Page 43 of Clara Knows Best

Margo was his right-hand man in Austin, and she wore scrubs every day. He was not even sure, now that he thought about it, if she always wore the same color. And that was the way it should be.

Today Clara was wearing a long, shiny pink skirt with about a million pleats in it, a tee in the same shade of pink, and high strappy heels in metallic silver.

“Futuristic,” he said.

“Thank you,” she replied.

“February’s not kidding around,” Yoli announced, coming in. “Brr! Ooh, look at you, Clara Wilder!”

“Thank you,” Clara said again, dipping into a graceful curtsey.

“Well, it’s Day 4 of being a small-town GP. How are you holding up, Dr. Flores?”

“Fine, thanks.”

“We’re closed tomorrow for Dr. Wilder’s birthday.”

“Yes, I know.”

“So is this your last day? Or are you gonna be here next week?”

He took a moment to fantasize about flying home on Sunday afternoon, but he knew it wasn’t in the cards.

“You don’t have to stay another whole week,” Clara spoke up from the reception desk. “This morning Mom said she can work next week. She said it’s a lot easier to get around now, and she can sit down most of the time anyway.”

It was hard to believe that Clara could be so intelligent and yet so naïve when it came to her mother. “She knows she definitely shouldn’t be working yet. And she knows I know it, too.”

“Does that mean you’re staying?” she asked curiously.

Hadn’t he known from the beginning that he would? “Guess so.”

“You’ll be here on Valentine’s Day after all!” Yoli pointed out. “I think I might know someone you—”

“No, thanks,” he said firmly. Thelastthing he needed was to start a relationship in this town.

“He doesn’tdoValentine’s Day,” Clara reminded her. To him, she said, “Do you want me to change your flight?”

“I never booked one,” he admitted.

She raised her eyebrows. “I thought you said you were leaving at dawn on Saturday.”

“Wishful thinking.”

“Why are you in such a big rush to get back home?” Yoli asked, apparently unaware that they weren’t best friends and his life was none of her business. “This job is easy, the people are all nice—and this weekend you get to go on vacation! You must have a girlfriend in the city, huh? If you had a dog you would’ve brought it with you.”

“It’s not that he wants to bethere,” Clara answered before he could. “He just wants to benot here. It’s our secret family dysfunction.”

“Secret family dysfunction?” Yoli repeated. “This I gotta hear.”

“Shut up, Clara,” Jesse warned.

“Tell me when he goes in his office,” Yoli whispered to Clara.

“I don’tknowit,” Clara replied, for once sounding irritable. “It’s between him and my parents. Something happened six years ago and he never came home again.”

“Austinis home,” Jesse corrected, feeling like a jerk for disabusing her, but she wasso naïve.“It always has been. Your house was just a foster home. I aged out, and there was no reason to come back.”

Clara just looked at him, as serious as he had ever seen her.

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