“You’re crude.”
“Then I guess it’s good that you’re marrying somebody perfect like Hunter, and not somebody crude like me. Just because I do things to your body that make you cry with pleasure, because we enjoy each other’s company, because we work together so well—those aren’t reasons to marry me. I hear you even beat Hunter at tennis.”
“I’m glad I’m not marrying you. I never wanted to, ever.” A sound made her glance down the track and she saw the train.
Leander stood. “I’m damned well not going to wait here to see you make an ass of yourself.” He shoved his hands into his pockets. “You’re going to be miserable, and you deserve it.” He turned on his heel and left.
For a moment, Blair almost ran after him, but she caught herself. She’d made her decision and she was sticking to it. This would be better for everyone concerned.
The train pulled into the station, but Alan still wasn’t there. She stood and walked down the platform while two men got off the train and a man and a woman got on.
The conductor started to motion the train forward.
“You have to wait. There’s someone supposed to be here.”
“If he ain’t here, then he’s missed the train. All aboard.”
With disbelief, Blair watched the train pull out of the station. She sat down on the bench and waited. Perhaps Alan was just late and meant to catch the next train. She sat there for a total of two hours and forty-five minutes, but Alan didn’t appear. She asked the ticket manager if a man fitting Alan’s description had bought a ticket. He’d purchased two tickets early that morning—for the four o’clock.
Blair paced the platform for another thirty minutes, then began to walk home.
So this was how it felt to be jilted, she thought. Funny, but she didn’t feel bad at all. In fact, the closer she got to home, the lighter she felt. Maybe tomorrow she could work at the hospital with Leander.
When Blair walked into the house it was as quiet as a tomb, and the only light on was in the family parlor. She walked in, and to her surprise, her mother and Leander were sitting there, talking as quietly as if they were at a funeral.
When Opal saw her daughter, she very calmly, very slowly, dropped her embroidery and fainted. Leander stared at Blair so hard his mouth fell open, his cigar dropped out and set the fringe on a little footstool on fire.
Blair was so pleased with their reactions that she stood there grinning at them. The next moment, Susan came into the room and began screaming.
The screaming revived them all. Lee put out the fire, Blair slapped her mother’s hands until she recovered, and Susan went off to make tea.
As soon as Opal was sitting upright, Leander grabbed Blair’s shoulders, jerked her to her feet and began shaking her. “I hope that damned dress of yours fits because you’re marrying me on Monday. You understand that?”
“Leander, you’re hurting her,” Opal cried.
Lee didn’t pause in shaking Blair. “She’s killing me! You understand, Blair?”
“Yes, Leander,” she managed to say.
He pushed her down on the sofa and stormed from the room.
With shaking hands, Opal picked up her sewing from the floor. “I believe I’ve had enough excitement in the last two weeks to last me a lifetime.”
Blair leaned back on the couch and smiled.
Chapter 16
For three days, Leander kept Blair so busy at the hospital that she had no time to think. He came for her early in the morning and returned her late in the evening. He took her to the warehouse on Archer Avenue and told her of his plans to renovate the place into a women’s clinic. Right away, Blair had some ideas of her own, and Lee listened quietly and discussed them with her.
“I think we can have it ready in two weeks, since the equipment is already on its way from Denver,” Lee said. “I’d planned it as a surprise, a wedding present, but I’ve had more than my share of surprises lately and can’t stand any more.”
Before Blair could say a word, he ushered her out of the warehouse and into his buggy and drove her back to the hospital. She was relieved that what Alan had said wasn’t true, that Lee hadn’t been lying about the clinic just to win the competition.
As the hours accumulated and the wedding grew closer, Blair wondered why Lee had wanted to marry her. He made no attempt to touch her, and they never talked except to discuss a patient. A few times, she caught him watching her, especially when she was working with other doctors, but he always turned away when she looked up.
And every day, Blair came to respect Lee more and more as a doctor. She soon realized that he could have made a great deal of money if he’d stayed in a big city hospital but, instead, he chose to remain in Chandler where he was seldom paid for anything. The hours were long and hard, the sheer amount of work overwhelming, and the rewards, for the most part, intangible.
On Sunday afternoon, the day before the wedding—when Blair was feeling a little queasy from Houston’s pre-wedding party the night before—he called her into his office. It was an awkward meeting for both of them. Leander kept staring at her in a way that made her arms break into gooseflesh, and all she could think of was that tomorrow she was going to walk down the aisle to him.