Free Fatal Hearts by Norah Wilson

mouth.
    “I’m sorry—I lost my train of thought,” he offered. “Not enough sleep.” That was certainly true. His eyes felt gritty and his head clouded with fatigue.
    Her mouth softened again. “I can only imagine. It must be so hard.”
    His throat clogged with unexpected emotion at her words of sympathy. “For you too. I can see how much you miss him.”
    They stood there in the small, high-ceilinged bedroom, not touching but connected by their shared grief. He felt an even stronger pull toward her to comfort and be comforted.
    The thought had him stepping back. “So what happened to the Senator? Was it a stroke? I think that’s what Josh said. I know it was something catastrophic, since he had to vacate his Senate seat.”
    Hayden seized the change of subject, clearly eager to put the awkwardness behind them. “Yeah, the official statement said stroke.” Hayden walked to the window and drew the curtain aside to look out. “Funny thing, all the media attention seemed to focus on his seat, not the Senator himself. If I hadn’t been friends with Josh, I doubt I’d even have known he was here.”
    “Yeah, but you’re from away, right?” Boyd joined her there, taking care not to crowd her, to see what view his new bedroom offered. The rear parking lot, as it happened. He hadn’t even looked last time he’d been in this room. Or if he had, the view hadn’t registered. “Maybe folks aren’t as open if you’re not third-generation Frederictonian.”
    She rolled her eyes at him. “That’s a terrible stereotype about Maritimers.” She let the curtain fall back into place and moved away. “Things haven’t been like that for, oh . . . tens of years.”
    He laughed. “So they’ve adopted you?”
    “They’re campaigning hard to add me to their census roll, all right.”
    “Ah, the hard-sell recruitment?” He took her sigh as an affirmative. “Have you told them you’re not sticking around?”
    “Repeatedly. The recruitment officer doesn’t let a little thing like my life plan deter him.”
    Boyd caught himself before he could ask her what her life plan involved besides disappointing his twin and robbing him of the chance for the kind of love he’d dreamed of.
    Shit. The thought was unworthy of him. As much as it pained him to think about the unrequited love Josh had harbored for Hayden, it wasn’t her fault. Emotions couldn’t be willed or manufactured, something he well knew. But knowing that and getting past it were two different things.
    He realized she was looking at him as though she expected him to say something. Oh, yeah. The overly optimistic recruiter. “So you’re going to break the poor guy’s heart and go where, exactly?”
    “I’m not sure.”
    Not sure? After that speech about career plans and not letting relationships get in the way—dammit, after using it to shut Josh down—she didn’t even know where she wanted to end up?
    She snorted. “God, Boyd. I wish you could see your face. You look like I just said I was going to burn my diploma and walk away from medicine when I finish my residency.”
    “I’m sorry . . . It’s just . . . How could you not know where you’re going?”
    Her smile faded. “Okay, I should have said I’m bound for a bigger center. Toronto, Edmonton, Vancouver, even Halifax. It depends on what offers I get. All I know is I want to work somewhere where I can help the people who have the biggest health challenges, the people who need intervention the most.”
    He blinked. “Junkies?”
    That elicited another eye roll. “I meant the poor, Boyd. Which, yes, could include addicts.”
    “And there are no poor people here?”
    “Of course there are. There’s always poverty, wherever you go. But it’s relative. I’m sure Josh must have told you what a white-collar town this is. Seat of government, home to two universities, culturally rich. Scores very highly on all of those best places to live polls. It has a very high percentage of people