Healing Hearts (Easton Series #2) (4 page)

  
His eyes danced with approval. “The
war changed everything. We learned so much!” He looked back down at Elijah and
punched the needle in to sew another stitch. “You’re still a woman,” he
reminded himself aloud.

  
Hannah wasn’t listening. Her eyes
twinkled in the morning light, and she ran on excitedly. “Mind you, I’m not a
homeopath, but I use their best ideas. Botanicals do work. I also don’t believe
in using leeches to draw blood. It doesn’t bring down a fever any faster than
not letting blood. It weakens the patient. I’d go as far as to say many have
died from bleeding and purging methods.”

  
Jed shook his head, and he pulled
his eyes away from his patient to look into a face brightly lit with the hope
and aspirations of a newly-minted doctor. The woman was much more than he’d
given her at first glance. She was a mature thinker, ripe in mind as well as
body. He found himself anticipating further discussions with her.

  
Jed swallowed hard. “OK, Doctor Hannah.
We got off on the wrong foot. I’ll let you stay and work for a week, but only until
the next wagon out.”

Chapter 4

  
T
hree days passed, and Hannah
quickly established a routine that wove around Jed’s sleeping and eating habits.
She rose early and made breakfast, every day, even after a patient’s needs had
interrupted her sleep. Jed was slower to rouse himself, but he always made it
to the table, and between grunts he ate her eggs and fried pork and pancakes.

  
As she worked alongside him, Hannah
came to understand her confident and handsome, but somehow embittered and
brooding, partner. His mood ran from hot to cold, as if he were emotionally
rudderless. At one moment he could be laughing and smiling on the porch,
beneath the stars on a moon-shadowed night, as they discussed the merits of her
aural stethoscope with it’s fancy ivory earpieces and rubber tubing, versus his
older model’s woven fabric tubing and wooden ear horns. Not a half hour later
he’d be back in the surgery, shaking bottles in the lamplight and railing about
how she’d used too much tincture of iodine on scraped knees presented by
schoolboys.

  
His vulnerability touched her deeply; he had a need,
something she couldn’t put her finger on, but she’d keep searching. He’d known
danger and suffering. But then again, so had she, and she’d persevered with her
manners and humor intact.

  
Hannah faced the man who was stabbing his breakfast sausage with steady
surgical precision. “Doctor Rutherford, I’m grateful for the room upstairs, but
I wish to share it – “

  
“The cot is fine.” He swallowed. “I give you leave to call me Jed.” His raspy
voice withered around his name, as if he wasn’t sure he liked the sound of it.

  
“Oh,
likewise, call me Hannah. Doctor Sutton is too formal.” Her lips curled. She
didn’t need to remind him he’d avoided addressing her with a professional title.
Sometimes she didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.
Small steps,
she told herself.
Baby
steps.

  
Hannah didn’t dare ask him about
the tintypes on the bureau in her bedroom. The dust-streaked photos from his
previous life spoke of hardship and duty. Soldiers laden with bowie knives,
blanket rolls, box knapsacks, and canteens stared blankly at the camera in the
photographs. There were notes on the backsides: “My medical corps” and “5
^th
regiment”, or simply a name of a colleague or patient.

  
She’d also run across haunting photos
of soldiers with missing limbs, carefully stacked in the top drawer. Hannah had
seen such images during her training, but these were likely the cases
Rutherford knew intimately. He’d documented the devastating effects of the minie
balls, soft lead bullets that distorted on contact with flesh to create large
entrance and exit wounds. These tore and mangled tissue and shattered bones, making
amputation necessary because infection risk was high. Sacrifice of arms and legs
had saved countless lives, but those lives would never be what they should have
been.

  
Hannah closed her eyes and
shuddered. The war left so much devastation.

 
She came back to the table when Jed’s
voice broke through her dreary thoughts. He was saying something about a
wedding. Her eyes searched his face. He was nursing his coffee and avoiding her
eyes.

 
  
“Pardon me, Doctor. Of what do you
speak?”

  
He smiled wryly. “Ned Kingman’s getting
married today, in an hour. Cal Easton beat me out for best man. Hard to believe,
but anyway, we’re invited,” Jed muttered gruffly. “It’s a way for you to meet
people,” he added. His blue eyes stared blankly at a speck on the wall.

  
 
Her eyes widened, but she suppressed her
pleasure at being asked to accompany him to such a special event. “You might
have given me more notice.” She rose and yanked at the loose ties on her blue
apron, ripping it from around her slim waist.

 
 
Jed didn’t reply, so she turned to face the sink where she’d piled dirty
plates. “Who’s Ned Kingman?”

  
“War veteran. He manages accounts
at the Mineral Creek ranch.”

  
“Oh,” she shot over her shoulder,
“he’s marrying someone you know?”

  
“Ned plucked our spinster
schoolteacher, Geneva Grayson. You’ll like her. She’s a lot like you.”

  
The thrill she felt at being asked
to the wedding faded. “I’m not a schoolmarm, so you must mean the spinster
part,” Hannah bit off.

  
A muscle tensed along his jaw. “Geneva
isn’t at all what you’d expect. She’s pretty, smart, practical, loyal,
hardheaded but kindhearted. A crack shot. Uncommon eyes. She’ll be a fine wife,
and any man would be lucky to marry her.”

  
Hannah turned to face him and
smiled.
He wouldn’t be asking her to meet
the town if he were serious about his plan to send her off in four days, would
he?
“Well then, they’ll share a good life.”

  
He nodded. “Bound to . . . Ned’s
an eager groom. He’s been courting her for the better part of a year.”

  
Hannah swallowed. “Excuse me, I need
to dress and repair my hair.”
 
Hannah wiped her hands on a towel and headed for the stairs.

*
      
*
     
*

  
Hannah wore her best cream cotton
dress with lace overlay. Her dark hair was twisted into a French braid and
pinned under in a fashionable coif. Jed’s blue eyes widened in approval, and
Hannah was equally pleased with his attire – a clean white cotton shirt
with gray vest and wool pants. He wore a dark Stetson hat to match boots
polished to a black shine. Hannah thought he could pass as
going-to-Sunday-meeting cowboy, right down to the damp ends of his sun-streaked
brown hair touching lightly at his collar.

  
“Doctor Sutton.” His voice hitched
as if he were trying to catch his breath. He offered his arm. Her smile
brightened, and she slipped her hand into the crook.

  
“Doctor Rutherford.” She mocked
seriousness as they stepped out the door and walked through puddles of sunshine
splattered between buildings, to the little church on the other side of the town.

 
 
He jerked a thumb in the direction of the church. “We don’t have call
for fancy balls or afternoon teas.”

  
She shook her head. “That suits
me. I’m partial to an occasional modest social with close friends and family.”

  
He smiled.

  
“You look beautiful.”

  
His words knocked the breath out
of her. The man wasn’t what she’d expected. At times he was normally hard and
coarse and harsh, but today he was bright and sincere and gentlemanly. Above it
all, his heart was reflected in those blue eyes, shining warm and deep. They
reminded her of the sky on a summer day, holding wide dreams she had no right
to ponder but relished in this unguarded moment anyway.

  
“You clean up nice yourself,” she
choked, and her cheeks reddened. She forced herself not to stare. Uh, you’ll
have to help me with the names and faces,” Hannah put forth.

  
“No problem. The groom is Ned, and
the bride is Geneva. You’ll meet the rest of the Easton clan. You already know
the sheriff, Roy. His older brother, Cal, runs the Mineral Creek Ranch, and
he’ll be Ned’s best man. He’s tall like his brother, and his word is better
than a handshake. Cal’s wife is Sarah. You’ll recognize her because she’ll be
carrying a month-old baby named Thomas.” He winked. “Yes, I delivered him.”

  
Hannah’s lips curved up. “Sounds
like good people.”

  
“The best. Sarah’s blond little
sister is Emily. Roy dotes on her like crazy. Sarah and Emily were orphan
sisters, and the Eastons took them in.”

  
“That’s very fine,” she whispered.

  
He cleared his throat. “And you
know the Watkins clan, from the store.”

  
She nodded and cast a sidelong
glance, studying him beneath lowered lashes. “I also know the Wrights from the
bank.”

  
“Yes. They’ll be there, and --“

  
“Doc!” A strange voice hailed them,
stopping them in their tracks.

  
Jed and Hannah turned in unison to
see a figure approaching from a side street.

  
Jed touched his hat brim as the
stout man approached like a ship coming over the horizon. “John. On your way to
the wedding?” The men shook hands.

  
“Yes I am, and Nelda Rose will be
joining me right soon.” The man was wearing his Sunday best, and his hair was
clumped in combed lines above his broad freckled face.

  
Jed cocked his head toward Hannah.
“John, this is Doctor Hannah Sutton. Hannah, this is John Hawkins. Mr. Hawkins
owns the hotel. He runs it with his lovely wife, Nelda Rose. She plays the
piano for visitors in the parlor.”

  
“Pleased to meet you.” Hannah stuck
out a hand after recovering from the stricken look she’d seen as it flashed across
John Hawkins face. The man, who still looked like he’d seen a ghost, pumped her
hand with an iron grip.

 
  
“I heard you’re Doc’s new partner,
Doctor Hannah! Is it all right to say Doctor Hannah? It’s what folks are
calling you.”

  
Hannah was pleased to hear the now-familiar
moniker. “I like that. Thank you.”

  
“No use bothering with a last
name! A lucky man’s going to change yours soon enough.”

  
Hannah felt blood rush to her
cheeks. “Oh, I-I have no time for such pursuits.”

  
John Hawkins’ nervous laugh was
low and hearty. “You don’t need time. You’ll get a bushel of offers at your
door.”

  
Jed moved impatiently and kicked
at the dirt. “We better get a move on, or we’ll miss the fanfare and vows.”

  
“Right. I’ll see you there. I have
to stop at the store first.” Hawkins adjusted his hat and moved away.

  
Jed latched onto Hannah’s arm and
herded her across the street to the little church. She looked down at the hem
of her dress. It had turned brown from the street dust.

 
 
Benches dragged from the school were
lined up outside for a reception. They entered and took a seat in a middle pew.
Hannah whacked at the bottom of her skirt.

  
“What are you doing?” Jed’s low
voice rumbled.

  
“Shaking dirt off my skirt.”

 
 
“Dirt is your new friend. Get used to it, but don’t bring it into the
surgery.”

  
After a few minutes the doors
closed and an older than usual couple walked to the front of the congregation.
Hannah saw a minister appear from a side door. The ritual commenced, and it
lasted only ten minutes. The bride cried after she repeated her vows.

  
“They have a sweet story,” Jed
whispered. “I pulled a bullet from Ned’s leg.” His voice was hoarse.

  
“Come on,” he jumped up at the end
of the ceremony. “Let’s get to the front of the line so we can get through and
leave early, if we have to, of course.”

  
“It’s ok. I don’t mind. Really. I
like meeting new people.” She couldn’t figure what he thought he’d rescue her from;
maybe he was trying to save the town from thinking she’d become be a permanent
citizen, but then why drag her to the wedding in the first place? After all, the
job was about getting to know people, and their lives. Hannah had always enjoyed
delving into the whole person -- and that included Doc Rutherford . . . if she
could pull down the wall he put up to shield himself from authentic feelings.

  
They moved through the door,
hugged the bride and groom, and shook hands with the best man, Cal, and his
wife, Sarah, and the minister. As they edged down the line Jed formally introduced
“Doctor Hannah Sutton”, and she received a warm clutch and curious welcome from
each guest. More importantly, she observed the respect shown to Jed. It seemed
he’d touched nearly every life in some way; the truth about his position in the
community shone in young and old eyes alike. Finally, after a man with scars on
his hands thanked Jed, she jokingly asked her colleague if he’d be turning
water into wine. He laughed, deeply, and she realized it was for the first time
since she’d met him.