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“It’s okay.”
“No, it’s not okay.”
“I can do my own apologizing, thanks,” Michelle said.
He took off his sunglasses and with his thumb and forefinger rubbed his eyes wearily. Behind him, his daughter sat staring stonily out the window. The silence in the Jeep stretched uncomfortably.
Danny had watched and listened with fascination. His eyes were big now as he looked at Michelle. “You’re in trouble.”
His whisper carried easily to the adults in the front seat. Their eyes met. And for a second, Claire almost forgot where she was. Who he was. They were simply two single parents, each struggling with the problems of trying to rear children.
He leaned forward then and started the car and the spell was broken.
WHEN THEY TURNED OFF the highway about twenty minutes later, Mack told her that they were on McMollere land—over two thousand acres of flat, treeless bottomland planted exclusively in sugarcane. Fields and more fields of the green plants had reached a height exceeding eight feet in the August sun. The crop was nearing maturity, he explained. Then in the fall, in a flurry of activity, it would be cut, the strappy growth burned off, loaded on large trucks and hauled to the processing plants. Also owned by the McMolleres.
“What are those things?” Danny asked, pointing to mechanical beasts moving slowly up and down in various spots throughout the fields, like pecking birds.
“Oil pumps,” Mack explained. “There’s oil beneath the surface of the cane fields.”
“That’s how you get it out of the ground?” Danny was spellbound.
“That’s right, hotshot.”
Oil wells and sugarcane. Black and white gold. Claire sat stunned, taking it all in. The McMolleres’ wealth was more extensive than she’d realized. As was their power. She fought the fear rising in her chest.
“Is it okay to call you Uncle Mack?” Danny asked suddenly.
“That sounds fine to me,” Mack said, ignoring the snicker from Michelle.
“Did you like my dad? He was Carter McMollere.”
Claire met Mack’s startled glance. Why was he so surprised? she wondered. Did he expect her to bring Danny to meet Carter’s family and not explain to the child just who Carter McMollere was? Did they think Danny had reached age five without asking who his father was and why that man wasn’t a part of their lives?
“Yes, I liked him. He was my brother,” Mack said.
“Did you play with him?”
Enough, thought Claire. “Danny, let’s save this conversation for later, okay?”
“When, Mommy?”
“Just later, sweetie.” To her relief, Mack turned the car into a narrow lane. Finally.
Michelle had the door open almost before the Jeep stopped. “Well, here it is, kid,” she said, giving Danny a hand as he scrambled out after her. “Your heritage. Take a look.”
“What’s a heritage?” Danny asked, squinting in the sun at the imposing residence.
“Ask your mommy,” Michelle said, throwing a hostile look in Claire’s direction. “I’ll bet she has the answer to that one.”
“Michelle. Go to your room.” Mack’s expression was fierce. The girl shrugged and turned, heading for the front door.
Claire was used to teenage behavior. Before she took the job as a librarian, Claire had been an English teacher and had experienced her share of impudence and sheer bad manners from teenagers. She had found that such behavior often came from a deep well of hurt in a child. What, she wondered, was causing this girl such pain?
But there was no time to ponder the problem. As Michelle entered the house, two people came out. Claire reached for Danny, pulling him protectively against her, then turned to face Angus and Wyona McMollere, her son’s grandparents.
Later she realized that Mack was the force that had eased those first awkward moments. He had introduced his mother first. Wyona McMollere was tiny, no more than five feet tall. Her skin was fair and unlined, her hair delicately blond. Her hand trembled as she touched Danny’s hair, then his cheek. Claire guessed the woman to be about sixty, but her vague and distracted manner made her seem older.
“Mama, meet Claire Woodson,” Mack said. “Claire, my mother, Wyona.”
“Hello, Mrs. McMollere.”
The woman extended her hand. “How do you do?” she said, obviously striving to be polite. “I thought you would be younger.”
“Because I was a student when I met Carter?” Claire asked.
“Well, yes.”
“My mother was ill, so I had to delay getting my degree,” Claire explained, guessing from the woman’s surprised expression that she hadn’t expected Claire to have enough character to care for a sick mother. “I’m thirty-four.”
“Claire, this is Danny’s grandfather, Angus McMollere,” Mack said. “Dad, Claire Woodson.”
She recalled that Angus had suffered a stroke right after Carter’s death. Age and illness had apparently taken a toll, because the stern and uncompromising tyrant that Carter had described hardly fit the slightly stooped, fragile-looking man before her. But his eyes— so like Mack’s and Danny’s—were still fiercely blue.
She shook his hand. “Mr. McMollere.”
“Well, the boy certainly has the best of both of you,” he declared, studying Danny’s face.
“You mean, Carter and me?” Claire smiled coolly. “Is that a compliment?”
“My grandson’s a good-looking boy,” the old man blustered.
She gave Danny’s shoulder an affectionate squeeze. “I think so, too.”
“Michelle thinks he looks like me.” Everybody stared at Mack in surprise.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” his mother said, finding her voice first.
“That was a joke, Mama.”
Claire felt a hand beneath her elbow and realized it belonged to Mack. She had a wild impulse to turn around and run from these people who represented anything but safety to her and Danny. But Mack was urging her across the threshold, and she had no choice but to keep going. Behind her, the door closed.
“Welcome to Sugarland,” he said.
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