward the gym, leaving him amazed and confused. She’d been nice. She’d expressed gratitude. He’d never understand Hannah. Maybe that was the reason she interested him.

He dumped the paper plates and napkins in the trash before he headed across the parking lot and the grassy area that separated the high school from the middle school gym. Once inside, he looked around. Cots covered most of the area, some pulled into square formations where evacuated families rested while others marched in precise rows across the floor, sheets folded on them and awaiting occupants. A curtain divided the gym in half.

“Where do volunteers sleep?” he asked a woman at the table.

“On the other side of the curtain.”

“Do we need to sign in or show ID?”

“Show your ID when you come in, that’s it.”

“Can I reserve a place?”

“First come, first served. Should be plenty.”

“Thanks.” He headed around the curtain to find, not surprisingly, more cots lined up.

At four, after Hannah had worked twelve hours with only the lunch break, Gabe carried a tray of cookies and juice boxes into triage. “Break time,” he shouted.

The doctors, nurses, and orderlies converged on him, grabbed cookies and cartons, saying “Thank you” before leaning against a wall to drink, crunch, and rest.

Of course, the woman he’d brought this offering to hadn’t appeared. She stood next to the little girl he’d seen her with before.

“Gabe,” she called. “Can you bring me some juice?”

He grabbed a couple of cartons and picked up the plate of cookies.

When he arrived, she took the proffered juice box and stuck the straw in. “Here you go,” she said to the girl. “Don’t drink it too fast.”

“I brought one for you, too.”

“Thanks. Don’t need one.” She smiled at him for a nanosecond. “I had a huge lunch.”

“Yes, Doctor, you do. All the others are taking a break. Your turn.” With that, he put the cookies and carton on a small table. “Dr. Jordan, you have to take care of yourself,” he commanded.

“You sound exactly like my brother,” she said.

“Believe me, if there’s anything I don’t want to be, it’s your brother.”

As he spoke those words, her glance flew to his face, this time searching for clues to his meaning. He kept his features expressionless and wondered why he’d spoken so honestly.

“Okay, okay. I can see you won’t go away.” She took the snickerdoodle he held out.

“Right, and if you don’t take a drink, I’ll follow you all over carrying a carton and embarrassing you.”

She laughed. “You are such a jerk,” she said, but not in a snarky way.

She also sat and reached for the juice. After finishing the snack, she tossed the carton and napkin in the trash, leaned her head back, and within seconds seemed to have dozed off.

Mission accomplished. For a moment, he watched her. She looked young and vulnerable and deceptively sweet in her sleep.

Hannah noticed that Adam’s friend had left her alone for two hours. She’d awakened from her quick nap in ten minutes. The juice, cookie, and sleep had revived her.

She glanced around. All the patients were resting comfortably. Two doctors and several nurses wandered around the gym. Most of the professionals would leave tomorrow or Monday. Several volunteers had come from New Mexico, others from Oklahoma and Arizona.

Whether she wanted to admit it or not, her gaze continued to search for Adam’s friend. She called him “Adam’s friend” in her mind to distance herself from him, to build a barrier between them, as if he didn’t mean anything to her in any other role. Didn’t work. Neither did “Hector’s coach.” That shouldn’t surprise her because the idea had not an iota of scientific evidence to support it. She might as well recognize that no barrier—visible, invisible, or logical—existed.

When she located Gabe, he was chatting with an elderly Hispanic man about five rows away, a patient who didn’t speak English.

“You speak Spanish?” she asked Gabe after the conversation ended.

“Surprised? I grew up in Texas, spent a lot of time with my aunt on the border. Know a lot of words I refuse to repeat. Played with Ginobili a couple of years.”

What was a Ginobili?

“No,” she said. “I’m not surprised you speak another language.”

“Really?” He shook his head, calling her bluff.

“No.” She paused to consider her exact opinion. “I’m impressed.” Admitting that didn’t hurt as much as she’d thought. “Most people don’t speak two languages.”

“Also picked up some French from Tony Parker, a little German from Nowitzki.”

“Who are they?”

“You don’t know?” He sounded incredulous. Those two people seemed important to him. “Ginobili and Parker and Nowitzki played in the NBA at the same time I did,” he explained.

She had no idea what he’d just said. Oh, she’d heard the words, but the meaning escaped her.

“You can’t tell me you have no idea what the NBA is.”

“Not the slightest.” She hated, absolutely hated, to admit lack of knowledge. Well, no she didn’t, not at this moment. Admitting ignorance didn’t feel nearly as bad or as humiliating as she’d always believed it would, possibly because she did it so seldom. Maybe never.

“The National Basketball Association, professional basketball in the United States.”

“Oh.” The explanation clicked into the part of her brain where she stored facts she’d never access again. “You played basketball
and
learned other languages in this association.”

“Yes! Pro ball isn’t all orgies with nubile young women.” After the words left his mouth, he thunked his hand on his forehead and said, “I don’t mean we have orgies in pro ball. I don’t.”

She immediately and oddly discovered she had much more interest in his relationships with nubile young women than she dared to consider. How interesting. She should have known from the perfection of Gabe that he had a past that included women so gorgeous she could never compete. Why try? Why should she even consider opening herself to heartbreak?

She had to face facts. They’d been thrown together by this emergency. He was her brother’s friend and behaved nicely to her. He’d forget her as soon as he returned to Butternut Creek unless he remembered her as Adam’s pitiful sister. She’d forget him when she returned to…to wherever she went from here. Her uncertain future shouldn’t be complicated by attraction to this man. Well, to
any
man, but particularly this one.

And yet his statement had opened up an amazing new world to her. Always curious and willing to expand her limited knowledge of certain aspects of the rest of the world, she asked, “'What sort of things go on at these orgies?”

“You don’t want to know. Besides, I didn’t go to them. I only heard about them from other players. I’m not really an orgy man.”

“I like to learn about stuff,” she said seriously.

Gabe stood and held out his hand. “Time for dinner. Let’s go.”

Although she’d never read people well, Hannah did recognize an effort to change the subject. People behaved that way around her often.

“I’m not hungry,” she said before she realized she was and she could use a rest, too. She nearly quivered with exhaustion and had only overcome it by sheer willpower. What had happened to her? She used to be able to work around the clock and still feel great. Unlike other interns, she hadn’t depended on vast infusions of caffeine to stay awake and keep going.

“You need to eat. You’re just getting over malaria,” he said. “And you’re not as young as you used to be.”