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“Idaho?” Garth asked. “I thought he was from Memphis.”
“He is. He inherited his grandparents’ ranch when they were killed a few years ago.” She paused and said, “When Dylan and I figured out what Dad had done, I immediately left but didn’t want to catch a commercial flight. I rented a plane and flew myself home.”
“What!” Claudia exclaimed. “That had to be a five-hour flight. You flew home alone without anything in your stomach?”
Charm frowned. “I was too mad to pass out. I was determined to get here and give Dad a piece of my mind. I hate him.”
“You did more than give him a piece of your mind,” Garth said, shaking his head. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen the old man so shaken. At least not since that time Cash threatened to disown him. He thinks you’re actually going to change your last name.”
“I am.”
Garth shook his head again. “No, you’re not, Charm. You’ve got to learn to deal with Bart like the rest of us. You’re an Outlaw and will stay an Outlaw. You only get to change your name the day you get married.”
She couldn’t stop the tears from springing into her eyes. “I’m never going to get married. The only man I want to marry doesn’t want me now because of Dad. I hate him and don’t want to be his daughter anymore.”
Garth moved aside when Charm began crying and Claudia pulled Charm into her arms as she continued to sob. “Don’t cry, darling,” her mother cooed softly in her ear.
Charm pulled back slightly and stared up at her mother. “So you didn’t know what he’d done?” she asked, swiping at her tears.
Claudia shook her head. “I knew about that dinner meeting he had with you and Dylan Emanuel when you were sixteen. Although I agree that you were too young to get seriously involved with a guy, I would have handled the situation with a lot more diplomacy than Bart.”
Of course she would have, Charm thought. “I know.”
“However, I did know he discovered two years later the two of you were sneaking around behind his back. All he said was that he handled the issue. I never asked for details.”
“He said he handled the issue? What he did was play me and Dylan against each other. For ten years I thought the worst of him and he did likewise with me,” Charm said as new tears flowed from her eyes. She began sobbing almost uncontrollably in her mother’s arms.
“Tell us, sweetheart,” Claudia said as she gently stroked Charm’s back. “Tell me and Garth what happened.”
Charm nodded and after pulling herself together, she told her mother and brother everything.
“Is she okay, Garth?”
Garth heard both stress and deep concern in his father’s voice. He saw it in his face as well. After what Charm had shared with him and Claudia, a part of Garth wanted to think his father deserved the worry for being so ruthless, manipulative and controlling. When Garth and his brothers were in their teens, they hadn’t called him “Dictator Bart” behind his back for nothing.
But then Bart was Bart and ten years ago the old man had been at the top of his game. Since then, he had settled down somewhat. He still gave orders and expected them to be obeyed but these days he spent less time being a tyrant and more time as a man determined to win the heart of the woman he loved.
Garth had a feeling this issue with Charm and the heartache their father had caused her wouldn’t go over well with Claudia, who was just as protective of their daughter as Bart was. Claudia didn’t like Bart’s shenanigans.
“Charm’s fine. She just hadn’t eaten since yesterday and—”
“Why hadn’t she eaten since yesterday?” Sloan asked.
Garth rubbed a hand down his face. “Before she could eat anything today, she found out what Dad had done and rented a plane to fly straight home.”
“From Mexico?” Maverick asked as if shocked.
“No, she was at Dylan Emanuel’s ranch in Idaho. But still she shouldn’t have been in the air for five hours on an empty stomach.”
“I agree,” Cash said. “What if she’d passed out at the controls while in the air.”
“Jesus,” Bart said in anguish, probably at the thought of the picture Cash had just painted. Garth thought the old man looked faint and watched him drop down in a chair at the table. He then buried his face in his hands after saying, “I could have lost my daughter.”
Garth hated to tell Bart but he’d probably lost her anyway now that Charm knew what he’d done. “I’m taking her home and will stop and get something for her to eat on the way.”
Bart snatched his head up. “Home? This is her home.”
Garth knew Charm usually spent more time here than she did at her own place, but that’s where she wanted to go and where he’d promised to take her. “She wants to go to her own house, Dad.”
