Daddy's Girls (35)

    All things considered, Scarlett was very fair about him, and willing to admit her own mistakes. He never had. He never did. And they had been cheated of a mother as a result, in order to punish her, and so he could be the only star in his daughters’ lives. It was a devastating revelation for them all. None of them could imagine her ever going to jail, or being on drugs for ten years. They realized she was a strong person if she had survived all of it and turned her life around. She looked proper and respectable and wholesome, and seemed like an honest, open, very loving person, even if she’d been foolish in her youth. And how could anyone guess what they would do, faced with that kind of poverty and despair?

“It’s ironic,” she said quietly, “that he died first, and you found me as a result. I’m surprised he never destroyed the paperwork, so there was no evidence.” It surprised her daughters too.

“He probably forgot,” Kate said in response, “or meant to do it later. He died very suddenly of a heart attack, and he was quite young, at sixty-four. I’m sure he expected to live much longer and thought he had time to destroy the papers.”

“Did he ever remarry? Did you have a woman in your life?” she asked gently.

“No, he didn’t. He’s been with the same woman for twenty-four years, almost as long as you’ve been with your Italian friend,” Gemma answered. “She’s very discreet, and treated us more as friends. Dad never wanted anyone too involved with us. They didn’t move in together until Caroline left for college. He was pretty proper about things like that.”

    “Are you all married? Do you have children?” Scarlett wanted to know everything about them, and Kate laughed.

“I’m not. I run the ranch, and have worked for Dad for twenty years. Gemma’s not married either. She’s been too busy being a star.” They all laughed. “Caroline is married and has two kids, a son, eleven, and a daughter, fifteen.”

“My daughter looks a lot like you,” Caroline said softly. Her sisters had noticed it too.

They were all shocked to realize they had spent two hours with her, while she told her story. It had been a heavy emotional experience for all of them. Her partner, Roberto Puccinelli, let himself in as they were chatting at the end. She introduced him to all of her daughters, and he looked deeply moved.

“Your mother speaks of you almost every day.” He smiled at Gemma. He was a handsome, distinguished-looking man with lively blue eyes and white hair. “And we watch your show every week.”

“You’ll have to watch reruns now,” she said sadly. “We just went off the air.”

“Oh no!” he exclaimed, and Scarlett smiled at them.

“May I see you again?” she asked cautiously, afraid of what they’d say. Maybe they only wanted to satisfy their curiosity, but didn’t want her in their lives now. Anything was possible. Jimmy had successfully gouged her out of their lives for nearly forty years.

“Of course,” Caroline was the first to say, and Gemma and Kate were quick to respond positively.

“Will you come to the ranch to visit us?” Kate asked her. “We’re all staying there right now, which is very unusual for us.”

“Where do you all live normally?”

    “I live in L.A.,” Gemma volunteered, and Caroline said San Francisco. They had never been very far from her.

“I would love to come to the ranch,” Scarlett said, and Kate extended the invitation to Roberto too.

They all had much to think about, and a little while later, the sisters left, after promising to all get together again soon. Roberto stood next to Scarlett with an arm around her and they waved as the girls drove away. Kate noticed that her lip was trembling. The poor woman was overcome with emotion to have seen her daughters and told them her story.

There was silence in the truck for the first few minutes after they drove away, and Caroline and Gemma dabbed at their eyes again.

“What an amazing woman,” Gemma said. “I can see how it all happened. How could Dad do that to her, not let her see us?” But they all knew he had a vengeful side. If you crossed him, he didn’t forgive you. Leaving him for another man must have been the ultimate betrayal, and he made her pay for his broken heart and his bruised ego, and had clearly never forgiven her. Her life sentence was to make her stick to her agreement to give up her daughters. They believed her that she thought she could get him and the courts to relent but she couldn’t. She was trapped by her own agreements, and by a man who would never forgive her. By some miracle fate had intervened. They were all glad they had seen her. They each felt as though a piece of them that had been missing had been restored. The mother they knew virtually nothing about had reappeared. She hadn’t been a disappointment, as they had feared. She had been a gift.





Chapter 8


Much to Scarlett’s delight, Kate called her the next day to thank her for seeing them, and being so open with them. After so long, and so much pain, she could have refused to open her heart again, but she hadn’t. Kate said that hearing her story and knowing the truth had helped each of them. They had all been enormously impressed by her, her grace, her simplicity, and her honesty.

Kate invited her and Roberto to the ranch for lunch on Sunday, and Scarlett was thrilled to come, and said Roberto would be too. She knew about Jimmy’s enormously successful ranch, of course, but had never been there. She asked if their father’s companion would be upset by their visit.