Page 1
ONE
“No more peppermints, Mrs. Frost, or next time it’s a root canal.”
Mrs. Frost chortled with laughter, her veined and sun-spotted hand holding her cheek where it was still numb from the filling. “Don’t you get sassy with me, Dr. Quinn.” She put heavily sarcastic emphasis on the “doctor” part of that sentence. “I knew you when you were nothing but a shocked look on your mama’s face.”
Meredith Quinn removed her gloves and tossed them in the trash before helping Mrs. Frost climb from the dental chair. “I think surprise babies make the best babies. At least that was certainly true in my mother’s case.”
Mrs. Frost patted her hand, and her hooded eyes were kind and gentle when she asked, “How is your mama, child?”
Meredith made sure the elderly woman was steady on her feet before she responded. “She’s good. So far no sign of a recurrence. The doctors said her cancer was growing rapidly, but they treated it aggressively and we’re happy for all the days we have with her.”
“I know you are. You’re a good daughter.” Mrs. Frost fumbled in her purse for her wallet. “How much do I owe you?”
“Nothing, Mrs. Frost. It was my pleasure.” The woman had family who helped take care of her as much as they could, but she was on a fixed income and didn’t have anything extra.
“Nonsense. I have to pay you something.”
“I’d take some hot chocolate before I leave.”
Mrs. Frost gave her a shrewd look. “You’ve sure turned into a Quinn woman. I see that as clear as day. Sweet as sugar. Stubborn as a mule.”
“I’ll be sure to tell Granny you gave me such a lovely compliment.”
“You’ll do no such thing. You can’t talk about your patients. I know. There’s laws about it now.”
Meredith laughed at her superior tone. “I can’t talk about your dental condition. But there aren’t any rules preventing me from passing along well-wishes to my granny from an old friend.”
“Pshaw.” Mrs. Frost waved a hand at her. “Who’re you calling old? I should tell your mama to wash your mouth out with soap.” She opened the door that led from Meredith’s mobile dental van and stepped out. “Come inside when you’re done. I’ll have the cocoa ready.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Meredith watched until Mrs. Frost was safely through her front door before she closed herself back into the small space.
Her mobile dental clinic had been a gift from her parents and grandparents when she’d moved back to Gossamer Falls a couple of years earlier. She loved it with every fiber of her being. It was small. There was only one chair. And most of the time she had to be hygienist and dentist. But with it housed in the back of a diesel-powered Sprinter van, she could navigate the winding roads of the Western North Carolina mountains and bring basic dental services to the underserved populations who would otherwise do without.
At least one Saturday a month, sometimes more, she would drive to a nearby county and set up her van. Usually it was in the parking lot of a small church. She’d clean the teeth of anyone who came by. Most of her patients were kids, and she typically gave them a good cleaning, a thorough checkup, and instructions for them and their parents on proper dental health.
But today had been the first time she’d made a midweek house call. Mrs. Frost lived forty-five minutes away from Gossamer Falls in what she generously referred to as a cabin.
Meredith’s brother, Mo, called it a shack. Mo was correct.
Still, as she’d pointed out, Mrs. Frost had known Meredith since before she was born, just ten months after her brother, Mo. Meredith’s arrival had shocked the extended Quinn family and the town of Gossamer Falls. A story she’d heard many, many times in her youth.
She didn’t hear it quite so much anymore. Only the real old-timers ever brought it up. To most people, she was Dr. Meredith Quinn, town dentist. Sister to Mo. Cousin to ... well, about half the town. Daughter to Douglas and Jacqueline. Granddaughter to John and Catherine.
Gossamer Falls had been her home for all but ten of her thirty-two years. She’d finished her bachelor’s degree in three years. Went straight to dental school for four years. Then worked for three years in an urban setting where her days were a mixture of typical dental practice and charity dental clinics.
She’d been talking about being a dentist since she was a tiny girl. But no one knew what she’d hoped for most. Not her parents, Mo, or her cousin Cal who was more brother than cousin, not even Bronwyn Pierce, her childhood best friend. Meredith had prayed that someday she would move back to Gossamer Falls with a husband who would want to make his life there.
She’d dated in college and a little bit while in dental school, but husband material was thin on the ground.
But when the opportunity to open a dental practice in Gossamer Falls had presented itself, she took it. Even though it meant giving up on the dream of finding a spouse. Because she already knew everyone in Gossamer Falls, and a husband-to-be surely wasn’t there.
And when her mother was diagnosed with aggressive breast cancer within a year of her return, Meredith knew she’d made the right choice. Even if the cost was high.
She shook her head at the way her thoughts had wandered as she went through the motions of securing all her equipment for the drive home. Once everything met her stringent requirements, she stepped outside, locked the van, and joined Mrs. Frost for hot cocoa.
And hopefully cookies.
An hour later, full of hot cocoa and more no-bake cookies than she wanted to admit to eating, Meredith climbed into the van and headed home. She typically took Wednesdays off, and her plans for this morning had been to sleep in, clean her tiny home—which with its seven hundred square feet took her all of an hour at most—and then spend the rest of the day working on her taxes.
The sleeping in and cleaning wouldn’t be happening. Sadly, the taxes would. It wasn’t even lunchtime yet. She should be able to return to Gossamer Falls and park her van in its normal spot in the garage off her dental office without anyone getting their shorts in a twist about her absence.
She had promised not to go out alone anymore, but that promise had been for her charity clinics where the clientele, admittedly, could be a bit on the shady side. Today’s trip had been a response to an SOS from Mrs. Frost. Meredith had been in absolutely no danger. There’d been no reason to take an escort. Certainly not a police escort.
Not that Police Chief Grayson Ward would agree with her assessment. If he found out, he would blow a gasket.
No. Nope. Not thinking about Gray. Not today. She was happy. She was smiling. The world was beautiful. Mrs. Frost wasn’t hurting anymore. Meredith kept her speed steady as she maneuvered through the mountain roads without a care. They didn’t intimidate her. She’d learned how to drive on this very stretch of road.
Uncle Craig, her cousin Cal’s dad, had put her behind the wheel of his pickup when she was almost fifteen and said, “Take it away, sweetheart.”
In a family as large as the Quinns, it was hard not to have favorites. Meredith didn’t even try. Uncle Craig was her favorite uncle. He didn’t fuss when she hit the brakes too hard. Didn’t grab the door when she took a turn too quickly. They rode around for two hours before they made their way back home.
She’d never forgotten how her father greeted them. “Well?” He looked at Uncle Craig like he had some explaining to do.
“She’s a natural.” Uncle Craig gave her a hug and a wink and walked inside with her dad.
Mo and Cal swarmed her. “How was it?” Cal asked. Mo studied her.
“It was awesome!”
Mo gave her a hug then and they went into Cal’s home where her parents, Uncle Craig, and Aunt Carol were standing in the kitchen drinking coffee.
It wasn’t until ten years later that she learned that her dad had told Uncle Craig that he just didn’t think he could do it. His baby girl, out on the road? The idea of teaching her to drive terrified him.
So Uncle Craig had volunteered and took full credit for the fact that Meredith was, hands down, the best driver in the family.
As if in response to her prideful thought, the van stuttered as she accelerated through a curve. She patted the steering wheel. “What’s the matter, baby?” She glanced along the panel, and the light of the low-fuel indicator caught her attention.
“That can’t be right.” She’d filled up this morning. She should have at least three-quarters of a tank. No way she could be on empty.
The shudder that ran through her vehicle put the inaccuracy of her assessment into sharp relief. None of this made sense. Her low-fuel indicator usually flicked on when she still had a quarter of a tank. And even when she was all the way on empty, she had enough diesel to get to a gas station.
But her fuel gauge didn’t care about her logic. The van jerked. Jolted. Jumped forward a few times. Died. Her downhill momentum kept the van going long enough for her to ease off the road and park on a small shoulder between the road and the mountains towering above her. She was still ten miles from home.
She was eight miles from anything.
The ground on the other side of the road went straight down.
She glanced at her phone. This was going to hurt. She dialed Mo’s number.
Or tried to. No signal.
Not unusual in the mountains. No cell phone provider had figured out how to make phones work in all the nooks and crannies of the forested area she called home.
Meredith dug around in the passenger seat for her coat. She hated driving while wearing one. And it wasn’t safe to do that anyway. But she kept one in her van at all times. She’d put it on and go find a spot that gave her a view of the road coming into and out of the curve. She’d be able to flag down anyone who happened to come by.
The good news was that she was back in Gossamer County. Barely. But she was in Gray’s jurisdiction.
It shouldn’t matter, but Chief Kirby was crooked, and she didn’t trust the officers from Neeson the way she trusted the Gossamer Falls officers. Gray, for his many faults, was a cut above when it came to police chiefs. He was irreproachable.
Donovan Bledsoe, one of Gray’s officers, had recently stolen the heart of her baby cousin Cassie. They were so in love it was disgusting. Sweet. But disgusting.
If Meredith ever fell in love, she was going to keep the PDA to a minimum. No need for smooching every single time you see each other. No lingering looks that left little to the imagination.
Nope. Meredith planned to keep her personal relationships personal.
If she ever managed to have a relationship to keep personal.
But her relationship status, or lack thereof, wasn’t a pressing issue. She was stuck on the side of the road in a dead Sprinter van with no cell service. It was January, and it was cold as whiz. Not that she had any idea what that meant. But that’s what she’d always heard. “Cold as whiz” meant that things were freezing.
Like her nose. And fingertips.
Both of which she needed. And her gloves weren’t in her coat pocket. Where were they?
She rested her head on the steering wheel. This was not how the day was supposed to go. Not at all.
The crunch of gravel on the road behind her pulled her to an upright position. A quick glance revealed flashing lights. A frisson of fear trickled through her until a closer look settled her. This was a Gossamer Falls patrol car.
She was safe.
Then Grayson Ward climbed from the vehicle and stalked toward her.
Maybe not.
Grayson Ward took his time approaching Meredith’s van. He had questions.
So many questions.
But the first one, the one that mattered the most, was answered when she opened her door and hopped out.
Something inside him settled at the sight of her. Uninjured, but with blue eyes flashing. He braced himself for what she would say.
Meredith Quinn wasn’t a petite woman. She was five-seven and there was nothing that would compel him to try to guess her weight. She owned a shirt that said, “You can tell I work out but also love pizza,” and that seemed like a perfect description. She had plenty of muscle, and she loved to go hiking, but there was also a softness about her—particularly in her face—that many people found compelling.
Not that any of that softness was directed toward him at the moment. “Are you following me? Did you put a tracker on my van?” She’d walked closer as she talked and now stood just a foot away. “How did you find me?”
He leaned back and crossed his arms. “Why are you on the side of the road?” He had no idea how or why, but his question took the fight right out of her.
“I don’t know!” she all but wailed. “Everything was fine. I was cruising toward home, thinking about how my uncle Craig taught me to drive on this road, and then”—she reached back and patted her van—“Flossy started acting funny.”
Flossy? She’d named her van Flossy? “Define funny.”
“She jerked a few times. At first I thought something was in the fuel line.” She wrinkled her nose. “But now I’m wondering if something is wrong with the fuel line. Do you smell that?”
“Oh yeah.” He’d noticed it as soon as he got out of his car. “Smells like diesel.”
“Yes! And that makes no sense. I had a full tank before I left town this morning. I always fill up right before I come because”—she flung a hand toward her van—“getting stuck on the side of the road in the mountains is never a good idea.” She patted the van again. “At least it’s broad daylight.”
“Not a fan of the dark?” Gray attempted to keep his tone neutral.
“Not a fan of being outside alone in the dark. There are critters. Big ones. Small ones. I prefer to keep my distance from all of them.”
“Understood.” Gray looked at the van, then back to Meredith. “You keep an eye on the road. I’m going to see if I can figure out why you’re losing fuel.”
Gray removed his duty belt and laid it in his cruiser.
“Why aren’t you in your Explorer?” He never drove a regular Gossamer Falls cruiser.
“Because”—he grabbed a flashlight from the car and returned to her van—“my Explorer needed new tires.” Then he lay on his back and shimmied his body between the ground and the underside of the van. This was going to be the end of the shirt he was wearing. He managed to wait until he was well and truly under the van to ask, “Who needed their teeth cleaned so urgently this morning that you couldn’t wait for me to come with you?”
The silence that greeted him told him he’d done a lousy job in his attempt to be calm.
Shoes—completely impractical shoes—appeared in his line of sight. “For your information, it was urgent. And it didn’t require your professional presence. I wasn’t hosting a clinic. It’s my day off, but Mrs. Frost called me at home at six thirty this morning. She had a toothache that had kept her up all night. She’s eighty-seven and everyone knows she shouldn’t be driving anywhere under any circumstances. Speaking of which, can’t you take her license? Isn’t that in your job description?”
Gray slid the flashlight between his teeth and found the fuel tank. “Not my jurisdiction.”
The words were garbled, but she must have understood because she responded, “Gotcha. And that means Kirby should do it, but he’s not going to do anything he doesn’t have to do. Mrs. Frost would probably swat him on the nose with a rolled-up newspaper if he tried. She doesn’t suffer fools.”
Meredith was correct on all counts. Even the part about her not needing his assistance. They had an agreement that she wouldn’t do any clinics alone. She’d promised to take someone with law enforcement experience with her, and she’d stuck to that for the past six months without complaint. He’d gone several times during the fall. Donovan, one of his most trusted officers, had gone in December. Her brother, Mo, and cousin Cal, both of whom had military experience and were, technically, consultants for the Gossamer Falls Police Department, had gone with her in early January when she’d made a rare weekday trek to try to catch as many children as she could before they returned to school after the Christmas break.
“You still haven’t answered my question, Chief Ward.”
Uh-oh. When she started “Chief Ward-ing” him, it meant he’d lost control of the conversation. At this point, all he could do was institute emergency measures.
“I was on patrol.” True. “This”—he shifted—“entire”—he scooted again, and a piece of gravel dug into his back. A grunt escaped.
Meredith’s face appeared between the ground and the bottom of the van. “What happened? Are you okay?”
“I’m fine.”
“Are you sure?”
“It was a rock, Meredith. I’m lying in the gravel on the edge of the road looking at the bottom of a van. It’s not going to be comfortable.”
“Right. Sorry about that. Maybe I—”
“Don’t even think about it.” He had no idea what she might be thinking. But the last time she’d had a bright idea, she’d redecorated the break room at the police station. If she’d stopped there, it might have been okay. But she hadn’t. She’d redecorated his office and the locker room too.
It was still masculine. But now, each stall had little odor sprays and each shower had an array of soaps and lotions, which at times meant his officers walked around the station smelling like they were headed out on a date instead of on the way to keep the peace.
The towels, well, no, he couldn’t complain about the towels. The towels she’d brought were plush and large, and he had shamelessly checked the invoice and bought some to use at home.
But still. Meredith had no off button. Once she decided something needed to be done, there was no stopping her.
A low humph was her only response to him shutting her down, but even without looking in her direction, he could picture her. Blue eyes flashing in outrage. Full lips pouting. There were curls in her brown hair today, and they were probably flying around her face in the wind.
“Don’t think I missed the fact that you have yet to explain what you’re doing here, Chief Ward.”
When Gray next glanced in her direction, all he could see was her feet as she paced beside the van. He smiled around the flashlight. Meredith was bighearted and bullheaded and the reason he walked around with a bruised heart. The blasted thing insisted on beating hard every time she was in the vicinity, and nothing his brain said could convince it to chill and accept the truth.
Meredith Quinn was his to protect, but she could never be his.