The Parent Plan

“Darn it, Vick, hold still.”

Vicki stood ramrod stiff on the tabletop, her small pixie face screwed into a knot of worry. He winced as she let out yet another long-suffering sigh. “How much longer till you’re done, Daddy?”

“Couple of minutes,” he mumbled, all thumbs and masculine frustration.

“You keep saying that.”

He drew a steadying breath. “Cut me some slack here, peanut. I’m doing the best I can.”

One pin later she was scowling at him again. “Your hands are too big.”

“Luck of the draw, peanut.” Damn pins were slippery, too.

“My hands are puny, like Mommy’s.” She lifted her hands and glared at them. “I can’t throw a rope worth spit.”

“Little girls aren’t supposed to throw a rope worth spit—or otherwise.”

Looking down, Vicki traced an imaginary pattern on the shiny tabletop. “Did your daddy teach you how to rope?”

“No, and hold still.”

“If your daddy didn’t teach you, who did?”

“I taught myself.” Cassidy felt sweat sliding between his shoulder blades, and his head hurt from squinting at the striped fabric. “Son of a—buck,” he all but shouted when the wickedly sharp sliver of steel pierced the ball of his thumb.

“Daddy, be careful! You’ll bleed on my beautiful dress and ruin it.”

His thumb stuck in his mouth, Cassidy regarded his daughter over the tops of his callused knuckles. “I’m bleeding to death, and all you care about is your dress?” he muttered.

Vicki’s dark eyes danced with mischief. “You’re not very good at this, are you?” She reached up to catch hold of his hand. After giving his injured thumb a quick appraisal, she wrinkled her nose. “It’s only a little prick.”

Cassidy turned his thumb to assess the damage. “That is not a prick. That’s a wound. Probably get infected and ruin my roping for a solid month.”

He stuck the smarting digit into his mouth again to stop the bleeding, his indignant gaze locked with his daughter’s laughing one. At least she was no longer worrying that her pretty new dress might not be finished in time for the party tonight, he congratulated himself.

Maybe he wasn’t much of a seamstress, but he could still tease a smile out of his little girl, even if she did seem more grown-up and femininely unpredictable with each passing day.

“After you pin it, you have to sew it by hand,” she informed him, her small mouth twitching suspiciously at the corners. “With a needle and thread, so no one can see them. Mommy said.”

“So you’ve told me about a dozen times already.”

Vicki nudged her chin down far enough to direct an imperious little-girl frown his way. “Just so you know.”

“I know. Believe me, I know.”

Cassidy gripped the blasted hem and braced himself for another attempt. At the same time, he cast another hopeful glance at the window. At the sight of the hovering clouds, which appeared to grow more threatening minute by minute, a nagging unease gripped him.

Karen had a reliable four-by-four and the best cell phone money could buy. Come winter, he always made sure she had new snow tires. Nevertheless, he hated the idea of her driving back and forth to town alone at night or when the weather was bad. One more reason to hate that frigging job of hers.

“Make sure it’s pinned real even, okay?” Vicki ordered with a worried frown as he tightened his hold on the material. “I don’t want to look like a loser in front of my friends.”

Eyeing the scrape on his daughter’s right knee, Cassidy bit off a sigh. Yesterday, she’d been happily running wild on the ranch in dusty jeans and a cowboy hat. Tonight she was as haughty and poised as a princess about to depart for a fancy ball. Was this yo-yoing back and forth normal for little girls? Or was he just inept at parenting? Either way, he was as worried as a greenhorn facing his first branding.

“Look, I have an idea,” he said with a forced heartiness. “Why don’t you wear your jeans and a nice shirt tonight? Maybe that blue one with the fancy buttons you wore to church last Sunday?”

Vicki managed to look both offended and impatient. “Because tonight is special, Daddy. All my friends are going to be there. And some important people from town are going to give Mommy a certificate. I can’t go wearing an icky old pair of jeans.”

It was special, all right, he thought sourly. Half the town would be showing up to honor the folks who’d helped out in last June’s massive storm—rescue workers, firefighters and hospital staff. Grand Springs’s own heroes and heroines. Since the invitation had arrived last month, Vicki had talked about little else. Her mom was a genuine heroine, just like in the movies or in the games on her Xbox.

A man had to be blind not to notice how proud Vick was. The more she talked, the more Cassidy bit his tongue. Okay, so Kari was good at her job. He respected that. But dammit, her patients weren’t the only ones who needed her care and compassion—and love. What about a little girl who spent more time with a sitter or hanging around the corral talking to the hands than she spent with her mom? Or a husband who was beginning to wonder if his wife would even miss him if he suddenly up and disappeared?

“Stop fidgeting, Vick,” he muttered, his temper almost as frayed as the ragged edge of the pink-and-white material he was trying to hide under a little fold the way Vick had ordered.

“I wish I was as pretty as Mommy,” Vicki murmured with a wistful sigh.

Seeing her shoulders slump dejectedly, Cassidy felt something tear inside. Before he could shore up his defenses, he was all but overcome by an urge to wrap her up in silk and sunshine and keep her safe from all the hurts he knew waited for her in the world outside the cocoon he’d tried to weave around her. But even as he fought it off, he knew he would always feel protective toward this marvelous little miracle in pink and white.

“Trust me on this, peanut,” he drawled past the lump in his throat. “You’re as beautiful as the dark-haired princess in that book you read under the covers when you think Mom and I are asleep.”

Vicki wrinkled her nose. “I’m way too skinny.”

“No way! I’m already dreading the day when the boys start lining up outside that door there.” Summoning a decent enough grin, he playfully tugged on one of her long fat braids, hoping to win a smile. When he saw a frown instead, he bit off a sigh.

“You’re willowy,” he assured her. “Just like those ladies on TV.”

Vicki looked unconvinced. “Brooks Gallagher says I’m as flat as one of his skis.”

“Forget Brooks Gallagher,” he said as he concentrated on the last few inches of unpinned hem.

“He’s always hanging around Maria Del Rio, ’cause she wears lipstick.” Vicki sniffed. “And a bra.”

Good Lord. A third-grader, wearing a bra? Cassidy felt a flare of helpless panic. “Don’t even think about it.”

“I’m only talking about lipstick.”

“No.”

“Oh, please, Daddy! Just for tonight.”

“No!” He fought down the urge to tuck her away in her room for the next twenty years. “You’re too young.”

“I’ll be nine in six weeks.”

Had it really been nine years since he first laid eyes on the doll-sized, red-faced, squalling scrap of femininity cradled in her mama’s arms? Lord, but he’d been punch-drunk with happiness that morning. And proud enough to shout his wife’s praises in the streets. He’d wanted another baby as soon as it was safe for Karen to get pregnant. She’d talked him into waiting. He was still waiting. But the so-called “right time” seemed about as far away as ever, and, at thirty-five, he didn’t have a lot of years to wait. Not if he wanted to be around long enough to make sure his kids had everything he’d missed—like a mom they saw for more than a few minutes every morning…and if they got lucky, a few minutes before bedtime.

“No bra and no lipstick. That’s final.”

“You’re just mad ’cause Mommy’s late,” Vicki accused, more perceptive than she should be.

“I’m not mad.” Cassidy felt a sudden heat spread over his face at the blatant lie. “More like…impatient.”

“You are too mad. I can tell, ’cause your face gets all hard and your eyes have a funny look.”

Cassidy made a mental note to exert more control on his thoughts. “Turn a little more to your right,” he muttered, squinting at the target he’d selected for the next pin.

“Daddy, how come boys don’t like girls who are smarter than they are?”

Whoa! Where did that come from? “What makes you ask that?” he hedged.

“Wanda June said I wouldn’t be popular if I keep on making straight A’s in school.”

Wanda June should learn to keep her mouth shut. “Honey, a girl as sweet and special as you isn’t going to have any trouble attracting boyfriends.” He had a mental image of pimply-faced punks trying to hustle his innocent daughter out of her virginity and felt his gut twist. “When the time comes,” he added with more force than necessary.

“What if it doesn’t? What if no one wants to marry me?”

Cassidy took a deep breath. He didn’t have a clue how to proceed. This kind of thing was Karen’s responsibility. “Someone will.”

“Mommy said it’s never too early to start thinking about the future.”

Cassidy stabbed another pin into the material. “Mommy was talking about your education, specifically about why you need to take arithmetic.”

Vicki huffed her disgust. “That’s only important if I want to go to college.”

Cassidy was beginning to think females were born with an innate ability to drive a man beyond his reason. “You’re going to college.”

“You didn’t.”

Cassidy felt an old ache flare to life. Every time he was around Karen and her doctor friends he was reminded of his poor education. Hell, he’d had to jump through hoops just to get through high school—and even then he’d had to take extra courses during summer school before the army would take him on.

“I wanted to. But I couldn’t afford college and the ranch, too.”

Vicki’s expression turned cunning, and Cassidy nearly groaned aloud. “It probably cost a lot more now, and Billy says you’re putting all your money into that new bull you’re fixing to get in California real soon.”

“Billy needs a lesson in watching his mouth.” Cassidy made a mental note to do some straight talking with his blabbermouth ramrod ASAP.

“Billy’s my friend. He thinks it’s great I’m going to run the Lazy S someday.”

“Get this straight, Victoria. You will go to college. I don’t care which one you pick or how much it costs, but you will get an education. Got that?”

“No way. I’m going to help you run the Lazy S, and when you get too old, I’m going to take over as the boss.”

“Vicki, we’ve had this discussion too many times already, and—”

“That sounds like Mommy’s car!” Vicki cried, whirling around.

Even as relief flooded through him, Cassidy had the presence of mind to grab for the small box of pins just as Vicki’s foot sent it flying off the table. Pins showered the carpet like silver hail. Before he could stop himself, Cassidy blistered the air with curses.

“Daddy! You’re not supposed to say words like that when I’m around! Mommy said.”

He felt his face flaming as Karen walked in, looking harried and tired, her eyes shadowed. She’d lost weight in the past few months, and her small body looked whisper-thin in the rumpled surgical scrubs. Even when she wasn’t working, exhaustion seemed to roll off her in waves. And no wonder. She’d worked three-to-eleven for two months straight, getting home at midnight most nights. And then, this morning, she’d had to get up before dawn in order to work the seven-to-three shift for somebody else.

Anger seared through him. She was wearing herself out at that damn place. And for what? Money? Hell, he wasn’t a rich man, but they weren’t starving, were they? Prestige? A membership in the country club when neither of them played golf? The chance to be “Woman of the Year?”

He scowled, fighting off black memories, the dangerous, ugly kind that would torture him for days if he let them take hold.

“Did you get my hair ribbons?” Vicki demanded before her mother had a chance to open her mouth.

“Of course.”

“Got ’em in Denver, did you?” The sarcastic words were out before Cassidy could stop them.

Karen cast him a reproving glance. “No, at Farley’s. Right after I picked up your suit from the cleaners and the colic medicine you wanted from the vet’s.”

It was then that he noticed the clear plastic cleaner’s bag dangling from her hand. He felt a momentary jolt of guilt before habit had him twisting it into anger, one of the few emotions he tolerated in himself.

“If you didn’t have time to stop tonight, you should have told me.”

The shadows in her eyes turned to sparks, and her chin seemed to jerk upward. “And then what? Listen to a lecture about how you don’t have time to run into town for every little thing?”

“Karen—”

“Not now, Cassidy,” she said, pointedly directing her attention—and his—to their daughter. By tacit agreement, they had tried to keep their problems from hurting Vicki. Problems that seemed to grow worse daily.

“Sweetheart, you look just as adorable in that dress as I thought you would. Lilac is definitely your color.”

Vicki glanced from one to the other, her brow knitted. “I wanted to wait to do the hem, but it was getting awfully late and Daddy said you wouldn’t mind if he helped out.”

“Of course I don’t mind.”

She draped Cassidy’s suit over the back of one of the chairs and dropped her purse onto the table. Something crunched under her sneakers and she glanced down.

“Oops.”

Vicki giggled. “Daddy dropped the pin box.”

“I think Daddy has done a terrific job,” she said, meeting Cassidy’s gaze. “I’m sorry I’m late, but Noah asked me to consult on a patient he’d just admitted. It was an emergency. I couldn’t very well say no.”

“It’s not hard, Karen. You’ve been saying it a lot to me lately.” She shot him a disgusted glance that had him kicking himself. “It’s getting late. I’d best take a shower while you finish up.” He grabbed his suit and headed for the back of the house.

* * *

Cassidy stepped buck naked from the shower, his skin tingling from the icy water. Scowling, he snagged a towel from the rack with one long arm and swiped away most of the drops clinging to his body before knotting the towel around his waist.

As he crossed to the sink, the sound of Vicki’s laughter floated through the closed door dividing the bathroom from the master bedroom. Apparently she and Karen were now involved in the more delicate work of sewing those baby stitches Vick had warned him about.

With a jerk of one powerful hand he opened the hot water tap, then reached for the ivory-and-steel straight-edged razor given to him during the last year of his hitch by a crusty sergeant who was retiring to Tahiti.

Damn the jackass who invented birth control, he thought as he slapped lather on a day’s worth of stubble. A woman with a houseful of kids wouldn’t have time to traipse off to work every morning.

A scowl tightened his face, and he paused with razor in hand to stare at the angry man in the mirror. Hell, he knew better than most how much it hurt to wait in line for a mother’s attention. He knew what it felt like to lie in bed at night and listen to his father beg his mother not to leave him. To beg God to help him control his temper and make good grades and remember to clean his room so they’d love him enough to stay together.

In the end, it hadn’t mattered. Johnny had died, and his mother had left.

Cassidy’s eyes burned with the sudden tears he’d refused to shed for a lot of years. His baby brother had been half Vicki’s age when he’d bled his life out in the middle of a Santa Fe street, his terror-filled eyes begging Cassidy for help. And God help him, there hadn’t been a day since that he hadn’t hated his mother for leaving her children alone that day.

And there hadn’t been a day since that he hadn’t hated himself even more, he thought with bitter anger as he swiped the wickedly sharp razor with long, sure strokes over his face. A sudden pain seared his jaw, and he bit off a curse. Blood dripped from the nick to drop on the sink, forming a shimmering spot of scarlet.

Shock jolted through him, and his breathing changed. He felt hot, then cold, and his stomach churned. Alone, where no one could see, he leaned over the toilet and was thoroughly, violently sick.

Chapter Three

Though the thunder rumbled steadily as Cassidy drove his family into town on Saturday night, the rain itself held off. Even the wind had abated, as though Mother Nature had decided to join in the spirit of the town’s celebration.

“Are we there yet, Daddy?” Vicki implored from the back seat of the truck’s extended cab. Cassidy glanced over his shoulder and grinned. Lights from a passing pickup revealed the starry-eyed excitement on her small face, and he felt a hard knot form in his chest.

“Five more minutes, peanut,” he told her, returning his gaze to the road ahead.

Vicki was silent for less than a mile before erupting again. “Drive faster, Daddy. We don’t want to miss any of the fun.”

Cassidy obediently nudged the speed up to the limit, though he would just as soon be heading the other way. Parties had never been his thing. The last one he’d willingly attended was his wedding reception. Even then, however, he’d been ready to leave as soon as they’d cut the cake and done the other folderol that Karen had set her heart on.

Just a few more minutes, she’d whispered, her face glowing. Those few minutes had stretched to the better part of three hours. Hours they could have spent alone, making love.

His loins ached at the memory of his restraint during the rest of that party. Karen had looked tired, but ecstatic, when he’d hustled her home to the ranch. The bed he’d bought especially for his new bride was waiting, made up with crisp new sheets that he’d picked out after a lot of second-guessing and embarrassment. Damn things had pink roses on them, the fluffy kind she’d talked about planting by the front door. He’d expected to feel like a sissy sleeping on flowers for the first time in his life. Instead, he’d lost himself so completely in Karen’s soft, lush body that he’d vowed never to sleep on anything else.

Their wedding sheets were worn thin now, but Cassidy had balked at letting Karen rip them into rags. Embarrassed to tell her the truth, he’d settled on the need to economize as the reason.

His face suddenly too warm and his collar too tight, Cassidy found himself sneaking a glance at his wife. Karen hadn’t said more than a few words since their talk in the dining room. He hated the tension between them, like a thorn buried too deep in his flesh to be easily removed.

Since this was her night, her party, he supposed he ought to apologize for being such a surly cuss. And then what? he asked himself sourly. End up like his father, a half-baked excuse for a man with no self-esteem and a spine about as stiff as a worn-out rope?

A familiar stab of disgust hit him squarely in his gut an instant before the truck rounded a curve, bringing the bright yellow lights of the fairground parking lot into view. Resolutely, he shut the door on his past and turned his attention to the evening to come. Two hours, three at the most, and he could hustle his ladies home, where they belonged.

“Turn here, Daddy,” Vicki ordered, beating him on the shoulder from her place behind him.

“Yes, ma’am,” he said, his mouth twitching.

Vicki might look as delicate as a spring flower in her new party dress, but inside, she had the same single-minded determination as her mother.

“I told you, everybody’s already here,” Vicki wailed as Cassidy drove past row after row of mud-encrusted, well-used vehicles.

“Not everyone, darling,” Karen teased with a grin. “Otherwise, we’d be inside instead of out here, looking for a parking place.”

“Oh, Mommy,” Vicki protested, her tone long-suffering.

By the time Cassidy nosed his rig into a slot at the end of the second-to-last row, Vicki had snapped off her seat belt and was perched impatiently on the edge of her seat.

“You two stay put till I can help you out,” he ordered as he killed the engine and tossed the key into the empty ashtray.

“Oh, Daddy, Mommy and me aren’t helpless,” Vicki said in an outraged tone that had him grinning.

“I know that, sweetheart,” he said as he opened his door. “But you both look so pretty, I feel like playin’ gentleman, okay?”

Vicki beamed. “Way cool, isn’t it, Mommy?”

“I should say it is,” Karen replied, glancing his way. In the dim illumination of the interior light, her eyes seemed to glow, and her smile was soft, reminding him of the kind young woman who’d bewitched him one hellish afternoon in a cold emergency room cubicle.

Cassidy suddenly felt fifteen and tongue-tied. “Anything for my girls,” he said, and then winced. “Sorry. I realize that’s not politically correct these days.”

“We don’t mind, do we, Mommy?” Vicki piped up, glancing anxiously at her mother.

“If it were anyone else but your daddy, I would mind,” Karen disagreed gently. “But I know your dad doesn’t mean to be condescending.”

Vicki frowned. “Con-dee-sending? What’s that?”

Karen glanced his way. “It means that some men think women should be pampered and coddled instead of treated like equals. But Daddy knows better. When we first met, he thought it was great that I wanted to be a doctor.” Her eyes pleaded with him. But for what? Understanding? Approval?

An apology for wanting her to stay home with her child?

Something stirred inside him, part longing and part grief, two emotions he hated. Before either or both could take hold, he slammed the door and walked around the pickup’s long bed.

The air was still winter crisp, with the last of the storm still lingering like a heavy mist. He grabbed a lungful of fresh air and let it out slowly as he opened the passenger door.

“Thanks,” Karen said, putting her hand into his. As he assisted her down, he felt the suppleness of her wrist, the strength in her graceful fingers. The warmth of her touch. His jaw hardened at the memory of the incredible massages she used to give him in the early days. No matter how tired he’d been when she’d started or how chastely she touched him, he’d invariably ended up hard and throbbing.

It had been his turn then to slide his palms over the tantalizing curves of her breasts and hips, to trace the soft mounds of her bottom, to test the texture of her skin with his fingertips. When, at last, he’d turned his attention to the warm, moist secrets between her lush thighs, she’d all but exploded in pleasure.

Tonight she was wearing his favorite dress. It was pale blue with a high neck and long sleeves, and it had a way of clinging to her breasts that made a man think he was seeing more than he really was.

He wanted his mouth on her, her body warm and compliant beneath his. He wanted to stroke every inch of that curvy little body until she was wet and wild and trembling. And then he would sink into her, his engorged body filling the hot, smooth space that seemed fashioned just for him.

Thinking about those things now was a mistake, he realized as he felt his body harden instantly and painfully. Biting off a groan, he widened his stance, grateful that he was wearing loose-fitting trousers instead of his customary jeans.

“Mind the puddles,” he all but growled in his frustration. No matter how hot it was inside, he had a feeling he’d be wearing his suit coat most of the night.

“Hurry up, Daddy.”

Stifling a sigh, he released Karen’s hand in order to open the cab’s rear door. “There you go, Vick. Hop out.”

“No, Daddy, hold out your hand like you did with Mommy,” Vicki said with a pout.

“I beg your pardon, Miss Sloane.” He bowed slightly, sending Vicki into a gurgle of laughter. “May I?” he added, extending his hand.