Her words had certainly caught Dr. Gatewood’s attention, however. “I’ve heard there is to be a dance, but I thought it wasn’t until Friday evening?”
“You’re correct, but there is a . . .” Her cheeks went warm, knowing she was about to let Dr. Gatewood know she couldn’t dance. “Well, a practice of sorts this afternoon.”
“Ah.” He nodded, seemingly nonplussed by her words. “The ladies are holding a dance practice?”
“Not only the ladies. Anyone can attend. I imagine men will be there too.”
Dr. Gatewood nodded again. “In that case, perhaps I ought to go also.”
Willa’s heart leaped. “Oh? I would have assumed you already knew how to dance, given your background.”
“And what background is that?” He gave her a teasing smile before offering her his arm again.
Willa pushed her lips together to keep from smiling too broadly and giving away her delight at his decision to attend the dance practice. “A fine one, I’m certain,” she said. “One replete with dinner parties and cigars and brandy and simpering socialites.”
Dr. Gatewood laughed loudly, and Willa let herself smile at his amusement. “You aren’t far off from the truth,” he said. “It was a confining, miserable existence.”
“Oh?” Willa was curious now. How could anyone born into such luck despise it so? “How come? I can’t imagine never wanting for a thing.”
He grew more serious and brought his other hand over to tuck hers beneath it, shielding her fingers from the frostbitten air. It was a tiny action, but one that made Willa grow warm from head to toe.
“I felt useless,” he finally said as they passed a saloon, calm now in the light of day. “I studied medicine to save lives, to do something important. And yet I found myself treating gout and fainting spells while attempting to ward away my mother’s attempts to marry me off to one of those simpering socialites, as you put it.”
Willa bit her lip and watched him as he spoke. He was careful to steer her around particularly wet and icy areas on the boards of the sidewalk.
“Out here, I feel as if I can breathe. No one is watching my every move. And I can make a difference. Just look at last night—I saved two men from death.Thatis what I want to do with my life. Money is nothing without meaning.”
Money is nothing without meaning. Willa let his words echo in her mind a moment. “That makes sense,” she said. “When we’re in a town and I see Papa’s medicines helping someone, it eases the pain of not truly having a home.”
Dr. Gatewood watched her now. “I can’t imagine how difficult that must be. Not having a home.”
Willa swallowed. It felt as if he were reaching into her very soul with his words and with the way he looked at her. “It gets lonely,” she said, hoping she didn’t sound pathetic. “I have my father, and Amos and Leroy, of course. But I have no friends. And . . .” She stopped herself before confessing her greatest worry.I fear I’ll never marry, and that I’ll be alone when I no longer have Papa. She shivered at the thought. It was the one that haunted her late at night, when she awoke in yet another inn or in one of the wagons. The one that sat in the deepest part of her heart.
“You’re not alone right now.” Dr. Gatewood had stopped, and they stood in front of the Tivoli Ballroom. But as far as Willa was concerned, it felt as if they were by themselves, far from town, in a place where the world spun around them.
Her breath hitched in her throat as he held her gaze with those lake-colored eyes. He raised a hand and pushed a strand of hair from her face, the fingertips of his gloves grazing her skin. She ought to step back. This was too much, especially from a man she wasn’t entirely certain she could trust, despite how he’d saved Amos. But Willa couldn’t move. She could hardly breathe. It was as if Dr. Gatewood had taken all sense from her mind with that one little touch along her cheekbone.
He smiled at her just then and pulled the door open. “Shall we go inside?”
Willa let out a jagged breath as he led her forward. How ever could she dance with him if she could hardly handle what had just happened?
