A look of such great longing, mixed with pain, came across Rip’s face that Sloan nearly got up to go to him. In another instant, the strained look was gone and he was in control again.
“There’s nothing I can do to help her now,” he said with a sigh of regret. “And Luke isn’t going to let me forget it.”
“But there’s something you can do to help him. Is that it?” Sloan said. “Is that why you want to give him Three Oaks?”
“Something like that,” Rip admitted. “It isn’t that I wouldn’t have wanted to help him anyway. After all, he is my son.”
“How do you know he’s actually your son?”
To her surprise Rip grinned. “Charity made sure he knew about my birthmark. Luke has the same one.”
“I never knew-”
“It isn’t in a place that shows.”
Sloan had never thought of her father as an ordinary person with ordinary flaws. He had always been someone larger than life, the bedrock of Three Oaks, the stubborn, opinionated head of the household.
Now she realized he was only a man, one who had made a terrible mistake once upon a time. It was a mistake he clearly regretted and one that would likely haunt him the rest of his life.
It was also a mistake for which she was being forced to pay the consequences.
Sloan scooted off the bed and walked the few steps necessary to lay a hand on Rip’s shoulder, offering the comfort she hadn’t dared to offer before.
Rip’s head came up with a jerk, and his gray eyes turned dark as he perused her face. “I assume you’ve come back to be my overseer.”
“I’ve come back to claim what’s mine.”
Rip chuffed out a breath of air. “What about Cruz?”
“What about him?”
“The man seemed pretty certain he wanted you for his wife. Do you mean to tell me he’s changed his mind?”
“Not exactly.”
Rip cocked a brow and waited.
“No, dammit, he hasn’t changed his mind,” Sloan admitted in a rush.
“Seems to me your marrying Cruz would be the perfect answer to all our problems,” Rip said. “You would be mistress of Dolorosa, and I could leave Three Oaks to Luke. Everything would be even all around.”
“Except I don’t want Dolorosa. I want Three Oaks,” Sloan retorted.
“We don’t always get everything we want.”
A silence descended between them as they both digested the bitter truth of Rip’s statement.
“Why are you so determined to disinherit me?” Sloan asked.
“Maybe I’m just trying to do what’s best for you,” Rip said, his brow furrowed.
“I’ll be the judge of what’s best for me.”
Rip took a good look at his eldest daughter, who defied him with shoulders back, chin up, and arms crossed aggressively under her breasts. He had trained her well, molded her in his image. Perhaps he had done too good a job. Perhaps she was going to plow bullheadedly forward in the wrong direction just to get her own way.
He had learned a few hard lessons over the past few years. The hardest of them was that he wasn’t as smart as he had thought he was. He had dreamed of having three sons, of creating an empire that would begin with Three Oaks.
Now he realized that he hadn’t counted on the vast opportunities Texas would offer his children. He hadn’t counted on their wanting to take off, like eaglets leaving their aerie, in search of their own domain.
He hadn’t counted on the choices being taken out of his hands.
Rip had watched his two younger daughters leave Three Oaks and start fulfilling new lives with their husbands. He couldn’t help wanting that same kind of happiness for Sloan, the child with whom he had shared so much of the burden of Three Oaks, the one on whom he had been hardest because she must be best.
She had always been independent, and determined to do everything her own way. Now she was going to throw away the chance of a life with Cruz in order to possess Three Oaks.
For the first time in his life, he didn’t know what to do. So he said, “I guess I’ll let you and Luke fight it out.”
Sloan could hardly believe her ears. “You have no objection to my claiming Three Oaks?”
“You’ll have to settle the matter with Luke. He makes the decisions about Three Oaks now.” Rip rose from the chair and walked across the room, not stopping until he reached the door. “If you want to wait, Luke said he would be back along about sundown. It’s good to see you, Sloan.”
It was all the welcome she was going to get, Sloan knew, and yet it was more of a statement of caring than he had ever made in the past. Still, her sense of betrayal ran deep. Luke hated Rip; she loved her father; yet Rip had given control of Three Oaks to his son.
Damn right she planned to wait and talk to Luke!
She was sitting in Rip’s office when she heard footsteps in the central hallway. She waited for Luke to come in, belatedly realizing that she had heard the steps of two men.
“Howdy, Sloan,” Luke said.
She turned her head to greet him and was stunned by the sight of Cruz standing next to him. “What are you doing here?”
“I was about to ask you the same thing. I came home and found you gone. I thought we had an understanding.”
Sloan rose to confront Cruz. “I understood what you wanted. But I don’t think you have an inkling of what I want.” She turned to Luke. “Rip told me he’s given control of Three Oaks to you.”
“If that’s what he said, it must be so,” Luke said.
“I want it back.”
“Why?” Luke asked. “You’re married to Cruz. Or so he just told me. You’ll be living at Dolorosa.”
“I… we…” She looked into Cruz’s eyes and saw him dare her to deny it. “This has nothing to do with whether I’m married to Cruz or not.”
“I’m afraid I have to differ with you,” Luke said. “A woman belongs with her husband.”
Sloan didn’t know what argument to use against that reasoning.
“But that’s not why I went to Dolorosa looking for you today,” Luke said.
“You went to Dolorosa?”
“I’ve just come from there. That’s where Cruz and I hooked up. What I wanted to tell you is that I’m sorry about the way things turned out. I never wanted to be a cotton farmer. I never wanted Three Oaks. I just wanted… Aw, hell.”
He stuck his thumbs in the front of his pants and said, “The bulk of the harvest is finished, so I’m going to take care of some Ranger business in San Antonio that needs tending.”
“Is it something to do with Alejandro and the Hawk?” Sloan watched as Cruz and Luke exchanged guilty glances. “It is, isn’t it?”
Sloan felt a frisson of excitement when Luke’s frown seemed to confirm her speculation. “Alejandro’s alive, isn’t he? And working with a spy called the Hawk?”
“Stay out of this, Sloan,” Luke said.
“Do not worry,
“The
“Listen, Sloan,” Luke cajoled. “Those bandido spies mean business. They-”
“Spies?”
All eyes turned to find Rip silhouetted in the doorway to his office. Luke groaned in disgust.
“What’s all this talk about bandido spies?” Rip demanded.
“It’s nothing,” Luke said.
“Don’t give me that bullshit, son. It’s something, all right, and I want to hear what!”
Luke had stiffened when Rip called him son, and Sloan was certain he wasn’t about to explain anything to Rip.
Luke proved her wrong when he said, “You know how it is. There’s plenty of intrigue where politics and money are concerned. The English aren’t too happy about Texas becoming the next state. Seems there’s a bunch of British investors who’ll lose money if Texas joins the Union, so there’s some manipulation going on to try and stall annexation. That’s all there is to it. Nothing the Rangers can’t handle.”
“So that’s why you had to leave Three Oaks?”
Luke pursed his lips. “Part of it.”
“And the rest of it?”
“I explained that once. I don’t see any need to go over it again.”
“I do.”
“I’ve done all the talking I plan to do.”
Sloan felt the animosity flash between the two men like heat lightning. She should have been glad to have them at odds, but it distressed her to see father and son bristling at one another like two wildcats. And she didn’t see any easy solutions to the problems that plagued them.
But Luke’s declaration had offered her the first hope she’d had since he had shown up at her father’s doorstep that she would regain possession of Three Oaks.
That possibility created its own set of problems. Suppose she did become heir to Three Oaks again. How was she going to manage the plantation until the six months she had promised Cruz were up?
