Daddy's Girls

by Danielle Steel

  She sat with her sisters for a few minutes to catch her breath between dances, and he went to get them all some beers.

  “You look happy, Kate,” Caroline said quietly. She looked as troubled as she had since she arrived and they all knew why. Peter had gone silent on her, and she was beginning to think it was just as well. She was determined to wait to hear from him, and not chase him, which was agony for her, but seemed like the strong thing to do. If it was over, she needed to face it and couldn’t run away from it. It wasn’t what she wanted, but it was the hand she’d been dealt. She wasn’t going to run away from what he’d done, turn a blind eye, let him get away with it, or pretend it wasn’t happening. It was, and she was willing to face it head-on, if he reached out to her. And if he didn’t, she would move on, and find the strength to do it. “I’m happy for you and Thad,” she said, and Kate could tell that she meant it.

  “We both are,” Gemma seconded it. “Somebody has to be happy around here and it’s definitely your turn.” Kate had played handmaiden to their father for twenty years, which was more than enough. And he had left her the legacy of Thad, almost like his blessing of their union, if she needed that.

  He came back with the beers then, and sat down with the three of them. “If I eat any more ribs, I’m going to pop.”

  “Me too,” Gemma said with a groan. “I may have to get my fancy trainer up here if I keep eating like this. I’m starting a biking program with Morgan tomorrow. But I might have another piece of the apple pie first, with vanilla ice cream.”

  “I always forget how good the food is at our barbecue,” Kate said with a smile and leaned over and kissed Thad. He looked like the happiest man on earth. They were signing the papers for his new land in two weeks. A contractor in town was working on plans for the house, modeling it on JT’s, only slightly larger, with more bedrooms, and he was in love with the love of his life.

  They went back to the dance floor after that, and led the next round of line dancing. Scarlett and Roberto joined them for a last dance before they left, and said they’d had a great time. She asked Caro quietly if she’d heard from Peter yet and she shook her head.

  “You will,” she said confidently, and hugged her. And Caroline felt safe in her mother’s arms.

  The party lasted until two A.M., and all three sisters stayed until the bitter end. As the party finally wound down, Thad held Kate in his arms and looked into her eyes.

  “Thank you for making me so happy.” He didn’t ask her when they were going to get married. He didn’t want to rush her, but it was all he could think about now.

  When the party was over, they walked up the road to her house hand in hand, for everyone to see, and up the front steps into her house. It was where he belonged now. The owner and the foreman, proud to be together. Gemma watched their bedroom lights go out a little while later and smiled. And wherever their father was, she hoped he was smiling too.

  Chapter 11

  After the big summer barbecue, the days just seemed to roll by with bright blue skies and hot weather. Thad and Kate together everywhere on the ranch became a familiar sight, more than ever. She gave him her old office, next to her father’s, which she was using now, and they were always consulting each other about something, or working on a project together. Their breeding barn was busier than it had been in a long time. And their livestock and Thoroughbred auction almost doubled in size because of Thad’s bulletins about it ahead of time on the internet. He was good about using social media to increase their business. They worked hard all month, while Caroline went on outings with Morgan and Billy, and Gemma went to L.A. for auditions several times, but nothing had borne fruit so far. She felt lazy on the ranch and spent hours reading in a hammock Thad had set up for her. And whenever they got the chance, one or all of them visited their mother in Santa Barbara.

  It was in many ways a perfect summer, although different. It was their first without their father. Juliette was away, and sent postcards from all over France. And Scarlett and Roberto came to lunch several times on Sundays when Kate and Thad weren’t working. Caroline had heard from Peter a few times, and he met Morgan and Billy in Santa Barbara for a weekend. Caroline had Thad drive them there to meet him. She didn’t want to see Peter.

  Roberto and Scarlett had been to the ranch for the day in early August, it was Saturday, and Kate and Thad were lying in bed that night at her house, talking about them, and Kate said how nice it was to suddenly have a mother at her age. She had just said that to Thad when he sat bolt upright in bed, sniffing the air and listening. And before he could say a word to her, he had leapt out of bed, jumped into his jeans, grabbed his boots and pulled them on, put on a T-shirt inside out, and grabbed his denim jacket as she watched him intently.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Fire…I’m sure I smell something.” She got out of bed just as quickly, and pulled her clothes on. She was heading for the stairs when he was already at the front door, and as soon as he opened the door, she could smell it. They ran outside, and the night sky was lit up in the distance. It was bright orange. It wasn’t close yet, but that could change in an instant. There was a light breeze, and he left her at a dead run to sound the alarm. Kate called both her sisters on her cellphone, while she ran to the old fire bell they still used as backup. The sirens came on less than a minute later when Thad turned on the alarm, and within minutes men came running from everywhere, the bunkhouse and the barn. They grabbed hoses and started hosing down the roof of the barn and the other structures. Thad had called 911, and was waiting for them, ready to head to the fire with them in his truck.

  The fire department was there in less than ten minutes, the regular force and the volunteers on their heels, and Thad took off with them. Her sisters and Morgan and Billy came to find Kate at the barn, and she gave Billy the job of continuing to ring the old fire bell, while Morgan, Caroline, and Gemma helped the men spraying the roof of the barn with hoses. Ranch hands were getting as many horses as they could into trailers. The horses were looking wild-eyed, but they wanted to have them ready to move at a moment’s notice if the fire turned in their direction. From the distance, Kate couldn’t tell which way it was going. A few minutes later, a helicopter swooped by overhead to check the fire from the air. They would call in the fire planes if they needed them later, but it hadn’t reached those proportions yet. Gemma flashed by on her way to help the men getting the horses into the trailers. Fire was their worst fear on the ranch, and they had at least one bad one a year in the area, sometimes more, once the grass was dry, and the temperatures rose. It had been a dry year, so this could be severe.

  By four that morning, the planes to spray the fire were hard at work. Kate was dying to get in her truck to follow the fire trucks to the fire. She hadn’t seen Thad since he drove off and left her. Most of the horses were in trailers by then, frightened and whinnying, but ready to move if they had to. There were hundreds of men spread out across the ranch, doing their jobs, and at seven o’clock they could see men and trucks starting to return, and the planes flew back in the direction they came from. Kate could tell from all the signs that the fire had been contained and the worst of the danger was over. At this time of year, a small fire could become a blaze and wipe out thousands of acres, homes, and livestock. She had seen it before and sometimes it took days to contain the fire.

  By ten o’clock that morning, Thad came back filthy, his face blackened with soot and ash, and red from the heat, but everyone had done their job. Two of the fire trucks followed his truck back to the ranch, and the drivers stopped to talk to Kate and the men. They weren’t going to put the horses back in the barn yet, waiting to make sure that the fire was as contained as they believed it was.

  Kate was standing with Caroline when the men got off the trucks, and ranch hands handed out bottles of water, when she saw Caroline give a start and look at one of the men.

  “Tom McAvoy?” sh
e said, as he gratefully took a bottle of water and drained it. They’d been in the thick of it for eight hours, and they were wet from the hoses, and hot from the flames in their heavy suits with their masks and helmets slung over their arms. He grinned as soon as he saw her. His red hair was plastered to his head and face, and he had streaks of soot all over his cheeks, but she had recognized him in an instant. He had been her boyfriend senior year in high school, and he had gone into the fire department when she’d left for college. And a year later when she came back, he was married and had a baby.

  “Caro?” he said, as his face broke into a broad grin. “What are you doing here?”

  “I’m here for the summer. Gemma’s here too.” She was talking to some of the firemen she had recognized from school, and they looked shy with her, knowing she was a big star now. But there was nothing shy about Tom McAvoy and never had been. “How are your kids?” she asked him.

  “My oldest is applying to veterinary school at UC Davis. The twins are at UCSB, and my baby just graduated from high school. She’s getting married in September.” They started young in the Valley, and it was impressive that he had three in college. She had lost track of the fact that he had four kids. “What about yours?” She pointed to Morgan and Billy handing out bottles of water to firefighters. Thad had just given the order to get the horses back into the barn. The danger was over. They’d been lucky. August was usually the worst month for fires all up and down the California coast, and especially in the valleys.

  “How’s Ellen?” Caroline asked him politely about his wife, a girl she’d gone to school with and never liked.

  “Happy, married to someone else, with two more kids. We got divorced about ten years ago. I don’t think you’ve been here for a while.”

  “No, I haven’t,” she admitted.

  “What about you? Still married?” It was an interesting question at the moment, for which she didn’t have an easy answer. She hesitated just long enough for it to catch his attention.

  “Yes, I guess I am,” she finally responded. “Peter stayed in Marin for the summer. I’m here with my sisters.” Without spelling it out to him, he got the distinct impression that something was wrong, and he nodded.

  “We got lucky with the wind tonight,” he told her. “It could have been a bad one, if the wind had turned on us. It didn’t. We had a couple of real bad ones last year, wiped out acres of homes, and the Canyon Ranch.” She had heard about it from Kate and forgotten. It was a worry for them every year too, and there was little you could do to protect yourself from it, except keep the brush cleared away, and react quickly when it happened. As he chatted with her, one of his men came up and addressed him as “Captain.”

  “You’re a captain now?” Caro smiled at him.

  “Hell, I should be. I just turned forty. I’ve been in the department since I was eighteen.” Like a lot of the kids they had gone to school with, and even Gemma, he hadn’t gone to college. “I’m planning to retire from the department in ten years and run my own business. I’ve got a small business started now. With three kids in college, I’ll be working for the next hundred years to help them pay off their student loans. By the way, I’m sorry about your dad. Our guys came out right away, but there was nothing they could do.” She nodded and thanked him, as more of his men came up to talk to him. They had left a detail where the fire was, and they wanted to get the trucks back to the firehouse, so the men could rest and take over the shifts later that afternoon, to stay near the fire until it was fully out. “Duty calls.” He smiled at her. “I’ll call you if you’ll be here for a while.”

  “Till the end of the month.” He patted her arm, and followed his men, got in the cab of the biggest fire truck and they took off a minute later. He waved as they drove by.

  “Was that Tom McAvoy?” Kate asked her and she nodded, still looking surprised. “He hasn’t changed since high school.”

  “He’s divorced, and he’s got three kids in college, one who just graduated from high school and is about to get married. Shit, that makes me feel old.”

  “They get a head start in the Valley,” Kate said, echoing her sister’s thoughts. “He came out with Dickie Jackson for Dad,” she said, which Caroline vaguely remembered Kate telling her. “It’s funny how a lot of the people we knew are still here. Like me,” she said, and laughed, but she had gone away to college. Thad came and joined them then, and a little while later, a hearty breakfast was served by the staff for everyone in the barn, as they all stood around and talked about the fire. Everyone was on deck, all thirty-five ranch hands, and all the office employees had showed up and pitched in. Billy was enjoying the excitement and talking to the men, and Morgan was helping serve breakfast. Gemma came and stood with her sisters, and had seen three or four men she had gone to school with too. “Did everyone we went to school with end up in the fire department?” she commented.

  “Or working on ranches,” Kate answered.

  “They all said their wives watch my show.”

  “We should have set up a table to have you sign autographs,” Kate teased her, and a little while later they all went back to their houses. It was almost eleven by then, and they could still see smoke in the distance.

  Kate went upstairs to take a shower, and a little while later, Thad came in and joined her, and they wound up making love. It was Sunday and no one was going to work. They’d spend the day cleaning up and trying to calm the horses, who had had a rough night. The men were still on an adrenaline rush, and Kate and Thad went out to the barn, to make sure none of the horses had gotten hurt while unloading them from the trailers. Everything went smoothly as they got the horses back in their stalls.

  It was a long day and everyone was tired when they went home at six o’clock. Thad came back to Kate’s place, and stretched out his legs, sitting on the couch, while she organized something for them to eat.

  “It’s a good thing you smelled the fire last night. I didn’t smell anything till we got outside,” she said, sitting down next to him, and handing him a plate. All she’d been able to rustle up for him was a turkey, cheese, and tomato sandwich, but it was all they wanted.

  * * *

  —

  By the next day, the ranch was back to normal, and the fire department still had a detail of men watching the embers and hosing them down in the back pasture, and Caroline was surprised when Tom McAvoy called her. He left a message for her at the main office of the ranch, and she called him back that night.

  “It was nice seeing you last night, Caro,” he said easily. “You haven’t changed a bit.”

  “I wish that were true.” She smiled, thinking about him when they were in high school. He hadn’t changed much except he had less hair, but he was still attractive. He was a big, burly guy.

  “Do you want to have dinner tomorrow night?” he asked her.

  “Sure, I’d love that.”

  “Great. I’ll pick you up at seven.”

  She told Gemma about it the next day, and she teased her about it.

  “Going back to old boyfriends, are we?”

  “I’m married and he has a million kids,” Caroline said with a quelling look at her sister. The truth was that she had no idea how married she was at the moment. She and Peter had spoken on the phone now, but their conversations had been awkward and didn’t touch on the significant issues. But at least he’d called, and it seemed wiser not to broach the big issues until she got back to the city and saw him. She’d know more when she could see his face, and read what she saw in his eyes. She realized that there was a strong possibility that they were headed for divorce. She wasn’t sure if she had done the right thing kicking him out of the house. She had the feeling that she had thrown him right into Veronica Ashton’s arms. But letting him stay with her wouldn’t have changed that, if that was the case.

  When Tom showed up that night at seven, he was driving his
captain’s car. He said he had just come from work, but she had the feeling he was trying to impress her. It was fun getting in with him, and he showed her how the siren worked. He let her put on the flashing lights on the way to dinner. And they went to the same diner they used to go to as kids. It was still there, and so were two of the old waitresses, who recognized her. It was like a time warp. And Tom said he still ate there regularly.

  “So what have you been up to for the past twenty years?” he asked her. She’d run into him once but hadn’t really talked to him. He’d been carrying the twins, his wife had a toddler by the hand and she was pregnant. Caroline had felt sorry for her. It was exactly the life she had wanted to escape when she left for San Francisco.

  “Not much, being married, two kids.” She answered his question, and she told him about her young adult books, which he said sounded interesting. He asked what her husband did and she said he was in venture capital.

  “A big guy, huh?”

  “Not really. To be honest, I think we’re separated at the moment.” She tried to sound nonchalant about it.

  “But you’re not sure?” He looked puzzled. “When my wife told me she wanted a divorce, believe me, I was sure. She threw a frying pan at me.” He laughed at the memory.

  “Did you cheat on her?” Caroline asked, curious.

  “No, I used to take three-day shifts at the firehouse to get away from the kids, and play poker with the guys. I lost a lot of money and she was pissed. I’m a good boy now. I can’t afford to play poker anymore. The kids need the money. She married my captain. He retired and runs a security alarm business, and does pretty well.” It was a small life with people struggling for money. Just hearing about those lives used to make her feel trapped, terrified that she’d become one of them. They didn’t scare her anymore, but they sounded sad to her. None of them had had a chance to live and get out of the Valley. Tom had been a bright boy. He had wanted to get a football scholarship to college, but got his girlfriend pregnant and got married instead.