Gemma’s home in L.A. was filled with French antiques that reflected her taste. Life was simpler on the ranch. Jimmy had never liked showing off, and used the old Texan expression “All hat and no cattle” to describe people who did, but Peter had the income to back it up, and so did Gemma with her starring role on the show. She even got to keep her character’s expensive designer wardrobe per her contract, was always dressed to the teeth in L.A., and got a new sports car every year. She said she needed it for her image. Kate had no image to keep up. She had a ranch to run.
“It depresses me to come here,” Caroline said about using the house on the ranch. And Kate knew that Peter wasn’t a big fan of their father. They were two powerful male egos colliding, with Caroline trapped in the middle, squeezed by both. But that would be different now, with their father gone. Kate wondered if it would make Caroline more independent and freer, or more dependent on Peter.
“It would be fun for your kids to spend time here,” Kate said gently.
“Maybe,” Caroline said noncommittally, as they cleared away the dishes, and headed for their father’s house a few minutes later. Kate made notes for the inventory. Gemma wanted one small cowboy painting as a souvenir. She had always loved it. Caroline said she didn’t want anything. It was all part of an unhappy memory for her, of her childhood in a place she hated where she didn’t fit in.
“You need to go through his papers here,” Juliette reminded Kate before they left. “And his clothes. I can’t do it. It will make me too sad.” Just hearing her say it made his absence suddenly all too real, to be giving away his things.
“You should just give it all to Goodwill,” Gemma said. The very thought of it tore at Kate’s heart, all the familiar well-worn plaid shirts, his vests, his battered cowboy hats, his roping chaps he’d worn at the rodeo. She wanted it all to be there forever. More than anything she wanted him back.
“Do you two want to come for a weekend and go through his things with me? There’s a lot of our old childhood stuff too in the back barn. We could go through it at the same time.”
“Mostly yearbooks and Barbie dolls,” Gemma said with a wry grin. “I guess we could come for a weekend,” she said hesitantly, and Caroline nodded but didn’t comment. She didn’t really want to unearth those memories and remember the past. “Maybe we could go to Santa Barbara and check out our mother then,” Gemma suggested.
“Should we call her first?” Kate asked her, and Gemma shook her head.
“Let’s not. Let’s surprise her. Maybe we can get a look at her, and decide if we want to connect,” Gemma said cautiously, and Kate nodded. It seemed like a good idea to her.
“Count me out for that,” Caroline said firmly. She was adamant about not seeing her. “What would you say to her? ‘Why did you give us up?’ ”
“Yeah, that’s the whole point, isn’t it?” Gemma answered. “Why did she? We can’t ask Dad now, and he lied to us about it for our whole lives. She’s the only one who can tell us. I want to know. Don’t you?” She looked from Caroline to Kate, and Kate nodded. She did want to know, and they couldn’t confront their father. But she did think it was a good idea to approach with caution, and see what she looked like. Kate was burning with curiosity now, and so was Gemma. “Maybe I’ll come back in a few weeks when we’re on hiatus. I don’t know why, but now that the place belongs to us, it’s a little more appealing. And we don’t have to deal with Dad when we come here.” Caroline nodded agreement, but she wasn’t sure it was enough to make her come back anytime soon. They were going to Aspen for most of the summer.
Kate and Gemma didn’t have those constraints. Gemma had the show to film every week, but they were off every year in June and July, and part of August, which gave the cast a chance to do other things, or just play and relax. Gemma hadn’t done other projects in at least five years. She made more than enough money on the show to meet her needs, and she usually went to Europe in the summer, and rented a house in Italy or Saint Tropez. Sometimes she chartered a yacht and took friends, but she hadn’t made her summer plans yet. Kate never went away, although Gemma invited her, but the ranch was a living, breathing entity, and needed her every day, now more than ever. She didn’t see how she could get away. She never did.
The three sisters had dinner together that night, and tried to figure out a weekend they could spend together to go through their father’s papers and personal effects. It was going to be painful, but it had to be done, and Kate didn’t want to do it alone, so she pressed them to join her. They finally settled on a date in early June, and then Caroline went back to the half-empty house she had hardly ever used, and Gemma to the small guesthouse where she always stayed. The three sisters hugged each other before they left, and Kate clung to each of them for a minute, wishing they had more time with each other. There was comfort in being together no matter how differently they viewed their father, and how differently he had treated them when he was alive. Despite their divergent views of him, he had loved them, and Kate thought he had been a good father. The one mystery they wanted to solve now was what had really happened with their mother, and what the truth was. Kate was sure there was an explanation for it. Caroline and Gemma weren’t as sure. It was an enormous lie to have told them.
It had been a strange few days with their father’s death, his funeral, and the discovery they had made about their mother, which gave rise to a thousand questions about the past.
Caroline was leaving early the next morning, and had arranged for a car to pick her up to take her to the airport for the flight to San Francisco. Gemma had to be on the set at seven A.M. in Burbank and had to start the drive at four, so they said goodbye that night.
Gemma and Caroline headed down the path together in the dark, as Kate called after them in the starry moonlit night, “I love you guys!” They turned and waved at her, as she watched them disappear and gently closed the door. There weren’t three more different women on the planet, but they were sisters and they loved each other, and as Kate thought about their father, she was sure that whatever his mistakes, he had loved them too. Now she had the ranch to run, and his legacy to carry on for him. She missed him more than her sisters would, since she saw him every day. She hoped that whatever they discovered about their mother wouldn’t shatter their illusions about him forever, and destroy their ties to each other. She needed them. They were the only family she had. And whether they knew it or not, they needed her. They each brought their own strengths to the table and complemented each other.
Chapter 3
Kate got up the next morning at four, just as Gemma was driving off the ranch. She heard the car drive by as she woke up.
She followed her morning routine, and was in the barn at five-thirty. She saw her father’s hat on a peg on the wall, and it hit her again that he was gone. For a minute, she had forgotten and was expecting to see him. It was a shock to realize that she never would again. She looked pale and stunned a minute later when Thad walked into the barn.
“You okay?” he asked, worried about her. She had a lot on her shoulders now, and it had been a hard few days.
“Yeah.” She nodded. “It just hit me again.”
“It keeps happening to me too. It doesn’t feel real yet,” he said, as he poured coffee into a mug and handed it to her. There would be decisions to make now, and all of them would rest on her, even if he was there to help her. The ultimate responsibility was hers. “I wanted to tell you what it meant that your father left me…” He stumbled over the words. “…what he did. He didn’t need to do that. I never expected it.” She smiled at him. He was a good man, and she was glad to have him there, more than ever now, to run the ranch with her.
“I’m glad he did. Are you going to buy a decent house now? Or a ranch?” The cabin he lived in was so small he hardly had room to move around in it, but always said it was enough for him, until he got married and had kids, and he was in no rush f
or that. He had plenty of fun on his time off the way things were.
“I don’t need a house, or a ranch,” he said, sipping his coffee. “I’ve got this ranch to keep me busy, and I don’t need a bigger house. Are you going to start using his office?” She had a smaller one next to her father’s, and could have used more space for everything she kept there, but she shook her head.
“Not yet.” It would have hurt too much to take over his desk. It would mean that he was really gone, and she wasn’t ready to face that.
“Do you want to ride out and check the north pastures with me?” he offered, and she nodded. It would be a relief to get back to work, and get her mind off her father, the funeral, and their discovery about their mother. She didn’t want to think about anything, just ride with Thad, as they always did.
They left the barn, and took a familiar path, until they were cantering across the fields as the sun came up in a brilliant pink and purple sky, and she started to feel alive again.
“Are your sisters okay with sharing the ranch?” he asked her when they slowed down.
“It’s fine for now,” she said with a sigh. “Neither of them is interested in it. I have to beg them to come here.”
“I figured they might want to sell their share.”
“They might eventually, but for now they don’t need the money, so nothing’s going to change,” she reassured him.
“What if they decide to cash out, and want you to buy their shares? That’s a bundle of cash you’ll have to come up with.” He knew their financial status, and that her father never kept much liquidity and often used cash to buy more land. A sudden request from her sisters might come at a bad time for her.
“Then I’ll have to sell some land to pay them, I guess,” she said. “I’ll figure it out when it happens, if it ever does.” She wasn’t going to worry about it now, since she didn’t have to.
He hesitated for a moment, and then decided to speak up. “If that ever happens, I’d pay you for the land. I can’t give you enough to pay both of them. But if one of them wants to sell, I’ve got some money saved up, and with what your father just left me, I think I could manage.”
“To buy a third of the ranch?” She looked surprised, and impressed.
“I’ve been saving for a long time. I’ve been wanting to buy a piece of your dad’s land since I got here. I think I could do it now, thanks to him. Just keep it in mind, in case one of them wants to sell and you’re short at the time. I’d like nothing better than to own part of all this. We could still run it together, if you want. It doesn’t have to be a big change.”
“Thanks, Thad. It might make a big difference if the time comes. They’re not in any hurry now, thank God. I figure Caroline will be the first one to bail, if her husband thinks she should. But we’re in good shape for now. Let’s keep it that way.” She smiled at him and they picked up the pace again. She was glad to know that if she had to pay off one of her sisters, she could sell some land to him if she wanted to. She thought her father would have liked that too. And if both her sisters wanted to sell at the same time, Thad’s buying out one of them would make it easier for Kate.
It was a beautiful morning, the sun was warm on their faces, and the pain of the last few days started to ease. The land around them belonged to her, as far as the eye could see. Whatever else he had done, her father had left her an incredible gift, and she was grateful to him.
* * *
—
Gemma dropped off her bag at her house on her way to work. She hadn’t hit traffic on the freeway, and she had time to change, and picked up coffee on the way to work. She hadn’t studied her lines, but she knew she’d be able to do it in her trailer. The director had sent her a text that she wasn’t going to be in a scene until after lunch, and she remembered her lines with ease.
She was on set by seven-thirty, only half an hour late, got her hair colored, and was in her trailer with the latest version of the script by ten-thirty. It felt good to be back to work. It was always hard going to the ranch, and this time particularly, although it was good being with Caroline and Kate. As different as they were, they shared something special. Her mind wandered to their discovery about their mother while she was studying her lines, and she wondered how that would turn out. She wanted to go to Santa Barbara with Kate, since Caroline wouldn’t go. Caroline never liked confronting the hard situations, always bowed out, and let them do the dirty work. She wanted to know what had happened as much as they did, she just didn’t want to have to see her mother or confront her. Gemma wasn’t afraid of it, although this was possibly the most important confrontation they’d ever had. It was no small thing to have given up custody of three young children. Nor for their father to have pretended that their mother was dead. If he were still alive, Gemma would have been at his throat, wanting answers, and an explanation of the massive lie. Her sisters could always count on her for that, but no more. All they had to do now was find their mother, and hear it from her, if she was willing to see them, and tell them the truth. Gemma wondered what kind of woman she was. Giving up three very young children didn’t speak well for her.
The producer came to see her before lunch to find out how she was. He expressed his sympathy about her father, and said he was glad that she was back. The director came in a little while later. They were shooting back-to-back the scenes that she had missed while she was away. She would be on set all of the next day. But she was happy to be back in her real life. Whenever she went to the ranch, it reminded her of how trapped she had felt when she was young. All she had wanted to do was get the hell out. She always felt as though her life had begun when she left and went to L.A. Even starving there in the early years had been better than being on the ranch. She always felt as though she had been switched at birth and didn’t belong there. The last thing she wanted was to be a hick. She was a city girl to her very core. She knew Caroline felt that way too. Only Kate loved life on the ranch, and must have had an overdose of her father’s Texan blood. She was a cowboy just like him. She smiled thinking about it and went back to work.
She worked hard for the next two days to catch up, and on Friday afternoon, the director let them break early. They had covered a lot of ground that week, and the producer was coming on set to have a word with them. Usually, a general meeting with the producer meant some unpleasant change on set. It was rarely good news, but there had been no recent rumors, and everyone hoped it would be some ordinary announcement, maybe a big name actor joining the show, a better time slot than the one they had, which would have been hard to improve, or an important new sponsor. Everyone was in a good mood when the producer and executive producer showed up. The executive producer waited for silence on the set. They hardly ever saw him. He was the money guy, dealing with investors, insurance, and the overall planning of the show. They were in their tenth season, and everything was pretty well set. He had two other major shows on the air, one of which had just debuted in the fall and was a huge hit.
“Well, we have good and bad news for you.” Two of the actors on the show had been nominated for Emmys. Gemma had been nominated in the past but hadn’t won at first. She had won one in their third season. And the show had won a Golden Globe Award from the foreign press several times. “We’ve had a record year for our tenth season, thanks to all of you.” He smiled at them. “And the show is still solid. We’ve been debating this for a long time, trying to figure out the life span of the show, and at what point we should elegantly fold up our tents and go home, before we start to slide. We’ve been discussing it with our wonderful writers for months.” He paused. “As much as we hate to do it, our decision is that we’ve really done it. We’ve stretched as far as we can go. We want to go out on a high, not when people start switching to other channels when we come on. So the bad news is that when we wrap in June, that’s going to be it. The show is over. But the good news is that you’ll be free to pursue all the other p
rojects that I know many of you are itching to do, feature films, other series, Broadway shows. I know several of you are ready to spread your wings, and now you can.
“For those of us who have settled into a comfortable routine here, including me, this is a good kick in the butt to get us going and become more creative again, and reinvent ourselves. We’ve had a great run, folks, and now it’s time to take a final bow, and leave the stage.” There was dead silence on the set when he finished, and then an explosion of chatter and exclamations as everyone started talking at once. Their contracts would determine how they got paid, but none of the contracts had showed up yet for the new season, and this was obviously why. The show was over, and they only had a few weeks of shooting left before the hiatus, and this time it would be permanent. The show was over. They didn’t want to wait to be canceled by the network one day. They wanted to leave on a high, and for a minute, Gemma was too shocked to speak to the actors standing next to her.
“Fuck,” her co-star said to her, “and they call that good news? I have three ex-wives and five kids to support. Shit. I never saw that coming.” He looked panicked.
“Neither did I,” Gemma said, “and I only have me to support, which is bad enough.” In the past ten years, she had grown comfortable in a lifestyle that she couldn’t manage without the show, and thinking it would go on forever, she hadn’t saved a penny, and lived a life of first-class travel to luxury hotels at fabulous destinations, drove a Bentley sports car, spent a fortune on jewelry, expensive restaurants, and had a heavy mortgage on her house. It was a major shock, and would take some serious figuring to slim down her overhead. Everything but her mortgage would have to go. She didn’t want to lose her house. She had to call her agent immediately to find work. Hopefully she’d be in major demand for another show. She’d only done minor things on the side for the last decade, a perfume campaign, a hair products line, an occasional appearance on a movie made for TV, and one in a feature film. She didn’t need the work and didn’t have the time, and she liked playing hard during the hiatus, frequently in Europe. She hadn’t had to seriously look for a job in ten years.
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