“Is that so?” Erin asked.
“This is rough country. Man’s country, I guess, much as it kills me to call it that. I wasn’t quite ready for it.”
“Well, the men in here are very…”
“I know,” Mel said, laughing. “Very pretty, aren’t they? But dangerous. Watch out.”
“Dangerous?” Erin questioned, wide-eyed.
Mel leaned close. “They shoot deer, play poker, smoke big nasty cigars. And as it turns out—have pretty high sperm counts. You can trust me—I’m the local midwife…”
Jack chuckled, drawing a glance from Erin.
“Where are you from?” Erin asked Mel.
“Most recently, Los Angeles,” Mel said. “I was looking for a change.”
“A change?” Erin asked, stunned.
Mel smiled sweetly. “It snuck up on me. The power of this beauty, the natural phenomenon of unspoiled landscape. What I saw on my first morning—trees that touched the sky, eagles soaring, deer in the yard…Then there are the people here—they’re just plain decent folk. I fell in love.” She gave her tummy a rub. “Then I fell in love with Jack, who is entirely too fertile for my taste, but still…he has his good points.”
“Mel,” Marcie said. “I need a lift back to Ian’s.”
Both women turned to look at her. “Marcie, I won’t let you do this!” Erin insisted. “It’s primitive! He’s primitive! He looks like a total nutcase. A wild man.”
“He’s actually very docile. Kind.”
“There are no beds!”
“I slept on a pallet on the floor for two years while I was remodeling this bar,” Jack put in. He scratched his chin. “Didn’t shave much either. Used Doc’s shower about once every three days or so. We’re kind of homespun around here.”
“But…But we’re not,” Erin said.
“Jack,” Marcie said. “Call the sheriff. I’m being kidnapped.”
“That wild-man look,” Jack told Erin. “Not unusual around here. Lotta farmers, loggers and ranchers don’t shave in winter. And they don’t usually wear Sunday best to chop wood or feed sheep. Ian Buchanan fits right in, and seems like a civil man. I wouldn’t worry.”
Marcie put her hand over Erin’s. “I’m going back and I want you to go home. I’ll call and check in, I promise. But I was just barely over being sick, just barely getting him to talk. I’m not done here.”
“Marcie—I don’t mean to sound cruel, baby, but you’re not the only one who lost Bobby. His family, me and Drew…”
“I know, I know. I’m not ignoring that, I promise. We’ll be together for Christmas. Please, Erin, don’t fight me. Let me do what I came to do. Then it’ll be done and I can move on.” Tears welled up in her eyes. “Honest, I just have to feel like this is complete.”
“What?” Erin asked pleadingly, her voice a strained whisper. “What do you think you’re going to accomplish?”
Marcie shot a pleading glance at Mel.
Mel and Marcie connected eyes for a moment. Then Mel looked at her husband. “Jack, take Marcie back to Ian’s. Take David with you. I’ll tend the bar if anyone comes in, or I can call Preacher or Mike. I think Erin and I should talk a minute.”
Jack lifted one brow. “You sure?”
She just nodded and smiled. He leaned slowly across the bar and gave her a little kiss. “I’ll be back before the dinner crowd shows up.”
When Jack and Marcie had left, Mel went around behind the bar and poured two cups of coffee. “Cream or sugar?” she asked Erin. “Both. Please. And I don’t think you even come close to realizing just how—”
“Almost three years ago, my first husband was murdered,” Mel said. With that, Erin stopped explaining herself any further. Mel cleared her throat. “I was a nurse practitioner and midwife in an urban trauma center—central L.A. Mark was an E.R. doc there. He was stopping off at a convenience store for milk for his cornflakes after pulling a thirty-six-hour call and there was a robbery in progress. He was shot. Killed.”
“I’m sorry,” Erin said softly.
“Thank you. At the time I really wanted my life to end with his. After several months passed and I couldn’t seem to get on with my life, I did the craziest thing—I took a job in this one-horse town for almost no money just because I had an instinct that it was different enough to jolt me into some kind of change. I have an older sister,” she added, smiling. “She thought I was completely nuts and was ready to kidnap me, drag me to her house to recover. Her way.”