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Her mother lifted the spoon from the red sauce, tasted it, tossed in some salt, and turned to her. “Time to talk turkey, missy.”
“You wanted me to come early to talk about poultry?”
Of course, Tess knew this wasn’t about anything as inane as food. This was about her father. Neither she nor Frank had figured out how to traverse the gulf between them, so Maggie had built the raft. Tess had dreaded this moment as much as she had craved it. She needed to be moved, and her mother was the woman to kick her ass in gear.
“Turkey is fowl,” her mother intoned, tossing the spoon into the sink and untying her apron. “Let’s go out back.”
“It’s hot, Ma.”
“So is the kitchen,” Maggie said, grabbing a sweating glass of lemonade and shoving another one that had obviously been waiting on Tess. “Here. Follow me.”
Tess had no recourse but to do as directed. Her mother wasn’t a woman to be questioned—people just did whatever the diminutive drill sergeant said. Yep, Maggie had missed her calling in life.
Tess sighed. “Fine.”
They walked to the flagstone patio sitting near the waterfall her mother had insisted they build to cover the noise of the nearby highway. The oaks gracefully bowed, magnanimously sharing the cover of their leaves, casting pure shadow on the outdoor living room her mother had created. With the tumbling verbena and vibrant canna lilies clustered with the blooming irises, the patio looked like the cover of a gardening magazine.
“Sit down,” her mother said with a gracious wave of her hand, reminding Tess of the spider opening her parlor to the fly. Suddenly Tess felt twitchy. She so should have faked a migraine.
“What’s up? I’m looking for the coals you’re about to rake me over but I don’t see any.” Tess set her glass down, plopped onto an overstuffed chair and crossed her arms. Realizing she probably looked like a sullen teenager, she uncrossed them, hooking one on the back of her chair.
“Oh, honey, you know I don’t have to tell you what is up. You know what’s up,” Maggie said, taking a careful sip of her lemonade before setting it beside Tess’s on the stone coffee table.
Tess sucked in a deep breath and tried one last-ditch effort to prevent the talk they were about to have. “Dad told everyone this is between him and me.”
“Oh, no, honey. It’s not.” Maggie leveled her with the “mom look” she’d used on Tess her whole life. Tess refrained from doing the requisite squirm.
“I can’t—”
“Oh, yes, you can. I understand your disappointment with his decision regarding the company, but he is your father.”
Silence fell hard and the tinkling of the waterfall fountain thing might as well have been fingernails on a chalkboard. Tess already knew that. What she didn’t know was how to forgive him so she could deal with his illness.
“Let me say that again, Tess. He is yourfather.”
“But he didn’t remember he was my father when it came time to choose his replacement. I’m hisdaughter.”
“So you are,” Maggie said with a sigh. “But have you ever paused to wonder if you were the one who was wrong?”
She jerked her gaze up to Maggie’s. “What?”
“Have you ever examined the notion you truly aren’t ready to run the company?”
Her mother’s question might as well have been a bucket of cold water in the face. Not ready? “How can you even suggest that?”
“How can I not?”
Tess looked away, grappling with the thought her own mother didn’t think she was able to run Ullo. Tess was capable of running the company. Sure, there would be a learning curve, just like at Upstart. But Tess knew she could do it, and that her own mother doubted her felt like a razor blade swiped across her heart.
Maggie waited.
Tess raised her gaze to the woman who’d always believed her daughter could do anything she set her mind to. “You don’t think I can.”
Maggie hesitated for a few minutes, seemingly looking for the right words. “I’m not sure. You know the answer to that, but you’ve clung to the belief it was your birthright for so long, you never stopped to consider whether it was the right place for you. I don’t work for Ullo. My job is to love the man who built the company… and my job is to love you.”
Tess sank back on the cushion. “I can run Ullo.”
“Maybe the question is not whether you can run Ullo, but if you are ready to run it at this moment.”
