Robyn CarrVIRGIN RIVER
ROBYN CARR
This novel is dedicated to Pam Glenn, Goddess of Midwifery, my friend and sister of my heart.
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Acknowledgements
Chapter One
Mel squinted into the rain and darkness, creeping along the narrow, twisting, muddy, tree-enshrouded road and for the hundredth time thought, am I out of my mind? And then she heard and felt a thump as the right rear wheel of her BMW slipped off the road onto the shoulder and sank into the mud. The car rocked to a stop. She accelerated and heard the wheel spin but she was going nowhere fast.
I am so screwed, was her next thought.
She turned on the dome light and looked at her cell phone. Shed lost the signal an hour ago when she left the freeway and headed up into the mountains. In fact, shed been having a pretty lively discussion with her sister Joey when the steep hills and unbelievably tall trees blocked the signal and cut them off.
I cannot believe youre really doing this, Joey was saying. I thought youd come to your senses. This isnt you, Mel! Youre not a small-town girl!
Yeah? Well, it looks like Im gonna beI took the job and sold everything, so I wouldnt be tempted to go back.
You couldnt just take a leave of absence? Maybe go to a small, private hospital? Try to think this through?
I need everything to be different, Mel said. No more hospital war zone. Im just guessing, but I imagine I wont be called on to deliver a lot of crack babies out here in the woods. The woman said this place, this Virgin River, is calm and quiet and safe.
And stuck back in the forest, a million miles from a Starbucks, where youll get paid in eggs and pigs feet and
And none of my patients will be brought in handcuffed, guarded by a corrections officer. Then Mel took a breath and, unexpectedly, laughed and said, Pigs feet? Oh-oh, JoeyIm going up into the trees again, I might lose you&