The Tycoon (19 page)

But even as Shannon said that, she remembered the high voltage that had arced between her and Drake clear across a crowded room. Would he be able to forget that?

“My God, Shannon. This is like a story. A look across a crowded room, yada, yada, yada. It’s like Cinderella. Why did you lie to him about who you are?”

And that was the question Shannon had no answer to. Why, indeed? She winced and frowned. “I don’t know. I was so flattered and shocked that he even looked at me. And so nervous. I was intimidated by the surroundings and the people. I’ve never been anywhere that was like that party. I wasn’t thinking clearly and I’d had a lot of champagne. Everything got out of my control.”

“Well it’s easy to fix. You just call him up.”

“And say what? ‘Hey, remember me? The pick-up from Saturday night. I sure remember you.’”

“Tell him what you just told me. The way I see it, you wouldn’t be any worse off than you are now.”

Shannon gave that some thought. Christa knew more about men than anyone she knew. Drake’s business phone number must be in the Fort Worth phone book. But then, she hadn’t heard him say the name of his company. The information would be easy enough to find, but she wasn’t convinced that calling him was the right step. “I don’t know, Christa. You know my rotten history with guys.” She shook her head. “I think I’m better off to put it behind me.”

Christa huffed and waved away her concerns. “You should think about it some more.”

The video game ended and the kids trouped into the kitchen for water and food. Christa invited Shannon to stay for supper, but she declined and left for home.

She drove slowly, considering options. Maybe she would look up Drake’s company and call him tomorrow. An imaginary conversation sifted through her mind:
Hi, guess who?... Sorry I left in the middle of the night. Had to get home, you know. Don’t worry, I didn’t steal anything but a coffee mug.

She shut down those thoughts. No way could she call him. She would never find the right words. Why cause herself pain on top of embarrassment?

Hell. Just hell.

Chapter 12

Sunday evening, after spending Saturday night with Barron Wilkes, Betty Lockhart withheld an invitation for him to sleep at her house and sent him home. She didn’t mind sleeping at his house, which she had done last night, but she didn’t want him spending the night at hers. She didn’t want her stuffy neighbors seeing his car parked in her driveway in the early morning. And she never knew when her estranged husband might drop by.

Tonight she had thought Barron would never leave. She was dying to know what had happened between Drake and Donna Schoonover. Reluctant to have so personal a conversation with her son in Barron’s presence, she had sneaked a call to him this morning while Barron was in the shower, but she hadn’t had an opportunity to call him since.

She wasn’t well-acquainted with Donna. Nor did she know much about Drake’s relationship with her. But she hated that he had quarreled with the daughter of Don and Karen Stafford. She believed Donna to be a good catch for any man.

The Staffords had venerable standing, not only in Texas, but everywhere. Don Stafford was friends with Saudi princes and had been influential with four or five Presidents. Karen Stafford was a member of every important organization for good causes in the state and had even written a children’s book. And they had so much lovely money.

Still, Betty did wonder what kind of mother Donna would make. For all of the heiress’s plusses, Betty had to admit that Drake could be right about her drinking. Every time Betty saw her she had a drink in her hand. And though she and Drake were near the same age, she was rumored to have been married three times. But Betty refused to let herself get bogged down with minuses that conflicted with her wishes.

Now she paced in front of the marble fireplace in her family room, considering how she should approach her son. He hadn’t appreciated her advice in years about his girlfriends and marriage.

Well, her children could brush off her opinions all they liked. Both of her boys were past thirty now and her daughter, Kate, was nearing the thirty mark. It was high time all of them settled down—time Drake spent less time making money, time Pic spent less time tending cows and time Kate chased after something other than wild cowboys and horse shows.

And poor Troy, her stepson who had moved to the Double-Barrel when he was eight years old. Betty doubted he would ever settle down and be loyal to one woman. He was probably too much like his trashy mother. Having lived in a family of animal breeders, she knew a thing or two about genes.

All of them had a bad taste for marriage. Betty wished she understood it. Pic had had a wife years back, though the girl had never acted as a helpmate. She had hated the ranch and hated living in Drinkwell and she had behaved as if she hated Pic. After the marriage failed, an ugly divorce and settlement had cost Pic as well as the family a lot of money. Because of it, friction bubbled beneath the surface among Pic and his siblings to this day. And sometimes it erupted.

Betty walked to the kitchen and poured herself a fresh cup of coffee, continuing to think about her children and when they were small, when she’d had some control of what they did and said. She had loved those years. She loved kids. She wanted nothing more at this stage of her life than grandchildren.

But as she again tried to envision Donna Schoonover as a mother, that cruel bastard Reality, punched her right between the eyes. While she might like seeing Drake married into one of the wealthiest and most influential families in Texas, she had no wish for him to bring her longed-for extended family into a world of messy parenting and an unstable home life. She knew that story and all of its difficulties. She had stuck it out with Bill Junior for years for the sake of preserving a two-parent environment for their children, but at great cost to her own self respect and happiness.

Or at least, that’s what she had told herself many times. With Bill Junior, there were other factors, to be sure.

She carried her coffee back to the family room. A shiver passed over her and she moved closer to the fire. She found these cold dreary days trying. She couldn’t work in her flowerbeds, couldn’t play golf and didn’t like leaving the warmth of her home to go play Bridge or even go shopping. If she had some grandchildren, she could bring them here and bake cookies for them, read to them, play games with them.
They
would pay attention to her, as her own children had done only when they were small.

And as those thoughts tumbled through her mind, her landline rang.

“Hi, Mom. Look, I know we talked about lunch, but I’m—”

“Drake. I’m so glad you called. Did you and Donna sort everything out?”

“I didn’t call to talk about Donna. I just watched the weather report. It’s supposed to clear tonight so I can fly tomorrow. I need to go back to Lubbock to finish what I started a couple of weeks ago.”

“Oh, drat. I wanted us to have lunch this week.”

“That’s why I called. How about breakfast? If you can come downtown to the Tower tomorrow morning, we’ll eat at Rusty’s Campfire downstairs. Make it early and I’ll still have enough time to get to Lubbock before evening.”

“I’ll be there. I have something to discuss with you.”

****

Betty was up early the next morning. When Drake said “early,” that was what he meant. She planned to be at the popular bistro on the bottom floor of the building that bore her family’s name no later than eight o’clock.

Though the weeklong storm had moved on, the temperature was still cold. She dressed in a winter pants suit in a royal blue color that flattered her skin and hair.

When she reached the café, she spotted him already present and reading the newspaper at a table in the corner of the dining room. He looked up as she approached, laid his paper aside, rose and rounded the table. “Morning, Mom.”

The frown line that always showed between his dark brows looked deeper than usual this morning.
Was he troubled by what had happened with Donna?
They touched cheeks. “Good morning yourself,” she said.

He pulled out a chair for her, then returned to his seat on the opposite side of the table. He was dressed as usual today—jeans, a long-sleeved tan button-down shirt and boots. Just like his father dressed. He was built like Bill Junior. He had always been a cowboy. She supposed he always would be. Just like his father. Both of them were such lovely men to look at.

“Did you sleep well?” she asked him as the waiter hurried over and poured her coffee cup full.

“Fine,” he said. He looked up at the waiter and told him they needed menus. “So what do you want to talk about?” he asked after the waiter hurried away.

Drake wasn’t one to waste air on small talk. She often wondered if he was so abrupt with

the women he dated. If so, no wonder he had never married.

“Well…” She draped her napkin over her lap, cleared her throat and steeled herself for her son’s reaction when she dropped her bomb. “I’m thinking I won’t go to the ranch for Christmas this year.”

There. She had said it. Let the chips fall where they may.

His pointed look came at her like a spear. He certainly had her eyes, she noted for the umpteenth time. He was the only one of her children who did. Whiskey-colored eyes you could drown in, his father had always said. But given Bill Junior’s fondness for drinking and partying, Betty hadn’t found the description romantic or flattering. Her other son and daughter had lake-blue eyes like Bill Junior’s. Those were the eyes you could drown in.

And Troy, well his eyes were so dark she could hardly distinguish the pupil. They were probably like his trashy mother’s.

Just then, the waiter returned. She requested oatmeal with cream. She never cooked oatmeal at home. It was too messy to clean up after. Drake ordered a he-man breakfast—two eggs over easy, sausage patties and biscuits with honey, the breakfast he had favored as a teenage athlete.

“Why aren’t you going?” he asked when the waiter left again. “I thought you and Dad made up when y’all went to Nashville.”

Back in October, she had accompanied her husband to Nashville to take in the Grand Ole Opry. “We did. Sort of. But something’s happened since then. Your father’s sleeping with someone in Drinkwell. I wasn’t going to tell you, but you’ve probably already heard it.

His eyes settled on hers. “No, Mom, I haven’t heard that,” he said gently. He was the only one of her children who knew, or cared, that gossip like this hurt her. “But you know you can’t believe everything you hear. Who told you?”

“One of my old…a
cquaintances
from down there called me a few days ago. I don’t think I’d be comfortable going to the Double-Barrel now. I might never go down there again.”

“Come on, Mom. What difference does it make, really? Even if it’s true? You’ve been gone what, seven years? And you’re sleeping with somebody in Fort Worth.”

“Drake!” She looked around to see if anyone she knew was close enough to hear him.

“Well, aren’t you? Although considering Wilkes’ age, I’d believe you if you said no.”

Her spine stiffened. “That is uncharitable for you to say.”

She had to defend her choice in a companion, though she knew what Drake meant. Barron was fifteen years older than her fifty-two and Viagra or no, he hadn’t exactly proven himself to be a stallion in the bedroom. More than once she had entertained the notion of finding a younger man more physically able to satisfy her carnal needs.
And just what would her self-righteous oldest son think of that?
she wondered.

The waiter brought their meals. “I’m kidding,” Drake said, tucking into his food, “but Wilkes must be damn near seventy.”

“What are you implying?”

“Sorry, Mom. It was just a smart-aleck remark. We don’t need to get into geriatric biology over breakfast.”