Page 22 of The Seal's Promise

The next two hours were terrible. With the six remaining recruits, Brooke gave an extensive tour of the hospital, they talked about the airlifts from the beach and to the city, and they reviewed the types of cases they could handle and which went to town. She thought she had at least two of them seriously considering the job, but then Dr. Jones arrived with his surly personality, making it abundantly clear that whomever took the job would be answering to him for at least six months to “learn the ropes and relieve him of guilt when he retired.” Interest had clearly waned as she walked them all to the exit. Then a mom arrived with her twin sons who were experiencing upset stomachs, and the tour ended.

“That was a colossal waste of your time, and now you have patients to see,” Nora said.

“We’ll see.” Brooke sighed before taking a big bite of a donut. “Several of them were planning to stay in Sandy Point tonight and get a better feel for the town. You never know.”

“I always know, and I can tell you, none of them are ever coming back here unless they’re patients.”

Brooke spent the next two hours seeing patients. A stomach bug was working its way through town, one man needed stitches after trying to remove an old shed in his yard, and then an unexpected visitor arrived.

“Oh hello, Mrs. Barbara, how are you feeling?” Brooke asked when she found Dalton’s grandmother at the front desk. Nora had stepped away, and the woman looked a little surprised to even be there.

“Hello, Brooke, I was hoping to see Dr. Jones.”

“He’s with a patient now, but you can sit in the waiting room or maybe there’s something I could help you with?”

“Actually, you probably are the right person I need to talk to—we all know you run this hospital.”

“Why don’t we head over to the lounge, grab a coffee, and you can tell me what’s going on.”

She poured them both a fresh cup of coffee and offered Mrs. Barbara a donut, then watched her sit like a proper Southern lady and stir cream into her coffee.

“Brooke, you know I don’t tend to dress things up when I have something to say, so I’ll just get on with it.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“I’d like you to give my grandson a job here.”

Brooke nearly spit out her coffee and Mrs. Barbara looked her dead in the eyes. One of her eyebrows rose as if she could tell Brooke had no intention of ever offering Dalton a job.

“Mrs. Barbara, I’m sure your grandson is a fine doctor, but we need a permanent solution, not a temporary bandage. And he hasn’t applied or even inquired about a job here.”

“Not yet, but I think he’s coming around to the idea of making Sandy Point a more permanent move. He just needs a nudge or a reason to stay.”

“That might be true, but he also might be ready to head back to the big city the minute his business is done,” Brooke said. “I wouldn’t want to leave the town without proper care when he’s ready to move on again.”

“Now I know you’re aware why Dalton left the first time, so I’m not giving away any of his personal business, but I think he needs to stay so he can heal. This town will always hold bad memories from when his parents died. But I believe there was some other reason he didn’t come back, and maybe enough time has passed that he’s ready to face it.”

Brooke had no idea what Mrs. Barb was talking about. She was certain the only reason he left was because his parents had died, and he didn’t come back because, like those young doctors, he wanted to be out in the world. Living in a small beach town was a different kind of lifestyle.

“If Dalton wants a job here he’ll need to apply, but I can certainly ask the doctors to mention to him that we have a vacancy.”

A big sly smile spread on her face. “Thank you, Brooke. I do think we can convince Dalton there are more reasons to stay than to leave.” She sipped her coffee. “Now tell me about that boy of yours. I read in the gazette he’s the team captain on his baseball team.”

She felt like she’d fallen into a trap but at the same time couldn’t help but enjoy Mrs. Barbara’s visit. There were several women in town who were thought of as the Sandy Point matriarchs. They were always planning community events and making sure the town stayed on the right path, which was their path. Somehow these women knew every family’s business, and Mrs. Barbara Hart had long been the queen. The Hart family was one of the few original pioneer families in Sandy Point. But the small beach town also had coastal families who owned a lot of the land and businesses in town. It was like the townies versus the coasties at times when they were growing up—Banks kids with flashy cars, and the working-class kids riding bikes to school.

Brooke hadn’t really understood how rich some of the families were until she’d fallen for Tyler. As he liked to point out during their divorce, he was from the wealthiest family in Sandy Point, and she’d been lucky to be with him. Brooke loved Sandy Point, where she and her younger sister had an idyllic childhood and her parents owned a home remodeling business. When she fell for Tyler he’d easily convinced her to get married and move away. She thought all her dreams had come true.

A year later she was married and living in a big, fancy house, but then one day she walked in on her husband cheating on her, in their bedroom. She realized that day that she’d just been like a trinket he’d picked up that summer, a conquest, and once he’d had enough, he’d cast her aside. She’d returned home to Sandy Point humiliated, and the wealthiest family’s reputation for being rude and cutthroat was amplified. The Banks family lived on the outside of town along the beach, there were three brothers, one younger sister, and their father owned a wealth investment firm among other things. So Brooke knew she was going to need a good lawyer if she was going to take a Banks to court for anything. It wouldn’t hurt if Mrs. Barbara Hart was on her side.

CHAPTER TWELVE

Dalton

Caught in the Act

The problem withSandy Point was that no one could keep a secret, and Dalton needed to be strategic about advertising a part-time position on his grandmother’s estate. Plus, he didn’t exactly know what the job would be. The job description was in flux because he needed a companion for his grandmother, but also someone who could cook, clean, help in the garden, and keep track of her. Even as a trained Navy SEAL he was constantly losing her in the huge two-story Victorian-style family house on the one-hundred-acre property. She had a very busy social calendar and easily slipped out into town without him realizing. Which was why this morning he was standing at the bulletin board in the local library, reading over the other types of jobs and town news posted, trying to decide if he should post anything at all.

“Look, Mom, Mr. Dalton’s here. Now I don’t have to be bored with all those books,” Max’s squeaky voice rang in the foyer of the library as he and Brooke walked through the sliding doors of the new building.

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