The Wilders: Falling for the M.D.. Teresa Southwick

a man who longed for a woman?

      Peter inclined his head. “All right,” he promised.

      He really did need to start socializing more, Peter thought as he made his way over to the buffet table that ran along one wall.

      The affair was being catered by a company that was doing it all at cost. It was their donation to the institution that had long treated most members of the owner’s family.

      Ella was standing at the far end of the table, contemplating her choices. Despite the clusters of people scattered along the perimeter doing the same thing, for all intents and purposes, Ella appeared to be alone.

      Since their father’s death, she’d withdrawn into herself, working at the hospital and then slipping home, spending most of her time alone. Though he would have never pushed her toward it, Peter was glad she’d decided to attend the fund-raiser.

      Taking a plate, he queued up behind her. “How are you doing, kiddo?” he asked quietly.

      Preoccupied, Ella seemed a little startled as she turned around to look at him. “Oh, Peter, hi.” His question played itself back in her head. “I’m fine,” she replied, keeping her voice light. “I had a slightly tricky procedure today, but I think I handled myself well. It turned out all right in the end. Patient’s doing very well …”

      “I don’t mean professionally,” Peter said, cutting in. He deliberately looked down into her eyes. “How are you doing?”

      Ella’s shrug was vague and, for a moment, she looked away. She knew what he was asking. Taking the protective covering from her wounds was difficult. But this was Peter, so she forced herself to do it. Because he’d asked.

      “It’s hard for me to believe that I’m not going to run into him somewhere in the hospital. That Dad’s not going to come walking around the corner at any minute.” She sighed, making choices from the buffet without really paying attention to the canapés she placed on her plate. “He was bigger than life, you know?”

      A few days ago, it would have taken no effort on his part to agree with her because he’d shared that opinion. But now … now it took a bit of doing for him to keep the truth from surfacing. It took effort to nod his head and say, “Yes, I know what you mean.”

      Another sigh escaped her lips and she nodded, as if in response to something she’d hypothesized in her mind. “I guess it’s going to take time before things are back to normal for us.”

      Here he couldn’t flatly agree. Wouldn’t be able to face himself in the mirror come morning if he didn’t contradict her, because nothing was ever going to be the same again. Not for him. Not for the rest of them if he decided to share the secret.

      But this was Ella and his instinctive need to protect her had him tempering his response. “I doubt,” he told her slowly, “that things are going to get back to normal anytime soon.”

      Because the hospital staff was all speculating about the possible takeover by NHC, Ella thought he was talking about that. She knew how he felt about it without having to ask.

      Ella placed her hand on his and squeezed, offering comfort. He seemed surprised. “Don’t worry, Peter. Northeastern Healthcare isn’t going to come and gobble us up.”

      It was on the tip of his tongue to say he wasn’t referring to that, but then he stopped. It was better this way, better for her to think he was preoccupied about the takeover and not what he’d learned about their father. “What makes you so sure?”

      She flashed what he’d always referred to as her thousand-watt smile. “Because we have the great Dr. Peter Wilder fighting our fight for us,” she told him with affection, patting his cheek. “And you’re not going to let anything happen to Dad’s hospital.”

      Right now, he couldn’t bring himself to think of the hospital in those terms. “The hospital belongs to all of us—and to the town.”

      “Right,” she agreed. “And that’s the way Dad saw it, but I still can’t help thinking of it as his baby.”

      “Whether he meant to or not.” The words had just slipped out.

      She stared at him, confused. “Excuse me?”

      Damn, he was going to have to exercise better control over himself than that, Peter silently chided. “Sorry, my mind wandered for a moment.”

      The light of understanding entered her eyes as Ella looked over her shoulder toward Bethany and the circle formed by some of the other board members who were attempting to engage her in conversation.

      “I can’t blame you,” Ella said. “She is really a knockout.” And then her gaze returned to her brother. She regarded him with unabashed curiosity. “Are the two of you, you know, involved?”

      That was all he needed, for a rumor to get started. He didn’t want that pushing them together. He was already having enough trouble standing on level ground.

      “Only in keeping Walnut River General an excellent hospital,” he answered. “The problem is, we have two very different opinions on how that might be accomplished.”

      “So I’ve heard.” And then she smiled. “Well, if anyone can change her mind, Peter, it’ll be you.”

      She was giving him far too much credit, he thought. “I’m not a knight in shining armor, Ella.”

      “Next best thing—a doctor in a brilliant white lab coat.” Ella paused to kiss her big brother’s cheek. “Don’t ever stop being who you are, Peter. I couldn’t stand it if you suddenly changed.”

      And how, he wondered, would Ella take the news that her beloved father had changed from an angel to a man with feet of clay? Or, at the very least, that he’d had one fall from grace and then compounded it a thousandfold by never owning up to the truth?

      Again he felt the weight of his father’s secret all but bending his back. At that moment, he found himself resenting his father.

      “Whoops,” Ella declared, looking toward a far-off corner of the room, “there’s Ben Crawford. I’ve been trying to get a hold of him all day for a consult. Excuse me, Peter, but I’ve got to corner him before he gets away again.” And with that, she made her way across the ballroom.

      “You look pensive,” Bethany said, coming up beside him. “Ella all right?” And then she added, “You were taking your time with the food and I thought it might be easier if I came to get my own.”

      “Right.” He handed her a plate, feeling slightly guilty that he’d forgotten all about bringing her back something to eat the way he’d promised. Talking to Ella had steered his thoughts in another direction. “Ella’s doing as well as can be expected.”

      She picked up two stuffed mushrooms, placing them side by side on her plate. “You two seem to have a good relationship. I was watching,” she confessed. “You’re lucky. Both of you.”

      The way she said it had him reading between the lines again. “You don’t have a good relationship with your sister?”

      “I don’t have any relationship at all,” she admitted. It wasn’t something she was proud of. “We competed as children. After college, we went our separate ways. It’s been more than a year since we spoke.”

      He recalled that she’d mentioned her sister worked at a bank in England. “They don’t have telephones in England?”

      “Yes.” She put two tiny popovers onto her plate. “And she doesn’t call.”

      The woman was too bright to miss the obvious, he thought. But he said it anyway. “Last I checked, phone lines worked both ways. Sometimes all it takes to start the healing process is taking the first step.”

      It would take more than that, she thought. “You moonlight as an advice columnist?”

      He laughed, then