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“So I’m not sure where I’ll be,” Terri said over the phone. “Bob has a place up on Orcas Island and it’s absolutely beautiful in the summer.”
“Dee Dee needs a permanent home.”
“So you’ve said.”
“Terri, for once, think of her.”
“Like I don’t?” she replied, her voice elevating an octave. “Do I have to remind you that I’ve raised her almost single-handedly these past eight years?”
Here we go again. “No, Terri, but I’ve told you I’d like her to live with me.”
She snorted. “Forget it, Mason, I’ll let you know what I decide. Remember, you’ve got her for a couple of hours tonight. I’ll drop her off later.”
“Wait a minute—”
Click.
“Terri? Terri?” But she’d hung up. “Damn it all to hell.” He kicked at the wastebasket and sent it flying against the far wall.
“Are you all right?” Edie asked.
“Just fine,” Mason growled as he slammed down the receiver and fought the urge to swear a blue streak. His head pounded and if he thought it would do any good, he’d drive over to Terri’s place and—and what? Scream and yell? Beg and plead? Threaten? No way. The only thing Terri understood was money. Lots of it. He had to calm down and work this out with a cool head and an open checkbook.
Slowly counting to fifty, he stood and stretched his spine, balled and straightened his fists. His desk was cluttered and now, where the wastebasket had spilled, papers had spewed onto the floor. He picked up the can and retrieved the trash and vowed never to let that woman get to him again.
He’d spent the better part of the day going over profit-and-loss statements, dealing with attorneys and accountants, and wrestling with decisions about his business, his daughter and, of course, Bliss. He’d foolishly thought he could forget her. Wrong. It seemed that with each passing day he was more obsessed with John Cawthorne’s daughter.
Cawthorne. He was another headache in and of himself. A real head case, that guy.
Resting a hip on the corner of his desk, Mason spied the deed to Cawthorne’s ranch on top of one stack of papers. Brynnie had signed it; the thing was legal. All he had to do was record the transaction with the county.
Or sell it back to her.
Hell, what a mess.
He rounded the desk, found a bottle of Scotch in the cupboard by the window, unscrewed the cap and took one long, fiery swallow. As the liquor burned a welcome trail down his throat, he discovered that all of his anger with the old man had evaporated, and the vengeance he’d nurtured over the years—the need to prove himself to Bliss and her father—had faded with time. He didn’t need Cawthorne Acres. Unfortunately, what he did need, he realized with a sinking feeling, was Bliss.
“Get a grip, Lafferty,” he chastised. She was still off-limits. Always would be. And he had other problems to deal with. If he wasn’t going to settle down at the Cawthorne ranch, he needed a place big enough for himself, Dee Dee and a housekeeper-nanny. Or a wife.
He took one more tug off the bottle, screwed on the cap and shoved it back where it belonged. A wife? No way. He’d tried that once before and look what a mess he’d gotten himself into. Yeah, but you married the wrong woman. You knew it at the time.
/> He folded the deed and slipped it into the inner pocket of his jacket just as the phone rang.
“Jarrod Smith, on line one,” Edie called through the open door.
“Got it.” Mason picked up the receiver. “Hey,” he said, “what’s up?”
“It’s Patty.” Jarrod’s voice was grim, without any trace of humor whatsoever. “I think I’ve found her.”
CHAPTER TEN
“I’ve got a bad feeling about this,” Bliss thought aloud, but Katie, determined that the sisters should meet, was threading the car into the slow stream of traffic that ran through Bittersweet. “You know I already met Tiffany once.”
“I heard. Mom said Octavia told her about it.”
“Tiffany never said a word about who she was or that we were sisters or anything.”
“She was probably shocked.”
