Daddy's Girls (42)

“Yes, it was.” It had been a hard two months between her father dying and the show folding, and being broke. But she was enjoying her sisters and the ranch, and she had loved connecting with her mother again, although it cast a terrible shadow on her father, who had cheated them all of Scarlett for their whole lives. She had a feeling Caroline would never forgive him, particularly since their relationship hadn’t been strong. But at least she had Peter and her kids. You couldn’t have everything in life.

    The part he had described to her sounded interesting but she also knew that the British were partial to their own, and more likely to hire a British actress who could do an American accent than a real American. She wasn’t counting on it for now. And they weren’t ready to cast anyway.

He promised to keep her informed and they hung up.

She had a meeting with her tenant that afternoon about the possible purchase of her house. Then she went to the hairdresser and got her hair colored. She was staying at a small hotel she knew that wasn’t too expensive. She was planning to spend a week in L.A., and see some friends. She was enjoying the ranch, but it was nice to get out of the sticks, and come back to the city, where she belonged. She might have been born in Texas and raised in the Valley, but they were never going to make a country girl of her. She had L.A. in her blood. Caroline felt the same way about it. She loved San Francisco, and any big city. But as a temporary rest stop the ranch was fine, even fun at times. And she loved being with her sisters. They each brought something different to the table, irreverence, in Gemma’s case, and glamour and style, which was good for Caroline and Kate.

It seemed too quiet on the ranch to Kate after Caroline and the children left, and Gemma went to L.A.

“Gemma will only be gone for a week,” Kate told Thad. They had signed all the papers for his purchase of the land, and were just waiting for approval from the county, to split it off from the ranch, but they didn’t expect any problems with it. They expected the approval to come through in July. He asked Kate to ride out there with him again at the end of a day’s work. He wanted her to see where he was thinking of situating the house he was planning to build and he wanted her advice.

    “You know, this is the first thing I’ve ever owned in my life,” he said shyly, when they got there and looked around. They had picked some beautiful acreage on the border of the property, with a stream running through it, and some handsome tall trees that would provide shade. He was planning to build a house for himself, a bunkhouse, and a barn, which was all he needed for a start.

“My father felt that way too when he inherited his first piece of land out here.” He had told her about it often and what it meant to him. She felt guilty selling some of that now, even to Thad, but it was Gemma’s decision not hers. And she didn’t want to buy her out, nor did Caroline.

“I’ve never owned a house, land, or even a horse. It feels like it’s time. Your father was about my age when he started,” he reminded her.

“He was a little older. I think he was forty, or a few years older, when he started buying. But he had three kids. That makes a difference. He had started early.” Thad nodded, looking at her, remembering what she had looked like when he’d met her. She was twenty-three. She hadn’t changed much, in his opinion, she had only improved with time, and didn’t look very different at forty-two. He had been an eighteen-year-old kid when they met, just a boy.

“I want to build a house like his, with a porch around it, and enough bedrooms, if I need them one day, but not so big that I’ll get lost in it. I’m used to living in a cabin barely bigger than a horse stall. It’s going to take some getting used to, having more space. I’m really grateful that Gemma is willing to sell me her share.”

“She’s grateful to you too,” Kate said. “She wasn’t ready for it when they canceled the show. It really left her high and dry. So you’re helping her out too.”

    “I couldn’t do it without the money your dad left me,” he said, and pointed to the spot where he wanted to build the house. It looked perfect to her, with the tall trees nearby. “I don’t want anything too modern. I like old houses.”

“So did my dad.” She smiled at him. “I like old houses too.”

“I always wanted to live in a house like that when I was a kid, shuffling around from place to place. I never thought I could do it, and now here I am.” He looked so proud, standing in the tall grass on the land that was about to be his. He had a manly quality to him, and the sexy appeal of real cowboys. It reminded her of her father and the kind of men she had always liked and used to meet at the rodeo. You couldn’t tell the cowboys from the ranchers sometimes, they all had that easy, sexy, masculine look.

“You can do anything you want to, if you try hard enough. That’s what my dad always said. I believe that. No dream is too big if you keep plugging away at it. This ranch is proof of that. And now yours will be too.” They sat down on a log together, looking out over the land into the Valley, their horses tied loosely to a tree, happily grazing.

“What about you, Kate? Do you think you’ll keep the ranch forever?”

“I hope so. What else would I do? This is what I know, and there’s nowhere else I want to be. This is it for me.” She looked at peace. She had always known she belonged here, unlike her sisters. She had no yearning to be anywhere but where she was, doing what she did every day. All she wanted was to do it a little better, but it provided all the challenges she wanted, and she did it well. She was one of the most responsible ranch owners he had ever known, and she was more creative and open-minded than her father, which would take her far.