Annie O'Neil - The Surgeon's Christmas Wish

As the morning wore on and the steady stream of patients ebbed away, Tara felt back on her game. Composed. In control. The morning’s cases had been fairly easy—a fractured wrist, a severe nosebleed and an early case of stomach upset from over-indulgence. Just enough busy work for Tara to almost squeeze images of the dark-haired Scot from her mind.

Almost.

Sending Fraser out on a tour of Deer Creek, a small resort village compromising a lodge, a few ski chalets and a tiny town center was hardly going to keep him out of the clinic for long. She could feel herself return to her old habit of chewing on her lower lip. This man was not bringing out the best in her.

Technically, Fraser hadn’t been contracted to start work until the following Monday. It hadn’t even occurred to her to hire someone to start work over the holiday. When she’d found out at the last minute that Tom Brady was heading to Banff, instead of renewing his contract in Deer Creek, she’d made a few phone calls. Soon enough she’d felt she had covered all her bases for the holiday weekend. There were plenty of locals who helped out with search and rescue teams if required, and the team at the fire station were all trained in first aid, not to mention the ski patrollers, who were always rostered on. Bar anything truly horrible happening—she gave a quick subconscious knock on the wooden doorframe—everything would be okay.

“Anybody home?” Liesel quipped as she entered to Tara’s knock.

“Just little old me!” Tara smiled at the nurse, whom she now counted as a good friend. “Sorry about earlier.” She winced apologetically. “I must’ve woken up on the wrong side of the bed this morning.”

“Mmm … could be that,” Liesel mused. She leant forward and teasingly poked Tara in the arm. “Or it could be that someone has a crush on the handsome new Highland doctor.”

Tara playfully slapped away Liesel’s hand. At least she hoped it seemed playful.

“Do not. I don’t have time for silly crushes.” How humiliating.

“Are you saying my crush on Eric is silly?” Liesel persisted in taunting her boss.

“I would hardly call dating someone for several months and being invited to their family home for Thanksgiving as having a silly crush.”

“True.” Liesel dropped her backpack on the floor behind the reception counter and flopped into the wheeled chair, lazily swinging herself from side to side.

“Where did you leave Dr. MacKenzie, anyway?” Tara wished she could’ve bitten back the words as soon as they’d left her mouth. She was pretty sure they betrayed a bit too much interest as to his irritatingly magnetic whereabouts. Too much interest for her own liking anyway.

Seemingly not having heard her, Liesel turned to Tara with a big grin. “This will be my first Thanksgiving, you know.”

Tara smiled warmly at her pixie-haired friend. She deserved all of the happiness she received. From the sound of it, Liesel’s heart had been picked up at the beginning of a number of ski seasons and soundly dropped at the last ski lift run at the first sign of spring. She was a kind, trusting woman and, from the sound of it, was reaching a point where traveling from resort to resort had lost its luster. “It’s homey here, isn’t it?”

“Where, the clinic?” Tara laughed. The clinic was nice, but not nearly as welcoming as one of those little craftsman houses with all-weather porches tucked away on the hillside. Too bad her finances didn’t stretch far enough to include a house.

“No, silly. Deer Creek. I could really see me staying here a while.” She let out a wistful sigh.

Tara slipped into the chair next to her, joining in the rhythmic swinging of chairs from side to side.

It was nice here. Especially when there was someone to share it all with.

COULD THE RECEPTION area stand up to a third run with the mop?

Tara scanned the immaculate room.

It was Thanksgiving morning and so far she had helped a whopping single visitor on a quest for a handful of cotton balls. Full marks for keeping everyone fit and healthy on the holiday, zero for keeping her mind occupied.

She felt her shoulders slump a bit as she scanned the empty room. She wondered what Liesel was doing. No. She didn’t. She knew exactly what Liesel was doing. Enjoying the early phases of the holiday with Eric and his family. An involuntary sigh escaped her lips.

It wasn’t the lack of patients that was sapping her good spirits. It was the absence of a certain Scottish doctor. No. That wasn’t quite right.

Tara pulled on a dark curl and chewed her lower lip. It had been a long time—if ever—that someone had made such a full-force impact on her. Talk about setting your senses on fire! She stifled a yawn, knowing full well she’d kept herself up all night doing little re-runs of the previous day. Taking a little memory-lane trip along those well-defined cheekbones, stopping for a moment to enjoy the salt and pepper temples before making a quick turn towards those eyes of his. Mother Nature had come up trumps when it came to Fraser MacKenzie.

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