“I’ll cut the damn bushes down!”
“That’s the point—even if you wanted to do that, no one else on either side would stand for it.”
He shook his head firmly. “No, Tanya, I’m not taking that as an answer.”
“It’s my answer. You can’t change it.”
“But you can. You want to break down barriers for a living, expose wrongs, change things—start here.”
“I don’t think it would make any difference here. I only think it would do damage.” To her. To her mother. And she wouldn’t do that.
“Tanya, I’m in love with you!”
Her breath caught in her lungs at those words that everything in her wanted to hear, wanted to be able to rejoice in.
But as heartfelt as they sounded, she still wasn’t sure that whatever he was feeling was real or enduring or anything she should count on. She thought it was more of an exuberance he was experiencing as he emerged from the low point he’d been in. And that wouldn’t last.
Tanya swallowed hard and forced herself to breathe again. But the best she could manage was a whispered, “I’m sorry,” before she pulled her hands out of his.
“Don’t do this,” he said. “You’re wrong and you’re ruining so much for both of us.”
But she only repeated, “I’m sorry.”
Then she stood and went into the house because she knew she couldn’t keep from crying for much longer and she wouldn’t do that in front of him.
She made it as far as the laundry room and ducked in where she knew Tate couldn’t see her before she crumpled against the dryer and sobbed.
And that was when she admitted to herself that while she might not believe that Tate genuinely loved her, she was very much afraid that she might have genuinely fallen in love with him….
Chapter Thirteen
“T ate McCord proposed to you?”
It was after four o’clock on Monday afternoon. In the midst of last-minute, hectic preparations for the McCords’ Labor Day party, JoBeth had hustled into the cottage for a sandwich and, while she was throwing it together, had demanded to know what was going on with Tanya and Tate.
Because her mother was so busy with the party, Tanya had been able to keep a low profile since Tate’s visit Sunday morning. This morning JoBeth had noticed her lethargy and swollen eyes, but Tanya had said it must be allergies. She’d known her mother was skeptical, but JoBeth hadn’t had the time to explore it.
Then, apparently, during the course of the day, JoBeth had overheard the gardeners talking about seeing Tate storm away from the housekeeper’s bungalow Sunday. Added to an unusually heated argument between Tate and his brother Blake over Katie Whitcomb-Salgar at lunchtime—during which Tate had apparently shouted that Katie Whitcomb-Salgar was the last thing on his mind—JoBeth had put two and two together. And come home to Tanya for the truth.
Knowing how relentless her mother could be, Tanya had given in without much resistance and told her mother the whole story.
“It wasn’t a formal, will-you-marry-me proposal, no,” Tanya answered her mother’s shocked question. “But I think that was what he was saying, yes.”
“And you said no?”
It hadn’t occurred to Tanya until hours later on Sunday that Tate could fire her mother out of retribution, and with that on her mind now, too, she could only apologize to JoBeth the way she had to Tate yesterday morning. “Yes, I said no. And I’m sorry, Mama. I don’t think it will hurt your job but it’s probably better if I get an apartment right away—out of sight, out of mind—just for safekeeping.”
While she ate more of her sandwich, JoBeth waved that away, obviously unbothered by it. “It isn’t as if I’d have you marry a man just to save my job, Tanya. But by the same token, I wouldn’t have you not marry someone you want to marry because of it.”
“I didn’t say I wanted to marry him,” Tanya said quietly.
“But you do. Look at you—this is not allergies. And I heard you up pacing most of the night.”
“Everything with Tate just came out of the blue and surprised me,” Tanya said. “Having something serious with him—a future with him—isn’t something I’d ever thought about.” Although she’d thought about almost nothing else since…
“But you do want to marry him,” JoBeth repeated.
“It’s complicated—maybe that’s what happens when you let yourself get involved with someone who leads a complicated life,” Tanya said, referring to her mother’s past words.
“But you do want to marry Tate,” JoBeth repeated yet again.
“I don’t know, Mama!” Tanya snapped.
JoBeth let a moment of silence follow to relay her lack of appreciation for having her head bitten off. She didn’t say anything about Tanya’s outburst, though. Instead, after finishing half of her sandwich, she said, “My position here is not the reason for you to say no if you want to say yes. Either I’m hired help who makes the schedule and tells the staff what to do, or I’m the in-law on the payroll who makes the schedule and tells the staff what to do.”
“You don’t think it would be weird if you were the in-law who did it?”
“Weird becomes normal if you give it enough time. And I’d certainly have job security,” JoBeth said.
“Unless of course I married him and six months down the road he realized that I don’t belong with his family and friends, and Katie Whitcomb-Salgar looks good to him again—the way she always has before when one of their breakups ended.”
“So my job isn’t the only reason you said no.”
“It was only one of them—a big one, but only one. You’ve reminded me yourself that Tate and Katie always get back together. And of course I know how things are—a McCord isn’t supposed to marry the help. And I’m happy with who I am, I like it, I want to be in touch with the real world the way you sent me to Grandma and Grandpa to be. I don’t want to be a McCord.”
“Another of the reasons I sent you to spend time with your grandparents was because I didn’t want you to want what you couldn’t have. But you want Tate. And wanting what you can have? I don’t know that you should turn your nose up at that, Tanya.”
“But like I said, even if I can have Tate now, will it last? And wouldn’t it be so much worse to have him for a while and then lose him because one day he regrets that I’m not Katie Whitcomb-Salgar?”
“What does Tate have to say on the subject of young Miss Whitcomb-Salgar?”
Tanya told her mother all of Tate’s claims that he and Katie were nothing but friends and never again would be engaged.
“And you don’t believe him?” JoBeth asked.
“It isn’t that. But you know how many times they’ve called it quits and then started up again. I’m sure he believed it was over every time. And it wasn’t.”
“But he’s different now than he was before.”
That was true and Tanya couldn’t refute it. But did the change in him mean that the back-and-forth with Katie was over?
“He is different,” Tanya conceded rather than address the issue of whether or not that was any guarantee that he was finished with the other woman. “But the rest of his family and friends aren’t and they have their hearts set on him being with Katie. There’s bound to be pressure for that and all the more disapproval of me because I’m standing in the way of that.”
“But if it really is over between them Tate won’t go back with her because other people want him to. So his family and friends will just have to be disappointed and learn to live with it. And if Tate honestly has changed and doesn’t feel as if he completely fits in with everyone anymore, doesn’t that clear the way for the two of you to carve out a place of your own that isn’t altogether on his side of the fence—so to speak—or altogether on yours?”
“We’d be in the bushes?” Tanya muttered to herself, knowing her mother wouldn’t understand the reference to what she and Tate had talked about.
Then, to JoBeth she said, “I don’t know. I suppose it’s poss
ible that we could make a niche of our own. But it still wouldn’t take away the risk that eventually Tate might want to be back in the heart of his circle, and not with the housekeeper’s daughter at his side.”
“So I suppose what you can do is try to figure out if you think this change in Tate is permanent or temporary. And no matter what you think, decide if you want him enough to take the risk on him.”
JoBeth glanced at the clock on the wall. “I shouldn’t have been away this long on a party day. I have to get back,” she announced as she set her dish and the other half of her sandwich in the sink.
But still she hesitated to leave Tanya, looking at her daughter with sympathetic eyes. “I hate to see you so mopey,” she said. “And poor Tate, he seems just as miserable. I thought he was down before, but now? This is as bad as he was right after word came that his friend was hurt.”
Tanya felt guilty for being comforted and satisfied at hearing that Tate felt awful, too. But she did.
“I know he invited you tonight,” JoBeth went on. “Maybe you should come.”
“And help you tell the kitchen staff to wash glasses and serve dessert, or hide that you and I are mother and daughter when I’m introduced to the governor?”
“I’ll take care of the glasses and the dessert and when I see you with the governor I’ll come over and you can introduce me, too,” JoBeth said, solving the problem simply. Then she gave Tanya a hug before she headed for the door to leave.
But before she did, she turned back to Tanya and added, “I always wanted you to have more in life than I did, Tanya. I wanted you to have your education, to have a career you chose—not just the best job you could get under the circumstances. You’ve done that and I’m proud of you. Proud of the person you are and proud of your accomplishments and successes. But most of all, I just want you to be happy. If Tate McCord makes you happy, then…Well, where there’s a will, there’s a way. That may not be something Tate had to learn, but it’s something you did. And don’t ever—ever—let me be what blocks that way. Or any other people, either.”
When her mother left the cottage Tanya sat at the kitchen table where her notes were spread out. She’d been trying all day long to get some work done on her report but today, like Saturday, cataloging information on the McCords didn’t help keep her from thinking about Tate.
Plus the sounds of all that was going on on the other side of the bushes didn’t aid her concentration.
The day of one of the McCords’ parties required full staff in addition to outside caterers, waiters and waitresses, bartenders, decorators, florists and extra gardeners. As a child on days like this, Tanya would have been at the heart of it all. She would have had orders to stay out from underfoot, but she would have been put to work running messages from one place to another or doing small odd jobs. It had always been fun and exciting for her.
And then when the party got underway, she would have kept out of sight in the kitchen, watching from there or from behind the bushes when her mother sent her off to bed and she’d hidden there instead of minding her mom.
But today she was nowhere. She wasn’t enjoying the bustle and camaraderie of the staff as they did their jobs. She wasn’t getting to see everything come together. And she wouldn’t spend tonight in the kitchen or sitting in the bushes to watch from the sidelines.
This time around, she was missing out on it all and that added to the sadness she was already wearing like a shroud.
She was sad and melancholy and lonely and miserable and tied up in knots—that’s how what had happened with Tate yesterday had left her.
And yet her mother had been so calm about it….
Was that only an act to make me feel better? Tanya wondered as she stared into space rather than at any of her papers.
She knew her mother well and she didn’t think that JoBeth had been hiding her true response to spare Tanya. Her mother hadn’t seemed at all upset or worried or even unnerved by this turn of events or what could come of it. And if it wasn’t a big deal to her mother, should it be such a big deal to her? she asked herself.
Maybe not such a big deal—at least when it came to her mother’s job. But the fact that JoBeth could come to grips with the idea of Tanya being with Tate still didn’t remove the whole problem.
It would still be strange for me, she thought.
As strange as it had been to be at Tate’s country club, at the charity dinner, surrounded by the people who had always been a part of his life, by his family. A family served by her mother and other people who were like her family. How could she be a part of both sides?
Just thinking about it felt awkward, even if JoBeth had taken it in stride.
But it was her mother who had suggested that maybe Tanya and Tate could carve out a place of their own and that caused Tanya to recall something that had occurred to her on Thursday night after that steamy kiss they’d shared—that when they were together it was in some kind of no-man’s-land between their two worlds.
But even if they could carve out a place of their own between the two, there would still be times when she would have to venture into the McCord circle….
Okay, so she’d handled Friday night’s charity dinner all right, and while she hadn’t been received with open arms and warm hugs, there hadn’t been any open hostility or snubbing, either. If it was always like that, would it be unbearable? she asked herself.
It wouldn’t be, she decided. And really, as a reporter, she was often met with some reservation. So what if the country-club set didn’t embrace her and usher her into their ranks? She didn’t want to be there anyway and as long as she wasn’t shunned, she could live with aloof courtesy. Plus, socializing with the movers and shakers might even give her inside information here and there that she could use—in that way it could even be good for her career.
But country-club events weren’t staffed by her mother and a whole lot of other people Tanya was close to. What about those times? Times that were purely personal? When her career wouldn’t enter into it?
She thought about that. Thought about her mother’s comment about introducing JoBeth to the governor.
Yes, if Tanya met the governor she’d be thrilled to turn around and introduce her mother. She certainly wouldn’t be embarrassed or feel the least bit ashamed.
So maybe when it came to occupying a new position here, it was all in the attitude. And since Tanya felt certain that she would always have the same attitude toward the people who worked for the McCords, then maybe an alteration in roles was just something minor to be dealt with. Something slightly weird that would become normal, the way her mother had said of her own position….
The more she thought about that, the more doable it seemed.
But what wasn’t only something to be dealt with was Tate himself.
Were the changes in him permanent? Could she trust that he had come to the point where he was finished with Katie Whitcomb-Salgar….
The musicians must have arrived because Tanya heard the tuning of instruments begin.
The party would start soon.
Tate would be there.
Katie Whitcomb-Salgar would be there.
And the mere idea of that tightened the knots in Tanya’s stomach and somehow made everything she was mentally sorting through feel all the more in immediate need of a resolution.
Were the changes in Tate permanent? Or would he go back to being the carefree, insulated, good-time-Charlie he’d been before?
She’d told Tate that it seemed to her that the changes in him were really only that he’d grown up, matured. She honestly believed that. And those weren’t things that were likely to revert.
Plus, she thought that his eyes genuinely had been opened, and to more than his feelings for her the way he’d said on Sunday morning. And now that they were, now that he felt so strongly about what he’d witnessed and experienced, was it conceivable that he would close his eyes to it all again and be able to forget about it, to go blithely on?
She
didn’t think that was conceivable.
What she’d learned about him was that he had a determination to do more, to help more. Yes, he still needed to reconcile his guilt over having so much himself, but to go back to his carefree ways? That just didn’t seem like what the man he was now would do.
No, the more she thought about it, the more convinced she was that the Tate who had evolved out of the sorrow of losing his friend, the Tate who had gone to the Middle East to contribute what he could, was also the Tate who had returned home determined to continue to contribute here. And that was the real Tate now. The Tate he would be from here on.
The Tate who had impressed her and earned her admiration. The Tate who had won her over.
But there was still Katie Whitcomb-Salgar….
The last thing on his mind—that’s what her mother had overheard him yell at Blake.
And how many times, in how many ways, had he told Tanya that his relationship with Katie was over?
More times, in more ways, than she could recall.
And if she tried to plug the new Tate into the old pattern of on-again, off-again with Katie?
Tanya had to admit that it didn’t line up.
The old Tate was easily swayed. He’d gone whatever way the wind blew. So whenever the wind had blown him back in Katie’s direction, he’d merely gone with it.
But the new Tate was firm in his convictions. Plus it seemed as if he’d gotten to know himself on a deeper level. To recognize things not only about life beyond the walls of the mansion and the country club, but about himself, too.
And one of the things he’d said he recognized was that he and Katie were nothing more than friends. And never would be anything more than that….
Tanya wanted to believe that so much it hurt.
But a breakup of Tate and Katie that actually stuck? That was the hardest for her to bank on when he’d gone back to Katie so many other times….
But he swore it’s me he wants, not her….
Texas Cinderella Page 17
