Getting Jack back

This was not his professional plan. Dr. Jack Alexander—dedicated surgeon and humanitarian—never expected an accident would end his time in the O.R. Nor did he expect to have to abandon his aid work. Now, back in Atlanta, he’s faced with rebuilding his career…his life. And his hope for the future comes from the least likely source—the little family next door.

From the first moment he spots Sophie Connors having a water fight with her young sons, Jack is captivated. She defies all of his assumptions about family and relationships. Too bad she resists committing. Somehow he has to change her mind. Because together they may find that life doesn’t always turn out the way you planned…sometimes, it turns out even better.

Praise for Tracy Wolff!

“Wolff does an amazing job depicting Rhiannon’s fear and insecurity, as well as Shawn’s desire to help her get over both.”

—RT Book Reviews on Unguarded

“The Christmas Present is more traditional in its plot (lovers from the opposites sides of the track) but the characterization is...strong.”

—Dear Author on The Christmas Present

“Unguarded is a deeply compelling,

character driven novel.”

—Lynette’s Two Cents on Unguarded

“Wolff is an excellent writer.”

—IReadRomance.com on

The Christmas Wedding

Dear Reader,

I am so excited that Healing Dr. Alexander has finally made it to the shelves. This is my second book about doctors working to make the world a better place. Jack’s story has haunted me for years and I’m thrilled to have this chance to share it with the world.

I first got the idea for these books—and this story, in particular—when I was still in graduate school. Though I knew I wasn’t ready to write it then (too busy juggling school, teaching and a new baby) it was an idea I couldn’t let go of. So I filed it away, and when it came time to propose my latest ideas to Harlequin, I knew it was finally time for me to write this book.

Healing Dr. Alexander is a story of love and redemption, preconceived notions and second chances. My main characters, Jack and Sophie, have both had a really difficult time of it in recent years and I love the fact that, despite all their pain, mistrust and determination to go it alone, in the end they find their way to each other and their happily-ever-after. It isn’t an easy road—with their pasts and their baggage, trusting in something as nebulous as love is about as easy as going for a root canal without anesthetic. But somehow they manage it, and I’m so glad they do. Putting the end on this story and giving these two the future they both richly deserve was one of the most satisfying things I’ve done in a very long time. I hope, when you get to the end, you’ll agree.

Thanks so much for picking up Healing Dr. Alexander and giving Jack and Sophie a chance. I love hearing from my readers via email at tracy@tracywolff.com or on my blog, www.tracywolff.blogspot.com.

Happy reading,

Tracy Wolff

Healing Dr. Alexander

Tracy Wolff

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Tracy Wolff collects books, English degrees and lipsticks, and has been known to forget where—and sometimes who—she is when immersed in a great novel. At six, she wrote her first short story—something with a rainbow and a prince—and at seven, she ventured into the wonderful world of girls’ lit with her first Judy Blume novel. By ten, she’d read everything in the young-adult and classics sections of her local bookstore, so in desperation her mom started her on romance novels. And from the first page of the first book, Tracy knew she’d found her lifelong love. Tracy lives in Texas with her husband and three sons, where she pens romance novels and teaches writing at her local community college.

For my husband.

Love,

Tracy

Contents

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

PROLOGUE

“DR. ALEXANDER, now!”

The panic in the head nurse’s voice barely penetrated Jack Alexander’s concentration as he searched for the bleeder that, if not stopped, would claim his patient’s life. The top of the damn artery had started to roll back up the leg and he was having a difficult time finding it amidst all the blood.

“Dr. Alexander!” Becca’s shrill voice called his name a second time.

“Whatever it is, it’s going to have to wait!” he said, not taking his eyes from the teenage boy on the gurney in front of him. “I’ve only got a couple of minutes here or I’m going to lose him.”

The clinic didn’t have enough blood stored to make up for what was currently being pumped out of the poor kid. And while there was a line of people hundreds deep outside the clinic, most of the Somali patients were too close to starvation to afford the blood loss that came with donating. No, if this boy had any chance of survival at all, Jack had to find the top half of the shorn artery. Now.

“They want to talk to whoever’s in charge. I told them you were in surgery. They didn’t care.”

“Who?” he asked, distractedly. Then turning to Ruth, the nurse who was assisting him, he barked, “Stretch his leg out as far as you can. I’ve got to dig for it.” It was times like these that he missed his fully equipped operating room back in the States. Performing surgery in an ill-equipped tent in Somalia might have been his calling, but in moments like this it was also a horror.

“The Shahab,” Becca told him, her voice low and urgent and frightened. That got his attention.

“They’re here?” he demanded, even as he dug deeper into his patient’s leg. He was deadly aware of the moments that kept ticking by. In another ninety seconds this whole situation was going to be moot because the teenager on the table in front of him would be dead. Damn it. He glanced down at the kid’s face. He couldn’t have been more than fourteen or fifteen. Far too young to die.

“They’re outside. They want supplies.”

“We just gave them stuff last week,” he said, following the path the artery had taken, his gloved fingers slipping. Thank God they’d had enough anesthesia to knock the kid out—this time. But if they gave the Somali warlords any more supplies, they wouldn’t have enough for the next emergency. The next shipment from For the Children wasn’t expected for at least three more weeks. “Tell them we don’t have anything left to share.”

“I did. They aren’t listening.”

The panic in her voice finally got through to him, but there was nothing he could do about it. Not then, as his fingers finally brushed against the ragged edge of the severed artery. “Stay here,” he told her as he twisted his arm and shoved his hand a little deeper. “I’ll take care of them when I’m done with this surgery.”

“I don’t think they’re going to wait.”

“They’re going to have to,” he snapped, “because I’m not letting this kid go.” He finally got hold of the artery and pinched it tightly between his thumb and forefinger. “Get the clamp ready, Ruth.”

She already had the surgical clamp in her hand, and extended toward him. He tugged on the artery, not bothering to be gentle. The boy was going to feel like hell when the anesthesia wore off, but at least now he actually had a chance of waking up. Here, now, that was all the hope Jack could offer him.

The knowledge grated his insides raw, but he couldn’t afford to dwell on it. Not right now.

He finally got the artery back down where he could see it, and within seconds had it clamped off, the steady pulsing of blood finally stopped. “Okay, I need the sutures,” he told Ruth. The kid was out of immediate danger, but now came the delicate process of mending the artery. “Fin Dr. Alexander?” he heard the gruff words behind him.

“Am shi!” he shouted at the rebels to get out. This might not be a sterile OR to start with, but that didn’t mean he wanted them tracking in God only knew what kind of germs while his patient’s leg was wide open.

Even as he yelled, he hadn’t turned around. There wasn’t time to be distracted. His nimble hands began weaving the ragged edges of the artery back together. “Get the last pint of O negative,” he told Ruth. “We’ve got to get it in him, quick.”

“Not so fast,” said Mussa, the leader of the rebels. “Nobody gets anything until we have what we came for.”

There was the unmistakable sound of a gun being cocked, and Jack finally glanced up from what he was doing in time to see his nurse’s face, livid with fear. “Ruth,” he told her with firm authority, refusing to let her drown in her own panic. “Go get the blood.” If he could get her away from the rebels, it was one less person for them to hurt.

A gunshot rang out, slamming into the dirt floor near the foot of the hospital gurney even as he tensed for impact. “Damn it!” he shouted. “We’ve got oxygen going in here. You’re going to blow us all up if you’re not careful.”

A bunch of muttered words in Arabic followed his exclamation, and then one of the soldiers—who wasn’t any older than the boy he was currently working on—strode over to the table, shut off the gas that was flowing.

“What the hell are you doing?” Jack exploded, only half lunging over the table at him. The only thing that kept him from fully going after the guy was that he couldn’t afford to stop working. Not now. “Turn that back on!”

There was no response. Jack’s attention and his fingers flew over the torn artery, determined to finish as quickly as possible. His patient wouldn’t die without the oxygen, but it wasn’t optimum, either. Not like anything here was, but still… “Look, let me finish what I’m doing and then we can talk about this,” he said in the most conciliatory tone he could manage. Which wasn’t really, but it was better than swearing at them—or hitting them—both of which he wanted to do. Both of which might mean the difference between life and death for his patient.

The soldier pulled out a pistol, cocked it, and pointed it straight at Jack. “We want to talk now.”

“I’m almost finished, damn it. If I stop now, he’ll lose his leg.”

The man behind him—obviously the leader—laughed. “What does it matter to me if he loses his leg? I need supplies and don’t have time to waste.”

Jack swore again. “Fine, Ruth and Becca will take you back. You can—” He broke off as another shot rang out, this time mere inches from his feet.

“We want you.” He paused for emphasis before continuing. “Our general believes you were not as generous last time as you could have been.”

Anger ripped through Jack. He’d turned over half of his supplies to the bastards the last time they’d been here, so many that he’d all but crippled the clinic. It was a bitter pill to swallow at the best of times—and this was far from the best of times. Still, the alternative was having them ransack the place, destroying whatever they didn’t want. Or worse, having them make life so awful here that For the Children would have to pull out altogether. As it was, they were one of a very few relief clinics that had been allowed into the country to begin with.

While it was true the clinic could help more people if they got to keep all the supplies they received each month, at the same time, how many people would die if they weren’t here to help at all? It was a trade-off that hurt him deeply, but one he’d learned to live with through the years. In this, Somalia was no different from Eritrea or Chechnya or Haiti.

Tamping down on the resentment and fury that were ravaging him from the inside, he muttered, “Fine, whatever. I’m almost done.” He kept working even as he fumed. Another couple of minutes and it would be complete. The other doctor on staff could close the wound up.

“Now!” the leader said. And this time he was the one walking around the table, pointing a gun at Jack.

“Okay, okay.” He was almost finished, almost—

This time when the soldier fired three times, Jack didn’t even flinch, expecting the bullets to slam into the ground once again. His adrenaline was so high that it took him a full thirty seconds to comprehend that these shots hadn’t been fired at the dirt. Even then he didn’t understand, even then he didn’t feel anything until his patient’s artery began, once again, to spurt blood.

He went to stop it, tried to clamp the newly severed ends, but his fingers wouldn’t respond. They wouldn’t do what he needed them to do. And that’s when he finally understood. They hadn’t just shot his patient. They’d shot him, as well.

CHAPTER ONE

HE NEEDED TO get out of the car. Jack knew it, just as he knew his best and oldest friend, Dr. Amanda Jacobs, was waiting for him inside the run-down clinic. He’d been due to meet her here two hours ago, but somehow he’d found a million reasons to be late. Lingering over a lunch he didn’t want and couldn’t bring himself to eat, filling the rental car up with gas, exploring websites about sightseeing in Atlanta, though he had no desire to actually visit the place. Anything and everything to keep him from this parking lot, this moment, this decision he wasn’t ready to make.

Not that it was a done deal, he reassured himself as he finally reached for the door handle. He hadn’t agreed to anything. He was here to see his friend, to take a look around. Checking out the clinic didn’t mean he was promising anything. To Amanda or himself. It proved he was interested in what his friend had been getting up to.

Still, the walk to the front door of the clinic was a long one. And not just because of the bowling ball in his stomach. Both his leg and his hand ached from where he’d been shot two months before; Atlanta’s humidity exacerbating the still recovering tendons.

Which brought up the question he’d been asking himself ever since his plane had landed the night before. What was he doing here? His doctor was in Boston. His physical therapist was in Boston. His family was in Boston. And yet here he was, in Atlanta, checking out a clinic he had absolutely no interest in working in.

This whole trip was stupid. A joke. He didn’t belong here any more than he belonged in the fancy family practice his father had gotten him an interview at in Boston last week. He hadn’t been interested in that job, either, but his father had refused to take no for an answer. Dealing with sniffles and high blood pressure was a long way from being Chief of Thoracic Surgery at John Hopkins, but it was better than “scrabbling away in that pathetic little hovel in Africa,” as the elder Jack Alexander liked to say.

The casual cruelty, and inherent snobbery, of his father’s words was what made Jack dial up Amanda in the first place, then take her up on her frequently issued invitation to come see the newest project she was involved in.

Atlanta felt too foreign, too strange, and that was even before he took into account his ridiculous feelings for Amanda. Feelings that wouldn’t go away, no matter how hopeless they were.

And they were hopeless, he reminded himself viciously. They’d been friends for well over a decade—ever since they’d met as first years at Harvard Medical School—and though he’d been in love with her since they’d duked it out for the top spot in the program, she’d never seen him as anything more than a pal. And now she was married—married—to another of Jack’s closest buddies and any tiny hope he’d held on to that they might one day be together had been officially destroyed.

He closed his eyes, took a deep breath. Started to head to the car. No, he didn’t belong here. But that was the problem, wasn’t it? He didn’t belong anywhere. Not anymore. Not like he used to. These days he was a shell of his former self, one who could barely hold a stethoscope steady let alone a scalpel.

Jack cut off the familiar thought as he forced himself to turn back around and step into the clinic. He let the cracked glass door with its iron burglar bars swing shut behind him. The pity party was getting old. Especially since he was the only one at the table.Sick of himself, and the grinding pain he couldn’t escape no matter how many exercises he did, he tried to distract himself by looking around. Analyzing the surroundings.

There wasn’t much to analyze. The waiting room was large and spare, its walls painted with what he guessed had once been cream, but was now more of a dingy yellow splashed with stains. People sat on folding chairs, crammed into every available space, while a couple of forlorn plants—ones that had definitely seen better days—sat in the front corner of the room next to a high counter. Behind it, a large, African-American woman worked on a computer, several charts stacked in front of her. It all reminded him a lot more of his tent clinic in Somalia than the private practice his family was trying to force him to join.

To the woman’s left was a small sliding-glass window. There were about a dozen people lined up in front of it, all bedraggled and clearly feeling sick and miserable. Nothing compared to the patients he’d seen in Somalia, but still it was obvious these people needed help.

He felt that old familiar stirring inside of him, the one that demanded he roll up his sleeves and pitch in. This was what he did. What he was good at.

He beat the urge back down. This was what he had done. What he had been good at. These days, he could barely dress himself let alone practice medicine.

Despite the fact that the clinic was overcrowded, it was obviously efficiently run. Though the line of people was growing, they were being rapidly signed in and triaged. Behind the window, he could see a nurse taking temperatures even as she typed notes into a computer.

Not that he was surprised. Amanda could work anywhere, could practice medicine in the middle of war zones and natural disasters without blinking an eye. But she demanded efficiency of everyone around her—or at least she did when she wasn’t drowning in sorrow.

Seeing the way this clinic ran like clockwork, convinced him even more that he’d made the right decision all those months ago. Getting her out of Africa so she could deal with the loss of her child and regain her health, had been exactly the right thing to do. Even if, in doing so, he had lost her forever.

The loss was bittersweet, especially now that he could see that she really had found herself again here in this run-down, little clinic in Atlanta. He’d sent her out of Somalia a year ago, so burned out and run-down he was afraid she would work herself to death. He’d told her to take a vacation. Instead, she’d ended up here.

And now, somehow, so had he.

Not that he was planning on getting involved, he assured himself. He was just here to see an old friend, to see for himself that she really was okay and to assure her the same thing about him. He’d take her and Simon to dinner later that evening. Tell a few stories, crack a few jokes, and then catch the first flight back to Massachusetts in the morning. It would be easy, so easy that even he couldn’t screw it up.

Now that he had a plan, Jack straightened his shoulders.

Flexed his already cramping hand.

Made sure his I’m-in-control-and-master-of-my-own-destiny mask was firmly in place, then headed toward the front of the waiting room.

He figured his best bet was the woman behind the computer because, as he’d been standing here thinking, the line at the small window had only gotten longer. So he leaned on the high counter, hoping if he took some weight off his leg it would stop throbbing quite so badly. He smiled at the woman.

“I’m here to—”

“The line starts over there.” She pointed at the window without ever looking away from the computer.

“I can see that. However, I want to talk to—”

“Over. There.” The finger jabbed at the air for emphasis, but the woman still didn’t look at him.

“Again. I see the window. However, I’m a friend of—”

She did look at him then, her eyebrows pulled low over her eyes and her mouth curled downward. “I don’t actually care if you’re friends with the surgeon general, the president of the United States and Denzel Washington. The line starts over there.” Again she stabbed a finger in the direction of the window, than grunted as she reached for another file and began inputting its content into the computer.

Jack stared at her for a few moments, then turned to look at the line she was directing him to. It had grown exponentially in the past five minutes, efficient nurses or not. His leg throbbed, his hand ached and the last thing he wanted to do was to stand around for the next hour while he waited on a chance to see Amanda.

Maybe it wasn’t meant to be, he told himself as he pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and flipped through his contacts until he found her cell number. He’d call Amanda and if she didn’t pick up—and she probably wouldn’t as she was more than likely with a patient—he’d call it a day. After all, he’d tried his best. He’d shown up, talked to the office manager, had tried to explain who he was. It wasn’t his fault that she wouldn’t listen.

Ignoring the voice in his head that told him he was being a coward and taking the easy way out, Jack listened to Amanda’s voice mail greeting and left a brief message letting her know that he was in the waiting room. Then he headed for the door, doing his best to justify the fact that he was—despite his good intentions—running away.

He assured himself that he wasn’t afraid of touring this little, low-income clinic. It was simply that he had better things to do. Like staring at the ceiling of his hotel room…

“Jack!” Amanda’s voice rang through the waiting room, foiling his escape. He froze, his hand on the door handle. “Where are you going?”

He turned to see her barreling through the door that separated the waiting room from the rest of the clinic. Then she was hurtling herself into his arms and his only choice was to brace himself with his good leg and catch her or let her take them both to the floor.

“Hey! Where’s the fire?” he asked, even as he wrapped his arms around her in a huge bear hug.

“I’m so glad you’re here!” she said, stretching up on tiptoes to kiss his cheek before pulling away. “I’ve missed you. And you have perfect timing. My shift just ended.”

He swallowed the sudden lump in his throat and smiled down at her. “I’ve missed you, too. Although Atlanta seems to be agreeing with you.”

“It really does,” she said, blushing a little.

“I can tell.” She barely looked like the same woman he’d banished from Africa all those months ago. The sparkle was back in her silver eyes, the shine back in her short, blonde hair. Her skin glowed and her smile was wide and unfettered. Her time here in Atlanta—and with Simon—had obviously been good for her.

He ignored the lingering pain that awareness caused, focusing instead on the sweet realization that Amanda really was okay. That was enough, more than enough, to make up for any hurt he might be feeling.

“I’m so glad you came,” she told him, giving him another quick hug. “I’ve been waiting for you to get here forever.”

“I’m sorry I’m late. I got…” His voice trailed off, his excuses drying up as surely as the deserts of North Africa. He never had been able to lie worth a damn, especially not to Amanda.

“No excuses,” she told him, reaching for his hand. “You’re here now. That’s what’s important.”

He watched as she examined the still raw scars on his hand. Scars where the bullet went in. Scars from where the doctors at the American University of Cairo had struggled to save his hand. Even more scars from the three operations in Boston to repair as much of the tendon damage as possible. Two top surgeons had collaborated on his case—one a friend of his father’s and one a friend of his—but even their expertise hadn’t been enough to help him regain full mobility.

In time, with intensive physical therapy, he’d once again be able to use his right hand to open bottle caps or button small buttons or to do most of the little day-to-day things he’d taken for granted for so much of his life. But no matter how much physical therapy he did, no matter how many exercise reps he forced himself to complete, he would never again hold a scalpel.

Would never again be able to operate.

He could see the knowledge in Amanda’s eyes, feel her pity in the soft caress of her fingers over his, and it embarrassed him. Shamed him.

He quickly pulled his hand from her grasp, hating how his inability to perform surgery made him feel like half a man—maybe even less. No wonder he’d never been able to compete with Simon.

“Does it still hurt?” she asked softly, ignoring the No Trespassing signs he’d hastily thrown up. But then, a decade and a half of friendship gave her that privilege. Especially since the last time they’d seen each other had ended up with him drugging her so that Simon could get her out of Africa and back to America where she could get the rest she needed. Next to that, a few questions seemed well within the boundaries of friendship.

“Not really,” he prevaricated as he curled the hand in question into a fist.

“Liar.” He didn’t respond and Amanda sighed, linking her right arm with his left one. “But I won’t tell. To everyone else you can be the same old indestructible Jack.”

Indestructible. He liked the sound of that. If only it were true.

“So, show me this clinic of yours,” he told her, not even trying to hide his desperation to change the subject. “I’ve been looking forward to seeing what you’ve been up to.”

After giving him another long look—one that told him she still knew him better than anyone else on earth—Amanda led him to the back of the clinic. And into another layer of hell.

CHAPTER TWO

IT HAD BEEN two months since he’d been in a medical establishment as anything but a patient.

Two months since anyone had called him doctor and meant it.

Two months since he’d felt anything but useless.

He knew Amanda had brought him here so that he could see there was life after surgery, life after Africa, but it wasn’t working. As she took him by the exam rooms, introduced him to the clinic staff, stopped and talked to a few patients she obviously knew, he only felt worse. On one hand, everything had changed. On the other, nothing had and he was stuck in the middle trying to find a spot for himself when the only place where he wanted to be, was no longer an option for him.

“So, what do you think?” Amanda asked as they wound up the tour in the hallway outside the exam rooms.

“It’s great,” he told her, meaning it. The clinic, while not wasting money for cosmetic changes, had top of the line equipment and a staff that appeared very well-trained. “You look like you’ve finally found your place.”

“I have.” This time, when she smiled, contentment radiated from her. “We do good work here.”

“I wouldn’t expect anything less.”

Amanda was a hell of a doctor and she wouldn’t get involved in any establishment that wasn’t top-notch. At the thought, For the Children, the organization that funded his clinic in Somali, flashed into his mind. They were a fantastic organization to work for and after two months away, he missed them. Missed practicing medicine. At the same time, though, returning to Africa, where he’d been shot, made him uneasy. Oh, he would never admit it to anyone, but he was beginning to think that his time in Africa was as finished as Amanda’s was. The idea filled him with sadness, with more knowledge of how useless he had become.

He shook the uneasiness off, refused to give in to it. So what if he was aimless, directionless, for the first time in his life. Parading his insecurities in front of Amanda was the last thing he wanted to do.

“So, can I buy you a late lunch?” he asked her, glancing at his watch. “I want to take you and Simon to dinner tonight, as well.”

“Actually, we were hoping to have you over to the house tonight. Simon’s cooking.”

Of course he was, as Amanda could scorch water. His stomach tightened a little at the idea of seeing the two of them ensconced together in domestic bliss, but it wasn’t like he hadn’t known it was coming. He was the one who had emailed Simon, after all. Who had brought him back into Amanda’s life.

Which was a good thing, he told himself viciously. The other man had saved her, brought her back to herself after the devastating death of their daughter. Seeing her with him again after all these years was fine. Better than fine, when it meant she was whole and happy and healthy.

“Sure. That’d be great.” He added an extra-large grin, so she’d know he meant it.

“Fantastic. And I wish you’d reconsider staying with us.” She shot him a reproving look. “We have plenty of room.”

Yeah, well, that was where he drew the line. Coming here, making sure she was okay, was one thing. Torturing himself with the knowledge that the woman he’d loved for a decade was down the hall in bed with another man? Call him crazy, but he wasn’t that big of a masochist.

“I’m great at the hotel. Honest. Besides, I have to leave for the airport really early in the morning. I don’t want to disturb you.”

“Airport?” she asked in dismay. “You just got to town last night.”

“I know, but I can’t stay. I have a physical-therapy appointment in Boston on Thursday. I can’t miss it.”

“We have physical therapists here in Atlanta, you know.”

He ignored the cute little pout her mouth had worked itself into. “Yes, but I don’t live in Atlanta. My doctors are in Boston.”

“Boston, Shmoston. You’re not happy there. I know you’re not.”

He sighed, ran a hand through his hair. Resisted the urge to tell her that he didn’t have it in him to be happy anywhere. But then he’d sound like the pathetic loser he was, and call him vain, but he wasn’t up for any more sympathy.

Not sure what to say, he finally settled on part of the truth. “I’m tired, Amanda. I don’t have it in me to try to be someplace new right now. And with the shape my hand is in…I can’t be a doctor right now. I can’t—”

“Bullshit.”

“Excuse me?” He wouldn’t have been as shocked if she’d punched him. Amanda had been circling around him for weeks.

“I said, you’re spouting bullshit.” She grabbed his arm and yanked him into a small supply closet that he assumed—from the desk and diplomas on the wall—was serving double-duty as her office. “You aren’t tired. You’re scared and you’re drowning in self-pity.”

“You’re one to talk.” The words were out before he could stop them. He saw them hit her, saw their impact, and wished he could take them back. Angry as he was, he had no right to take it out on Amanda. Not when she’d already suffered so much.

But she was nodding, eyes clear and shoulders straight. “Exactly. I am one to talk. Because I was where you are not too long ago.” Her voice was harsh and direct now, containing none of the sweetness he’d been hearing from her for weeks. It was almost a relief to have her back to normal—somehow it made him feel more like a functioning member of society.

“You did your tough love thing for me not that long ago. Now it’s time for me to return the favor.”

“It’s not the same thing. I’m going to be fine. I just need…” He didn’t know what he needed, besides the full use of his hand back. Without that, he had nothing.

“You need a change of scenery.”

“I’ve already got that. Boston is a far cry from Somalia.”

“You’ve never been able to breathe in Boston. We both know that. Your dad has probably already got you signed up to interview at some prestigious family practice—” She broke off when she saw his face. “Are you kidding me, Jack? You really want to take care of women who spend more on plastic surgery in a year than it would take to run this clinic?”

“You’re over-simplifying things.”

“And you’re making them too complicated. Come to Atlanta for a few months, hang out with Simon and me. Do your physical therapy here, and then, when you’re ready, when you’re healed, you can make a better decision.”

“I can do all that in Boston.” Admittedly, Amanda wasn’t in Boston, but that wasn’t exactly a deterrent. He totally accepted that she was married to Simon—was happy, in fact, that things had worked out so well for her. That didn’t mean he was dying to spend every day with what he couldn’t have right in front of him.

“Yeah, but here you won’t have your family making you nuts all the time.”

“No, I’ll have you poking and prodding at me.”

“Someone needs to—”

“Doctor Jacobs!” The shout sounded from the hallway outside Amanda’s closed door and was followed quickly by the slap of footsteps against the linoleum floor.

Jack threw open the door to see the triage nurse from the waiting room. “Dr. Zilker said to get you,” she said breathlessly. “There’s been a shooting. It’s bad.”

“Which room?” demanded Amanda, already running to the front of the clinic.

“We’ve got him in exam-room one.”

Jack followed her, adrenaline pumping through his system despite himself. “Who’s Zilker?”

“One of our residents. He’s good, but he’s still new—” She broke off as they entered the exam room and Jack knew why. There was blood everywhere.

For a second, he flashed back to that operating room in Somalia. The one where he’d lost both his patient and his ability to perform surgery. His bum leg shook and he was almost certain he was going to land on his ass.

But then Amanda took control, demanding vitals as she slipped on a pair of gloves before diving right into the mess. Somehow the normalcy of being in the middle of an emergency with Amanda steadied him, had him striding forward and pulling on a pair of gloves, as well. He struggled a little with the right one, but refused to let it back him off.

“What have we got?” he demanded of the resident, who was standing at the front of the bed, his face as white as the sheets on the bed.

His voice must have carried enough authority to make up for the fact that he was a stranger because Zilker didn’t hesitate as he stuttered out, “Male, age eighteen to twenty. Multiple gunshot wounds to the chest, pelvis, upper thigh. Blood pressure is seventy over forty and falling…”

The world narrowed the way it always did for him in situations like these. “Do you have blood?” he asked Amanda.

“Yeah. Type him. And call 911,” Amanda said, as she went for the wound in the kid’s pelvis.

Which left the chest wound to him. It shouldn’t come as such a surprise—after all, that was how they always worked, but it did. He looked at the gaping hole in the kid’s chest, and wished for his old dexterity. For his ability to get in there and stitch things up.

So great was the longing that he almost walked away, had actually taken a step back when Amanda looked up and pinned him with silver eyes made steely with determination. “Do you think he cares about your hand, Jack?” she snapped at him. “Get in there, get the bleeding stopped enough that the ambulance can transport him to County for surgery or he’s going to die. I’ve got a mess down here. If I try to leave it, he’s going to bleed out.”

Her words, and the absolute lack of doubt she conveyed, snapped him out of it. Had him moving forward despite his fear and anger, barking out orders to the resident and two nurses standing next to him.

The next twenty minutes passed in a blur of concentration and pain as he forced his stiff hand into positions it hadn’t attempted in two very long months. Amanda worked beside him, dealing with the wounds on the kid’s lower body as he struggled to stop the bleeding in his chest long enough for the paramedics to be able to take over.

In the old days, he would have said to hell with it and started stitching the boy up, but he didn’t have the small motor skills necessary to do that anymore. So he concentrated on basic emergency triage, doing what any other family practitioner or internist would do in the same situation. It wasn’t clean, and it wasn’t pretty, but eventually the patient was stable enough to be rushed to the nearest O.R.

Before he knew it, paramedics were at the door. Stepping back, he gestured for them to take over. He and Amanda had done all they could.

Stripping off his gloves, he looked down at himself. He was covered in blood, as neither he nor Amanda had taken time to gown up. Which was fine for her, as she probably kept a spare set of clothes around here somewhere, but he looked like he’d just gotten out of a war zone. Not the best look for someone who had to walk through a hotel lobby before getting to his room to clean up.

“We have a few pairs of scrubs in the back that will probably fit you,” Amanda told him, having read his mind. “You and Lucas are about the same size.”

“Lucas?” he asked.

“My boss. Our boss, if you decide to take the job. This clinic is his baby.”

“Oh. Right.” This wasn’t Amanda’s clinic. Wouldn’t be his clinic if he decided to take a chance on Atlanta, to take a chance on this job. Which was one more strike against the idea, in his opinion. He hadn’t had to answer to anyone in a long time. After running clinics in some of the most remote places on earth for almost his entire career, the idea that he would have to step back and let someone else be in charge, grated. Big time. If he was being honest, he wasn’t sure he could work that way.

He didn’t give voice to any of his doubts, but then he didn’t have to. He and Amanda had known each other a long time.

“You’ll be fine,” she told him. “Lucas is great to work for. Even a big, bad surgeon like yourself won’t have any complaints.”

He wasn’t so sure. But instead of trying to explain himself, he simply said, “I’m not a surgeon anymore. I couldn’t even sew that kid up.” He jerked his chin toward their unconscious patient, who the paramedics were prepping for travel.

Amanda didn’t flinch, didn’t make excuses. Met his eyes straight on and said, “So what?”

He goggled at her. “Excuse me?”

“So you couldn’t sew him up. So you can’t do everything. So you’re not as damn perfect as you want to be. So what? You’re still a damn good doctor, one of the best I’ve ever seen.” Her voice was strong, firm, passionate. And pitched low enough that no one else in the room could hear what she was saying. “You saved that kid’s life.”

“He’s not safe yet. There’s a lot more work to be done on him.”

She made a sound of frustration in the back of her throat. “You know what I mean.”

“I know that if I could still use my hand properly, that kid would have a much better chance of survival than he currently does.”

“Yeah, and if you hadn’t been here, he would already be dead. I’m a damn good doctor, but I couldn’t have dealt with the chest and pelvis at the same time. So take what you can from that and move on. You did your best.”

“What if my best isn’t good enough?” he asked, hating that he sounded like a whiny little boy, but unable to stop the words from tumbling out.

Amanda sighed, then grabbed his arm and yanked him out of the room. For a long time, they didn’t say anything. They squared off in the hallway in a stare down of epic proportions.

Amanda blinked first. “What if it is good enough?” she asked. “You’ve got a gift, Jack. Surgeon or not, you can do things, see things, that no one else can.”

“There are a lot of great doctors out there, Amanda.” He gestured to her. “And in here. We know that kid would have been better off with a surgeon who had full use of his hands, too. We can debate this all day. In fact, why don’t—”

Amanda held up a hand, stopping him mid-breath. “Is working here the same as doing surgery in some fancy Boston hospital? No, of course not. But it’s still good work. Still necessary work. You never wanted that life, anyway. Driving a silver Ferrari and doing weekends on Martha’s Vineyard. That’s no more you, than it is me.”

“No, that wasn’t where I was headed in my life and it wasn’t what I miss. I was happy in Africa, doing surgery for For the Children. Was it frustrating? Yes. Were there times I wanted to quit? Absolutely. But it was good work. Important work. You’re damn right I miss it.”

“And as soon as you heal, you can go back. I know you want to, even though the rest of us would rather you didn’t. The fact of the matter is, you could so easily have died in that clinic in Somalia, Jack. You—”

“I know that.”

“Do you, really? Because I think you and your God complex have somehow managed to forget it. Another man, a weaker man, would have given in to the pain and the blood loss and those bastards who wanted you dead. But you didn’t. You’re still here. Are you hurt? Absolutely. Has your life taken a twist you weren’t ready for? No doubt. Welcome to the world of being human, Jack. That’s what happens. It’s messy and it hurts and rarely goes according to plan. But that’s okay, because it means you’re still alive. And you are, Jack, whether you wish you’d given up back there or not. So isn’t it time you started acting like it?”

He didn’t answer her. He was afraid that if he did he’d lash out at her with words no one needed to hear, let alone Amanda. It wasn’t that long ago that she’d been an emotional wreck, a couple short steps from working herself to death because she couldn’t deal with the loss of her only child.

He’d been the one lecturing her then and the fact that things had changed so completely made him feel worse. In the space of two months, his whole world had turned upside down and he didn’t know what to do about it. Every time he tried to imagine his future without surgery, every time he tried to picture himself in six months or a year or five years, he drew nothing but a blank. If he wasn’t a surgeon, if he wasn’t a doctor for For the Children, then what the hell was he?

The answer came back to him the same as it always did these days. He was nothing. Working at some low-income clinic in Atlanta wasn’t going to change all that.

Panic overwhelmed him and he started to tremble. He was on the verge of shaking apart, the emotional pain of his loss combining with the pain in his hand and leg, spreading through his whole body until he couldn’t think. Couldn’t breathe. The specter of everything he’d lost rose up inside him, paralyzing him.

On top of that, he was afraid he couldn’t hide it, especially from someone who knew him as well as Amanda. If she noticed, however, it didn’t matter, because she wasn’t letting up. “We need you, Jack.” She stepped forward and put one soft hand on his forearm. “We really need you.” What she didn’t say, but what hung in the air between them, was the fact that he needed this clinic, needed her, at least as much as it needed him.

Sensing his weakness, she pressed her advantage. “Come on, give us a month. What’s the worst that can happen?”

His heart was beating too fast and he swore he felt a panic attack coming on for the first time in his life. He tamped down on it even as her question circled around and around in his head. What was the worst that could happen? How about complete and total humiliation? Or him losing even more faith in himself and his skills?

Or, God forbid, him killing someone who could have been saved because his damn hand wouldn’t work right?

The possibilities were endless and he started to tell Amanda so, to list the number of really terrible things that could happen. But one look at her face told him she wouldn’t listen. Her mind was made up. Besides, it wasn’t like he wanted to shout out his deepest insecurities for the world—or his best friend—to hear. That had never been his style.

Instead, he looked down at his bloodstained clothes and thought of the boy they had saved. Then glanced back into the room at the ripped-up clothes and blood-soaked gauze, and at the patient who was even now being strapped to a gurney to be transported to the hospital.

Yes, he was afraid—desperately afraid—of not being able to do what needed to be done here. But he was even more afraid that if he went back home to Boston he’d end up selling out. Giving in. Becoming the kind of doctor his parents had always wanted him to be—the kind he’d always despised.

And then he knew. Even with everything that could go wrong, with all the mistakes he could make, he would still rather be here, doing something truly helpful, than sitting at home, selling out and feeling sorry for himself.

A sense of relief washed over him. His heartbeat slowed and he could breathe again. Panic subsided into a calm clarity. Working at this clinic with Amanda wouldn’t be forever—he couldn’t afford to let it be—but for now it was a million times better than the alternative.

He wadded up the gloves he was still holding and—using his good hand—lobbed them at the trash can. They soared into the center of the basket in a perfect three pointer.

Then he turned to Amanda with the closest thing to a smile he could manage. “You’re right. It’s better than Boston. Looks like you’ve got yourself a doctor.”

CHAPTER THREE

CLIMBING THE FRONT steps that led to the small house he’d rented in the same upper-middle class area of Atlanta that Amanda lived in, Jack couldn’t believe how tired he was. In Africa, he regularly worked sixteen or eighteen hour days in an effort to keep up with the never-ending patient load, while today he’d only put in half a shift—five hours—yet he was completely exhausted.

Admittedly, it was his first day on the job. And it had come after a ten-day whirlwind in which he’d packed up his necessities in Boston, moved them all to Atlanta, found a place to rent, visited various medical specialists Lucas had recommended, and started an intense, three-day-a-week course of physical therapy.

But still, he’d figured he was in better shape than this. How had two and a half months off the job turned him into such a wimp? He ignored the voice in his head that told him his weakness had a lot more to do with two bullets and three surgeries than it did the time he’d been forced to take off work.

He loosened his tie and headed into the kitchen for a glass of iced tea. Grimacing as he took a sip of the too-sweet liquid, he tried to appreciate the drink that was a hallmark of his newly adopted city. It was difficult, though, especially considering he much preferred a cold beer at the end of a long day. But, ostensibly, he was still on pain medication. The little white pills he’d been prescribed did not react well with alcohol.

Not that he was actually taking them regularly anymore. Though his doctor, his physical therapist and his own medical training all told him that he needed to keep a steady supply of the anti-inflammatory and pain medication in his bloodstream if he expected it to do its job, he couldn’t force himself to keep up with them anymore. It was stupid, he knew, but he hated the crutch. Hated the need to depend on something else—even a pill—to make himself feel better. He’d gotten through his entire adult life without having to rely on anyone or anything and damn it, he would get through this, too. Even if it killed him.

Which it wouldn’t, he assured himself as he took another long swallow of the sweet tea. After all, he didn’t completely ignore his doctor’ orders. He took the pills when he really needed them—mainly on nights when insomnia struck, because if there was one thing he hated more than depending on the medication, it was lying in bed and staring at the still unfamiliar ceiling, wondering how in the hell he had gotten himself here, to this point.

Opening the fridge, he tried to drum up some enthusiasm as he stared at the fresh produce filling nearly all the available shelves. Amanda had come over the other day, loaded down with bags from her garden and the local farmer’s market, and stocked him up. Which he appreciated. He really did. He hadn’t been very hungry lately.

Grabbing an apple, he made his way slowly through the house to the back porch. It was what had sold him on the place to begin with. Most of the house was pretty non-descript—typical rental property—except for the backyard. There was a huge porch that ran the length of the house and looked out over a garden that would fit better at a country estate than a small, city property.

Lush plants and flowers took up nearly every square inch, their eminent domain broken only by small walking paths that twisted and turned throughout the backyard. He’d explored them all his first couple of days in the house, had found a rose garden with a bench and the remnants of a vegetable garden. Maybe, if his hand came back enough, he’d start his own vegetable garden this spring.

If he was still here, that was. He might be long gone by then. Back to Boston, maybe. Or more likely, back to Somalia. Or some other war-torn country that was in such desperate need of doctors that they didn’t mind broken ones.

Uneasiness twisted in his stomach at the idea of going back to For the Children, back to another war zone where anything could happen. But Jack ignored it and settled himself on the big, comfy swing. He didn’t need to think about that now, or about anything, really. He could just sit here and relax for a while. Eat his apple and contemplate nothing more difficult than what vegetables he would plant if he was still around in a few months. Maybe some carrots. Tomatoes. He liked red peppers—

A steady stream of water came out of nowhere, hitting him square in the face before dropping a foot to scatter across his blue T-shirt, as well. It stopped for a moment, than a second stream hit him, followed so closely by a third and fourth that he was soaked before he had time to react. Jumping to his feet, he glanced around, trying to figure out where the attack was coming from. Had his sprinkler system gone insane? Was he sitting directly under a rain gutter?

He investigated the roof of the porch, then the empty blue sky above, then looked carefully around his yard.

But there was nothing, no one.

Dropping his apple core on the table next to the swing, he started to jump off the porch but then remembered his bum leg. More annoyed by that than by the fact that he was soaked, he took the steps two at a time instead. Then headed in the direction the water had come from.

He heard them before he saw them, two young voices laughing and whispering and hushing each other even as they rustled the hedge that separated his yard from his next-door neighbor’s. “Hey!” he called, making a beeline for the bushes. “Can I help you?”

At that moment, two towheaded little boys peeked their heads out of the foliage, their expressions steely and determined. It was a look reinforced by the huge water guns in their hands, though the bright colors of the guns tempered the effect. “We don’t need help from the enemy,” one told him in a tough guy voice that matched his soldier act.

“Yeah,” said the other, who was clearly younger by a few years, “We’re special forces and we’ve come to bring you in.” As he spoke, the first one leveled his water gun straight at Jack’s chest.

“The way I see it,” the boy continued. “We can do this two ways.”

“Oh, yeah?” Jack cocked an eyebrow, and decided what the hell. He could play along. Better than sitting around whining to himself about his pathetic excuse for a life. “And which two ways are those?” he asked in his own tough-guy voice. He even added a little sneer, to keep things interesting.

The boys’ eyes grew round with delight and they exchanged a quick look of triumph. But it only took the older one a second to regain his composure and add a snarl of his own to the mix. “Easy. My way or the highway.”

“Our way,” the younger one corrected him.

“Right. Our way.”

Jack grinned. He couldn’t help himself. They were adorable. Plus, it was nice to see two healthy, happy, well-nourished kids. So much better than the children he was used to interacting with. And these two were loaded with confidence, especially the older one. Jack liked it.

“You think this is funny, Punk?” the oldest one demanded, obviously taking his role seriously.

“No. Not at all.” Jack forced the smile from his face—and his voice. “I do have a question, though.”

His two assailants looked at each other, wide-eyed. Obviously, their plan hadn’t included the hostage engaging them in conversation.

It took a minute, but the younger one finally spoke. “Spit it out, scumbag. It can be your last request.”

“Well,” he said slowly, as if considering his options, even as he geared up for the fight of his life. “Can I have a few minutes? I’d like to say goodbye.” He pulled out his cell phone. “It won’t take long.”

“Geez, mister.” The older one looked disgusted as he stepped closer, gesturing emphatically with his gun. “What kind of hostage situation do you think this is? Get moving!”

“The kind where the hostage doesn’t go willingly.” Jack spun on his good leg, made a mad dash for cover at the closest tree. Then made a beeline for the water tap at the side of the house, regretting bitterly the fact that he hadn’t gotten around to buying a hose yet. But at least there was a bucket beneath it.

Using the house for cover, he twisted the tap with his good hand and waited impatiently for the bucket to fill up. When the two little dictators whipped around the corner, he was going to have a surprise waiting for them. One that, hopefully, got them as wet as they had gotten him.

* * *

HER SONS’ SHRIEKS split the air as Sophie Connors yanked the last weed out of the vegetable garden she and the boys had planted a few months before. It was doing nicely, she thought, as she sat back on her heels and surveyed the neat rows of greenery beginning to peek out of the dirt. In a couple more months they’d have a pretty good harvest to show for all the hours of planning and planting, watering and fertilizing, discussing and dreaming, that had already gone into it.

Which meant it was time for her to get a new project to work on. Nothing sprang to mind, but she knew one would come eventually. Maybe she could redecorate the boys’ rooms—they’d been obsessed with airplanes for weeks now. Or she could try those cooking classes she kept thinking about. This could totally be the year she branched out and learned how to make more than five dishes with any kind of confidence.

More little boy shrieks sounded behind her, and she rose unhurriedly to her feet. Better to let Noah and Kyle get the energy out now, before dinner and bath time, than end up chasing two naked and slippery little boys around the house right as they should be getting ready for bed.

But then the shrieks were followed by war whoops, and not all of them were in her sons’ young voices. In fact, a few of the whoops sounded distinctly masculine—deep and rumbly. Since they were followed by a bunch of laughter—and loud cries of “no surrender” from her sons, she figured she’d better go investigate. Hopefully her children hadn’t made enemies of the new neighbor quite yet. Usually it took them a week or two.

Although, judging from the sound of it, this one had a pretty decent sense of humor. Which would be a nice change of pace from the last tenant. He had had nothing but contempt for Sophie’s boys and though she’d done her best to keep them away from him, she hadn’t always succeeded. She tried to keep them in the backyard most of the time, but every once in a while they’d burst into the front. Inevitably, their escape to the front yard had always coincided with Reece’s trip to get his newspaper or take out the trash or go for his daily jog.

More shrieks sounded, these ones louder and more high-pitched than the ones that had come before. Sophie broke into a run.

By the time she got to the high hedge that separated her yard from her neighbor’s, the boys shrieks had turned to giggles. It soothed the panic that had raced through her at the sound of their distress, but still, she wasn’t going to be happy until she saw them.

Scooting through the hedge, she ignored the way the branches ripped at her old gardening T-shirt and scanned her neighbor’s yard for her sons. She didn’t see them at first and her fear roared back, but then they came flying around the house, their water guns held in clear attack mode, even as they retreated.

Amused, she watched as they dove behind a huge tree. They were small and skinny enough that she could only see their bright red-and-blue weapons. Water guns that were supposed to be in the pool bag and not in use in her neighbor’s yard.

Seconds later, the new neighbor came around the corner of the house after them. He wasn’t moving as fast as they were, but he was still booking it. In his hands was a large bucket, obviously filled with water. And it looked like he wasn’t afraid to use it.

Perhaps Noah and Kyle had finally met their match.

And what a beautiful match he was. The wet, clinging material of his blue T-shirt revealed a heavily muscled chest. His dark hair was shaggy in that way that only a really expensive hair stylist could manage and his jeans, though ripped at the knees, fit his long, muscular thighs like a second skin. She couldn’t see what color his eyes were from this distance, but she was betting they were the same blue as his shirt. And his broad smile was lighting up his entire face.

Deep inside, she responded to that smile. Even as she told her hormones to settle down and behave, that she wanted no part of this man or any other, a strange, unfamiliar heat burned deep in her stomach. Try as she did to ignore it—as she tended to do with most unwelcome things—Sophie couldn’t help wondering if a guy who looked like that, and who obviously had a decent sense of humor, was still single.

Before she could tell herself it was none of her business, the battle started up with renewed energy. Spotting her sons across the yard, the man ran toward them and was hit, full face, with double streams of water. Instead of getting angry, he laughed and continued his pursuit. But the bucket in his hands was sloshing and spilling a little bit with each uneven step.

So he was injured, or he had been. Either way, he was limping and she couldn’t help wondering how it had happened. Was he a veteran like her husband had been? And like Jeff, had he been injured in the war?

The thought made her guard drop even more, as did the way he handled it when her children leaped out from behind the tree and let him have it, lock, stock and barrel. Instead of getting mad like most people would—even when Noah nailed him in the eye—he just took the soaking. Then, when his opportunity came, he sent the water in the bucket soaring straight at them. Kyle was quicker than his older brother and managed to get out of the soak zone in time, but Noah took the water head on.

She barely suppressed a laugh at Kyle’s smirk of satisfaction and Noah’s whoop of shock—and glee—as the cold water hit him. He took off running, squishing with every step, and she knew the war was far from done.

Deciding she wanted in on the action, Sophie hurried back to her own house and turned on the hose. Then, stealthily creeping through the hedge, she snuck across the yard straight toward her boys, who were too busy taunting the neighbor to notice.

He must have seen her coming, but gave nothing away, so that when she pressed the valve on the hose nozzle and opened fire on her kids from behind, they were completely shocked.

Shrieks of delight filled the air as they whirled on her, slamming her with stream after stream of water. But they were no match for her mighty hose—or the neighbor’s refilled bucket—and soon the sounds of their surrender rang through the yard.

With a laugh, she reached forward and brushed a hand over Kyle’s sodden hair before doing the same to Noah.

“We’ll get you next time, Mom!”

“I have no doubt. You would have gotten me this time if I hadn’t had the aid of our new neighbor.” She looked at him, then realized with a jolt that she’d been wrong about the eyes. They weren’t blue. They were a rich, dark amber. She liked them, especially how this glint of amusement and mischief could coexist with that shell-shocked survivor look he, and so many veterans, wore.

Definitely a soldier, she thought, as she extended a hand toward him. “Hi, I’m Sophie Connors. Mother of these two hoodlums-in-training and your next-door neighbor. It’s nice to meet you.”

He hesitated for a second, then his hand came up to clasp hers. His grip wasn’t as firm as she would have expected from such a muscled arm, but when she glanced down and saw scars marring the skin, she understood why.

Injured hand, injured leg. This man had been through the ringer. And judging from the freshness of the scars, it had been a recent deployment and homecoming.

“I’m Jack Alexander,” he said in a deep voice that she couldn’t help liking the sound of.

“It’s nice to meet you, Jack.” She placed a hand on both of her son’s shoulders. “And these two water warriors are Noah and Kyle. Thank you so much for putting up with their troublemaking.”

He grinned, revealing even, white teeth. “They’re not troublemakers. A little high-spirited maybe, but they’re great fun to be around.”

“I think so.” She returned his smile. It was impossible not to like a man who so obviously liked her children. “Welcome to the neighborhood. If you need anything, please let me know.”

“Thanks.” He didn’t say anything else.

As the moment stretched, she gestured toward her house. “Time to come in, boys. Dinner should be almost ready.” With a little wave, she turned to go. But she’d only made it a few steps, her boys running ahead of her, before she felt compelled to turn back. “You’re welcome to come to dinner. Kind of an apology and welcoming, all in one? It’s nothing special, but if you’re interested, we’d love to have you.”

He took a little while to answer, longer than was strictly considered polite. She didn’t blame him, though. Her boys took a little getting used to and, now that she’d impulsively issued the invitation, she was aware of how it probably looked. Single mom on the prowl for hot new neighbor. Could she be more of a cliché?

Except she wasn’t on the prowl. Not even close. She felt a little sorry for him. A vet, freshly injured and back from war, trying to put his life back together. It couldn’t be easy. He deserved a home-cooked meal, one he didn’t have to put together himself.

“No strings,” she promised, holding her hands up in mock surrender. “I wanted to say thanks for putting up with my wild ones.”

He grimaced. “I wasn’t worried about strings. I’m not very good company right now, to be honest.”

“My usual dinner companions are eight and five. I love them, but they aren’t the most stimulating conversationalists in the world.”

“So the bar is low, then?”

She laughed, really liking his droll sense of humor. “Very low. Come on. It’s lasagna. Nothing fancy.”

“Homemade lasagna?” he asked, his ears perking up.

“Is there another kind?”

“What time do you want me there?”

She glanced at her watch. “Forty-five minutes? That will give me a chance to get the boys cleaned up and a salad made. Sound good?”

“Sounds great.”

“Okay, then.”

Sophie headed back for the hedge, leaning over to wind the hose as she went. And doing her best not to wonder if he was watching her leave. She hoped not. Her bottom was definitely not her best feature.

CHAPTER FOUR

EXACTLY FORTY-FIVE minutes later, Jack stood at Sophie’s door, a half gallon of ice cream in one hand and a bunch of regrets in the other. Why had he said yes? He really wasn’t up for socializing, no matter how casual it was. He was exhausted, in pain, and more than a little cranky—though he hated admitting that, as it made him feel like an overwrought toddler. And with a full day at the clinic ahead of him tomorrow, plus another damn physical-therapy appointment, he’d be better off going to bed early. Right now his job and recovery were taking all his energy. He didn’t need any more complications. This was the last thing he should be doing right now.

Yet, here he was. About to start a friendship he wasn’t the least bit certain he could keep up. He’d rung the doorbell twice, had waited more than long enough to be polite. If he wanted, he could take the melting container of ice cream and head home. After all, he’d lived up to his side of the bargain. He’d shown up, prepared to sit on a hard wooden chair and make uncomfortable small talk when all he really wanted was to be at home nursing his aching leg—the pain exacerbated by the water war.

He tried to tell himself he’d been seduced by the promise of homemade lasagna, but that wasn’t strictly true. After all, with his appetite the way it was, he probably wouldn’t be able to do the meal justice. Really, any company was better than his own. Pasting on a smile he was far from feeling, he knocked one more time to be thorough, and when there was no answer he was about to turn around and say to hell with it. But then the door flew open. This time, Sophie was the wet one, her bright purple tank top clinging to her in all the right places.

He might not be interested—in dating or in a relationship—but he’d have to be dead not to notice all those lush curves, especially when they were showcased so spectacularly. She had large, full breasts, a tiny waist and hips that his fingers itched to sink into. Her red-gold hair was piled in a messy bun and her green eyes had the same innate amusement he’d seen earlier in the yard. It was a good look on her.

“I’m sorry,” she said a little breathlessly, stepping back to let him into her home. “The boys were taking their bath and…” She trailed off with a laugh. “Let’s just say they got a little over-enthusiastic. Which, I’m sure you have no trouble imagining.”

“They were incredibly subdued when I saw them earlier,” he replied, tongue firmly in cheek. He stepped into the foyer.

“I noticed that.” She glanced down. “You brought ice cream?”

“I haven’t had a chance to pick up any wine. And I figured the boys would appreciate this more, anyway.”

“Chocolate-chip cookie dough is a particular favorite around here. You’ve already passed the cool test with your willingness to join the water fight this afternoon, but this will send you soaring through the stratosphere.”

“Thanks, I guess.” He didn’t know what else to say. He was a little wary of the way she spoke as if her kids had plans to keep him around for a while. He might be the new neighbor, but he had no intention of becoming part of the regular landscape around here. What was the point when he had less than no desire to stick around Atlanta at all?

Even more ill at ease than he’d been previously, Jack followed Sophie through a brightly colored living room filled with children’s toys into a friendly, well-lit kitchen. It was nice, not as fancy as the one at his house, but clearly used more often. The walls were a warm yellow and the counters were a dark gray granite. He liked it, especially the bay window above the sink. It was filled with colorful pots holding abundant herbs that filled the room with a rich earthy scent. It reminded him of the time he’d spent in South America.

“Is there anything I can do to help?” he asked to be polite, though he prayed she’d say no. He wanted to help, but his hand hurt from overuse and the muscles were spasming and aching so much that he figured it’d be a miracle if he could hold a fork correctly. He figured it was payback for the three physical-therapy appointments he’d missed during the course of the move.

“Actually, you could put the salad on the table,” she told him, nodding to a large wooden bowl on the counter. “I tossed it with olive oil and vinegar before it registered that you might have preferred something else.” She flushed a little. “Sorry. We don’t get a lot of company, to be honest.”

“Oil and vinegar is fine.” He used his good hand to lift the bowl and carry it to the wide table at the end of the room. “Everything smells delicious.”

“Yeah, well, lasagna’s hard to screw up.”

He laughed, despite the pain shooting up one arm and down his leg. “You sound surprised.”

“No. Relieved,” she said with her own laugh. It was a larger than life sound, one that filled the room to the brim with joy. He liked it, too. “Sometimes my cooking can be a little sketchy,” she told him. “I have a tendency to get distracted in the middle of a recipe and sometimes things take a turn for the…well, let’s call the result interesting.”

He must have looked a little alarmed because she hastened to add, “But not with Italian food. I can make spaghetti, fettuccini and lasagna with the best of them. A leftover from my days at Mama Maria’s.”

“You learned to cook in an Italian restaurant?”

“I learned to cook in an Italian foster home.” As soon as the words escaped her mouth, her eyes widened. Like she couldn’t believe what she’d told him.

He didn’t want to make her feel more uncomfortable by responding. The fact of the matter was, people often told him things they would otherwise keep to themselves. It had been that way for as long as he could remember. For whatever reason, people trusted him and, more often than not, spilled their guts. It never used to bother him, but these days it made him uneasy. Not the confidences, but the trust implicit in them. He didn’t deserve that trust, hadn’t deserved it since he stood in a Somali clinic and let a bunch of monsters kill his patient and his nurse, both of whom had been under his care. Both of whom he’d been responsible for.

Silence stretched between them, and as guilt rode him hard, he thought about breaking it with a witty comment, a funny anecdote. He had any number of tricks in his slick and charming bag. Or he could say something sincere and comforting, but that might encourage some kind of bonding moment and that was the last thing he wanted. Terrible as it seemed, he didn’t have the will or energy for any of this.

Sophie cleared her throat as she fiddled with the necklace that nestled in the hollow of her throat. “Let me get the lasagna on the table and we can eat.”

He nodded cautiously. “Sounds good. Thank you.”

Before she could say anything else, Kyle came flying into the room, Noah at his heels. “I’m going to kill you!” Sophie’s oldest son shouted as he chased his brother around the center island. “Give it back!” he shouted. “It’s mine!”

“You lost it. Finders keepers, losers weepers.”

“I didn’t lose it—you stole it. Now give it to me!”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Sophie said, putting a hand on each boys’ head to stop them. “What is going on here?”

“Kyle stole Mr. X,” Noah whined. “He knew I was looking for it and he took it.”

“That’s not true. Noah left it in my room yesterday. I was playing with it and when he saw me, he hit me.”

“You want me to hit you?” Noah sneered as he lunged at his brother. “That wasn’t a hit. That was a love tap.”

Sophie slapped a hand on Noah’s chest and moved him away a good three paces. Then turned in time to see her youngest making faces behind her back.

Jack could tell it was the last straw. Relaxing in his chair, he waited for the fireworks to begin.

* * *

IF THE GROUND opened up and swallowed her now, she’d be totally okay with it. Seriously. An earthquake fracturing a random crack down the middle of her kitchen. It would be better than this. Like it wasn’t bad enough that her kids had soaked her wounded neighbor to the skin an hour ago, now they had to start World War Twenty-Seven while he was sitting here watching? Fan-freaking-tastic.

“Give it to me,” she said holding her hand out for the action figure. She had to work hard to keep her voice level. After a week of getting up before dawn to work on arguments for the three cases she had going to court in the next couple of weeks, she was running on caffeine and adrenaline and not much else.

“But, Mom,” Kyle whined. “He left it in my room. That makes it mine.”

“No! I left it there because you distracted me. You couldn’t read your stupid baby book so I helped you. Now give it back! It’s mine.”

“Actually, it’s mine!” she told him, wiggling her fingers in a way that the boys knew meant business. Seconds later she was holding the latest cartoon villain and releasing her grip on two sulky little boys. The joys of motherhood were myriad and many, she reminded herself as she herded them to the table. Myriad and many.

Settling herself at the table, she risked a glance at the neighbor. What had possessed her to invite him over for a home-cooked meal? Yes, he’d looked a little lonely and she’d felt bad for him, but now he looked shell-shocked, and she couldn’t blame him. In the space of a couple hours, he’d been attacked by water-gun-toting maniacs, blabbered at by her at about a million miles an hour, and now he’d witnessed her children acting like…well, she wasn’t going to go there. It was a wonder he hadn’t run out screaming into the night.

An awkward silence descended on the table as she dished out the lasagna and garlic bread. Her boys were busy glaring at each other and the neighbor was pursing his lips and looking at everything but her. At first, she thought it was because he was embarrassed or annoyed, but then she realized he was trying to keep from laughing. The knowledge relaxed her immediately, and she dished up the food with a grin instead of a grimace.

“So, Jack,” she said after everyone was served. “How are you settling into the house?”

“I’m managing. It’s bigger than my last place so I’m going to have to do some shopping to fill it up.”

Before she could respond, Noah butted in. “I’m glad you moved in. I like you a lot better than our last neighbor.”

Jack turned to him, a bemused look on his face. “You don’t know me.”

“Yeah, well, old prune face would never have a water fight with us!”

Jack looked at her, baffled, like he had no idea whether to laugh or wait for her to scold the boy. Sophie smiled. She knew she should admonish her son but Reece really had been an old prune face, despite being under thirty. “Tommy brought a frog to school today!” Kyle contributed. “He had it hidden in his backpack but it got loose when he went in to get his snack. It hopped around the room before landing right in the middle of Mrs. Erickson’s desk.”

“What did Mrs. Erickson do?” Sophie asked.

“She screamed. Then she grabbed the butterfly net from our science kit and chased it around the room. Which was working until Jackson decided he wanted to help. He knocked over the aquarium and Nessy got out.”

Nessy was the class pet—a brown and black python that most of the kids in the class adored. There were a few hold-outs however and Sophie burst out laughing as she imagined the chaos that had to have ensued when Kyle’s sweet, soft-spoken kindergarten teacher attempted to capture a wily snake and a frog hell-bent on escape.

“How’d she catch them?” Jack asked. Kyle responded with a vivid tale about the combined efforts of the entire kindergarten class. Everyone, even Noah, laughed. The ice had officially melted.

After dinner, Sophie excused the boys to go play their nightly half hour of video games while she cleaned up the kitchen. As she stood to collect the plates, Jack insisted on helping her carry them to the sink. She wanted to protest—from the way he’d carefully avoided using his right hand during dinner, she could tell it was bothering him. But she was afraid her refusal would hurt his pride.

“So, I can tell from your accent that you’re not from Atlanta,” she said as they worked together.

He cleared his throat. “No, I’m from Boston.”

“That’s the accent I’m hearing. I knew it wasn’t Southern, but I couldn’t quite place it. What brings you here?”

“Work. A friend of mine runs a clinic down here and she needed a hand. I wanted a change of scenery, so here I am.”

“A clinic? You’re a—”

“I’m a trauma surgeon.” He choked a little, then corrected himself. “I’m a doctor.”

She glanced at his injured hand, which clearly wouldn’t be much help in a delicate surgery. It was balled into a fist where it rested against his thigh, the scars a livid purple white against his tanned skin. She had an overwhelming urge to reach out and stroke them, but she withheld the urge. Which was a good thing because when she looked up again, he was scowling at her.

An apology trembled on the tip of her tongue. She was embarrassed to be caught staring and felt bad because it was obviously a new and touchy subject for him. But she found herself unable to say she was sorry. Maybe it was the way he was looking at her, like he was daring her to say something. Or maybe it was the way he was so obviously caught up in the pain and confusion of having to be something different than what he’d always been.

She could relate to that. She’d had to reinvent herself a couple times so far—once when she was eighteen and had finally escaped from the foster-care system and again after Jeff had died in Afghanistan and she’d been left to raise two little boys alone. Neither time had been easy, but she’d made it through just fine.

But it seemed ridiculous to ignore his injury when they were both so aware of it. She’d hated it when she’d run into people after Jeff had died and they’d either drown her in pity or ignore the subject like it had never happened, even though it was written all over their faces So she decided to simply be straightforward about his injury.

“What happened?” she asked. “If you don’t mind me asking, I mean.”

His face turned a mottled red and when he answered he was looking at a spot over her shoulder instead of directly at her face. “I was shot.”

Her knees shook a little, before she locked them in place. Jeff had died from gunshot wounds. “In Iraq?”

“No.” He looked at her strangely. “Why would you think that?”

“I’m sorry. With your injuries, I figured you were a veteran—”

“I already told you. I’m a doctor.”

“I know. It’s just…not many civilian doctors get themselves shot.”

“I didn’t get myself shot.” He spoke so softly and precisely that she could tell she’d touched another sore spot.

“I’m sorry. I seem to be putting my foot in it a lot today. I didn’t mean that the way it came out. We can talk about something else if it will make you feel better.” He’d tensed up so much that she really wished she’d never brought the subject up. Maybe he didn’t feel the same way she did, that it was better to get the elephant in the room out in the open rather than hide it behind a sheer curtain three sizes too small. She hoped she hadn’t made a terrible mistake.

He didn’t answer for a while. She was about to attempt to broach some other, much less harmful subject—although she didn’t have a clue what that might be—when he said, “I was operating on a patient when it happened.”

“In Boston?” She couldn’t imagine a gunman getting into the operating room of a major hospital.

“In Somalia. I ran a clinic for a charity organization there.”

“Really? Which one?”

“For the Children. We’re a non-profit organization that goes into war-torn and disaster-stricken nations to establish medical care for people who wouldn’t otherwise have access to it.”

“I know who they are. I contribute every year during their big fundraising drive.”

He lifted an eyebrow. “From someone who’s worked for more than a decade in clinics that have benefitted from those donations, thank you.”

“I really admire what your organization does. It’s amazing to me the way you put your whole life on hold to help others.”

“My life wasn’t on hold. Going to those countries, working with For the Children, that was my life.” As soon as the words came out he looked sick, like he wanted nothing more than to never have said them.

Sophie thought she knew what it was like to have your whole life taken away with one pull of the trigger. She’d thought, when Jeff died, that everything had changed. But in the months that followed, she realized that in fact little had changed. Yes, she’d lost her husband. Yes, the boys had lost their father. But the truth was, Jeff had been gone more than he’d been around during their entire married life. Three tours in Iraq and one in Afghanistan had created a life at home, with the boys and with her career, that operated independently of him. And after he died, in a way, it simply continued that way.

Looking at Jack, hearing his story and seeing the small amount of pain he had exposed to her made her see that life had indeed changed irrevocably for Jack. With the injury to his operating hand and the trauma from being shot in the very clinic where he worked, there was probably no chance he could return to the life he loved.

Empathy pierced her and despite her feelings about apologies, she murmured, “I’m really—”

“Don’t say it.” His tone told her the conversation was closed.

Silence stretched taut between them as she continued to wash dishes and he continued to clear the table. When she could take it no longer, she asked. “So, where’s this clinic you’re working at now? Is it near here or—”

“It’s close to downtown.” He set the lasagna pan—the last thing to be brought over from the table—on the stove with an urgency that couldn’t be missed. “Thanks for dinner,” he continued. “But I should probably get going.”

“You don’t have to do that.”

“It’s late and I have work tomorrow.” Neither of them commented on the fact that it wasn’t yet eight o’clock. He made his way down the hallway, but she stopped him at the front door.

“At least stay for ice cream. I really am sorry. I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”

“You didn’t.” It was an obvious lie. “Thank you again for the meal. I guess I’ll see you around.”

In other words, please don’t ever invite me over again. Nice job, Sophie, she told herself as she stepped back, watching as Jack fled. She’d invited him over to welcome him to the neighborhood and had, instead, managed to both hurt and embarrass him. Definitely not one of her better ideas.

Yet as she watched the lights come on in his house, she couldn’t help thinking that Jack needed someone to shake him up. Oh, he was doing a good job of coasting along, looking and acting normal. But below the surface lay a seething wound of anger and regret that was festering.

It was none of her business. She knew it wasn’t. And yet…and yet she kept seeing him in the yard with her sons. Happy, kind, engaged. A huge grin on his face as he forgot, for a moment, all the pain and rage he had inside.

That’s when she knew she wasn’t going to be able to leave well enough alone. It looked like she had a new project after all.

CHAPTER FIVE

THE PHONE RANG as Jack was coming in from work. He was tempted to ignore it—only a few people had his house number and he wasn’t in the mood to talk to any of them. But he felt that familiar tug of responsibility. What if something was wrong? He answered it.

“Jack?” His mother’s smooth, cultured tones slid through the line as soon as he picked it up.

“Hi, Mom.”

“How are you feeling?”

“Fine.”

“Really?” She sounded hopeful.

No, not really. His leg throbbed and he’d had to pass two patients on to one of the residents today because they needed stitches he couldn’t do. “Absolutely.”

“Oh, good. I’m so glad to hear that.”

Of course she was. It was so much easier to move on with life when one’s son wasn’t mucking it up by getting shot. “Do you need something, Mom? I just got in and I want to take a shower.”

“Your father and I are celebrating our fortieth wedding anniversary next month and I’ve decided to throw a party. Naturally, we want you to be there. Especially since you missed the one we threw for our thirty-fifth.” Five years had passed and Jack could still hear the note of accusation in her voice.

“I was in Rwanda, Mom. It wasn’t like I was around the block and refused to come.”

“Of course not. But now that you’re so much closer, there should be no excuses.” There was a will of steel running through the conciliatory words. “Besides, it will give your dad a chance to check you over, make sure you’re healing all right.”

“Dad’s not an orthopedist, Mom.”

“He’s a doctor. And we’re both worried about you.”

Jack sighed. Of all the things he hated about his damn injury, this definitely made the top two. His relationship with his parents, at least up until the shooting, could be described as a benign disagreement. His parents loved him, he loved them. They’d provided him with everything a kid could ever need and in return, he’d graduated top of his high school class, went on to Johns Hopkins undergrad and Harvard Med—where he graduated second in his class. And then he dared to do the unthinkable—he’d taken a job with For the Children against their wishes—a decision they never understood. Even so, they had still enjoyed trotting out tales of their philanthropist son at dinner parties.

Now that he was injured, he was still refusing to settle down into the expected¸ and ritzy, path of private practice. But their interest had taken a sharp upswing. Suddenly his mother was calling him regularly to check on him, while his sister was bombarding him with emailed articles about post-traumatic stress disorder and learning to live with disabilities. Even his father was getting in on the act, albeit more subtly. Even though Jack had taken the position at the clinic, and made it clear he had every intention of going back to Africa once his physical therapy was over, he continued to get interview requests and partnership offers from lucrative practices all over Boston. He knew very well that his father was responsible for every single one.

Jack tolerated their interference for the most part, knowing they were trying to be supportive in their own ways. But it was so unlike the comfortable distance that had existed before the shooting—and so much more intrusive than he wanted to deal with right now—that he didn’t quite know how to respond. So, with a silent apology to his sister, he very deliberately threw her under the bus.

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