The Magnificent M.D. by Carol Grace Page A

“But you’re not required to take the hit. You’re not the secret service,” she said morosely.
    â€œI owe it to you. I cracked a window in this house one time.”
    â€œI don’t remember that,” she lied, nuzzling the baby with her cheek. But she remembered only too well. The sharp crack as a stone hit her bedroom window in the middle of the night. The shock as a rush of cold air hit her when she opened the window in her nightgown. The sight of Sam in his black leather jacket looking up at her. Her whole body shook with fright. She’d been scared her parents would hear. Scared he wouldn’t leave. Scared he would.
    â€œIn this case I’d say the parents are responsible for replacing it,” Sam said.
    â€œThen they’ll never come back here, and they won’t recommend it to their friends. No, I can’t even tell them. Where do you think they went?”
    â€œThe parents?” he asked.
    â€œNo, the little devils.”
    â€œI’ll go look,” he said, crossing the room. “I understand how their minds work. I’ll find them.”
    â€œAnd when you do—”
    â€œI’ll bury them alive in your mother’s rose garden. No one will think of looking there.”
    Despite the broken window, the screams and the cries, she smiled. Glad to see he hadn’t lost his roguish sense of humor. “Actually the garden isn’t a bad idea, if you could get them out there. There’s still a tire hanging from the oak tree. But you shouldn’t have to,” she said feeling a pang of guilt for using him this way, on his first day in town. “You’re a guest, after all.”
    â€œNo problem,” he said. “Playhouse still there?” he asked casually.
    Hayley jerked her head up from the baby’s cheek. “Yes,” she said. “Although it was renovated, turned into a pool house some time after…after I left home, but basically…I mean it’s still there.”
    â€œYeah, uh-huh,” he said blandly, and left the living room.
    Could he have forgotten? How could he not remember the most important, the most incredible event of her life that had taken place in that garden, in that playhouse? Because to him it didn’t mean that much. That’s how. The baby’s cries subsided to mere snuffles. Hayley looked into its little scrunched-up red face. “Don’t cry,” she murmured. “Never cry over men. It’s not worth it. How about some milk?” she asked. Without waiting for an answer, Hayley headed for the remodeled kitchen and warmed the bottle the parents had left behind.
    Then she sat in the garage-sale rocking chair she’d refinished and fed the baby. From where she sat she could see Sam and the two boys running around the yard playing some kind of game involving a ball. He ducked, he darted,he kicked and he ran. What a shame he hadn’t played sports in high school. But he’d said they were for kids, and in some ways Sam had never been a kid. Not until now, she thought, watching him gently tackle one of the boys.
    So that’s what it would be like to have a family of her own, she thought as she rocked slowly back and forth, lulling herself into a dream world. Instead of guests, that would be the kids and the dad in the yard. The mom and the baby in the kitchen. A fire in the wood stove radiating heat. A lamb ragout simmering on the back burner of the restaurant-size stove. A loaf of bread in the oven. Only the last parts were true. She’d started the bread and thrown the stew together this afternoon, just in case, hoping Sam would stay for dinner, knowing she shouldn’t count on him…but hoping…wanting to make him feel at home, though he wasn’t looking for a home, not with her, anyway.
    She suspected this was as close as she’d get to a real family life. The baby in her arms was not hers, the kids in the yard were not hers, the man