What the hell have I walked into?

Adam stared at the closed door. He felt like an animal trapped in a cage.

He’d known this trip was going to be hard. And he refused to lie to himself—he’d felt edgy about meeting Carolyn Trent from the start. What sane man in his position wouldn’t?

During the whole trip he’d hardened himself to face her. When he’d climbed the stairs to her home, his heart had pounded like a sledgehammer. He’d supposed she’d be polite—initially. After that, he’d been prepared for anything.

Except this. The woman he’d come to meet wasn’t here. Instead, he’d been thrown off from the first moment by the strange, starchy Michele Nightingale. As haunting as he found her looks, her manner set his teeth on edge. She’d seemed snippy and stuck-up.

Or so he’d thought until the moment she’d burst into tears.

He swore aloud. What to do now? Everything had to be rethought. Everything.

Dear Reader,

This book exists because of four extraordinary people.

One is my husband, Dan, who learned that there were endangered wild horses in the Bahamas—and knew I’d love to find out more. He tracked them down and took me to see them. I was hooked by their story, and I hope you will be, too.

The second person is the all-too-modest Milanne Roher. Milanne has selflessly dedicated herself to these beautiful, mysterious and threatened creatures, the wild horses of Abaco.

I wanted a character who, like Milanne, could bring great passion to a cause, and that character turned out to be Adam Duran. Though he and the heroine, Mickey, have a volatile clash of loyalties, they find they also have deep and abiding similarities.

The two other people who influenced this story are my mother, Beatrice, who was orphaned at fourteen, and an older woman—a stranger, Frances—who took her in. What began as an act of charity turned into a lifelong friendship. Frances’s kindness, warmth and generosity continue to echo through the generations of our family.

These women are the basis of the relationship between the characters of Mickey, the protagonist, and Carolyn Trent, who proves so important to both Mickey and Adam.

Please drop in and visit me at my Web site, www.bethanycampbell.com. You’ll find more information about the horses there, a contest for you to enter, other goodies and a chance to get in touch. I’d love to hear from you!

Sincerely,

Bethany Campbell

P.S. To see the real horses that got this story off to its start, just check out the Web site for the Abaco Wild Horse Fund, Inc. There are photos, videos, a history and frequent updates. You’ll find it at www.arkwild.org or you can simply type the words “Abaco Wild Horses” into your search engine.

Wild Horses
Bethany Campbell

www.millsandboon.co.uk

To Bea and Aunt Frances, with love

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

CHAPTER ONE

IN THEIR DAY, the Randolph brothers of Crystal Creek, Texas, had been famed for three things.

They were handsome as sin. They were rebellious to the point of recklessness. And they tended to drift off to faraway places and never return.

Enoch Randolph was no exception. He’d left Texas over thirty years ago for a life of ease in the Bahamas and never looked back. As time passed, the crankier he grew. He cut off his ties with all the people of Crystal Creek—except one.

That person was his niece, Carolyn. He stayed in touch, not out of love, but for money. Each spring Enoch mailed her a handwritten receipt. This receipt acknowledged that she’d sent him the yearly check for the range land that she leased from him.

Although Carolyn was Enoch’s closest living relative, he never added any greeting or message, except this: “Mrs. Carolyn Randolph Trent: My will stands as per the agreement I made with your mother in 1968. Enoch Randolph.”

So, in May when an envelope arrived with the Bahamian stamp, Carolyn’s secretary, twenty-six-year-old Mickey Nightingale, opened it as a matter of course. She expected Enoch’s usual statement in his usual, crabbed handwriting.

But instead of the receipt, Mickey found an entire letter. Unfolding it, she saw that it had been typed with an old-fashioned typewriter on a sheet of yellowing paper. As she read, anxiety tightened her chest and her heart raced ominously.

May 7

Box N-204 West Bay Street

Nassau, Bahamas

Mrs. Carolyn Trent

Circle T Ranch RR 1

Claro County, Texas 78624, USA

Dear Mrs. Trent:

I regret to inform you that your uncle, Enoch K. Randolph, died in his sleep one week ago on the night of April 30. It was peaceful.

As executor of his will, I am charged with settling the part of his estate involving his lands. Mr. Randolph left specific instructions that I am to do this in person.

I will arrive in Claro County on May 19, the Wednesday afternoon after next. Time is of the essence, and your full cooperation is necessary so matters can be settled by Friday. I can stay no longer.

Please reply immediately. You may leave a message at 424-555-1411.

Sincerely,

Adam Duran

P.S. Your uncle was cremated and his ashes scattered in the Caribbean without ceremony, as per his request.

“Uh-oh,” Mickey murmured. Whoever Adam Duran was, he seemed to have the tact and sympathy of a constipated rhinoceros.

Not only that, his letter must have been delayed. Good grief, May 19th was the day after tomorrow. The rhinoceros was practically on their doorstep.

Mickey hoped that news of Enoch’s death and the brusqueness of the message wouldn’t upset Carolyn. Concerned, she rose from her desk and hurried to find her.

Mickey was brisk, efficient and fiercely loyal to her employers, Vern and Carolyn Trent. She kept their lives organized and running smoothly; she liked this job and excelled at it. Officially she was Carolyn’s secretary; unofficially she was family, almost like a second daughter.

The Circle T was not only Mickey’s workplace, but her home and sanctuary. To her, it was like dwelling in a castle at the heart of a benevolent kingdom. Her growing-up had been harsh, but here she felt privileged, fulfilled—and grateful.

So it pained her to bring bad news to Carolyn, especially since Carolyn was so happy of late. And she was due. Caro had traveled a long stretch of hard times. But now she was giddy, almost girlish, and blooming like a Texas rose.

Carolyn’s only child, Beverly, who lived in Denver, was about to make her a grandmother. It was a miracle, pure and simple. Beverly and her husband, Sonny, had tried nine years for this baby. The baby was a girl and she would arrive in three weeks by C-section. She would be named for Carolyn and called Carrie.

As the due date neared, Carolyn’s excitement had quickened into intoxication. She and Vern were to fly to Denver to welcome the baby like the little princess she was. The trip was eclipsing almost everything else at the ranch.

Mickey was certain where Carolyn would be—in the spare bedroom she was transforming into a nursery for the baby’s visits. Mickey followed the scent of fresh paint down the hall.

She found Carolyn humming as she coated a window frame a rosier shade of pink. She was so intent on her work that she barely glanced up. “What do you think, Mick? Looks better than that pale pastel, doesn’t it? Cheerier?”

It’s the third time you’ve switched the color, Mickey wanted to tease. Carolyn had changed her mind about the wallpaper four times, the curtains three times, and the crib twice.

But the news of Enoch Randolph hung like a dark cloud over Mickey, so she could make no joke. “Carolyn,” she said uneasily. “You got a letter from Nassau this morning. I think you’d better read it.”

Carolyn kept painting, a small, puzzled smile crossing her face. “I don’t know anybody in Nassau.” Then suddenly her smile died, and her brush went still. “Wait. Uncle Enoch—he could be there. Is it about him?”

“I’m afraid so.”

Carolyn saw it then, the envelope in Mickey’s grip. She set the brush aside, her face wary. She knows, Mickey thought. She’s guessed.

Carolyn turned from the window frame, her face pale. “I don’t think I want to read it here.”

Mickey didn’t blame her. The nursery was meant to be a happy room, a place to celebrate life, not think about death.

She took Carolyn’s arm. “Maybe we should go into the den.”

Carolyn nodded, her lips pressed together. Mickey led the way, and when Carolyn sat on the leather couch Mickey settled beside her and handed her the envelope.

For a moment Carolyn only gazed down at it. She smoothed her blond hair, a nervous gesture. “He’s gone, isn’t he?” She kept her face severely controlled. “He’s dead.”

“I’m sorry.” Mickey felt the illogical guilt of the bearer of bad news.

Carolyn squared her shoulders, withdrew the letter and read it. Tears sprang to her eyes. She wiped them away. Mickey suspected they would be the only tears shed in the whole state of Texas for the old man, perhaps the only ones in the world.

“I’m glad he didn’t suffer,” Carolyn said in a shaky voice. “I’m glad it was peaceful.”

Mickey nodded.

“He had a long life,” Carolyn said in the same tone. “And he lived it the way he wanted. But I wish that this—this Duran man had phoned when it happened. This is so impersonal. Enoch and I didn’t have much of a relationship. Oh, hell, to tell the truth, he didn’t really even like me. But he was family.”

Mickey put her arm around Carolyn’s shoulder. “You always treated him well. You never forgot his birthday. You remembered him at Christmas. Whenever there was news about the land, you wrote him.”

“And he never answered.” Carolyn’s sigh was rueful. “My God, it’s the end of an era. He’s the last of my father’s generation of that family. And now I’m the last of my generation—the oldest living one. It gives me a shiver. Like a goose walking over my grave.”

She waved the letter unhappily. “But this really is cold. Hard-hearted, almost.” She frowned and reread it. “Who is this man?”

Mickey shrugged. “Nobody uses a typewriter like that anymore. He must be an old man, sticking to old ways.”

“Why is he the executor? And why does he have to come here?”

“I don’t know. Maybe your uncle wanted him to hand over the deed in person. That was the agreement, wasn’t it? The lease land’s yours now.”

Carolyn stared at the dates, frowning harder still. “Yes…but he’s coming tomorrow? Good God—tomorrow?”

“He wrote the letter more than a week ago,” Mickey said, pointing to its date. “It must have got misrouted.”

“Great. Just peachy. He doesn’t sound like Mr. Charm, does he? But I should invite him to stay with us. Especially since he’s coming all this way.”

Inwardly Mickey flinched. Things were frantic enough without an unbidden houseguest, and a stranger at that. Carolyn was trying to be gracious, but Mickey could tell it cost her effort.

“Do you want me to phone him for you? I’ll be glad to.”

Carolyn grimaced. “I’d love you to. But no, it’s something I should do myself. He’s probably wondering why I haven’t answered.”

She folded the letter, stood and handed it to Mickey. “Put it on my desk, will you, sweetie? I’ll call him later. First I’m going into town. To the florist. Maybe Enoch didn’t want any ceremony, but I can’t stand not to do something. I’ll order some flowers for the Sunday church service.”

“But if he didn’t want any ceremony—”

“They’re not for him. They’re for me,” Carolyn said. “I won’t even mention his name. I just need to do—something. Closure. A way to say goodbye. The Randolph men. Dead. All three.”

Mickey knew Carolyn’s heart churned with complex emotions. The old man had been eccentric, unfriendly and a loner. He had never married, he was basically shiftless, but he’d stuck to the bargain he’d made so long ago.

Carolyn had always been prompt with her checks, and over the years had raised her payments without being asked. She always saw that he got a fair price for the use of the land. And the money let him live as he chose, a free man.

Enoch had made the original agreement with Carolyn’s mother. He didn’t give a damn about his Texas land, which he’d won in a poker game. He’d gone to the Caribbean and bought a houseboat in the Bahamas, at Little Exuma. He’d never worked another day in his life.

Now Carolyn gazed down at her fingernails, speckled with rosy paint. “I’d better clean up to go to town.” Her face was pensive.

But she was, after all, Carolyn Trent, and half an hour later, when she walked out the door, she held herself royally straight, and she looked like a million dollars. With pride, Mickey watched her go.

LEON VANEK, the new foreman, also watched as Carolyn left. He stood in the shadows just inside the stable door.

At fifty-six, Carolyn Trent was still glamorous. She came from a long line of strong and beautiful women who seemed born to rule. Her domain was the Circle T, twenty-one thousand acres of prime Hill Country.

It was Carolyn who had run the Circle T since the death of her first husband. Her second husband, Vern, was an affable fellow, kindly and intelligent, but no cattleman. He was the county J.P., not a rancher.

Vern presided over justice court, small claims court and administrative hearings, and Carolyn presided over the cattle business. She did it with a firm and expert hand. Generously, she claimed she couldn’t handle the job without Mickey Nightingale.

Leon Vanek was new to his job, but he had long studied the Trents because they fascinated him. He was also interested in Mickey, for more than one reason. First, he liked the Circle T. It was the best job he’d ever had.

He’d been raised five counties away, and had worked his way up to assistant foreman at the old MacWhorter Ranch. Earl MacWhorter was a tightfisted old fogy, and both he and his ranch were in decay.

When Earl died, Leon forged glowing references for himself and snagged a series of jobs in Wyoming and Oklahoma. He was an abnormally proud man who had felt he was meant for finer things. With each job he left, he added to his doctored résumé. He didn’t think of his false recommendations as counterfeit. In his mind, he deserved them.

When he’d heard of a foreman’s position back near Crystal Creek, he lusted for it. He’d grown up looking jealously at the well-run ranches in Claro County. Two were so superior that they filled him with an almost aching covetousness.

J. T. McKinney’s Double C was the biggest and best, but Carolyn Trent’s was a close second.

It wasn’t just these places he looked upon with envy, but the people, as well. Hell, they were aristocracy. He burned to be one of them, so he typed a few more letters of praise for himself.

At the Circle T, he had found his place, and he intended to keep it. He was gentlemanly to Vernon Trent, courtly to Carolyn and unctuously polite to everyone more important than he was.

Now that Carolyn had left the ranch, he figured it the perfect time to call on Mickey. She was part of his plan.

Leon had been at the Circle T for four weeks now, and he saw that Carolyn was so fond of Mickey that she treated her like blood kin. Leon had quickly realized how to cement his relationship with the Trents permanently: he’d marry Mickey.

Then he’d practically be family. Carolyn was about to become a grandmother, with a brat to visit in far-off Colorado, and the Trents would travel more and more. Leon could see himself and Mickey running the place, running it smooth as silk, because Mickey was almost as capable as he was.

Hell, in a few years, the Trents could retire, and he’d reign over the whole shebang. It would be as if the Circle T belonged to him.

Now he knocked on the kitchen door. He used the back entrance out of deference to his position, but he didn’t aim to always do so. When Mickey opened the door, he was struck by another reason she interested him.

She was easy on the eyes.

Her skin was perfect, with a natural golden cast, her high cheekbones burnished with health. Her hair was sun-streaked brown, and her eyes were hazel and coolly mysterious.

She greeted him politely, as always. She wore blue jeans, a plain white shirt and a navy blue blazer. A yellow pencil was thrust neatly behind one ear. Everything about her said “strictly business.”

Except her hair. She wore it long, parted in the middle and tucked behind her ears. But it was thick and always seemed slightly tousled. It hinted that she had a secret: I’m not as prim as I act.

Leon believed that her prissiness hid a nature that was hot and wild. She had a good body, and in his imagination he did things to it. And he imagined her doing many, many things to his.

“Can I help you?” Mickey asked. “I’m afraid Carolyn’s gone.”

She had to look up at him, because she was only of medium height, and he was a tall man, almost six and a half feet. He enjoyed the sense of power his height gave him.

“Could I come in?” he asked. “It’s you I want to talk to.”

She looked startled, but stepped aside to let him enter. Cowboys usually kept their hats on inside, but Leon never did. He liked to emphasize that he was a better sort. “Thanks,” he said. “I hope I’m not interrupting.”

“I was taking a break from the household accounts. I haven’t got any coffee made, but I could offer you a glass of sweet tea.”

“Sounds mighty fine.” He watched as she moved briskly about, getting a glass, opening the fridge, pouring the tea—waiting on him.

She handed him the tea, but had poured none for herself. She gestured at the kitchen table. “Please have a seat.”

He sat, settling his hat on one wide thigh. She remained standing. She crossed her arms as he sipped the tea. “You wanted to talk?”

She was deliberately keeping distance between them. He’d noticed that about her. She acted as if men didn’t much interest her.

He’d asked some of the more talkative hands about her. They said if a guy put the move on her, she’d get standoffish and sometimes sharp-tongued. Well, she just hadn’t found the man who could give it to her the way she needed.

He reached into the pocket of his green western-cut shirt. He drew out a short length of glittering gold, a bracelet. “I found this. It’s the one you lost, isn’t it?”

For the first time, real emotion lit her face. The polite smile became dazzling. “Oh! I was afraid it was gone for good. Thank you.”

He held it toward her, dangling from his thick fingers. He made sure his hand brushed hers as she took the bracelet, but she didn’t seem to notice.

“I saw you and Miz Trent looking for it down by Sabur’s stall,” Leon said. “She asked me to keep an eye out for it. I found it a few minutes ago.”

She radiated happiness. “Carolyn and Vern gave it to me for my birthday. I was sick when I lost it.”

She tried to fasten it in place, but had trouble doing so with only one hand. He stood and moved next to her. “Here. Let me.”

He took the bracelet and slid the clasp in place. This time she couldn’t help but be conscious of his big fingers against her bare wrist.

Her cheeks flushed. “I can’t thank you enough.”

“I know a way you could thank me. Go out with me. Get better acquainted. We work together. But we don’t see much of each other.” He said this with a smile he thought was charming and nonthreatening. He’d practiced it in the mirror until he thought he’d perfected it.

Yet she seemed disturbed by the suggestion. “That’s very kind of you—” she began.

He cut her off smoothly. “There’s a new Bavarian restaurant just opened over in Fredricksburg. I thought that maybe tomorrow night—”

She inched backward, her chin rising aloofly. “Sorry. Carolyn’s having company from out of town. I have to help out.”

He’d expected this refusal. So he gave her the same rehearsed smile. “Maybe some other time.”

“Maybe. Things are awfully busy lately.” She said it without enthusiasm, as if she meant to discourage him.

At that moment, Leon heard tires on the gravel drive. He stole a glance out the kitchen window. Damn. Vern Trent was home early. Leon should make an exit. But he had one more ploy.

“Jazmeen should be foaling in two weeks,” he said. Jazmeen was Carolyn’s Arabian mare, and she’d homebred her to her stallion, Sabur al Akmar.

“She’s not showing signs yet, but I’ve seen the charts when she’s due. You want to see the little critter when I got it cleaned up and on its feet?”

A look of pure pleasure brightened her face again. Mickey loved horses; he knew that. That’s when he’d first taken real note of her, when he’d seen her riding. A woman who rode the way she did had a lot of passion bottled up inside. “I’d love to,” she said.

“I’ll come get you,” he promised. “Then afterwards we’ll have a drink, celebrate.” He picked up his hat from the chair seat just as Vern came in the door.

Vern looked harried. “Oh, hello, Leon. Everything all right?”

“Everything’s fine, Mr. Trent. Found Miss Nightingale’s bracelet. Just dropped it off.”

Vern glanced at Mickey, who held up her wrist and smiled.

Leon said, “Got to get back to work. Need to take some cotton-seed cake out to that herd by the creek. Thanks for the tea, Miss Nightingale.”

He lifted the glass, finished the tea, then set it back on the table. “I’ll be seeing you. You know. About Jazmeen and all.” He tipped his hat toward both of them, then left.

He went out the back door, putting his hat back on, pulling the brim down hard. Well, he’d made his move, and his campaign was in gear. She really did play hard to get, this one. But she liked him, he was sure of it. She’d be lucky to get a man like him. Why, if Carolyn hadn’t taken her in, she’d be no better than a guttersnipe. But she’d cleaned up real good, as the saying went.

The bracelet had given him points—he’d made her face light up, all right.

He’d seen the bracelet fall from her wrist yesterday morning when she’d dismounted Sabur. It had slipped into the straw in the stallion’s stall. She hadn’t noticed, and he’d said nothing. When she left the stable, he’d picked it up.

Later, when she and Carolyn came back to look, Mickey’d been near tears. She’d felt terrible about losing it; it was special. Leon pretended to help search. He didn’t say a word about having found it.

Not then. He was too smart. He’d waited for a moment that was better—for him.

WHEN LEON was gone, Mickey said, “You’re home early, Vern. A light schedule at the courthouse?”

“A couple cancellations.” He squinted at Mickey with interest. “You’re blushing, Mick. Carolyn’s claimed that Leon Vanek’s got his eye on you. She’s never wrong about things like that. Asked you out, didn’t he? Are you going?”

Mickey gave a defensive smile. “I don’t think he’s my type.”

She wanted to escape back to her office, but Vern wasn’t through with her. “What do you mean not your type? He seems like a nice fellow. Hardworking. Polite.”

Mickey swallowed and glanced toward the sanctuary of her own rooms. “He’s nice enough,” she murmured. She hadn’t had any say in Vanek’s hiring. She’d been down with a killer case of flu, and Caro, who’d needed a foreman quickly, hadn’t wanted to bother her.

Often, though, Mickey felt that Leon Vanek was too nice, almost groveling. But this was only an intuition, and she didn’t want to say such a thing to Vern, who’d helped Caro pick him. Still, Vanek made her uncomfortable.

Her uneasiness must have shown because Vern took pity on her. He smiled kindly. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t play Cupid. Carolyn’s all hearts and flowers and family-family-family now. It’s contagious. Pay me no mind. I’m a doddering old man about to become a grandpa.”

Mickey managed a smile. “You’re not doddering, and you’re not old. But I’ve got to get to back to the accounts.”

Vern’s face went serious. “Help me out first, will you? Caro called me on her car phone. Told me about Enoch. She took it harder than I thought she would. I suppose it brings back the other losses.”

Mickey nodded, for death had taken most of Carolyn’s family. Her father had deserted the family long ago and later died in Canada. Her mother and sister had both died of breast cancer. She had lost her first husband to a heart attack.

Now, both her uncles were gone, too. Beverly and the new baby were her only close blood relatives.

“I never knew Enoch,” Vern said solemnly. “Carolyn always shrugged him off as just a loner, but he sounded like a kook to me. I hope he hasn’t pulled any funny business with this will. Show me the letter, will you?”

Mickey led him into Carolyn’s office. Vern read it and shook his head. “I wonder who the hell this guy is. Hope he didn’t insinuate himself into the old coot’s life to fleece him. Enoch was getting up in years. He might have been losing his grip on reality.”

The thought was a grim one, and it had occurred to Mickey, too.

Vernon swung open the framed painting that hid the wall safe. “The original will’s in here somewhere. I’m going to take it into town and show it to Martin Avery. I want a lawyer’s opinion. I won’t have Caro cheated out of what’s rightfully hers.”

“That makes two of us,” Mickey said. There were eleven thousand acres of lease land, more than half the ranch. If Carolyn lost them, it would be ruinous to the Circle T. Next to her family, Carolyn loved the ranch more than anything in the world.

CAROLYN KNOCKED at Mickey’s door.

“Come on in,” Mickey called. She lay on the couch reading a library book. Carolyn entered, unceremoniously pushed aside Mickey’s stocking feet and sat next to her. “Well, I finally got through to the number Adam Duran gave.”

“And?” Mickey bit into an apple, her midevening snack.

“The number wasn’t a personal phone. It was a marina of some kind. I talked to a man who sounded like he was reciting the lyrics to a Calypso song.”

Mickey laughed. “So what did you learn?”

“Not much. I told him I was trying to find Duran to invite him to stay with us. He said he’d relay the message, that he’d see him later tonight.”

“Did you ask him who Duran is? What he does?”

“No. Too much noise. Like there was a party going on in the background. Anyway, I left word.”

“Hmm.” Mickey shrugged. “So what did the lawyer tell Vern?”

“Martin? He knows the old will was valid—his father’s the one who drew it up. If this Duran tries to pull something shady, Martin can handle him. He’s going to look it over and get back to us. But at this point he doesn’t think we have to worry.”

“That’s a relief,” Mickey said. “Super Barrister on the job. Hooray for Mighty Martin.”

Carolyn rumpled her hair playfully. From the front of the house, they heard the doorbell chime. A moment later, Vern knocked at Mickey’s door, which stood ajar. “Carolyn? Mickey? Come on out here. Lynn’s here. And she’s got a surprise for you.”

“Oops,” said Mickey. “Shoes? Shoes?” She groped around and slipped back into her moccasins, then followed Carolyn to the living room. Carolyn gave her niece’s cheek a smacking kiss, and Mickey greeted her with a grin.

Petite and auburn-haired, Lynn was the daughter of J. T. McKinney and Pauline, Carolyn’s late sister. In her thirties, Lynn looked young for her age, and her jeans and riding boots made her seem tomboyish. She was smiling like someone almost too joyful to contain herself.

“I just found out,” Lynn bubbled, “and I had to ride straight over to tell you in person. Guess what?”

“You’ve got a new horse?” Carolyn asked. Horses were Lynn’s passion.

“No,” laughed Lynn, “much better! Tyler and Ruth sold the winery in Napa Valley. They’re coming home! This time to stay.”

Lynn threw her arms around her aunt. She and Carolyn hugged and laughed and cried at the same time. Mickey grinned. Carolyn’s nephew—her late sister’s firstborn—coming home! Tyler was Carolyn’s favorite of Pauline’s children, and the one about whom she’d worried most.

Tyler had brains, determination and an almost endless capacity for work. What he’d never had was luck. His younger brother, Cal, seemed to prosper without effort. Tyler struggled to run two wineries that were a thousand miles apart. He was deeply in debt, mostly to Cal.

Carolyn had feared Tyler and his family might stay in California forever. His wife had inherited the Napa Valley winery. But running it was not only expensive, but a backbreaking job. Tyler’s heart belonged truly to the more humble winery he’d started in Claro County. He had sweat blood to keep both operations working.

“When did this happen?” Caro drew back to study Lynn’s beaming face.

“He called this afternoon. Ruth said she couldn’t watch Tyler work himself to death any longer. She decided she wanted to come back, and just this last weekend they put the winery up for sale. They didn’t tell anybody here, because they thought it might take forever to sell—”

Vern nodded. “True, from what I’ve read lately about the California wine market. I’m glad for Tyler. He’s had enough hard breaks.”

Lynn was so excited, she practically bounced. “But this movie star decided he wanted a winery—and it was theirs he wanted. It was just the right size, he said. So, as soon as they close the deal, in two weeks, they’ll move back.”

“To the house they built,” Carolyn said with satisfaction. “And the vineyards they planted here.”

“I’ve missed them something terrible,” Lynn admitted. Tears still glistened in her eyes.

“I know, honey,” Carolyn said. “We all have. But they had to try.”

Vern shook his head. “Two outfits, that far apart, that high maintenance—I was scared he’d work himself into an early grave trying to handle it all.”

Or go broke trying, Mickey thought. She knew Carolyn had worried about that, too. Without Cal’s help, Tyler would have failed long ago.

Carolyn took Lynn’s face between her hands. “I’m glad good luck’s finally come his way. He’s long overdue, that big brother of yours.”

“And Cal’s coming next fall, too,” Lynn said. “Both my brothers are moving home. I can’t believe it. We’ll all be together again.”

“Well, this occasion calls for one thing,” Vern announced. When the three women looked at him questioningly, he gave them a superior smile. “A toast. In wine. Texas wine.”

Mickey laughed, and so did Carolyn. Lynn hugged her aunt again and said, “And Beverly’s having a baby in less than a month. Nothing’s more important than family. Everything’s perfect.”

“Indeed, it is,” agreed Vern.

And everything did seem perfect. So perfect that no further thought of Adam Duran crossed anyone’s mind.

CHAPTER TWO

ON TUESDAY, Martin Avery came to the house to discuss Enoch’s will. Martin, in his mid-sixties, had rosy pink skin and snow-white hair.

Mild, mannerly and tidy, he had practiced law longer than anyone in Claro County. He was a peaceful man who worked hard to bring about peaceful solutions.

He sat at the dining room table with Carolyn and Vern. Because Mickey handled so much of the ranch’s business, Carolyn asked her to stay and listen to what Martin had to say.

Martin touched the two wills that lay before him. “These are simple documents. Enoch didn’t like doing things in complicated ways.”

Martin summed up the agreement Enoch had originally made with Carolyn’s mother. As long as she paid the lease monies, she was heir to the land. When she’d died, Enoch had the will redrawn naming Carolyn as heir, but nothing else was changed.

He paused. “Did he ever express dissatisfaction with the arrangement?”

Although Carolyn’s face showed concern, she shook her head no. “Every year he endorsed the check and wrote saying that the will stood according to agreement.”

“And when’s the last time he confirmed it?”

“A year ago.” She frowned. “But last year’s lease was legally up on April 21st, and he never cashed this year’s check. If he didn’t cash it, technically, right now, I’m not leasing the land. Is that a problem?”

“Let’s hope not. He probably didn’t cash it because he was ill.”

Vern spoke up. “It still worries me, and so does this executor. Who is he? Why’s he coming here? I don’t like the sound of it.”

Martin laid a slim, pink hand on the older document. “A will has to name an executor. In the first one, he named my father. But my father was retired when Enoch made you heir, Carolyn. He didn’t know or trust me—I was just a young whippersnapper to him.”

He touched the more recent will. “The executor for this one’s a judge in the Bahamas. If he retired or died, Enoch would have to name someone to replace him. Someone he trusted, and he didn’t trust easily. He’d be hard to hoodwink.”

Vern didn’t seem convinced. “Wouldn’t he have to rewrite the will to do that?”

“A handwritten codicil with witnesses should do it.”

“I hope you’re right.” Vern muttered. “But it bothers me. Duran sounds like a crank.”

Martin smiled and handed the two wills to Vernon. “Enoch was a crank himself. It figures he’d hook up with one of his own kind.”

“I wonder why he wanted this man to come to Texas,” Carolyn mused. “What’s the point?”

Martin gave a good-natured shrug. “Maybe that’s how he wanted it done. A friend to carry it out in person. Not to hand it off to some long-distance lawyer.” He made a wry face. “We lawyers are reputed to be a shifty lot, you know.”

Vern laughed, and Carolyn and Mickey both smiled. Carolyn said, “So I shouldn’t expect any surprises?”

Martin’s expression grew serious again. “There can always be surprises. If there are, we’ll deal with them as they arise. In the meantime relax, Caro. You’ve got a blessed event coming up. Don’t let some vague worry spoil it.”

Bridget Blum, the cook, knocked at the door frame. “Carolyn, that antique dealer from Austin’s on the phone. He wants to talk to you about the high chair from England. He can get it after all.”

Carolyn whooped. “He can? Fabulous! I’ll be right there—excuse me, everybody.”

And she was dashing off, the will forgotten for the time, her thoughts happily centering again on the coming of little Carrie.

Vernon pretended to hold his head in despair. “Antique? From England? The shipping alone will break us. She’s a woman possessed.”

“But it’s a good way to be possessed,” said Martin.

Mickey and Vernon walked him to the front door. As they watched Martin climb into his car, Vern said, “She has been extravagant lately. Beef prices aren’t what they used to be. It’s harder for her every year to keep this ranch in the black.”

Mickey knew. Every year she’d seen the profits wobble and sometimes shrink. “It’s just that she’s so excited right now. She’ll come back to herself. You’ll see.”

Vern patted her shoulder. “You’re exactly right. She’s kept a tight budget for a long time. She ought to be able to indulge herself.” He glanced at his watch. “I need to get back to the courthouse, but I’ll be home as early as I can. Mick, are you ready for this Duran character to descend?”

“Ready as I can be.”

Early that morning the man with the Caribbean accent had phoned and left a message on Carolyn’s answering machine. He said that he’d told Duran of the invitation, and Duran sent word he would stay if she wanted him to. But only if.

Carolyn and Mickey had found the message cryptic and wondered why Duran hadn’t phoned himself. Carolyn said maybe he was one of those people who didn’t like phones, and Mickey guessed that he was deaf, and they’d spend the whole visit shouting into his ear.

“I’m sure Carolyn’s delegated you the job of getting ready for Duran.” Vern smiled. “She’s too busy in Babyland.”

Mickey shot him a grin. “Bingo.”

She’d already seen to the guest room and given Bridget a supper menu. If Duran needed entertaining, she’d made a list of things that might amuse him. The Hill Country was in full spring bloom now, and if she had to, she’d drive him past every bluebonnet in the county.

Mickey spanked her hands together. “Don’t worry,” she said with total confidence. “I’ll handle him.”

THAT AFTERNOON Mickey was going over Carolyn’s extensive lists of Things That Must Be Done For the Great Journey to Denver.

Round-trip first-class tickets from Austin to Denver. Check.

Rental car in Denver. Check.

Arrange to courier extra luggage. Check.

Get Vern’s prescriptions refilled. Check.

Carolyn’s travel wardrobe. Fifty-two items, stored in guest-room closet, ready to be packed. Check, except two pairs of shoes.

Vern’s travel wardrobe (as if Vern cared). Twenty-one items. Stored with Carolyn’s to be packed. Check.

Presents for Beverly, twelve items. Check.

Presents for Sonny, nine items. Check.

Presents for baby, thirty-seven items. Check except locket to be picked up from jeweler in Austin.

Regular camera. Check.

Digital camera. Check.

Video camera. Check.

Film. Check.

Videotape. Check.

Mickey was starting page two of the list, when Carolyn called her into the living room. She was once again obsessed with The Matter of the Panda. Vern had just got home from work, and Carolyn wanted to talk to him, too.

“I’ve decided yes on that pink panda from Saks,” Carolyn announced. “But I don’t want to send it, I want to take it. I’ll have to carry it on the plane. See what the airline says, will you, Mickey? I’d hate to buy an extra seat for it. But I will if I have to.”

“Good grief!” Vern said. “A seat for a panda? We’ll be bankrupt.”

“Oh, hush,” Carolyn said. “When we come back home again, I’ll behave. You know I will. But that panda’s going to Denver.”

“That thing’s four feet tall,” he protested. “How can you carry it on? It’s big enough to carry you.”

“I don’t care,” said Carolyn. “It’s the most wonderful panda I’ve ever seen, and I want to give it to her myself.”

“Her? She’s a baby, Carolyn,” Vern reasoned. “She won’t even be able to see it.”

But Carolyn wouldn’t be budged. “I want to make Beverly laugh when she sees us deplane. It’s the cutest panda in the world. It’ll tickle her to pieces.”

“It won’t fit in the overhead.”

“I’ll hold it on my lap,” Carolyn replied. “It’s only a thousand miles or so.”

Vern rolled his eyes heavenward in mock despair. But when he let his gaze rest again on Carolyn, he couldn’t disguise his affection for her or his pleasure at her excitement.

Carolyn was thinking out loud. “But if I’m going to carry a pink panda, I can’t wear the red suit. I’ll wear the new pink one. But the shoes haven’t come yet. Mickey, will you call the store? I ordered them three weeks ago. What’s so hard about dying shoes pink?”

“Should be easy,” Mickey agreed and wrote,

Call airline about panda.

Call about pink shoes.

Carolyn laid her finger against her chin thoughtfully. “I should make an appointment at Curly Sue’s just before we go. This new tint she put on my hair isn’t holding. I want my old brand. I don’t want to go to Denver half blond and half gray….”

“I’ll call her for you,” Mickey promised, adding Curly Sue—old tint, to her list.

“You’d be gorgeous if your hair was green,” Vern said and kissed his wife’s forehead. “Settle down, honey. The baby isn’t due for three weeks.”

“Don’t pay any attention to me,” Carolyn said cheerfully. “I’m losing my mind, that’s all.”

“You need reality therapy,” Vern said. “Go change into your jeans. Maybe we’ll have time to take a little canter before this Duran fella comes.”

“But—” Carolyn started to protest.

“Go change,” Vern said firmly. “It’ll do you good. I’m going to get a glass of tea.” He ambled toward the kitchen.

Just as Carolyn headed for the master bedroom, the telephone jingled. Mickey reached for it, but Carolyn, brightening again, said, “I’ll get it. Maybe the locket’s ready.”

But when she picked up the phone and listened to the voice at the other end, her expression changed, and her body tensed as if she’d been physically struck.

Mickey had been on her way to her office, but the transformation in Carolyn alarmed her. She halted, staring in concern.

Carolyn sank onto the sofa as if her knees no longer had strength to support her. Her shoulders sagged, and her hands shook so hard she had to use both to hold the receiver. Her face turned ashen, and suddenly she looked every one of her fifty-six years.

She hardly spoke. From time to time she stammered out a question. But mostly she listened. And listened. Tears welled in her eyes.

Mickey’s heart went cold and clenched up like a fist. She had a sickening certainty: only one thing could hit Carolyn this hard. Something’s happened to Beverly. Or to the baby. Or to both.

When Carolyn hung up, her hands shook worse, and tears streaked her cheeks. Mickey, frightened, hurried toward her just as Vern stepped back into the room.

“Sometimes Bridget puts too much sugar in that stuff,” Vern grumbled, “Doesn’t even taste like tea anymore. Tastes like—”

He stopped when he saw Carolyn’s face. “Caro?” He went to her side and put his arm around her. “What’s wrong, honey?”

Carolyn could hardly speak. She struggled to keep her chin from quivering, but her lips moved jerkily, and she had to choke out the news.

The caller had been Beverly’s husband, Sonny. He’d had to rush Beverly to the emergency ward that morning just before dawn. Doctors had performed an emergency caesarian.

The baby was undersized, and her skin had a bluish cast. Her heart had a serious defect.

Carolyn started to cry harder, but forced herself to tell the rest. Sonny said that little Carrie had an obstruction of the right ventricle. She’d been put in a special neonatal unit. She needed open-heart surgery as soon as possible. Without surgery, she could not survive.

Then Carolyn lost control, and Vern drew her into his arms, holding her tightly.

Mickey, stunned and feeling helpless, put her hand on Carolyn’s shoulder. Never before had she seen Carolyn break down completely. Never.

“They’ll try to operate tomorrow,” Carolyn sobbed. “But she’s—she’s so tiny. And Beverly doesn’t know yet. They haven’t told her how serious it is. Oh, Vern, I want to go to them now.”

“Then we’ll go.” Vern held her tighter.

As he stroked her hair and rubbed her back, his troubled brown eyes settled on Mickey. “Mick, call the airport, will you? Get us on the first flight out of here.”

“I want to get to Beverly,” Carolyn said. “And my grandbaby. I’ve got to.”

Mickey’s mind raced, searching for the best way to meet this crisis. “What if I call J.T.? Maybe he could fly you.”

J.T., Carolyn’s brother-in-law, was a pilot, with his own small jet.

Vern looked at her gratefully. “Bless you, Mick. I didn’t even think of J.T.”

“I’ll phone him,” Mickey said. “Then I’ll pack for you.”

J.T. NOT ONLY AGREED to fly Caro and Vern to Denver; he insisted on it. He would be ready to take off in an hour, and urged Mickey to just get them to his place. And so Mickey packed only two suitcases instead of the dozens Carolyn had so painstakingly planned.

Carolyn refused, superstitiously, to take any of the presents, especially the baby gifts. If the worst happened, it would be too unbearable to have them there, each like a pulsing wound.

Mickey drove Carolyn and Vern to J.T.’s ranch. As Carolyn climbed into the plane, she looked dazed. She wasn’t wearing her pink suit or pink shoes or carrying the big pink panda designed to make Beverly laugh.

Mickey noticed, sadly, that Carolyn had been right. Her hair was half gray and half blond. She had planned to get off the plane in Denver looking glamorous and confident, ready to buck up Beverly’s spirits. Instead, she would arrive wan, disheveled and shaken.

Mickey brooded on the unfairness of it all the way back to the Circle T. Carolyn, Vern, Beverly and Sonny were good people, kind and generous. Carolyn had been like a second mother to Mickey—no, in truth, she’d treated Mickey far better than Mickey’s own mother had. She had been Mickey’s salvation. And so had Vern.

As for Sonny, he was himself a doctor, easing suffering and saving lives. Beverly was a hospital administrator. She, too, had worked to serve and heal people. Why was their child stricken? Life wasn’t simply unjust, it was random and cruel.

Lost in these gloomy thoughts, it wasn’t until late afternoon that Mickey realized she’d forgotten something. Worry and sorrow had driven all else from her mind.

She was puzzled when she heard an unfamiliar-sounding car come up the drive and stop. Its door slammed, and someone mounted the front porch steps. The doorbell rang, buzzing like an impatient wasp.

Mickey stifled a swearword. Oh, no, she thought. Adam Duran. Who needed him at a time like this? And Carolyn had invited him to stay.

The last thing Mickey wanted at this point was to guest-sit a stranger and pretend to be hospitable. She stamped to the entrance foyer, feeling anything but welcoming. But Carolyn would want her to be gracious, so she tried to hide her irritation as she swung open the door.

She saw the man standing there, and she blinked in amazement.

Good grief, he’s gorgeous, she thought in confusion. This can’t be him.

But it was. “I’m Adam Duran,” he said. He had a low voice, slightly husky. “I’m here to see Carolyn Trent.”

He held out his hand. She grasped it. It was warm and seemed to vibrate in hers, as if his gave off an electrical charge.

He was six feet tall with unfashionably long hair that fell past his ears and curved in a thick forelock across his brow. The hair was dark blond, and he was as tanned as a construction worker. His eyes were azure-blue.

He was dressed casually, almost insolently so for someone on a legal errand. His jeans were faded. The cotton shirt, too, was washed out, laundered so often the fabric was thin.

Yes, she thought, slightly awed, he looked like someone who lived on a sun-drenched island, who swam in the ocean every day, who was a different breed of man altogether from the land-bound cattlemen she knew.

The only thing that seemed out of place was that he had on cowboy boots, well-worn black ones, scuffed and down at the heels. In his left hand he carried a battered duffel bag.

A giddy, fluttery sensation filled her with bewilderment. He was a striking man, but handsome men didn’t have this effect on her—ever.

The expression on her face must have gone odd. He looked at her more closely and frowned. “This is Carolyn Trent’s place?”

Mickey, embarrassed by her reaction, tried to seize control of herself. She’d been carrying her reading glasses, and thrust them on as if donning a protective mask. The lenses blurred her vision. This helped her regain control of herself. Dimmed and out of focus, he was not as disturbing.

“Yes,” she said in her crispest tone. “I’m Mrs. Trent’s secretary. She said you’d be here. Come in.”

He took a step closer then paused. The sea-blue eyes had a critical glint as he looked her up and down. “And your name is…?” he prompted.

Her smile felt stiff, forced. “Miss Nightingale. Michele Nightingale. Er, Mickey.”

“Miss Nightingale,” he repeated with an edge of sarcasm in his voice.

“Yes,” she said, opening the door more widely. “Please, come in.”

She stood well back so that his body wouldn’t brush hers as he stepped inside. He stopped in the middle of the foyer and looked about. The living room was gracious, yet homey.

“Nice place,” he said, but he had that same edge in his voice.

“I imagine you had a long trip,” Mickey said, primly as an old-fashioned schoolmarm. “May I get you something to drink? We have coffee, soft drinks, sweet tea, juice, beer, wine—the wine’s local. Made just down the road, in fact. Or water, if you’d prefer.”

“Water’s fine,” Adam said. His eyes drifted to a painting over the fireplace and lingered there. Mickey stole a glimpse at him over the top of her glasses. Most men, seeing that painting for the first time, were bewitched.

Adam Duran also seemed struck by it, but his expression was critical.

“That’s Beverly, Mrs. Trent’s daughter,” Mickey said, keeping her teacherlike tone. “She lives in Denver now.”

He said nothing, just kept staring at the portrait. Beverly looked stunning; she was the sort of woman men could fall in love with at first sight—even if their first sight of her was only a picture.

Mickey turned away sadly from the image, for it made her wonder how Beverly and Sonny were, and if Caro and Vern had reached Denver yet. How was Caro holding up? If anything happened to this baby, Carolyn would be shattered, destroyed—Mickey could not bear to think of it.

Trying to push the fears from her mind, she went to the kitchen and poured a glass of ice water. Her job right now was to tend to Adam Duran. He should be told as soon as possible that Carolyn wasn’t there.

Carolyn had invited him to stay at the ranch, but with her gone, there was no need for him to stay. Mickey hoped he’d have the good grace to know it. Who cared about the technicalities of the stupid lease land at a time like this?

She carried the glass back to the living room and handed it to Adam, who still gazed up at Beverly’s likeness. “She looks like the sort that entered beauty contests,” he said. “And ended up marrying a doctor.”

Mickey didn’t like his tone. “She was,” she said coldly. “And she did.”

He smiled, as if smug about his own power of observation. Resentment tore through Mickey’s frayed nerves. Who was he to walk into Carolyn’s home and make a snide remark about her suffering child?

She no longer needed defenses against such a man. And she forgot that Carolyn would want her to be cordial. Almost defiantly, she laid her reading glasses aside and gestured at the couch.

“Sit,” she said, as much an order as an invitation. “I’m afraid I have some bad news for you.”

He raised a brow questioningly. But he sat. He didn’t sink back against the couch. He stayed on its edge, his posture alert, gazing at Mickey with narrowed eyes. “Okay. Bad news. What?”

She sat down in the chair opposite him. She crossed her ankles and clasped her hands in her lap. “Mrs. Trent and her husband were called away this afternoon. It’s a family emergency. I don’t know when they’ll be back. It may be a few days. It may be longer.”

He straightened his back and frowned. “I have to talk to her. As soon as possible. I can’t hang around here waiting. I’ve got tickets back home for Friday—”

“Nobody foresaw this, Mr. Duran,” she said. “It’s unfortunate for everyone concerned.”

He gave her a piercing look, almost intimidating. “You’ve got no idea how unfortunate. How can I get in touch with her?”

“I don’t know. She’s probably still en route.”

He gritted his teeth and cast an angry glance toward the ceiling, as if demanding that heaven give him patience.

Mickey said, “She invited you to be a guest here, and she’s not a woman to go back on her word. If you can’t change your ticket to go back sooner, you’re welcome to stay on until Friday or—”

“I can’t go back sooner,” he retorted. “The fare would be higher. I tried to get here as cheaply as I could.”

Well, Mickey thought, that was almost a point in his favor. At least he didn’t want to squander the estate money on travel expenses. But, still, his interest was only in himself. He hadn’t even asked about Caro’s troubles.

But then, though he still looked unhappy, he said, “What’s the family emergency? If I can ask.”

Mickey clasped her hands together more tightly. “Her daughter’s just had her first child. A little girl. The baby has a serious heart condition. They’re going to have to operate tomorrow.”

He looked at her, frowning as if such a thing could not be, should not be.

“A serious condition? You mean the baby could…”

Die. He didn’t say it, but the word hung in the air like a curse: The baby could die.

“Yes,” she said, her throat tightening.

“That’s lousy,” he said. “That’s terrible. I—I’m sorry.” The sarcastic tinge had vanished from his voice.

Her throat clamped even harder. She couldn’t speak. Only nod mutely.

He leaned toward her. “I really am sorry.” He paused. “You said it’s a little girl?”

“A little girl,” Mickey managed to repeat. She thought of the dozens of pink outfits Carolyn had bought for the child. They were still wrapped and stacked in the closet.

Her gaze fell to the coffee table. The Saks catalog lay there, still turned to the page picturing the enormous pink-and-white panda with its huge, rosy bow.

Again it flashed through Mickey’s mind: Carolyn’s plan to get off the plane, dressed all in pink, holding that ridiculously large animal, just to make Beverly laugh and not be nervous about the birth…. But now…

Mickey couldn’t help it. Tears welled in her eyes. She’d fought them ever since Sonny’s call, and until now she’d won. Suddenly they overtook her, and she turned her face so Adam wouldn’t see.

But he already had. “Are you all right? Miss Nightingale?”

She heaved a shaky sigh of anger at her own weakness. “I’ll be fine,” she managed to say. But memories cascaded madly through her head.

Carolyn had shopped so lovingly, had refused store gift wrap, because every purchase had to be brought home and shown to Vern and Mickey for approval. Then she and Mickey had wrapped them all, to make them more personal. Carolyn had gone through extravaganzas with paper and imaginative bows…she and Mickey had fussed and giggled and carried on, and Carolyn had been so happy….

Mickey swore to herself and covered her eyes. She’d never considered herself sentimental, but now she was coming apart over booties and ribbons and bows. She should be made of sterner stuff. But the tears spilled over and slipped down her cheeks.

Get hold of yourself, dammit.

Suddenly Adam Duran was before her, bending on one knee in front of her, putting a hand on each arm of the chair. “Miss Nightingale?” he said. “Michelle? Mickey—don’t cry. Please don’t cry.”

Now chagrin compounded her grief and fear. How stupid to let a stranger see her like this—and his kindness made it worse. It had been easier to be steely when she’d thought him cold and smug.

She kept her eyes covered and bent her head lower, but she could feel more tears coursing down, and her body shook with suppressed sobs.

“Well, no,” he said, sounding flummoxed, “Cry if you need to. Cry if it helps.”

He dug into the pocket of his faded jeans and pulled out an equally faded blue bandana handkerchief. She’d balled her free hand into a fist. He took the clamped fingers in his hands and gently pried them open. He tucked the handkerchief into her palm then closed her fingers back over it.

“Take that,” he said. “It’s old—but it’s clean. Really.”

She raised the handkerchief to her face. It smelled of old-fashioned laundry, the kind that dried by sunlight and breezes. She scrubbed at the offending tears.

“I—don’t—usually—do—this,” she said.

He touched her arm, a surprisingly gentle gesture. “Can I get you something? You want my glass of water? Or a fresh one?”

The sensation of his hand against her flesh sent a strange, new frisson through her. She hazarded a glimpse of him over the handkerchief. His forehead was furrowed, and his eyes were filled with worry that seemed real.

She realized she would do better if he were not so near and so tensed with empathy. “I—I’d like a glass of water,” she said, her voice thickened by crying. “There’s a pitcher in the fridge. If you wouldn’t mind.”

“Sure thing,” he said, patting her arm. “You bet.”

He rose and went toward the kitchen. Perhaps he understood she needed to be alone awhile to pull herself together. He took his time.

She stopped crying. She dried the last of her tears, straightened up in her chair. Taking slow, deep breaths, she got up and went to the coffee table. Without looking at the page, she slapped the catalog shut and thrust it deep into the magazine rack. She would not allow herself to look again at the picture of that damned panda. Not until she knew the baby was well.

And little Carrie Dekker would get well, she told herself. Doctors could do miracles these days, and Sonny knew the finest ones. But still, her mind nagged, but still…

Adam came into the room again, holding a blue glass misted with cold. He offered it to her. “Feel better?” he asked.

She took it. “Much better. Thank you.”

The drink cooled her aching throat. He watched her, concern still etched on his face.

“I really don’t usually do that,” she apologized.

He nodded, hooking one thumb in his belt. “I didn’t think so.”

“I—I’ve been holding it in. I didn’t want to break down in front of Caro. She didn’t need that. She was having a tough enough time herself.”

“I imagine she was.”

“This is her first grandchild,” Mickey said, feeling she owed him an explanation for her outburst. “She’s been planning for months. This really blindsided her. Did I mention Beverly’s her only child? She’s worried about her, too. Beverly’s wanted a baby for so long.”

He cast another look at Beverly’s portrait over the mantel. He no longer looked critical. “How long?”

“They’ve been married nine years.”

“I hope it all works out for them.”

“So do I,” Mickey said with feeling. “They’re good people. All of them.”

He looked suddenly troubled. “I shouldn’t impose on you at a time like this. I’ll go. I noticed a motel when I came through town.”

The motel, she thought dully. Oh, Carolyn wouldn’t want that.

“No,” Mickey said firmly. “You came all this way. You were invited to stay, and the invitation stands. Carolyn would be mortified if you checked into a motel.”

He said nothing. He stared down at the carpet, rubbed it with the heel of his scuffed cowboy boot.

Mickey was starting to feel more like her usual, efficient self. Or at least she thought she was. “Everything’s ready for you. The guest room’s waiting. Bridget’s got everything for supper…”

He looked up, meeting her gaze. Again she was startled by the vivid blue of his eyes. “Bridget?”

“She’s the cook and housekeeper,” Mickey said. “She lives here. We both do. And she likes company. She’s been looking forward to your visit.”

Mickey didn’t add that Bridget was the only one who’d looked forward it. But now she herself was determined to show Adam that the Circle T was a hospitable place, even in crisis.

Adam still looked conflicted, his mouth twisted with doubt.

“It’s a big house,” Mickey said. “You can have all the privacy you want. There’s a den with a TV and—things. And there’re horses, if you ride. Can you ride?”

His chin went up, and he seemed to stand taller. Any aura of uncertainty vanished. “Yeah,” he said. “I can ride.”

“Then it’s settled. Come with me. I’ll show you the guest room.”

A frown line appeared between his eyes, but he lifted the battered duffel bag and slung its strap over his shoulder. She led him down the hall, past Carolyn’s open office and her own. She noticed that he glanced in both rooms. He seemed to be observing the house with unusual keenness.

The guest room was a large, airy room with an adjoining bath. The white curtains had been pushed open, and the windows overlooked a garden of native Texas wildflowers. It was May, and they bloomed in profusion, the delicate gold of the daisies, the bolder gold and scarlet of the Indian blankets and the deep, tender blue of the bluebonnets.

Mickey had set a white vase of the flowers on the antique oak dresser with its framed oval mirror. Matching the dresser was a four-poster bed. It had a long white skirt and was covered with a colorful patchwork quilt.

A bookcase was filled with volumes old and new, from classics with faded spines to recent best sellers, their covers still crisp and shiny. A television sat on a low oak bench across from a pair of chintz-covered armchairs. Framed Audubon prints of songbirds hung on the walls.

She said, “The den’s next to the living room. There’s a bigger TV there, videos, more books and a pool table. If you need me, I’ll be right down the hall in my office.”

She moved to the door and stepped into the hall. “Supper’s at seven-thirty. Since there’s just you and me, I thought we’d eat in the kitchen, if that’s all right with you.”

He looked her up and down, then nodded. “It’s fine.”

She had never before thought of the guest room as womanish. But in contrast to his masculinity, it suddenly seemed so. He looked out of place in the midst of the snowy curtains and polished furniture and delicately framed prints. He didn’t seem a man suited for chintz and flower arrangements.

With his faded jeans and work shirt, and his skin so burnished by the sun, he would have looked far more at home on the deck of a boat on a lonely sea, tugging ropes and raising sails. As she closed the door, she had the uneasy feeling that he was the sort who wouldn’t be comfortable shut up in any room. He gave off the air that he wasn’t quite tame.

What sort of person was he, anyway? Who was this man, really, suddenly sharing the house with her and Bridget?

WHAT THE HELL have I walked into? Adam thought, staring at the closed door. He felt like an animal trapped in a cage.

He’d known this trip was going to be hard. And he refused to lie to himself; he’d felt edgy about meeting Carolyn Trent. What sane man in his position wouldn’t?

During the whole trip, he’d hardened himself to face her. When he’d climbed the front stairs, his heart had pounded like a sledgehammer. He’d supposed she’d be polite—initially. After that, he’d been prepared for anything.

Except for this. The woman he’d come so far to meet was gone. Because of a sick, newborn baby. Maybe a mortally sick baby.

He swore under his breath and pitched his bag onto the bed to unpack it. He’d been thrown off from the first moment by the strange, starchy Mickey Nightingale.

When she’d first opened the door, she’d stared at him as if he were a freak. He supposed that in her eyes he was. She was neat as a pin. The creases in her jeans looked sharp as blades. Her long-sleeved white blouse was ironed to perfection. Almost everything about her radiated purity and order, except her tousled hair. And the wildly startled look in her eyes.

She’d even put on her glasses, as if to make sure of what she was seeing on Carolyn’s respectable porch. He supposed he looked like a bum.

Before he’d come, he’d thought about getting a haircut. He’d thought about buying new jeans, even a dress shirt. Then he’d remembered the maxim: Distrust any enterprise that requires new clothes. To hell with upgrading his wardrobe.

He’d meant to show up as himself, not pretending to be anyone or anything else.

Yet he’d been immediately daunted by the Nightingale woman. She was attractive in an odd, unattainable way. In spite of her primness, there was something about her that was—only one word came to him—exquisite.

Her skin was so perfect he’d been tempted to reach out to find if it could possibly feel as smooth as it looked. She wore no makeup except for a touch of pink on her lips. Could her face really be so flawless?

Her hazel eyes were a rich, brownish gold. Her hair was brown slightly tinged with dark gold—a color as mysterious to him as autumn, a season that never came to the Caribbean. Her curls were rumpled, the only slightly untidy thing about her. Yet that one touch of disorder became her. It made her seem human, after all.

Otherwise she was the very essence of a proper, civilized, well-bred young woman. The complete opposite of him.

But as haunting as he found her looks, her manner had set his teeth on edge. She’d seemed snippy and stuck-up.

Or so he’d thought until the moment she’d burst into tears.

He’d been confounded by her news about Carolyn Trent and the ailing baby. He hadn’t noticed Mickey’s growing distress in talking about it. He’d been bewildered, wondering what in hell he was going to do now.

Then, before he knew it, the facade of her primness broke. Who could have thought such storms of feeling could toss within her?

What alarmed him was how deeply grieved she seemed. Her body had heaved in the effort to control the sobs that threatened to break out of control. She said she was a secretary, but she obviously cared a great deal about Carolyn Trent and her family.

Adam was not cruel. When he saw suffering, his first impulse was to ease it. And her tears brought the reality home to him: Carolyn might well be a person worth caring about. And Carolyn, too, was suffering.

He swore aloud again. What to do now? Everything had to be rethought. Everything.

And as for the Nightingale woman, she’d gone from tempestuous sorrow back to cool efficiency so quickly that she’d thrown him off balance yet again. Well, he was stuck here with her until Friday. He supposed that having dropped her guard once she’d be careful not to do it again.

So be it. It’d be easier on both of them.

He hung his two spare shirts and other pair of jeans in the closet. He truly wasn’t much for clothes. For him, living on his small boat, wearing more than a pair of ragged cutoffs was dressing up. What he had on now was like formal wear to him.

The rest of the contents of the duffel bag were books, photos, a videotape, a folder, two sealed manila envelopes with Enoch Randolph’s legal papers and some documents. He put everything but his books into a dresser drawer.

He looked about the room, and homey as it was meant to be, he still felt trapped. He resisted the impulse to pace. He picked up one of his books and flopped down in a chair, draping one leg over the arm.

He opened the book and began to read, although he knew it nearly by heart. His eyes fell on one of the opening sentences.

“At present I am a sojourner in civilized life again.”

That’s me, he thought, more restless than before. A sojourner in civilized life. I don’t live here. I’m just here for a temporary stay.

CHAPTER THREE

“VERN?” MICKEY HELD the receiver so tightly her knuckles paled. “Are you in Denver?”

“We got here about two hours ago.” Vern sounded exhausted in body and soul. “We’re at the hospital.”

“How’s the baby? How’s Beverly?”

“The baby…” He paused, as if uncertain how to say it. “The baby’s hanging in there. They—they say she’s a fighter.”

“She has to be,” Mickey said, her throat tightening. “Look who her grandma is.”

“Beverly’s pretty much out of it,” Vern said. “They’ve got her on morphine. She knows the baby has a problem. They haven’t told her yet how serious.”

“Does she know there’ll be an operation?”

“Not yet. They’re scheduling surgery for tomorrow. I’ll call you as soon as I know anything.”

“How’s Sonny?”

“Sonny’s Sonny. He’s holding everything together. He’s with Carolyn right now.”

Mickey shifted in her chair and stared at the framed snapshots ranged along her bookshelves. From those frames smiled their faces, all of them—Carolyn, Vern, Beverly and Sonny. She herself was in some of the photos. Carolyn and Vern had taken her on the family vacations to Aspen. In one shot she stood in her rented skis, laughing between Beverly and Sonny.

She had to turn her gaze from the reminders of those happier times. “How’s Carolyn?”

Again Vern paused. “She did just fine until she saw the baby. It’s such a little thing. On a respirator, and all these tubes and wires running into her. Poor Caro just sort of—lost it. Sonny got her pulled together again. She asked him to prescribe her tranquilizers. She wants to stay calm as she can for Beverly’s sake.”

Mickey shook her head in sympathy, unable to speak.

“Listen, Mick,” Vern said. “We took off from home like a pair of bats out of hell. There’s a lot we didn’t tend to. Carolyn had some signed checks in her desk drawer. I planned on depositing them when I went to the courthouse. Could you go to town and put them in the bank? Otherwise we’ll have checks bouncing all over town. And some are paychecks.”

“Of course. I’ll do it right away. But, Vern?”

“Yes?”

She nipped at her lower lip. “Something else got lost in the shuffle.”

She thought of the man with the azure eyes. The man who could look haughty as a king in spite of his shabby clothes, who could be either icy or kind.

Vern sighed. “I’m sure dozens of things got lost, Mick. What is it?”

She took a deep breath and said, “Adam Duran is here. The executor of Enoch’s will.”

“Oh, damn!” Vern almost moaned. “Damn! I never gave him a thought. Neither did Carolyn, I know. Hellfire, she doesn’t need him on her mind, too. Why didn’t I think—”

Mickey, feeling guilty for adding to his troubles, tried to reduce them. “Don’t give it a moment’s thought. He’s here, he’s comfortable, I’ll see to him.”

“I don’t know why he couldn’t have handled this damned will business by mail,” Vern grumbled. “What sort of guy is he? A lawyer? A banker? Or just a friend of Enoch’s?”

Mickey remembered the untrimmed hair and faded clothes, and thought perhaps the less she said the better. “I don’t think he’s a lawyer or banker. Just a—an acquaintance.”

“Well, God knows what kind of acquaintance that old coot would make. Be careful. But feel him out, will you? Maybe there are some strings tied to this lease-land deal. I hope not. I don’t want any nasty surprises sprung on Carolyn. She’s in no shape for it.”

“I’ll find out all I can,” Mickey promised.

“Tell him you’re Carolyn’s most trusted agent. Anything he has to say to her, he can say to you. It’s true, God knows.”

A glow of pride warmed her, in spite of her anxiety. “I’ll be glad to. So rest easy about this, Vern. And don’t let Carolyn fret over it.”

“I’m not even going to mention it to her. She’s got enough on her mind, God knows. You should have seen that tiny child. All those tubes—Lord.”

“Whatever you think is best,” Mickey assured him. She told him to give her love to everyone. They said their goodbyes, and she hung up.

Feeling strangely agitated, she walked down the hall and knocked on the guest-room door. “Mr. Duran, I’m leaving. I have to go into town on an errand,” she said through the door. “I’ll be back in about an hour. Bridget should be along any minute. I’ll call her and let her know you’re here.”

She waited, holding her breath. At last, from the other side of the door, he answered, “Fine.”

That single word was apparently all the reply he was going to make.

She felt odd about leaving him alone in Carolyn’s house, but she had no choice. And what she’d told him was true; Bridget would soon be there.

AS SOON AS Adam heard the car pull away, he opened the door and glanced down the deserted hall. The house had that eerie, empty feeling that houses get when their dwellers are gone, but a lone visitor stays. The place was still and silent with no sign of life—except for him. The unwanted guest.

He walked down the hall and saw that the office doors that had been open before were now closed. He tried the first one. Unlocked, it swung open easily.

Adam hesitated a moment, staring into the room. He wrestled with his conscience. His conscience lost. He stepped inside, not only an intruder, but a spy.

He told himself that he must do it, he had to learn as much about these people as he could. He needed to know their strengths. And even more, their weaknesses.

Once they knew who he really was, they could become his enemies—any or all of them—in a heartbeat.

BRIDGET BLUM, the cook and housekeeper at the Circle T, was one of seven children of an Irish mother and a German father. Her father, Dolph Blum had been the chief wrangler at the Double J, the old Kendell spread.

Dolph was a large man with a square jaw, a pug nose and a ready grin. His wife, Maeve, was tiny, as slender as a wand, but it was she who’d kept those seven children in order. Her voice could crack like a whip.

Bridget took after her father. She was almost six feet tall, and she had big hands, a big smile and a big heart. At forty-five she had never been married, and if she missed having a husband, she never let it show.

She seemed happy and busy with her own family: three married sisters, three married brothers and a whopping total of thirty-one nieces and nephews. Maeve had died four years ago, and Dolph was frail. Bridget, the eldest daughter, had become surrogate mother of the clan.

She had, as well, her adoptive family: Carolyn and Vern and the people of the Circle T. Yes, Bridget had plenty of people to care for and love; she did not know what an empty day felt like.

Because Carolyn and Vern were like kin, her heart filled with empathy for them over the ailing baby. But because, unlike either of them, she came from a large family, she was not as frightened as they were. In Bridget’s sprawling brood, someone was always falling off a bicycle or crashing out of a tree or tumbling down the stairs.

So when a true emergency arose, Bridget did what she always did: she went to church, lit candles and said prayers. That’s what she’d done today.

Just as she drove through the gates of the Circle T, her cell phone rang. This startled her, for she wasn’t yet used to the contraption—it still seemed supernatural to her. She prayed its ringing didn’t signal bad news about the baby.

She pulled over to the side of the drive, parked and rummaged through her purse for the chirping phone. “Hello?” she said breathlessly. “Hello?”

“Bridget, it’s Mick. I called to tell you that the Duran man got here from the Caribbean. I need to get to town before the bank closes, and I’m on my way. I had to leave him alone at the house. Are you close to home?”

Bridget glanced down the lane. The house was just around the curve. “I’m good as there right now. I’m nearly to the gates.”

“Good.” Relief eased Mickey’s voice. “I didn’t like the idea of giving a stranger the run of the place. And I wanted to warn you he was there.”

Bridget’s heart skipped guiltily. “Tarnation! I truly meant to get straight back. I stopped in the parking lot to help Mary Gibson with a flat tire. I swear I forgot about what’s his face—who?”

“Adam Duran. It’s all right. I’d forgotten about him, too. Anyway I’ve only been gone ten minutes.”

“Ah,” said Bridget, relieved, “and I’ll be there in two. What trouble could the man get up to in twelve minutes, I ask you?”

IF A MAN is determined and observant, he can discover a great deal in twelve minutes. Adam was determined, observant and quick to learn.

He was looking over Mickey Nightingale’s office when he heard the crunch of tires on the gravel driveway. The housekeeper—she must be back. I need to get out of here.

He turned from the pictures arranged on Mickey’s bookshelf. Her office was neat, almost Spartan, but like Carolyn, she enjoyed having framed snapshots about her while she worked. Adam had studied those snapshots with interest. Mickey’s choice of pictures was revealing—and mystifying.

But he had no time to ponder the significance of the photographs. He slipped out of her office, shut the door and made his way to the den. He sat down in an armchair and snatched up a copy of Western Horseman. He swept his legs up onto the ottoman and opened the magazine just as he heard the front door swing open.

He waited, giving the woman time to enter. Tentative footsteps sounded on the tiles of the foyer. A female voice called out, “Yoo-hoo. Mister Duran? It’s me, Bridget Blum. Mickey just phoned to tell me you were here. Mister Duran?”

Then she appeared, framed in the doorway, a tall woman, sturdy rather than plump. Adam sprang to his feet, holding the magazine in his left hand. He tried to seem friendly, comfortable and confident—as if he had every right to be sitting in the Trents’ family room, as if he himself were like the Trents—someone of note and power.

He approached Bridget, stretching his right hand to her. “Hi. I’m Adam Duran. Miss Nightingale said it was okay to use this room.”

The woman gripped his hand and shook it with surprising strength. But she had the same look of disbelief on her face that Mickey Nightingale had when she’d met him.

For the second time that day, he wished he’d sprung for new jeans, a more respectable shirt. But if his shabbiness caught her off guard, she quickly recovered.

She pumped his hand more vigorously, and friendly words began to spill from her as if she were a very cornucopia of hospitality.

“Welcome, Mr. Duran. I’m sorry you got left here rattling around alone. Everything is at sixes and sevens today. I don’t know if Mickey told you, but we’ve had such sad news, well, I hope it doesn’t stay sad, and that the ending is happy. Mrs. Trent’s grandbaby came early. She’s not well, poor tyke.”

Adam nodded. Her warmth disarmed him in a way Mickey’s chill could not. “She told me,” he said, troubled anew at his mission here. “I’m sorry. I came at a bad time. I’ll try to stay out of your way.”

“You’re not in my way at all.” She dropped his hand but gave his shoulder a motherly squeeze. “Are you hungry? Why, I hear they hardly give you any food at all these days on an airplane. You’re lucky if they toss you a pretzel. Did you have lunch?”

“No,” he admitted. “But it’s okay. I—”

The big woman seemed shocked. “Didn’t Mick feed you anything?”

“No,” he repeated, almost shyly. “But it’s okay, really—”

“It’s not okay,” Bridget said firmly. “I made some cheese bread for you special. You come into the kitchen and have a little snack while I start whipping up supper. If Mickey didn’t get some food into you—well, she’s upset, is all. Carolyn Trent is as dear as a mother to her.”

Before Adam could protest, she had him in the kitchen, seated at a round oak table. He watched as she bustled, plugging in the coffeemaker, putting the cheese bread into the oven to warm.

She was an attractive woman in her large-scale way. She had a broad, fair face with pink cheeks, a small nose and a generous jaw. Her dark red hair was so curly it was almost crinkly.

She asked all the polite questions about his flight, and he answered, but he didn’t want to talk about himself. He guided the conversation in a different direction. “Have you worked for Mrs. Trent long?”

She set down a coffee mug, a plate and a fork before him. “Nine years,” she said. “My aunt Consuela used to have this job. But she quit after the tornado, when the barn fell on Mr. Trent. ‘No deseo más de este tiempo de Tejas,’ she said. ‘No more of this Texas weather for me.’ And she made my uncle Emil take a job in British Columbia. Well, maybe she had a point. Because, at least, she missed that accursed flood last fall.”

Adam looked up, his interest piqued. “Tornado?” he said. “Flood?”

“Indeed.” Bridget shook her head with feeling. “It’s never dull around here. Now the tornado was an act of God, but that flood, it was another matter entirely….”

She took the conversational bit between her teeth, and she was off and running.

MICKEY STRETCHED out her trip to town. She went to the library, and Violet, the head librarian, had already heard about Beverly and the baby. News traveled fast in Crystal Creek.

“Bridget’s sister told me,” Violet said with a sad shake of her head. She led Mickey straight to the medical section and handed her the latest book about children with heart conditions. “It’s a good book,” she said. “Last winter, Dr. Purdy recommended it to Betsy Hutchinson when her little boy was diagnosed with a heart murmur. Betsy said it was a great comfort.”

She patted Mickey’s arm, and Mickey thanked her, touched by her concern.

Mickey went to the Long Horn Coffee Shop. Kasey, the manager, came right over and filled her a coffee cup. She nodded at the book on the red-and-white checkered tablecloth. “I heard about what happened. Nora Slattery was in here earlier. She was mighty upset.”

Mickey nodded sadly. Nora was the wife of J.T.’s foreman and had lived on J.T.’s ranch for years. She had known Beverly since childhood.

Kasey said, “My cousin’s baby had the same problem, Mick. She came through with flying colors. You’d look at her and never guess. I hope it’s the same for this little gal. But Carolyn’s devastated at this point, I imagine.”

“More than devastated,” Mickey said. “I—don’t think I can talk about it.” She didn’t want to cry again.

“I understand, hon. Tell her hello, and that we’re all pulling for her and the whole family. I’ll leave you be. Read your book. Maybe you’ll feel better.”

She surprised Mickey by giving her a brisk kiss on the cheek. Then she vanished into the kitchen. It was an hour before the supper rush would begin, and Mickey was the lone customer. She nursed her coffee and tried to read, but the words danced senselessly before her eyes.

She finished her coffee and knew she couldn’t put off returning to the Circle T forever. Reluctantly she drove home. Just as she pulled into the carport, Leon Vanek appeared. He stood at the carport’s edge, shifting his weight, clenching and unclenching his big hands.

His expression was far from happy. She wondered uneasily what he wanted. She got out of the car and faced him. “Yes, Leon? Did you want to see me about something?”

He stared at the gravel in the drive, pulling his hat down farther over his face. “Mr. and Mrs. Trent are in Denver. Because that child is sick.”

I know that all too well, Mickey thought. “Yes. We’re all concerned.”

Leon said, “You should have notified me. I’m the foreman here. You should tell me these things. I heard it from Werner. Him a common hand, and he knew before I did.”

Mickey knew Leon was a proud man and that his pride had been hurt. But she resented his accusatory tone. “I’m sorry. I just had a lot on my mind. We all did.”

Leon didn’t look placated. “I saw a man come today after they left. Come to the house.”

Mickey stared at him in puzzlement. “Yes? It’s the man Carolyn was expecting. He’s come about the lease land.”

Leon frowned. “Well, she isn’t here. And neither’s Mr. Trent.”

“Right now their place is with Beverly and Sonny.”

“You didn’t have time to tell me Mrs. Trent’s gone. That puts a lot of responsibility on my shoulders. But you had time to take him in and make him feel right at home.”

“That’s part of my responsibility,” she shot back. “It’s what Carolyn would want.”

“That man isn’t staying, is he?” Leon scowled and kicked the gravel.

“Carolyn invited him to stay. She couldn’t know this would happen.”

Leon raised his face, which was red with displeasure. “I saw him. He doesn’t look respectable. He looks like one of those hippies.”

Mickey almost smiled at the quaintness of the word “hippies,” but Leon’s disapproval seemed real. When she didn’t answer, he frowned harder. “It’s not fitting, a man like that to stay alone in the house with you. If you want me to ask him to leave, I will.”

“I’m not alone with him. Bridget’s with us. And if I wanted him to go, I’m capable of telling him myself.”

He looked more aggravated than before. “I’m concerned about your reputation. It doesn’t look good. Bridget or no. That’s all I got to say.”

“Thank you,” she said coolly, “but I can watch out for my own reputation. Good day, Leon.”

She started toward the house, but he put his hand on her wrist. It was a possessive move, and her resentment flared more hotly. He said, “I’ll watch out for you. If he bothers you, you let me know. I’ll take care of him.”

She snatched her hand away. “I said good day.” She turned her back on him and walked away in anger.

MICKEY FACED fresh exasperation when she found Bridget covering the dining room table with a white linen cloth. “Bridget, I want us to eat in the kitchen tonight. Didn’t I tell you?”

“No, you did not,” Bridget said righteously. “And this is what Carolyn would want. I aim to do it to the way she’d have it done herself. She’d snatch me bald, giving him supper in the kitchen.”

Mickey rolled her eyes. “He doesn’t exactly seemed the type for formal dining. The way he dresses, he’d probably be more comfortable on the back porch, eating beans out of a can.”

“Humph.” Bridget put her hand on her hip. “You sound high-and-mighty all of a sudden. It’s not like you, Mick. He’s a very nice young man. He has a nice way about him. Not up-pity at all. And he’s handsome, to boot. Lord, like a movie star. But he acts like he doesn’t even know it.”

Mickey gazed at her suspiciously. “Have you been talking to him?”

“I fed him—which you forgot to do. We chatted a wee bit. It seemed the polite thing to do, that’s all.”

Bridget would not hear another word about eating in the kitchen.

So Mickey, as Carolyn had intended, sat across the dining room table from Adam Duran, but she sat alone with him.

The good silver and china were set on the best linen. There were flowers—and candlelight. Carolyn was a great lover of flowers and candlelight.

From the kitchen came the succulent scents of Bridget’s sauerbraten and dumplings. One of Carolyn’s favorite albums played softly on the sound system, The Ballad of the Irish Horse.

Bridget had succeeded all too well; the atmosphere was pleasant, touched with elegance, even intimacy. Drat, thought Mickey, who didn’t want to think of intimacy with this disturbing man. Drat and double drat and triple drat.

She hadn’t dressed for supper. Neither had Adam. She wore the same denim slacks and high-necked white blouse. He wore the same washed-out jeans and faded work shirt.

He and she both bent, without speaking, over their salads. The music swelled, faded, then built again. The candlelight gleamed on the gold streaks in Adam’s hair. It flashed from their silver forks and the crystal glasses.

On the way home, Mickey had mentally listed enough neutral subjects to get through the ordeal of supper. She would save her more pointed questions for dessert, when he might be warmed enough by wine and good food to be candid.

She trotted out her first innocuous remark. “I hope you got to enjoy the wildflowers on your drive here. It’s a particularly nice spring.”

He was supposed to say, Yes, the drive was nice, the weather was nice, and the flowers were nice. Then she’d ask, Is it spring in the Caribbean, too? What’s the weather like there? Is it already hot?

But he instantly booby-trapped her plans. “I hear you had a fall that wasn’t so fine last year. That some developer caused a helluva flash flood. Mrs. Trent was in a lawsuit against him. She and the other ranchers.”

Mickey almost choked on her lettuce. She stole a quick sip of water. “Oh,” she said, flustered. “That. Thank God it wasn’t worse than it was.”

“Which wasn’t worse? The flood? Or the lawsuit?” Shadows played on the planes of his face, but even in the muted light she thought she saw a glint of challenge in his eyes.

“Neither. The flood didn’t do any major damage, here at least.”

“Really? I heard it wiped out a housing development.”

He said it calmly, but his words hit a nerve, rousing her wariness.

“A would-be development,” she corrected. “There were only five houses. None was finished. The developer put up this stupid dam—”

“—and the dam didn’t hold,” he finished for her. “So the developer pulled out. His name was Fabian, wasn’t it?”

He was right, and two suspicions struck Mickey at once. He and Bridget must have had more than a wee chat. Bridget seemed taken with Adam. Had he charmed her into spilling out information the whole time Mickey was away?

But the more ominous one was the same fear that had haunted Caro when Fabian started buying up local land.

Mickey threw discretion to the wind. She said, “You seem to know a lot. Fabian wanted all the land he could get. Enoch Randolph had plenty of it. Did Fabian offer to buy it?”

Adam tilted his wineglass so the candlelight reflected in its red depths and studied it. “Oh, yeah,” he said. “He offered.”

Mickey held her breath. “Well?” she challenged.

Adam tipped the glass to another angle, watching the changing refraction. “Enoch wouldn’t sell. Some fancy lawyer came to the Bahamas to try to talk him into it. Enoch laughed in his face.”

Relief swept through her. “Caro always said Enoch was his own man.”

Adam’s gaze shifted to her eyes again. “He turned down a hell of a lot of money.”

“So did Carolyn. So did most of the ranchers. It takes character to hold out against greed.”

“Does it?” There was mockery in his voice. “With Enoch, all it took was cussedness.”

Mickey looked at him questioningly.

“He knew he was dying,” Adam said. “He said, ‘This sonuvva bitch says I’ll be rich. What good’s money gonna do me? Buy me a gold coffin? Screw it.’”

The humor was dark, but Mickey smiled dutifully. “Good for him. Some men might find it tempting, to be rich for even a little while.”

Adam shook his head. “He didn’t like anything about the scheme.”

“We didn’t either. We’ve got a way of life here. Fabian threatened it.”

“You’re in favor of preservation?” Adam raised an eyebrow as if doubtful. “Protecting nature?”

“Yes, and so is Carolyn,” she insisted. “She and the others worked hard for it. She’ll be grateful to know Enoch helped.”

“Grateful?” he echoed. “He didn’t do it to help. He did it because he felt like doing it.”

Bridget swept in, carrying plates of sauerbraten, dumplings and homemade applesauce. “Save room for dessert,” she said cheerfully to Adam. “I made my special German chocolate cake.”

He smiled at her, and Bridget beamed at him as indulgently as a fond aunt. Mickey shot Bridget a warning look that said You and I are going to have a serious talk. But Bridget didn’t notice.

Gamely, Mickey raised her glass in a toast. “Here’s to Enoch, for helping to protect the Hill Country, whatever his reasons.”

“I’ll drink to Enoch,” he said, clicking his glass against hers. He did not mention the Hill Country.

They each sipped. He said, “You’re very…close to Carolyn and Vern.”

Good Lord, had Bridget talked about that, too? “Yes. I guess I am.”

“Especially Carolyn.”

Mickey felt unsettled by this turn in the conversation. “Well, it’s Carolyn I work for,” she said, trying to sound casual.

“Vern stays busy at the courthouse?”

“Very busy. He’s the only justice of the peace in the county.”

Adam gave a wry smile. He had a good smile, too good. It did odd, tickly things to the pit of her stomach. “I thought a justice of the peace was just a guy who could marry people.”

Mickey fought to ignore the tickle. “No. He handles civil and criminal cases and small-claims court. And works with juveniles. He’s got a lot of duties.”

“So Carolyn runs the ranch.”

“Yes.” Mickey pushed at the applesauce with her spoon. “But let’s talk about you. How did you come to know Enoch?”

“Let’s save that for later,” he said. “I’m staying in Carolyn’s house, enjoying her hospitality. I’d like to know more about her. She’s run this place a long time?”

Mickey’s guard went up. “Yes,” she said, not elaborating.

“How long?” he persisted.

“She inherited it from her mother. Almost twenty years ago.”

“She’s lived her whole life here?”

“Yes,” was all Mickey would say.

But Adam wasn’t put off by short answers. He pressed on. “Carolyn had a sister. She married a neighbor, J. T. McKinney. But she’s been dead for years, hasn’t she?”

“Yes.” Mickey didn’t know where these questions were leading, but they made her nervous.

“What happened to Carolyn’s father?”

Mickey’s body tensed. “He—deserted his family. The marriage was never very stable. One day he just disappeared. I don’t feel comfortable talking about it.”

Adam took another drink of wine. “It’s not easy for a man to disappear completely. Does she even know if he’s alive?”

Mickey squared her shoulders combatively. “She got word five years ago that he’d died in Canada. Now let’s drop the subject. Please.”

“Fine,” he said with a shrug. “We’ll talk about you. How long have you worked here?”

“Nine years,” she said. “I sort of ‘interned’ here for two years while I finished high school. I started right after Beverly went to Denver.”

“Hmm,” he said. “Beverly’s an only child. You must have become a sort of substitute daughter.”

Mickey blinked in displeasure. “I’m an employee, that’s all.”

This was not the truth, but Mickey would be damned before she told him any more. Mickey and Carolyn had filled painful emotional gaps in each other’s lives, and there was more than affection between them. There was love and the truest friendship Mickey had ever known.

“I didn’t mean you replaced her daughter.” Adam shrugged. “It just seems you’re more like one of the family. What about your own family? Where are they?”

“I have no family.” She said it sharply.

Suddenly his expression, so unreadable before, became sympathetic. “I’m sorry. Your parents are dead?”

“My mother died when I was sixteen.” Mickey said it with such acrimony that she hoped it would stop his questions.

But he nodded, almost sadly. He had an unexpected gift for seeming concerned. “That’s a hard age to lose a parent. And your father?”

She should lie. She should tell him none of this was his business. But if he wanted the ugly truth, she would give it to him. “My father divorced my mother when I was seven. He moved to California and married another woman. He never communicated with us again. He made it clear he didn’t want to.”

He set down his fork. He whistled softly. He put his elbow on the table and his chin on his fist. He stared at her. “So you were sixteen years old, without parents? What did you do?”

“I became a ward of the court. Nobody wanted me for a foster child. So Vern and Carolyn became my guardians. They took me in.”

He gazed at her with disconcerting steadiness. “Bridget said Carolyn put you through business school.”

I’m going to kill Bridget, Mickey thought. I’m going to put my hands around her neck and strangle her dead.

“Can we please talk about something else? What about your family?”

He shook his head. “I see why you’re close to Carolyn. You both had the same experience. The runaway father, the abandonment. She must seem like a second mother to you.”

No. She feels like my only mother; the one who really counted, the one I could depend on, who never shamed me or scared me or made me feel bad about myself.

But Mickey didn’t want to think about her real mother, a deeply troubled woman. Her appetite had fled, and she pushed her plate away. She struggled against the urge to excuse herself from the table and leave Adam sitting alone.

She must have looked as unhappy as she felt. He said, “I’m sorry. It’s just that your relationship is unusual. I—glanced into your office. You have all these photographs. Of you and her and her family. None of you and anyone else.”

Mickey’s emotions, so off balance for so long with this man, tipped again. Anger seized her. “You looked in my office? You looked at my pictures? How dare you?”

“I’m a daring guy,” he said. “I looked in hers, too.”

His brazenness appalled her. “You went in our offices? Those doors were closed. I closed them on purpose.”

“You didn’t lock them,” he said. He had the effrontery to smile.

“That’s inexcusable,” she accused. “I’m calling Vern. I’m telling him about this. And I hope he says to put you right out of this house. What right do you think you—”

He cut her off. “Look, I didn’t commit a crime. I didn’t go through the drawers or read the mail or move so much as a paper clip. I opened two doors, I looked at some pictures. That’s all. And I didn’t hide it from you. I told you.”

“It’s still a violation of trust,” she said with the same indignation. “It’s an invasion of privacy. Carolyn opened her house to you—even while she’s going through this—this horrible thing. And you flout her generosity by poking and snooping and spying on us like a—a—”

Resentment crackled in his eyes. “Stop it. I came here expressly to see her. I didn’t even know what she looked like. When you took me to the guest room, both those office doors were open. I saw the photos. I wanted to see close-up. I especially wanted to see her. It’s not like I picked your locks and stole the damned silverware.”

Mickey stood and roughly shoved her chair back in place. “You still had no right.”

“I said I wanted to see her,” he repeated, his lip curling in a sneer. “And I did. I figured out which one she is from the pictures of Beverly’s wedding. She’s a very lovely woman, Carolyn is.”

“Yes, she is,” Mickey snapped. “And you’re a very ill-bred man. Good night.”

She stalked from the room, her heart slamming so hard she could barely breathe. She would call Vern. She hoped he would tell her to throw Duran out of the house, executor or not, will or no will. Let Martin Avery handle it. And she was going to read Bridget the riot act.

But not now. Not yet. She was too upset. She threw open the French doors in the living room that led to the screened deck. She stepped outside into the gathering darkness, grateful for the coolness of the evening air on her heated skin.

She was so furious that she shook and her blood banged in her temples. Too much had happened today. She could stand no more. She forced herself to breathe deeply. She closed her eyes and covered them with her hands.

Perhaps she had overreacted to the man. But he really was the last straw. She started to count from one to a hundred, trying to calm herself.

But suddenly she realized she was not alone. She could feel another presence; feel his presence. She opened her eyes and whirled to face him.

She was about to order him to get away from her, but before she could speak, he laid his forefinger against her lips. The movement was full of such self-assurance, it shocked her wordless.

He pressed his finger against her mouth more firmly. “Shhh,” he commanded in a low voice. “I only wanted to see what she looks like. What she seems like. And I have the right. I’m her brother. Her half brother. Enoch’s my uncle, too. And he didn’t leave the lease lands to her. He left them to me.”

CHAPTER FOUR

MICKEY GAPED AT HIM, speechless. She felt as if she’d taken a punch to the stomach. Nausea and giddiness spun within her. She couldn’t get her breath.

Carolyn’s half brother? Impossible. He couldn’t be. He was younger even than Carolyn’s daughter.

Yet, not impossible.

Frantically, Mickey’s eyes explored his moonlit features. He did resemble Carolyn. Even more, he looked like Carolyn’s late sister, Pauline. She should have seen it from the first.

He had Pauline’s square jaw and stubborn chin. He had her straight nose, her sculpted mouth. His eyes were blue, like Pauline’s, but otherwise they were like Carolyn’s eyes, too: deep-set, thick-lashed, intense.

But his age and masculinity had disguised the similarities. So Mickey stood transfixed, both believing and not believing. “No,” she objected, as if that word could break the evil spell his words had cast.

“Yes,” he whispered. He was so close she could feel his breath tickle her cheek, stir an errant lock of her hair.

She realized his callused fingertip still rested against her lips. She jerked her head away to break the contact, yet her mouth tingled as if rubbed with something spicy. She wanted to move farther from him, but shock paralyzed her.

He touched her jaw, gently forcing her to face him again. “My father was Steve Randolph, the same as Carolyn’s.”

His expression was hard, but paradoxically his touch was almost tender. He said, “I was born in Florida.”

“Florida?” She didn’t understand. “I thought Steve Randolph went to Canada. I never knew he’d married again.”

“He didn’t.” A muscle twitched in Adam’s cheek. “He moved on before I was born. He must have had a habit of moving on.”

Mickey blinked in surprise, yet she felt an unexpected surge of sympathy.

Adam’s upper lip curled slightly. “So if you want to call me a bastard, go ahead. The name fits.”

She tensed. The news that he was Carolyn’s half brother had so stunned her, she’d forgotten the other bombshell he’d dropped. The lease land was his, or so he claimed.

Her sympathy died; suspicion loomed up in its place. She pushed his hand aside and tried to jerk away. But her shoulder blades struck the barrier of the screened windows. He had her cornered.

She jerked her chin up. “How’d you hook up with Enoch? How’d you talk him out of the lease land? Suck up to him?”

His mouth twisted sardonically. “I tried to track down my father. I found out he died in Ontario. That he’d had two brothers. One was dead—”

“—Thom,” Mickey said. She knew the story. Thom, the middle of the three Randolph brothers, had died in Thailand.

Adam cocked his head and leaned nearer. “But my father’s obituary notice said he was survived by a brother in the Caribbean—Enoch. Enoch and I had lived near each other for God knows how long. I looked him up. Last year. Until then, he hadn’t known I existed.”

She used her suspicion militantly, like a protective shield. “United, at last. How touching. And what a nice bonus for you—to learn you had a rich uncle. Or did you know he had property before you found him?”

She wished her heart beat less violently. She wished her flesh didn’t burn where he’d touched her.

His laugh was sarcastic. “I didn’t know about any money or land. He told me that he had land, but I didn’t know how much. I didn’t ask, and he didn’t tell. Until he was dying.”

For some insane reason, she wanted to believe him. A dangerous impulse, she fought it as hard she could. “You went looking for him just because he was your uncle? Not because he was your wealthy uncle?”

“What’s the problem?” He leaned one hand on the window frame next to her and bent nearer still. “The idea of wanting to meet your kin? Is that something ritzy Texans don’t understand?”

Stung, she glared. And his arm, so near, made her feel more trapped than before. “What are you talking about? Say what you mean.”

“I wanted to meet my father’s people. I just wanted to know. That’s all.”

“Know what?” she demanded.

His frown was earnest. “Know about him. His people. My father was a part of me that was missing. I just wanted to understand. You know?”

“No, I don’t,” Mickey flung back. “You’re talking about a man who—who ran out on your mother. Who deserted you before you were born. Whose family never lifted a finger to help you. Why would you want to have anything to do with him or them? It makes no sense to me.”

His eyes narrowed. “You’re calling me a liar?”

She wanted him to be a liar. She wanted it for Carolyn’s sake and her own. If he was an imposter, nothing more than a con artist, they could be rid of him; he would get out of their lives and stay out. He couldn’t hurt Carolyn, and he wouldn’t confuse her so wildly.

She challenged him again. “Why go chasing after Enoch, of all people? I didn’t know him, but—”

“—That’s right. You didn’t. Not at all.”

“—but he’s always sounded like a—a crank. A lazy, antisocial crank. My God, if you wanted to meet somebody in your family, why didn’t you get in touch with Carolyn?”

“I didn’t know she existed. Until Enoch told me.”

“You must not have had a very good detective,” she retorted.

“Steve Randolph covered his tracks well. Nobody in Ontario knew he had children in the States. Carolyn and Pauline didn’t know about me. And I didn’t know about them.”

Mickey was dizzied by hurt and anger. “When you found out about Carolyn, why didn’t you call her then? Why wait until now? It’s only about the land, isn’t it? Not about finding your people or a part of you that’s missing.”

He tensed with resentment. She didn’t care. She knew how Enoch had treated Carolyn, taking her money and rebuffing her courtesy with an indifference that bordered on contempt. For years he’d lived on her fairness and generosity, acting like a shiftless old pirate.

Mickey had to strike out in defense of her friend and benefactor; she couldn’t live with herself if she didn’t. “I don’t know why you’d be satisfied with finding only Enoch for family. Carolyn’s respectable, at least.”

“Respectable?” Adam mocked. “That’s what’s important? To you? To her? Is that how she felt about Enoch? He wasn’t as good as she is? Because he didn’t spend his life getting—stuff?”

He made a wide, disdainful sweep with his free hand to indicate the Circle T and everything on it. He radiated such disdain that Mickey’s temper flared higher.

“Carolyn’s worked hard for everything she’s got. Which is more than anybody can say for Enoch. If you knew about her, why didn’t you write her? Instead of cozying up to some eccentric old grouch who was probably losing his mind—”

He jerked his head in frustration, so that his hair fell over his forehead. “Why are you so judgmental? Before I met Enoch, I damn well didn’t know Carolyn existed. It was Enoch who told me the whole story about my dad’s first marriage. And that only Carolyn was left.”

Mickey put her fist on her hip. “So why didn’t you get in touch with her then? What happened to your burning urge to find your kinfolk? You waited until Enoch signed her inheritance over to you. And now you show up.”

Adam raked his hand through his hair. “He warned me about you people. He said she looked down on our kind.”

He dared to call Carolyn a snob? Carolyn, of all people? “Don’t you criticize Carolyn,” she warned. “You don’t even know her.”

“Then don’t criticize me. Or Enoch. You don’t know us, either.”

Mickey shook her finger in his face. “For years and years he promised that land would be hers.”

“Don’t do that,” Adam warned her, his voice flat.

But her dander was up, and she kept shaking her finger. If it annoyed him, she would shake it until doomsday. “But you come along like a thief in the night—”

“I said don’t do that.”

“I’ll do as I please, and you can’t stop me.”

“Yes, I can,” he said from between his teeth. He seized her wrist, and stepped even closer.

Her pulses drummed crazily. His body was too near hers, his face too close, his hand too strong, his anger growing as charged and heated as her own.

Mickey, who hardly ever lost control of herself, wanted to clench her fist and hit him in the stomach so hard that he’d double up in agony. Yet, paradoxically, she was swept by the dizzying and irrational wish that he’d kiss her. And just as irrationally, she knew he wanted it, too.

They stood glowering at each other, breathing hard. She saw a vein in his neck throbbing as fast and strong as her own heartbeat.

Just as she was about to either knee him in the groin or collapse into his arms, she heard Bridget’s cheery voice.

“Hello? Where’s everybody gone to? Are you out on the deck, Mickey? It’s a lovely night, isn’t it? Dessert is ready, and we have company come, just in time to share.”

Mickey nearly swooned in bewilderment. Company?

Bridget added, “It’s Reverend Blake and Reverend Casterleigh. Right this way, gentlemen!”

Mickey closed her eyes and thought, What have I done wrong, Lord? Guilt settled on her like a rough and heavy cloak.

Not one, but two ministers appearing at a moment like this?

SHE MET THE VISITORS in the dining room. Bridget had turned on the overhead lights, but the candles still flickered in their silver holders.

Reverend Howard Blake was an elderly man with an amazing head of white hair, full, lushly thick, and wavy. Although age had stooped his tall body, his cobalt-blue eyes still twinkled from behind his trifocals.

He had been the most respected minister in Crystal Creek for as long as Mickey could remember. But now he was getting ready to retire, and nobody envied the young man given the impossible task of replacing him.

Reverend Hugh Casterleigh was fresh out of divinity school. So lean he seemed gangling, he had an innocent, boyish face and a slight stammer. He was so sincere and good-hearted, he seemed like an awkward young angel being forced to serve time on Earth.

“Good evening, Mickey.” Reverend Blake took Mickey’s hand in his. “Forgive us for dropping in unannounced. We were driving by, and we just wanted to tell you that everyone is praying for Beverly and the baby. And dear Carolyn and Vern, as well.”

Mickey’s heart fairly shriveled with guilt. She hoped these two godly men could not see how bedeviled she’d just been, her heart torn by both anger and desire.

She bowed her head and murmured, “Thank you. I’ll be sure to tell Caro and Vern.”

He put his other hand on her shoulder. “I know this is hard on you, too, my dear. You’re like her second daughter. Our prayers are with you, as well.”

Her face burned with shame. “Thank you,” she said, her voice even smaller than before.

Howard Blake clasped her shoulder more tightly. “This is a trying time for Carolyn. First losing her uncle, now this. She’s lucky to have someone as steadfast as you to depend on.”

“P-please give her my condolences about her uncle, t-too,” Hugh Casterleigh said.

Howard stepped aside and let Casterleigh shake her hand. He pumped it as if he wished he could pump all sorrow out of the world.

“And you,” Howard said to Adam, “must be the executor. I’m Howard Blake. I was sorry to hear about Enoch. I knew him when he was young.”

Mickey fought not to wince. She became acutely conscious of Adam standing off to the side. “I’m sorry, I’m forgetting my manners,” she apologized.

Hugh Casterleigh blushed in sympathy and didn’t seem to know what to say. But Adam stepped up to Reverend Blake and offered his hand. “Thanks. I’m Adam Duran. From the Isabella Islands. I arrived at a bad time, I’m afraid.”

Howard clasped his hand. “You couldn’t know, my boy. But I’m sure that Mickey will take good care of you. Very capable girl, our Mickey.”

Her cheeks flamed more hotly. She managed to say, “Reverend Casterleigh, Adam Duran. Mr. Duran, Reverend Casterleigh.”

Casterleigh shambled over to Adam and engaged in another of his energetic handshakes. “S-sorry about Mr. Randolph,” he stammered.

Mickey went limp with relief when Bridget came in bearing a tray of dessert plates. “Y’all sit down,” she invited. “And I’ll be right back with the coffee.”

“Ah, Bridget,” Howard said. “Is that your famous German chocolate cake? You’re leading me into a temptation I can’t resist.”

“Oh, go on with you,” Bridget said, her cheeks flushed with pleasure. She set down the dessert plates, cleared away the remains of supper, and bustled off.

“Please sit,” Mickey said to the men. She sounded cordial and confident. What a faker I am. What a phony.

Howard Blake gallantly drew out her chair for her to be seated, and Hugh Casterleigh nearly tripped over a throw rug. Adam once again sat across from her, his face betraying nothing.

Howard asked what Mickey had heard from Denver, how everyone was getting on, and showed special concern for Carolyn. As Bridget poured the coffee, he turned to Adam. “This must complicate your travel plans, Mr. Duran. When did you plan on returning to the Isabellas?”

“Friday,” Adam said shortly.

“Ah.” Howard nodded. “So what shall you do now that Carolyn’s not here?”

Adam shot Mickey an unreadable look. “I’ll have to see. It depends on when Mrs. Trent can come back.”

“Yes. Well, that’s in God’s hands. Perhaps before we partake of Bridget’s talent, we should bow our heads and pray.”

Mickey ducked her head but didn’t shut her eyes. She watched as Howard said his prayer and Casterleigh pressed his hands together, his eyes tightly closed.

She could not help but notice that Adam barely lowered his head, and that he watched the others at the table. He blinked as if displeased when Howard said, “And may the soul of our brother Enoch rest in peace.”

He finished, said “Amen,” then turned to Adam again.

“My wife and I have been to the Caribbean a few times. Just what part of the Isabellas are you from?”

“The island of Los Eremitas,” Adam said.

“And what do you do there?” Howard’s question did not seem prying, only courteous.

“This and that.”

Adam said it in a way that blocked closer questioning. Mickey bristled inwardly, and Howard clearly noticed and changed the course of the conversation. “And what do you think of that cake, Hugh? Isn’t it a wonder?”

Casterleigh had to swallow before he could answer. “Sure enough.”

Howard Blake turned to Mickey. “Mick, I know everything’s topsy-turvy. And I hesitate a bit to bring this up, but Vernon was going to teach Sunday school this weekend. I’m sure it’s slipped his mind, and I wouldn’t have him feel bad about it for the world.”

“Oh,” Mickey said, taken aback. Vern often volunteered to substitute teach the first and second grade class. And she was sure Howard was right; the crisis had knocked all thought of Vern’s promise out of his mind.

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