The Baby Who Stole the Doctor's Heart. Dianne Drake

reasons he couldn’t afford any kind of relationship with her. She was so dynamic, so positive. He truly feared it could rub off on him. Truly feared it could make him change his mind about so many things he’d been etching in stone these past couple of years. “Well, right now we need to figure out if we can make your car work for you.”

      Angela climbed in, turned the key, elicited only a clicking noise. No grinding, no sputtering, no nothing.

      “How long’s it been since you’ve had a new battery?” he called out.

      “A month. That was my last repair.” She tried it again. Still, nothing happened.

      So he checked the battery cables and terminals, jiggled, adjusted and had her try one more time, to no avail. “Well, the good news is it’s not the carburetor,” he said, pulling out from under the hood. “The bad news is it’s either the starter or the starter solenoid. Meaning you need a mechanic.”

      “I’ve needed a mechanic almost every other week lately. Or it’s the time to buy a new car. I’ve got to find something more dependable because of Sarah.” She pulled her cell phone from her pocket. Started to dial.

      “Calling a cab?”

      She shook her head. “Calling Eric.”

      “Let him spend the evening with his family. I’ll take you home,” Mark offered impulsively.

      “Are you sure?”

      Again, she acted surprised that he had a little niceness in him. He really did have to work on that… some. “You fixed me a good dinner. It’s the least I can do.”

      “Then I accept.” She tucked her phone in her pocket, grabbed her purse, her briefcase, and her laptop computer from the back of her car. Mark took the laptop and briefcase, and led her to a large black pickup truck that was so high off the ground she wondered if she could get herself inside it without making a complete fool of herself. “Men and their big trucks,” she said, hoisting herself up.

      “Practical when you’re living in the mountains,” he said while he waited for her to settle herself.

      He was barely inside when she asked,“But you’re not going to live in the mountains, are you? Once you’ve fulfilled your eighteen months, don’t you plan on getting out of here?”

      “And if I don’t need a truck where I’m going, I’ll get something else.”

      “You don’t know where you’re going?” That didn’t surprise her, as Mark seemed more like a man who was running away from something rather than running to it.

      “Not a clue. Don’t really care. One road’s as good as another, and if it leads me someplace else, I’m perfectly fine with that.”

      Fastening her seat belt, Angela relaxed back into the leather seat, loving the new aroma of it. It reminded her of Mark. Big, manly, bold. “No one’s ever sat in this seat before, have they?” It was a strange question to ask, but she couldn’t see Mark involved enough with anyone to allow them in this seat, and she wanted to know. Such a solitary man.

      “You’re the first, except for the salesman who sat there when I took it out for a test drive.”

      No women. He didn’t date. Again, it didn’t surprise her, yet, in a way, it did. Men like Mark Anderson didn’t live without women. In other circumstances, she could picture him with a woman hanging on each arm. Under these circumstances, though, all she could picture was him alone. And scowling. “I want seventy-five percent tomorrow rather than ninety-eight.”

      “What?’

      “Your scowl. I want you scowling only seventy-five percent of the time. Being all sullen the way you are is bad for your digestion, and while I certainly wouldn’t lecture you on all the things that can go wrong with you physiologically when your gut stays in a constant knot, let me just say that nothing good comes of it. So, if you force yourself to quit frowning for a quarter of your day, and even try and smile a little during that time, you’re going to relax your gut and feel much better overall.”

      “And that’s your professional opinion?”

      “Yes. But that’s also the opinion of someone who spent too much time frowning, whose gut was knotted up just like yours.”

      “What happened to change that?”

      “I became happy. Had Sarah, realized the value of my friends. Discovered what I really wanted in my life wasn’t as complicated as I was making it out to be. And, most important, I figured out what I didn’t want and put an end to it.” All of it the truth. When she’d quit letting Brad be the shadow over her that had always held her back, everything had changed. Mark had the same kind of shadow over him, she could see it looming very close, barely allowing him any room to breathe. It was a pity because underneath the scowl she was catching glimpses of something good, and something so conflicted he didn’t even know the good was there anymore.

      Heading out of the parking lot and turning left onto the main street through town, Angela glanced up to the silhouette of the Three Sisters?three mountain peaks that towered over the entire valley. According to Indian lore, their magic safeguarded White Elk and all the people within their shadow. But theirs was a good shadow. Mark’s was not, and it was so heavy she could almost feel it trying to cloud her outlook. It was not a good place to be. In fact, it gave her cold chills. Come on, Three Sisters, she said silently to herself. Maybe, just maybe, they had a little of their magic in reserve for Mark, because he really did need it.