“Yes, ma’am.” The woman gathered her things and went out the door, quietly closing it behind her.
“Who’s there?” Marcus tried to sit but fell back against the pillows.
“It’s me, Daddy.” Cassie hurried to the bed and stopped him from pulling the breathing tube out of his nose. “It’s Cassie. Just calm down.”
“Where’s your mother? I saw her. I saw her right over there.”
Shock jolted Cassie into action. “Daddy, it’s okay. No one’s here but me. I told your aide to go home. Teresa is bringing your dinner. Are you hungry?”
He seemed to realize he was in this room at this time. His eyes went from a vacant stare to a more lucid clarity. “I must have been dreaming. I thought you were your mother.” He shrank back into the pillows, his disappointment heavy in the air. “I forgot that she’s dead.”
Cassie couldn’t speak. The depth of his grief ate at her with a stinging that felt like fire ants biting into her skin. She’d allowed this to happen. She’d stayed away, hating herself, and hating the man he’d become. She’d let this estrangement rip them apart and now it had made her bitter and distrustful and her father so ill and grief-stricken he was dying a slow, horrible death.
He opened his eyes to stare up at her. “Cassie-girl, you came home. I’m so glad.”
Cassie inhaled a gulping breath. “Are you, Daddy?”
“Of course I am, girl. I told ’em to call you home. I have a lot to discuss with you. Not much time.”
She wondered if Cal already knew what her father wanted to talk to her about. She’d just have to keep digging until she found out. “What do you want to tell me?”
He let out a shuddering cackle. “So much. Too much.”
Cassie found a chair and pulled it up to the bed. “I’m here now, Daddy. You can tell me whatever you want.”
But did she want to hear everything he had to tell?
CAL CAME IN THE BACK DOOR and turned toward the long, sunny kitchen on the right. Teresa was in her usual spot in the little sitting room by the breakfast nook, watching the evening news. Her apartment was next to the sitting room. “Hey,” she said, never taking her eyes off the television. “Looks like rain tomorrow.”
“Yep.” Right now he didn’t really care about the peanuts and corn. “Time for his tray?”
She got up. “It’s on the stove.” She went over and pulled the foil off the mashed potatoes and tiny chunks of beef stew and gravy. “Cal, Cassie’s in there with him. She sent the day nurse home.”
Cal braced his hands on the long butcher-block counter. “She came to see me in the stables, wanting to know what’s going on. I can’t tell her so I hope he explains things.”
Teresa glanced across the wide central hall. “But he doesn’t realize—”
“I know that.” He lowered his head. “If I tell her the truth, she’ll go ballistic and think I cooked up this whole scheme. I’m hanging on by a thread here, Teresa.”
Teresa put the tray in front of him. “We don’t have a whole lot of time left. Before that man dies, the truth has to come out, and I mean all of the truth. That’s why you’re here. You can help her. You can make her understand.”
“Like I did last time when she needed me and…I wound up hurting her?”
Teresa leaned over the counter, her whisper carrying through the high-ceilinged house. “No, this time you won’t hurt her. You had your reasons back then. This time, you’ll stay and show her the man you’ve become.”
Cal hoped he could do that. “But what if she doesn’t stay? What if she leaves again?”
Teresa wiped her hands down her apron. “Then you’ll go after her, Cal. This has to end, one way or another.”
The door across the way opened and closed and Cassie came into the kitchen. She looked at Cal then turned to Teresa. “Is that my father’s dinner tray?”
Teresa nodded. “I was about to let Cal bring it in to you, honey.”
Cal reached for the food tray, but Cassie tugged it away. “I’ve got it.”
“I’ll sit with you, if you want,” Cal offered, hoping to find some common ground. “No, thanks.”
With that, she lifted the tray and walked back across the hall.
Cal glanced over and realized the door was shut so he rushed to open it for her. Their eyes met but her expression never yielded. She went into the room, leaving him to close the door.
Teresa lifted her chin toward the stove. “Your dinner is ready if you want to eat now.”
“I’m not hungry,” Cal said. “I’ll come back later.”
He walked out onto the back porch, the crisp gloaming hitting him with a refreshing burst. He wasn’t sure he could do this. How was he supposed to stay here and run this place knowing Cassie was around day in and day out?
I’ve made a deal with the devil, he thought. Marcus Brennan always had some sort of deal up his sleeve. And this one was a real kicker.
But he’d made the deal, taking a big risk, so he could see her again and hopefully make up for the past. Well, that day had come and now he wished he’d just stayed up the road on his own place. He’d been content there, happy to work his land in solitude. He could leave now and go back to that solitude.
But then, he’d be leaving Cassie with a mess on her hands and a dying father on her conscience. He couldn’t do that even if she did think the worst of him.
So he stood and watched the sunset settling over the pines and pastures, his memories as golden and glistening as the rays falling across the distant corn fields. He remembered the first time he’d seen Cassie standing up on the second-floor porch, her long blond hair tumbling around her face, her expression haughty and full of dare. He’d pegged her for the spoiled princess, a rich girl who had a powerful father.
Forbidden and out of his reach.
He’d fallen for her right then and there.
Then he remembered finding her later in the stables, tears running down her face, her vulnerable angst over hearing her parents fight making her even more desirable because she needed him.
Their first kiss out underneath that old oak tree had been magical, like a soothing balm. It had brought him home to a place he’d been searching for all of his life.
He wanted to be back at that place. But he didn’t know how to find it again. Cassie had grown up in the years she’d been away. It was obvious she was a sophisticated woman who’d done things her own way. Maybe she’d outgrown those intense feelings they’d shared back then.
While he’d been standing in the same spot, waiting to rekindle something that could never be.
The back door banged open. “Cal, we need to talk.”
He turned to find her standing there, her eyes dark with a boiling rage. “What is it this time?”
“My father told me that I need to talk to you about the future of this plantation. What did he mean by that?”
Cal let out a long sigh. “What else did he tell you?”
She stalked to the porch railing. “Not much. I tried to get him to eat but he kept pushing me away.” Her shoulders slumped. “He seemed desperate to explain things, but maybe not sure what to do or say. He got upset and told me to leave. He told me to find you and come back in there.”
Cal rubbed a hand down one of the massive columns supporting the house. “Welcome to my world, darlin’. Some days he makes perfect sense.