Page 12 of My Fake Dating with the Grumpiest Highlander
Toward my hand trembling ever so slightly.
“I... sorry,” I mutter, grabbing a towel to wipe it up.
“McKinnon never would’ve wasted a perfectly good Tennent’s,” Duncan grumbles.
I didn’t waste it. It was an accident.
But I say nothing.
I drop the towel, grab my medical bag, and head for the door.
“Doctor, wait!” Ewan calls after me.
I ignore him.
I need air.
I need to get out of this room where every breath reminds me that I’ll never measure up to a man who apparently rescued cats from trees in his spare time.
The door slams shut behind me and the cold hits instantly. The rain has started again—obviously—and I remain standing there on the sidewalk with my ordered-but-never-delivered fish and chips.
“Dr. McLeod!”
Ewan rushes outside without a jacket despite the rain.
“I’m sorry about Duncan, he... he didn’t mean?—”
“Forget it.”
“No, listen. McKinnon was a pillar of the community. A lot of people took his leaving badly?—”
I stare at him incredulously.
“And that justifies hating me because I’m trying to do my job?”
“That’s not exactly?—”
“They don’t want a doctor,” I cut in. “They want a saint. Some superhero in a white coat who works twenty-four hours a day, never makes mistakes, and rescues cats from trees for fun.”
Ewan says nothing.
What could he possibly say?
“I’m not McKinnon,” I continue, my voice hardening. “I will never be McKinnon. I’m just a doctor trying to do his job without having doors slammed in his face every five minutes.”
“I know.”
“Do you? Because I’m starting to feel like I’m the only person in this village who understands that.”
Rain streams down my forehead. I wipe it away with my soaked sleeve, a completely useless gesture.
“For what it’s worth,” Ewan says after a moment of silence, “I think you’re a good doctor. My aunt Moira was wrong to throw you out yesterday.”
“Moira MacTavish is your aunt?”
“Unfortunately. She’s stubborn as hell. But she’ll give you a chance eventually. They all will. It’ll just take time.”
“How much time?”
