No Ordinary Billionaire (Sinclair #1)

Chapter 2

“Did you read my column today?”

Dr. Sarah Baxter bit her lip to keep from smiling as she looked at her elderly female patient, still sitting on an exam table after a routine visit. Elsie Renfrew was eccentric, but she was also a member of the Amesport City Council, and the biggest gossip in town, so she was far from demented. Sarah had grown very fond of the older woman, but she knew just how wily she actually was, and that Elsie knew the personal business of almost every resident in Amesport. Most people in town called her Elsie the Informer, but Mrs. Renfrew had enough power and clout locally that nobody would dare mention that moniker to the venerable woman face-to-face. Sarah rather admired the older woman’s spunk, but she found herself constantly and carefully monitoring anything she said to the chirpy, inquisitive woman. Even a casual comment about another Amesport resident was likely to end up in Elsie’s What’s Happening in Amesport column of the Amesport Herald if there was even a hint of juicy information. Sarah might admire the fact that her patient was over the age of eighty and still so active in the community, but she’d also readily admit that Mrs. Renfrew terrified the hell out of her sometimes. Just the slightest slip and the seemingly sweet woman would twist the information around and make it the subject of town gossip. Not that Elsie was mean-spirited. She just felt it was her duty to report any news in Amesport since her roots in the area went back to the time the town was founded.

“No, Mrs. Renfrew, I haven’t had a chance to read the paper today.” Sarah knew she was blatantly lying, but she quickly justified that fibbing was better than the possible alternative. She’d read the newspaper this morning at breakfast, including Elsie’s article titled “Another Sinclair Hottie Returns to Amesport Wounded.” If there was one thing Sarah definitely didn’t want Mrs. Renfrew to know, it was that she knew way more about that situation than anyone else in town—except for the so-called rich hottie’s family.

“Now, honey, I told you to call me Elsie ages ago.” The tiny gray-haired woman patted Sarah on the arm and hopped nimbly to the ground, her sneakers absorbing most of the impact. Amazingly, Elsie still looked elegant, even though she was dressed in white sneakers and a red sweat suit.

Sarah sighed as she snaked a hand out to catch the woman around her upper arm to make sure she was steady. She still wasn’t used to the informality around the friendly coastal town of Amesport. “You did tell me that. I’m sorry, Elsie.” Even after nearly a year of practicing here, Sarah still had a hard time calling her patients by their first names if they requested it, and had realized that she actually got to know them well enough that every one of her patients preferred it.

She’d done her residency in internal medicine and first year of practice in Chicago, rarely seeing a patient for very long before moving on to the next one. Her focus had been on hospitalized patients, so she’d rarely had a chance to get to know any of them personally, except for a few who required extensive hospitalization.

Sarah shuddered, a reaction she had every time she thought about even entering a hospital now.

“I kind of thought you might end up being the doctor who is seeing to Dante Sinclair’s injuries when he gets here.” Elsie raised an eyebrow with a sly look on her face. “It’s not like we have very many doctors here.”

Sarah shook her head, focusing her attention on her patient. “Even if I was his doctor, Elsie, I couldn’t tell you. Patient confidentiality.” And thank God for that. Being a doctor gave Sarah a good excuse to clam up when Elsie asked any questions about other residents.

“So are you saying you are going to be this Dante Sinclair’s doctor?” Elsie said shrewdly, shooting Sarah a calculating stare. “But you can’t tell me because of medical ethics?”