Last Licks

“Yeah,” Will replied. “Too bad we’ve got a date tonight.” The route they were traveling became a bit more complicated, and conversation halted as Will went into a series of turns, taking them through more built-up areas, then on a more countrified road again, and after about a quarter of a mile, he turned into what looked like a break in a wall of bushes, and they wound up in a parking lot.

”I didn’t think that places like this existed anymore,” Sunny said, taking in the building sprawling in front of them. It had probably started out as a lodge or log cabin but had grown, throwing out extensions. In his youth, Sunny’s dad would have called it a roadhouse. But there was no honky-tonk atmosphere inside. The lighting was subdued, the lunch crowd quiet, and the smell of food delicious.

“A couple of deputies from Levett took me here a few times,” Will whispered as they walked up to the hostess. “But I never felt comfortable here. Nesbit turned up too often.”

They mentioned Dr. Gavrik’s name and were quickly led to a booth in a quiet corner where the doctor was already sitting, her back to the wall, tight-lipped as ever, those piercing dark eyes glancing to her watch and then giving them a “time is money” look.

She had a cup of coffee in front of her. “The fried food is very good—to the taste, if not for the health.”

Sunny was surprised. That statement was the most human thing she’d heard from the doctor since they’d met her. Will ordered a burger and cola, Sunny a grilled chicken sandwich with lemonade, and the doctor told the waitress, “The usual.”

Will looked at her for a long moment after the waitress left, and then casually asked, “What was so important in Atlanta, Doctor?”

Gavrik’s gaze went from piercing to glaring for a moment, “Nothing was interesting there. A storm delayed me.” She took a sip of her coffee, her hand moving smoothly. “You think you have found something, but you know nothing. However, I will tell you, to keep you from prying into my personal life. I transferred at Hartsfield Airport, from a flight from Greensboro.”

“Okay,” Will said. “What was so important in Greensboro?”

“A job interview,” Gavrik replied. “Something perhaps I should have done long ago. There is a large Serbian population in that area, so perhaps my language—my accent—will be useful instead of a hindrance.”

“You want to leave Bridgewater Hall?” Sunny asked, thinking, Another defector!

“You ask why I should leave such a wonderful place?” For the briefest of moments, the woman smiled, and she was striking. Then her lips clamped tightly together again. “I came to this country with excellent medical training, but little English. Working at Bridgewater Hall—that was the best I could get. I was at the top of my class in medical school, and I end up catering to a collection of wealthy invalids? It is enough to make the saints laugh.”

“Then why did you come to the U.S.?” Will asked.

“My country . . . is no more. In the town where I grew up, my relatives were trying to kill the neighbors, and they were trying to do the same for us. I worked in a glorified butcher shop, patching holes in people so they could go out and fight again. I dreamed of working in a place where explosions would not bring the walls down on me. And so I came to America, the land of shining hospitals and the finest technology . . . and I worked on people who have shortness of breath or pains in the chest.” She grimaced. “Or who need enemas.”

Their food arrived. Dr. Gavrik’s “usual” was apparently a piece of meat in a pale sauce on noodles, but she didn’t touch it. “Do you know how it is to be looked down on, the foreign doctor who does the work no one else wants to do, who does it cheap? And all the while, you also see money wasted. Keeping animals for old fools to pet, or paying a person to sing with them . . . these are not necessary things. Yet the new administrator tells me how all departments must suffer if the facility is to go on. To me, that seems . . . ungenerous. So I think it is time to go.”

“It seems a long trip,” Sunny said.

“They told me six hours to return,” the doctor said. “I took the late flight in case my meeting ran long. It did.”

“You must have been pretty tired,” Will said.

Her black eyes snapped, boring into him. “Not really. The delays allowed me to sleep for a while, and I slept on the ride from Boston. Do not suggest that I made some sort of mistake because of fatigue. I followed all the protocols with Mr. Scatterwell. You can confirm that through the nurses who worked with me.”

She braced both hands flat on the table, leaning toward them. “Gardner Scatterwell died of a massive stroke. We did our best for him, but sometimes patients die.”

“How about the other patients who’ve died in the facility?” Will wanted to know. “The ones that have thrown your statistics out of whack?”

“I do not have time for this nonsense.” One second, the doctor was sitting across from them. The next, she was rapidly moving in the direction of the exit.