Finally Found by Lyn Cote

Author:Lyn Cote
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2002-08-31T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eight

With the first tangy bite of pizza on his tongue, Marco froze. How could he answer her? He’d only shared this with his mother…and God.

“You don’t have to tell me. I didn’t mean to pry.”

Her sensitive apology pulled the linchpin that had held back his voice. “When I got the chance to buy Dr. Johnson’s practice, I realized that I would be in a position to be of service to my community sooner than if I’d had to slowly build my own practice.”

She nodded. Marco let the balmy evening wrap itself around them. It was easy to imagine them far away from others on a twilight island. A very pleasant sensation. Her flaxen hair caught the lamplight and glowed like a halo. A dribble of tomato sauce decorated the corner of her mouth.

The sight made her more endearing than he’d thought possible. He couldn’t help himself. He reached over and dabbed it away with his napkin.

Grinning, she submitted. “Thanks. Go on. Please.”

“Well, Tía Rosita is only one of many people who need short-term medical care—”

“People who slip between the cracks?”

Her encouragement urged him on. “Yes, people who’ve lost their jobs, people who’ve just immigrated, people whose paperwork gets lost by medicaid or medicare—”

“Exactly.” She finished her slice. “What have you done so far?”

Sated by the tasty pizza, he wiped his face and hands.

Her matter-of-fact attitude made it much easier to bring this subject so close to his heart out into the open. “I’ve been looking around for a site.”

“In the old downtown?”

He glanced at her. “Right.” How had she guessed that?

Nodding, she supplied the answer to his unspoken question. “Real estate’s cheaper and the location’s accessible to more prospective patients and public transportation.”

Her incisive comments once more caught him by surprise. “That’s true.”

“Did you find a place?”

Her unexpected interest in his dream and her nearness made him vibrate inside like a plucked guitar string. He leaned forward in the low light, wanting to see the excitement on her face more clearly. “Yes, there’s a vacant church on Van Buren.”

She shook her head and rested her back against the chair. “I always hate to see a congregation move out of its building.”

In the duskiness, her white shorts and her long pale legs reflected the scant light. She took on an ethereal quality, like a fairy princess. The effect made his mouth dry.

“They outgrew their facility.”

“Then, they should have planted another church in another neighborhood and helped it get off the ground. Then this community would have two churches instead of one and one empty building.” She shook her head in disapproval. “But parishioners move out of the original neighborhood. The neighborhood itself changes….”

The common excuse for moving away from people deemed “undesirable” hit him smack between the eyes. Jolted back to reality, he gave a harsh laugh. “Changes. You mean the residents become undesirable.”

“Unfortunately, that’s often the case.” Spring sat up and leaned forward, too, her elbows resting on the plastic chair arms. “But it’s often hard for people to look past surface differences—and if there’s a language barrier, the gulf can be hard to bridge.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.