Meg knew exactly who he was—the handsome doctor with the kind eyes and a ready smile, but she didn’t want him recognizing her as the waitress he’d met during the one time she had talked to him. She’d had courage because she knew she would never see him again. Now here he was in Tall Pine, taunting her like a piece of bread dangling in front of a starving child.
She had clandestinely searched for him whenever he visited the hotel for dinner, occasionally escaping the kitchen the nights she knew he might come. There was something about his gentle countenance that had allured her. She’d first noticed him two years ago.
He had a ritual, though she called it a tradition. Before each meal he would pull out a photograph and stare at it with a smile that showed he was smitten. He had once explained to an employee who asked about it, that her name was Esther. She was a woman from his home town who he loved dearly. Meg and all the waiters and waitresses assumed it was his fiancée since no wedding ring adorned his left hand. It did not surprise Meg. Men like him would not find it difficult to marry.
/
Meg remembered one evening when he returned with head bent and shoulders looking as if they carried a heavy weight. When the waiter returned with a full plate, Meg paused in her work and dared to personally deliver a creation she’d experimented on earlier. Still wearing her apron, she’d left the sanctuary of the kitchen carrying a small plate of doughnuts dipped in chocolate and sprinkled with chopped almonds.
“Why the sad face?” she’d asked bluntly.
The doctor had looked up in surprise. His lips lifted ever so slightly from a frown as he studied her face. “Broken heart. I fancied myself in love with our town’s midwife, but when I came back from medical school, she’d married a Texas Ranger.” He shook his head. “Might as well tell somebody.”
Meg nodded. “I am sorry.” Then she smiled brightly, “Texas is not as good as it sounds, though.”
He frowned. “You have been there?”
“No,” she said with a shrug.
He laughed, “Neither have I.”
She smiled and placed the plate on the table. “Well, all I can say is that with eyes like yours, it is most certainly her loss.” She nodded at the doughnuts. “They’re the cure for a broken heart.”
Jonathan chuckled, “How did you know?”
“Know what?”
He strummed his fingers on the table. “Doughnuts are my favorite.”
She grinned, pleased, “I am glad to hear that.”
He waved a hand at the opposite chair. “Will you join me?”
Meg opened her mouth, but the foreboding figure of Mr. Lars caught her attention. She looked up to see her stepfather’s eyes piercing her with disapproval. He made a subtle, threatening gesture twisting his fist into his left palm.
“I am afraid not,” she said turning, “but please don’t be sad. The world is good to men like you. You’ll find your true match someday.”
She could feel his eyes on her as she fought every urge to look back at him. Her skin burned. Had she been too forward? What did it matter? She had no chance with a man like him, and that realization had made her act braver than she had felt. Men like this handsome doctor married prize worthy women. Not women like Meg who were … tainted. Meg knew she wasn’t a fallen woman, but she also was not the kind to get roses from an admirer, nor the kind who received tender kisses and modest love letters. She was the kind who had fought away eager hands from her stepfather and horrible, powerful men who visited the hotel. A pinch here, an offer there. She was the kind who attracted those with the lowest of morals. Besides, wasn’t it wrong for her to feel attracted to a man? Charles was always speaking of the evils of women, the sin of Eve, he liked to say. Such desires in a woman plagued men and then made them act sinfully.
Meg often dismissed anything that Charles Lars preached, but that night she had taken Charles’s fists to her stomach while spouting his habitual sermon of female wickedness over and over. It was hard to ignore such things when each word was emphasized by another blow. He’d forbidden her to leave the kitchen, threatened that if she ever talked to another man, he would make her beg for death by the time he was finished with her. She was his. His property. His game.
/
“So, a cook?” Jonathan said once the carriage was on its way down a dirt road. They were surrounded by green fields with cattle and sheep grazing peacefully.
“Yes.” Meg squeezed her hands on her lap, feeling like her lungs would burst from holding her breath. What did one say to a doctor while sitting next to him? Rose and Daisy had dozed off in the back already.
“For how long?” he asked encouragingly.
Meg bit her lip. “Four years—since I was sixteen.”
He raised his eyebrows and tilted his head at her. Meg felt her body grow warm and prayed that her sweat would not press through her clothing. Had there ever been a time when her nerves were so on end? She wanted to disappear to where she was safe.
“You are then … twenty years old?”
Meg’s eyes widened. “Why, do I look older?” she asked anxiously. Her mother always said that women with hard lives aged quicker than most. Meg had always thought that one day she would wake up with wrinkles and white hair while still young.
Again she heard that laugh, rich and bubbling like root beer.
“Heavens no, Miss Partridge,” he chuckled and drummed his knee with his long fingers. “Definitely not old,” he murmured.
Meg’s fingers eased from their fists. “Oh.” She did not know what else to say, although something told her it was her turn to ask a question, so she blurted the first thing that came to her.“What is your favorite food?”
Jonathan chuckled, “I’m sorry—my favorite what?”
“Food. I like to hear what people prefer and then think of how I would cook it.”
“Alright, I approve of that game.” He grinned and squinted his eyes in thought. Meg took the opportunity to turn her head and look at him. He had a fine straight nose with dark eyes and square jaw. Yet, a face that still held a delicacy to its features. He looked almost dream-like in his attractiveness. He did not belong in a carriage in Colorado, but on a white steed with a shield or holding a banner. She bit her lip and looked ahead.
After a good minute of thinking, Jonathan’s face lit up. “I have it. My favorite food is doughnuts. When I studied at Harvard, a man had a food stand right outside the university, and he fried hot doughnuts. He would plop a dozen in a bag then dump a large cup of sugar on them. There were weeks where I hardly slept and ate nothing else besides peanuts and coffee. It was often those doughnuts that kept up my spirits.” He looked at her briefly. “Doughnuts have good connotations.”
“Doughnuts?” Meg smiled, feeling unsettled. It’s only a coincidence. She was certain he did not remember her.
“So how would you make doughnuts?” he asked.
She tilted her head pensively. “Well, I must admit that hot doughnuts, fresh from the bubbling oil and then drenched in sugar are hard to beat. So to elaborate on something already delicious, I would make the dough especially delicate and fry them so that the outside was crisp and the inside fluffy. I would coat them with sugar, but shake of the excess so you tasted a sugary doughnut and not just sugar. Then I would put them on a plate drizzled with fresh raspberry syrup and serve them with a dollop of whipped cream.” She squinted her eyes now, truly thinking of various ways she could improve or transform a doughnut.
“Please stop,” Jonathan laughed, “I’ve only eaten a sandwich today, and now I am starving.” He turned towards her. “How about you? What is your favorite food?”
“A sandwich.” Her dimples deepened as he frowned.
“Really? A girl who thinks of doughnuts served with raspberries and whipped cream prefers a sandwich?”
“You have to listen first. My favorite sandwich is one with a fresh white bread toasted slowly with butter. While it’s toasting I add a smoked cheese and a sharp cheddar with fresh ham, basil, and an egg. Then I sprinkle a little salt and pepper and voila—I have the tastiest sandwich in the world.”’
Jonathan groaned and dramatically rubbed his stomach. “Ahh, Miss Meg, I did not think this ride would be so torturous. Now I want hot doughnuts and a sandwich, but all I have are apples.”
Meg looked away, focusing on the green fields blending into a horizon of mountains. “Yes,” she murmured softly. It was torture to want something so badly and know that she would never have it.