Page 81 of After All

“You don’t know what cappuccino is?” Kyle asked. “Really?”

Kyle was definitely grumpy, and Scott had a pretty good idea why. And he sympathized. Kyle’s little sister, Riley, was home, and then there was Hannah—the one that got away. Yeah, Scott would be grumpy too. But the thing was…he was in love. And he didn’t care if it was a little insensitive to be incredibly happy in the face of his friend’s stress.

“I just wanted to be sure that my friend who is abartenderis actually making cappuccinos and then sprinkling shit on top,” Scott said, picking the cup up and taking a sip. “Not bad.”

“Spoken by the guy who uses flavored creamer,” Kyle muttered, picking up his cup of black coffee.

Scott laughed. “Maybe Doc here needs something stronger than coffee,” he said to Derek.

“Bar’s closed,” Derek said, shaking his head. “Coffee, tea, cappuccino, soda, water.”

“Yeah, what exactly is going on here?” Scott asked, swiveling to take in the room again. He’d mostly been focused on Peyton, and had then noticed Heather, and then Riley and Hannah. But Conrad and Frank, two of the older guys in Sapphire Falls who were involved ineverything, sat at the table talking with Hannah, and there was also a guy at the corner table Scott had never seen before.

“Frank and Conrad are out kind of late, aren’t they?” Scott asked. Considering the guys were part of the group that met at the diner every morning for coffee at six a.m., he was shocked to see the guys out at one a.m.

“They’re here getting advice from Hannah,” Derek said, his mouth stretching into a huge grin as he looked at Kyle.

Scott looked at the good doctor as well, but Kyle was glaring at his coffee.

“What’s up with that?” Scott asked Derek.

“They came in because they heard Hannah’s been in here the past couple of nights. They wanted to ask her some questions but didn’t want Dr. Ames to find out.”

Scott looked at Kyle again. “And yet, Dr. Ames is right here.”

“Yep,” Derek said. “Here he is. Weird, when he has rounds at the hospital bright and early in,” Derek glanced at the clock on the wall, “a little over six hours from now.”

Scott turned toward Kyle and rested his elbow on the bar. “Yeah, thatisweird.”

“But I guess if someone’s in town trying to take some of your business away, you’d probably want to keep tabs,” Derek said.

“Hannah’s trying to take some of Kyle’s business?” Scott asked.

“Well, it didn’t really start out that way,” Derek said, leaning on the bar with both forearms. “It’s actually kind of a funny story.”

“It’s really not that funny,” Kyle said.

“Well, it’s probably in how the story is told,” Derek said.

“He has a point,” Scott said, totally rolling along with this. It was pretty fucking fun to make Kyle uncomfortable. Kyle was a perfectionist, and everything always worked out for him, and he rarely had so much as a wrinkle in his shirt. Even a hint that something might not be going exactly according to plan for him was enough for his friends to jump all over.

“Well, it was Kyle’s idea that they talk to her,” Derek said.

“Shut up, Derek.”

But they both knew there was no way Derek was going to shut up. “Kyle wanted to show her that it’s really nice to be involved in taking care of the people in your hometown. You know, kind of rub it in that she didn’t come home to practice like she’d promised. But he wanted her to talk to them as a physical therapist.”

“Because sheisa physical therapist, right?” Scott asked.

“Yeah, but Hannah’s not talking to them about physical therapy. She’s telling them all about acupuncture and massage and immersion therapy and stuff,” Derek said, shooting a look at Kyle as he said it.

“Immersion therapy?” Scott repeated.

“Oh, you’ll have to have Hannah explain it. She getsreallyexcited talking about it,” Derek said with a smirk.

Kyle’s eye roll was big enough to be seen across the room.

Derek went on, “She’s very anti-pain medication and, well, pills in general it seems. So she’s telling our old guys with arthritis and gout all about how to change their diets and to use meditation and massage and other stuff instead. Which, of course, kind of rubs our doc the wrong way. Pun totally intended.”

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