Texas Mum. Roz Fox Denny

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ her coffee. She remembered back to the boy her son had been after he’d gone into remission, before the fevers had returned with a vengeance. He’d been a normal, happy-go-lucky kid whose curiosity had seemed boundless. Now he was pale and wan, and intermittent fevers sapped his will to get out of bed.

      Yawning, she paced around the table and massaged tight knots in her shoulders. If only she had family with whom to bat around the pros and cons of this offer. She hesitated to call it an opportunity, because all results from the study weren’t rosy.

      Did she trust Dr. Von Claus and Dr. Avery? Without answering her own question, she picked up a pen and scribbled her name beside the red x’s. As a veterinarian there were times she’d given advice based on her gut instinct and sketchy evidence. Closing the folder, she took it back to Nurse Jessie. Then she took the thin blanket the nurse had scrounged up and hurried back to Nick’s room where she relaxed as best she could in the recliner.

      * * *

      A CRESCENT MOON and a few stars still adorned the lavender early morning sky when Dario exited the hacienda and tossed two suitcases into the back of his Range Rover. He was flying off to Texas, and he hadn’t slept much over the past several nights. His ears still rang from the daily battles with his father and his older brother, who also thought he ruled the roost now. Lorenzo had bowed out of the squabbles shortly after Delaney’s visit.

      Dario thought about how much he disliked arguments, unlike the other hotheaded men in the Sanchez family. He’d tried to reason with them, then cajole them. He’d appealed to their sense of duty. Nothing swayed the old man or Vicente. During last night’s fracas at dinner, his father had threatened to have Benito Molina, the estancia attorney, strike Dario’s share in the hacienda and the business. Then Maria Sofia had waded in, demanding to know why she didn’t get an equal share of the family holdings, which opened a whole other debate. The three sons knew, of course, that su padre believed women should be taken care of by their father, brothers or husbands. Their little sister had her own strong views on that.

      Hoping he could put the whole mess behind him while in Texas, Dario fastened his seat belt and thrust the key into the ignition. All at once the rear passenger door opened, and he saw a bag or two tossed in before the door slammed and he was plunged into darkness. Then the front passenger door opened, and Maria Sofia climbed in.

      “What in the devil are you doing?” Dario roared.

      “Going to Texas with you,” she said, settling into her seat. “We’d better hurry, or we could miss the flight.”

      “We are not going anywhere. You, Maria Sofia, are staying here.”

      She shook her head.

      “Out.” He shooed at her with his right hand. “You don’t have a ticket, and even if I wanted to buy you one at the airport, even if there are spots available on both legs of my flight, Papa would skin us alive when we return.”

      She pulled some papers from her shoulder bag and waved them under his nose. “I have tickets, Dayo. Papa paid, but he had Lorenzo book online for me.”

      “Why? Why would Papa do that?”

      “Drive, and I’ll tell you.”

      Ribbons of sunlight had begun to lighten the sky overhead. Dario threw the Range Rover in gear. Only after they were through the gate did he ask, “So, did all of these big changes come about after I left the table last night?”

      “Yes. Vicente would have no part of it. I could have done the booking myself. Papa is so provincial.” She shot Dario a grin that he didn’t return. “I think he caved because he’s afraid you’ll do something stupid, like marry Delaney Blair. And Lorenzo said, while I’m gone, Papa’s going hunting for some suitable man to take me off his hands. He’s near apoplectic at the thought of me wanting an equal share in the estancia.” She rolled her eyes. “Can you believe he still thinks arranged marriages are acceptable?”

      Dario grunted and tightened his grip on the steering wheel.

      “My mother would have never gone along with that idea.”

      “I don’t know.” Dario shrugged. “My mother would have fought him tooth and nail. She was a firebrand. Your mother was a lady in every sense of the word. She loved Papa and catered to his every whim.”

      “That’s so lame. Well, I’m not going to be coerced into marriage. And you’re a fine one to talk. You walk off instead of standing up to Papa and Vicente. I guess I can understand you taking heat from Papa. But what right does Vicente have to yell and get so angry at you for wanting to go see Delaney Blair?”

      Dario shot her a veiled look. “Vicente loved someone when he wasn’t much older than you are now. They were engaged, and planning a big wedding. Soledad begged to go with them when he and Papa delivered bulls to a rancher in Wyoming, and then she ran off with a rodeo bull rider. Vicente says he’s over it, but he isn’t. It’s why he doesn’t work with the bulls, never makes deliveries and instead only handles the financial end.”

      “How come I didn’t know any of that?”

      “You were a toddler. And Vicente remains bitter. He holds his loss against all Americans. That’s why I didn’t fight with him about Delaney. He’s not going to change his mind.”

      “That’s so unfair. Instead of holding a grudge, he should have found someone else to love.”

      “Mmm-hmm,” Dario mumbled. They drove in silence as they entered the city and traffic picked up.

      “I want to market our bulls,” Maria Sofia said, veering to a side topic.

      “You what? Now, wait a minute.” Afraid of sounding too much like his father, he elected to bite back a remark hovering on the tip of his tongue, mainly that selling bulls was no job for a young woman.

      “Would you stand up for me? Papa might listen to you.”

      “Maria Sofia, I don’t think your years at a finicky girls’ school lays the groundwork to sell cantankerous bulls.”

      “I don’t, either, which is why I took online courses in marketing from a reputable university, too.” She shot him a smile.

      All he could do was laugh as he pulled the Range Rover into airport parking. “And that is something my mother would have done to outsmart my father. We’ll talk about some of your ideas later. I’m sure we’ll have downtime in San Antonio. Even if you convince me, you still have to get approval from Papa, Vicente and Lorenzo. We’re all equal partners, remember.”

      “The fact you’ve said you’ll listen gives me hope, Dayo. I got all A’s in my marketing courses. The final paper I presented was based on our family operation. The professor said I showed ways to cut costs and increase sales by up to forty percent. I think money softens the hard heads of men like Vicente and Papa, don’t you?”

      “As someone who’s still smarting from going three rounds with them and not winning, I’m in no position to offer help.” He parked and pocketed his key. “Let’s scramble. If the international check-in lines aren’t too long, we may have time for coffee. Here, let me get your bags. Do you have your passport?”

      She nudged him away from the passenger door and crossed her eyes deliberately. “Stop being such a Sanchez. I’m capable of carrying my own bags.”

      Dario СКАЧАТЬ