A Distant Summer (11 page)

When she straightened and turned to him with a casual smile, he knew the vulnerable moment had passed. Kristina lifted a hand to the knot of silvery blond hair at the nape of her neck, and Tucker wondered if she wore the controlled hairstyle for the sake of coolness or for the restraint it represented.

“Aren’t you uncomfortable in this heat?” she asked, all trace of uncertainty gone from her voice. “It must be very different from a summer night in the Rockies.”

“Yes, but for some reason I’m enjoying the heat, humidity and all. It reminds me of Fourth of July fireworks and homemade ice cream and playing softball until after dark and walking barefoot over wiry summer grass. Do you have a hoard of childhood memories like that, Kristina? Things you never think about except on nights like this?”

Kris looked back to the starry coverlet overhead and felt a wistful pang for the simple pleasures that she had missed as a child ... and for the memories she would never share with her own child. “I grew up believing that ice cream came in prepackaged scoops ready to be served in a crystal dish and that summer was created by parents so they could send their children to camp. I used to dread the end of the school term.” She paused, remembering. “It really wasn’t as bad as it sounds. All things considered, I suppose I was happier during those summer camp sessions than at almost any other time in my childhood. I know my parents were.”

“Kris.” Tucker spoke in a sort of surprised hush, and she heard the creak of the swing as he stood. His footsteps sounded hollowly against the porch floor. He stopped a couple of feet away from her, to perch on the edge of the railing. “You surely don’t mean that.”

She lifted her shoulders in a dismissive shrug. “I never learned a great deal about softball at camp, but I saw some terrific fireworks displays.”

“Would you like me to tutor you in the fine points of sandlot softball?”

Such a gentle, easy tone. Kris loved him for accepting her reticence to discuss a less than cherished past. She hated her weakness in giving him even that small glimpse of an old hurt. “It’s a little late in the season for that, don’t you think?”

“We have the rest of the summer.”

Tensing, she turned toward him. “But you’re leaving tomorrow.”

“No.”

“Tucker....” She couldn’t continue. He watched her too closely, held her gaze with the honest blue of his own eyes.

“I know that you assumed I would, but I can’t leave yet, Kris. Already I feel comfortable in Maple Ridge, and I like the people I’ve met. Matt wants to talk to me about the possibility of building a hospital here. Gary invited me to help him snare an elusive bass. The manager of the grocery offered to show me around his family’s orchard. Ruth tempted me to dinner tomorrow night with a promise of fresh peach cobbler.” He glanced out at the quiet street and patted a thoughtful rhythm against his thigh. “I’m staying for a while, but I won’t impose on you. I’ll find another place ... an apartment, maybe.”

“No.” The protest was automatic. To think of his living nearby, seeing him during the course of her days, wondering about him at night, hearing friends ask the same curious questions again and again.

No, she couldn’t bear to have him so close yet distanced from her. Maybe here she could convince him of her sincerity. Maybe she could discourage him from staying too long. Maybe she could face her own selfish conflict in wishing he could stay for so much longer than “for a while.”

She inhaled a deep, supportive breath. “There’s no need to find another place, Tucker. You’re ... welcome here. I’m gone quite a bit of the time, and if you’ve decided to spend a few days in Maple Ridge, you may as well stay with me.”

“Thank you, I believe I will.”

Her gaze locked with his in a moment of wary alert, but he returned her searching look with unguarded candor. She couldn’t be sure what he was telling her in the silence, but she knew he was gradually tightening his hold on her heart, testing the strength of her resolve, and tempting her to forget the very thing she must remember.

Tucker smiled easily and stood to extend his hand to Kristina. “It’s late, and I’ll confess that I’m a little tired.”

She knew she should restate her position again, make certain he understood that their relationship wasn’t going to progress any further.

Yet her hand was reaching for the pleasure of his touch. It was another mistake to add to a growing list, but as she walked beside him across the porch and into the house, Kris couldn’t find the courage to correct it.

* * * *

Jena and Matt Saradon lived on a rambling farm that was a little farther than the hop, skip and jump that Tucker had imagined. Three miles from Kristina’s front door to the Saradons’ mailbox was Tucker’s best guess, but he didn’t think anyone cared enough to measure. Distance was a relative term in Maple Ridge, just as “neighbor” was gauged more by a communal affection than close proximity.

The community was well represented in the Saradon’s backyard on Saturday night when Tucker and Kristina arrived. The drive to the farm had been the closest he’d been to Kris for more than two days, two busy days in which he’d learned a lot about the community and very little about the woman who was temporarily sharing her home with him.

It was discouraging, Tucker decided as he swallowed the last of his iced drink and set the glass aside. Across the bricked patio Kristina chatted with a laughing group of her peers. He was surrounded by a more serious group and a conversational topic of deep importance to the men discussing it. Tucker had little concentration or advice when it came to the subject of a community hospital. The only subject that aroused his interest at the moment was Kristina and her subtle aloofness.

She caught his gaze and smiled, lifting her glass in a silent gesture of acknowledgment. The last rays of the sunset brushed her hair with amber and tinted her complexion a honeyed rose. His throat tightened at the delicate features, the softly arched brows over eyes that veiled her thoughts and feelings the way a mist conceals the morning. She was dressed in lightweight cotton slacks and a blouse that was knotted intriguingly at her waist. Her lips formed a warmly sensuous curve, and he could see little sign of aloofness. But he knew it was there, waiting, maintaining a distance that he simply couldn’t understand.

At least she hadn’t asked him to leave again, and she didn’t seem to mind the energetic welcome extended by her friends. Tucker realized that his supposed relationship with Kris was responsible for the warm acceptance bestowed on him, but he saw no point in trying to set the record straight. Who would believe him anyway? Anyone with a remnant of romanticism could tell he was in love with her.

Tucker reached blindly for the glass he’d set on a nearby table and closed his fingers around the sweaty sides. It was too early for an admission like that, especially when she tried to discourage him at every turn. Yet he knew that time would only prove it true, and even then convincing Kristina that he knew his own heart would be a formidable task.

Still, time was on his side, he reasoned, and he could legitimately find a number of good excuses to prolong his stay in Maple Ridge ... and in Kris’s home. The main possibility was being debated at that very moment by the three men standing with him. The subject of building a hospital was near and dear to the heart of every citizen in town.

Tucker wasn’t sure what he had to offer other than a professional viewpoint, but Matt had asked him to help, and he’d agreed to do so. Getting involved in the community had not been in his original plans, but it now seemed tantamount to being involved in Kris’s life. And one way or another he meant to accomplish that.

“Would you like something else to drink, Tucker?” The husky feminine voice drew his gaze and his attention. Jena Saradon, petite, dark, and engaging, smiled up at him.

“That would be great.” Tucker stepped back to let the continuing conversation close ranks. He’d been listening only peripherally to the men anyway, and he wasn’t sorry for the interruption. “I could use a little more ice, and maybe I’ll try the lemonade this time.”

“Then, by all means, follow me.” Jena started toward the house. Tucker fell into step beside her, shortening his strides to match her unhurried seven-month-pregnant walk. The pregnancy didn’t seem to slow the light, inconsequential chatter that she utilized, as a hostess often does, to put a newcomer at ease. Tucker saw no reason to tell her he already felt more than comfortable. He enjoyed talking with her, liked to watch the sparkle of contentment in her brown eyes.

It was hard to believe those eyes had known tragedy, but Kristina had told him that their first child had died. An accident had happened here on their farm, too far from the nearest medical facilities. Little wonder that Jena and Matt were determined to get a hospital built in Maple Ridge. The wonder was that they actually thought he could help.

In the neat kitchen Jena refilled his glass and handed it to him with a statement that sounded oddly like a question. “I asked Kris how long you were planning to stay in town.”

“Oh?” Tucker sipped at the tart lemonade. “And what did she tell you?”

“That you’d be leaving in a couple of days.” With a frown Jena leaned against the Formica countertop. “Matt thinks you’ll be in Maple Ridge until the new hospital is dedicated.” Brown eyes settled on him with disquieting regard. “Would you like to know my opinion?”

He acknowledged his interest by a slight arching of his brows and hid the sudden caution filtering through his body.

“I think you could be happy here indefinitely. I know it’s presumptuous to hope you might prefer practicing medicine in our small community over a larger, more well-endowed position somewhere else.”

“Well-endowed?”

His smile couldn’t be camouflaged, and Jena responded with a laugh. “You know what I meant. Besides, that isn’t the point. Staying in Maple Ridge is.” Her hands laced together as her voice softened in earnest. “We need you here, Tucker. We need your help in building the hospital, and we need dedicated professionals like you to staff it.”

“Jena, is there any lemonade left?” Kristina’s question preceded her into the room, but thirst became of secondary importance as her gaze met Jena’s determined expression and then drifted to Tucker. A shaky sensation threatened the backs of her knees as his lips curved in a welcome.

“Come in, Kris,” Jena said. “There’s plenty of lemonade. Help yourself; then you can help me persuade this doctor of yours to consider the career potential our community has to offer.”

Her whole body stilled in quick discretion, and then Kris managed a casual laugh as she moved to replenish the liquid in her glass. “I’m sure Dr. McCain has heard enough persuasive arguments for one night.” An ice cube clinked against the crystal. It had a false ring, just as her unconcern rang falsely in the words she said. “Nothing I have to say would add to your cause, Jena. Tucker is a surgeon. It’s understandable that he would prefer to have a larger practice in the city.”

Jena’s eyes widened in surprise, and Kris turned her back and her attention from the two other occupants of the kitchen. She wished she hadn’t offered a comment. Already she knew the direction of Jena’s thoughts; already she could imagine the whispers that would circulate before the evening ended:
A lover’s tiff. She wants him to stay. He won’t leave the city. It’ll work itself out. Kristina has good sense.

The pitcher of lemonade tilted dangerously with the thoughts, and Kris frowned as the cool drink spilled over the rim of her glass.

She reached for a towel only to discover that Tucker already had one in his hand. As he dried the wetness from the counter, she wondered why she believed small-town life was so great.

“Don’t listen to her, Jena.” He rubbed briskly, his tone easy, self-assured, and unthreatened. “Kristina’s being modest. I think she might be able to persuade me ... if she set her mind to it.”

“Well, then I can only hope she sets her mind to it.” Jena straightened and brushed a maternal hand across her extended waistline. “Now maybe I should rejoin the party and see if anyone else is dying of thirst.” She started for the door and glanced back. “Are you two coming with me?”

“Yes.” Agreement came swiftly on the heels of the question, and Kris noted the subtle arching of dark brows — both Jena’s and Tucker’s.

But she didn’t care.

The community she loved, the friends she trusted, were backing her helplessly into a corner, taking Tucker’s side in the mistaken belief that it was her side as well. “Let’s go,” she said brightly, and proceeded to follow her hostess from the house.

Jena stepped outside, but Tucker caught up to Kris just before she walked out the doorway. “You’re in a terrific hurry, Kris. Planning to scotch the rumors about us before they have a chance to circulate? It’s a lost cause, you know. Half the people here think I’m courting you and the other half believe you’re courting me, and they’re all hoping one of us succeeds.”

She looked up, wishing the underlying vein of seriousness were merely his way of teasing. “Because they want a doctor for the hospital, Tucker.”

He shook his head in dispute. “It’s because they want you to be happy, Kris. And as best I can tell, you’re the only one present who doesn’t believe I can make you happy.”

“You’re very arrogant to suggest that, Tucker.”

“Aren’t you being a little arrogant in denying that the possibility exists?”

She tipped her chin in cool restraint. “We’re wasting time, Tucker. Let’s join the party.”

He reached past her to push open the back door. “All right. We’ll drop the discussion, but remember that simply because something has ended doesn’t mean it’s over.”

No, she decided as she moved onto the patio with Tucker’s warmth right behind her. It wasn’t over. And if tonight was any indication, the best she could hope for was a postponement. Her feet seemed to be planted in the wrong direction, and even if they weren’t, there would be a crowd of Maple Ridge residents ready and eager to give her a push in Tucker’s direction.

Over? She had a feeling the tug-of-war had just begun.