Falling For Her Boss (26 page)

Cassie knew at times Lucy might still feel hurt that their mother had given her up for adoption, yet kept Cassie until the day she'd died.  At twenty-six they both had their own lives now, but their childhoods still had power over them.

Cassie clipped a few magenta rose stems, careful of the thorns, then said, "Let's go into the house.  I want to show you something."

The large ranch house on Twin Pines Ranch was three stories, covered with Wedgwood blue siding and accented by a wraparound apron veranda.  Caned rocking chairs waited there for visitors over the summer.  There were three bedrooms on the second floor, and the attic, used for storage, was hot and musty.

As the women ran up the steps to the front porch, Lucy asked, "Do you think the men will be out all morning mending fence?"

"Do you miss Zack already?" Cassie teased, knowing Zack and her twin were very much newlyweds and not apart any more than they had to be.

"Sure, I miss him," Lucy said with a bit of a shy smile.  "Life's a little crazy right now with living in town so he can start his practice, and going out to Mom and Dad's as much as we can to check out the site where the house is being built.  It's going to be so great, being able to be alone with Zack and being on the ranch."

"From what he said, he feels the same way.  So he's joining an established physician's practice in Long Brush?"

"Yes.  It will be easier this way on everyone.  The docs can cover for each other on weekends.  That's how we came this weekend.  Dr. Brewster is covering for him."

"It sounds as if you've combined the best of both worlds.  Zack certainly seems happy.  I think he's finally dropped the weight of everything that happened to him back in California.  And is Marty staying with the program?"  Lucy's adopted brother Marty had become an alcoholic.  Largely through Zack's efforts, he'd gone through rehab.

"Seems to be.  Our church has AA meetings once a week and he attends those.  Other times he'll call his sponsor or he'll drive to Long Brush to another meeting.  He understands the one day at a time philosophy and he's trying to make amends."

Cassie understood how a problem could turn into a lifelong battle.  "When you take a wrong turn, or you go off the wrong road, I think you do the most damage to yourself, at least if you're single.  I know I did.  Once you get over the humiliation and you can find a little confidence again, that helps everything else."

"Maybe you and Marty should talk."

"We did at Christmas."

Cassie didn't understand a lot about marriage and families.  Shifted from one foster home to the next from the time she was five, she hadn't known stability until Tina Christopher had taken her in when she was seventeen.  Tina had been a widow then, so Cassie had never seen what a good marriage was supposed to be.

"How's Zack handling being part of a large family?"

"He grumps once in a while because he thinks he knows best, but eventually he comes around to see what any of us really need, whether that's a pat on the head or a swift kick."

Cassie laughed.  "I can see Zack doing both.  He's so great with the horses.  I wish I could use him to train the new hand I've hired.  Clem tries too hard, wants to be too aggressive.  He definitely doesn't understand patience like Zack does."

"How old is he?"

"Just out of high school with nowhere else to go.  So I told him I'd give him a chance."

"Are you a sucker for a sad story?"

"Heck, I can be a sucker for any story.  Though I don't cry my eyes out like you do watching one of those card commercials on TV."

This time Lucy laughed.

They entered the living room, then went straight to the kitchen.  Cassie had readied two Waterford vases.  "Tina loved having these vases full of flowers this time of year.  I miss her most then.  I keep them filled with flowers all summer."

"That's a way to remember her well."

Cassie hesitated, then went on.  "I still haven't found a way to do that with our mom.  After she died, I tried to forget, not remember, because it hurt too much.

"And now?" Lucy asked with so much compassion Cassie wanted to hug her.

"Now—"

Lucy set the wicker basket on the counter and Cassie said, "We can arrange these later.  Come on, let's go up to my room." 

At the top of the stairs, the first door on the left was Cassie's.  It wasn't much bigger than the others, but it did have a private bath.  It had been Tina's room, and Cassie hadn't changed much here since her mentor had died, though she had redecorated in the past five years—the guest bedrooms, the living room, new wallpaper in the kitchen.  She'd changed those rooms because memories of her life with Tina were alive there...and they hurt.  The changes reminded her to think ahead rather than back.  But in this room, she remembered Tina.  She even still had a few of her clothes hanging in the closet.  Silly, maybe, but she liked to take a whiff of Tina's riding coat.  She liked to see those tall boots standing in the corner.  It made her feel closer.

Cassie went to the dresser and pulled out the top drawer.  Lucy crossed to her and they stared at each other in the mirror.  They were identical twins in most ways.  Zack had pointed out a few differences.  Cassie's hair was darker brown and Lucy had a dimple on the right side of her cheek when she smiled.  But they really were mirror images.

After Cassie opened the second drawer in the cherry wood dresser, she reached deep inside to the back and pulled out a suede pouch.  It was easy to see it was old.  The suede was worn around the edges and the leather ties were scraped from drawing the pouch closed.  She held it in her hand as if it were her most precious possession.  And maybe it was.

"My mom and I didn't have much, and I don't remember a lot.  But I do remember many nights we split a dinner she brought home from the restaurant where she waitressed.  I think I told you we lived in a one-room apartment.  She slept on the sofa and I slept on pillows on the floor." 

Her voice caught as some of the faded memories took on a little more color again.  After a moment, she went on.  "Even when I was five, I knew we didn't have anything valuable, anything worth keeping, except—"  She looked down at the pouch.  "For this.  Whenever we'd leave the apartment, Mom stuffed it in a sock and then pushed that sock into a cookie jar.  But while we were there she'd take it out and lay it on top of the orange crate where she kept a couple of books.  Sometimes she'd just pick it up and hold it and stare at it in such a way that made me not want to ask any questions."

Cassie opened the pouch and slid a gold pocket watch into her palm.  "One day I did ask her what it was, and she told me it was a watch and it had belonged to somebody very special.  That's all she'd ever say.  The night she was killed, she went out and a neighbor came over to stay with me.  We were watching TV when the police came to the door.  I heard everything.  I don't think I understood everything.  They said my mom was dead.  It was dark and she walked across the middle of the street and a car hit her.  He told the neighbor somebody would be coming for me.  Flo told me to get my favorite toy because I'd need it...that I wouldn't be coming back.  So I got my stuffed horse, and when everyone else was talking, I went to the cookie jar and pulled out the sock.  The horse had a tear in the middle, so I just stuffed the sock in his stomach.  No matter where I went or who had me, I protected that horse.  When I got a little older I sewed him up.  But I've always wondered about this."  She handed the watch to Lucy.

A few times since Cassie had met Lucy, they'd look at each other and known what the other was thinking.  That was definitely true of this moment.

But Cassie needed to put it into words.  "You found me with only a picture, a birth date and a last name."

"Gillian found you."

"Yes, I know.  She finds missing persons and she's obviously very good.  Before you found me, before you told me how Gillian did it, I never would have believed in a—a psychic.  But I thought maybe since she uses objects to pick up sensations, that maybe, just maybe, she'd see something that would help us know who this belonged to.  Maybe it wasn't our father.  Maybe it was a grandfather.  Maybe it was another special man our mom had met.  I don't know.  And I don't know if it's worth bothering Gillian about, or if she'd have time to do this for us.  But ever since you found me, I've been thinking about it and I knew I had to ask you what you thought."

Lucy closed the watch and ran her thumb over the top of the scroll engraving in the gold.  "We need to think about it."

Cassie felt a little deflated.  After all, this was the reason she hadn't brought it up before.  Maybe Lucy would want no part of finding out who their dad had been—a dad who had left them or maybe just another man who had been in and out of their mother's life.

But then Lucy went on.  "I waited a while before I decided to try to find you.  I found out a little bit of information, couldn't go any farther, and that's when Zack recommended Gillian.  But before I decided to go ahead with finding you, my biggest fear was that you wouldn't want to see me, that you wouldn't want to have any part of me.  And I think that's even more true and more of a fear when trying to find a parent.  If this did belong to our father, what did our mother mean to him?  Did he mean more to her than she meant to him?  Would he have a family now?  And if he has a family, would they want us to be part of it?  Would he want us to be part of it?  Do you see what I mean?"

Cassie wasn't any more open to getting hurt than Lucy, maybe even less so.  Lucy had grown up with the McIntyres, a loving, adopted family who had given her a sense of self-worth and a confidence to find what she was good at and pursue a dream.  Until Cassie was seventeen, no one had wanted to give to her, they'd only wanted to take from her and use her.  She didn't trust easily.  She didn't make friends easily.  She certainly didn't wear her heart on her sleeve.  So she understood everything Lucy was saying and realized it wasn't a rejection of her idea at all, it was just a pause for them to think and not be reckless, to think instead of getting hurt.  After all, they were twins and together in this. 

"You're right," she said.  "We should think about it."

Lucy looked relieved.  "We can talk to Zack, too, and see what he thinks.  You know I trust his advice.  But that's up to you."

Cassie was beginning to trust Zack, too.  After all, he'd kept her secret so far.  And that had to be hard, being a newlywed and wanting to share everything with Lucy.  Yet he was also a doctor and knew about doctor-patient confidentiality.  She had a feeling he was looking at her secret somewhat like that.  Still she didn't want it to go long.

She didn't want her secret to cause a rift between Zack and Lucy.  "I need to tell you something."

"Something Zack already knows?"

Cassie felt sideswiped.  "Why do you think that?"

"The first time we came to visit you here, I knew the two of you shared something.  When we returned to the Rising Star, I asked Zack if he was attracted to you because I misread the signals.  Zack told me he wasn't attracted to you, he was attracted to me.  He told me you were just talking and I knew that's all it had been.  But since then, when you've come to visit us, or we've come here, I can sense something between the two of you and I think you confided in him."

Now Cassie was sure she had to tell Lucy what she'd kept from everyone except Tina and her foreman Loren all these years.  "I've kept a secret all my life, Lucy.  Zack figured it out.  I didn't tell you because...because it makes me feel so inferior.  It makes me feel humiliated sometimes."

Lucy put her hand on her sister's shoulder.  "You can tell me anything, absolutely anything."

Cassie took a deep breath, then let it out.  "I can't read."

Cassie didn't see the shock she expected in Lucy's eyes.  She didn't see judgment or even pity which would have made Cassie run in the opposite direction.  She only saw compassion as Lucy murmured, "That must be so difficult for you."

"I've learned to cope," Cassie confessed.  "I think I have something called dyslexia, though I've never been diagnosed.  Loren's the only one who knew for a long time.  I mean, Tina did, too.  And Rachel knows now.  They looked it up on the computer.  I mix up my letters.  I see them differently on the page.  That's why I cut school so much, why I got into trouble.  Once Tina brought me here I didn't need to know how to read.  The horses and I communicate just fine.  I can ride a fence line and cut cattle and muck out stalls without reading."

"But how do you run the ranch?"

"Well, the thing is, once I hear something I usually remember it.  Rachel takes care of the household necessities.  Loren does all the numbers and forms on the computer.  But he reads me everything.  I take it in and use it when I need to."  She didn't know how she would handle it without her foreman and her housekeeper.

"Oh, Cassie."  Lucy wrapped her arms around her sister and Cassie didn't think she'd ever felt more loved.  Tears sprang to her eyes and she swiped them away.  "Zack saw I didn't have any reading material around, that I had X's on the calendar so I could count the days."

"Here I thought you were just neat."

Cassie laughed.

Suddenly outside there was the sound of horses clopping into the corral and men's voices.  "I guess they're back.  We'd better go down and fix lunch.  Rachel went into town to pick up extra supplies."