To Wear His Ring: Circle of Gold / Trophy Wives / Dakota Bride

Gil didn’t say anything, but his eyes were very expressive. “Where is she?”

“I really don’t know,” Pauline lied, wide-eyed. “She didn’t say where they were going. She was clinging to him like ivy and obviously very anxious to be alone with him,” she added. “I can’t say I blame her, he’s very handsome.”

“Bess could have died.”

“But I was right here. I never left them,” she assured him. “The girls mean everything to me. Here, let me have Jenny. I’ll take care of her while you get Bess seen to.”

“Want Kasie,” Jenny whimpered.

“There, there, darling,” Pauline said sweetly, kissing the plump little cheek. “Pauline’s here.”

“Damn Kasie!” Gil bit off, horrified at what might have happened. Kasie knew he didn’t trust Pauline to watch the girls. Why had Kasie been so irresponsible? Was it to get back at him for what he’d said the night they arrived in Nassau?

When the ambulance arrived, Kasie and Zeke left their dessert half-eaten and rushed out the door. Zeke had to stop to pay the check, but Kasie, apprehensive and uneasy without knowing exactly why, rounded the corner of the building just in time to see little Bess being loaded onto the ambulance.

“Bess! What happened?!” Kasie asked, sobbing.

“She hit her head on the pool, apparently, and almost drowned, while you were away having a good time with your boyfriend,” Gil said furiously. The expression on his face could have backed down a mob. “You’ve got a ticket home. Use it today. Go back to the ranch and start packing. I want you out of my house when I get back. I’ll send your severance pay along, and you can thank your lucky stars that I’m not pressing charges!”

“But, but, Pauline was watching them—” Kasie began, horrified at Bess’s white face and big, tragic eyes staring at her from the ambulance.

“It was your job to watch them,” Gil shot at her. “That’s what you were paid to do. She could have died, damn you!”

Kasie went stark white. “I’m sorry,” she choked, horrified.

“Too late,” he returned, heading to the ambulance. “You heard me, Kasie,” he added coldly. “Get out. Pauline, take care of Jenny until I get back.”

“Of course, darling,” she cooed.

“And get her away from the swimming pool!”

“I’ll take her up to my room and read to her. I hope you’ll be fine, Bess, darling,” she added.

Kasie stood like a little statue, sick and alone and frightened as the ambulance closed up and rushed away, its lights flashing ominously.

Pauline turned and gave Kasie a superior appraisal. “It seems you’re out of a job, Miss Mayfield.”

Kasie was too sick at heart to react. She didn’t have it in her for a fight. Seeing Bess lying there, so white and fragile was acutely painful. Even Jenny seemed not to like her anymore. She buried her face against Pauline and clung.

Pauline turned and carried the child back to her chaise lounge to get her room key. Not bad, she thought, for a morning’s work. One serious rival accounted for and out of the way.

Zeke caught up with Kasie at the pool. “What happened?” he asked, brushing a stray tear from Kasie’s cheek.

“Bess almost drowned,” she said huskily. “Pauline promised to watch her. How did she hit her head?”

“I wouldn’t put much past that woman,” he told Kasie somberly. “Some people won’t tolerate rivals.”

“I’m no rival,” she replied. “I never was.”

Having noted the expression on her boss’s face at the airport when he’d said goodbye to Kasie, he could have disputed that. He knew jealousy when he saw it. The man had been looking at him as if he’d like to put a stake through his heart.

“He fired me,” Kasie continued dazedly. “He fired me, without even letting me explain.”

“Trust me, after whatever she told him, it wouldn’t have done any good. Go home and let things cool down,” he added. “Most men regain their reason when the initial upset passes.”

“You know a lot about people,” Kasie remarked as they started up to her room.

“I’m a reporter. It goes with the territory. I’ll go with you to the airport and help you change the ticket,” he added grimly. “Not that I want to. I was looking forward to getting to know you. Now we’ll be ships that passed in the night.”

“So we will. Do you believe in fate?” she asked numbly.

“I do. Most things happen for a reason. Just go with the flow.” He grinned. “And don’t forget to give me your home address! I won’t be out of the country forever.”

Chapter Eight

It didn’t take long for Kasie to pack. She wouldn’t let herself think of what was ahead, because she’d cry, and she didn’t have time for tears. She changed into a neat gray pantsuit to travel in, and picked up her suitcase and purse to put them by the door. But she stopped long enough to find the phone number of the hospital and check on Bess. The head nurse on the floor, once Kasie’s relationship to the girls was made clear, told her that the child was sitting up in bed asking for ice cream. Kasie thanked her and hung up. She wondered if the news would have been quite as forthcoming if she’d mentioned that she’d just been fired.

She moved out into the sitting room with her heart like a heavy weight in her chest. She looked around to make sure she hadn’t forgotten anything and went into the hall with her small piece of carry-on luggage on wheels and her pocketbook. It was the most painful moment of her recent life. She thought of never seeing the girls and Gil again, of having Gil hate her. Tears stung her eyes, and she dashed at them impatiently with a tissue.

As she passed Pauline’s room, she hesitated. She wanted to say goodbye to little Jenny. But on second thought, she went ahead to the elevator, deciding that it would only make matters worse. Besides, Pauline was probably still at the hospital with Gil. She wished she knew what had really happened by the pool. She should never have left the girls with Pauline, despite the other woman’s assurances that she’d look after them. Gil had said often enough that she was responsible for them, not Pauline. She should have listened.

Downstairs, Zeke was waiting for her. He put her small bag into the little car he’d rented at the airport and drove her to the airport to catch her flight.

At the hospital, Bess was demanding ice cream. Gil hugged her close, more frightened than he wanted to admit about how easily he could have lost her forever.

“I’m okay, Daddy,” she assured him with a grin.

“Does your head hurt?” he asked, touching the bandage the doctor had placed over the cut, which had been stitched.

“Only a little. But ice cream would make it feel better,” she added hopefully.

“I’ll see what I can do,” he promised with a strained smile.

The nurse came in, motioning Pauline and Jenny in behind her. “I thought it might help to let her sister see her,” she told Gil confidentially.

“Hi, Bess,” Jenny said, sidling up to the bed. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” Bess assured her. “But it was real scary.” She glared at Pauline. “It was your fault. You tripped me.”

“Bess!” Gil warned his daughter while wondering at Pauline’s odd expression.

“I did not trip you!” Pauline shot back.

“You did so,” Bess argued. “I wouldn’t dive in, and you tripped me so I’d fall in.”

“She’s obviously delirious,” Pauline said tautly.

“You told Kasie you’d stay right with us,” she continued angrily. “And she told us not to go swimming, but you showed me how to dive and you told me to dive into the pool. And when I didn’t, you tripped me!”

Pauline was flushed. Gil was looking vaguely murderous. “She did hit her head, you know,” she stammered. “I was telling her how to dive, I didn’t tell her to actually do it!”

“You tripped me and I hurt myself!” Bess kept on.

Pauline backed away from Gil. “What do I know about kids?” she asked impatiently. “She said she wanted to learn how to swim. I showed her a diving position. Then I slipped on the wet tiles and fell against her. It was an accident. I never meant to hurt her. You must know that I wouldn’t deliberately hurt a child!” she added fiercely.

He was still silent, as the fear for Bess began to fade and his reason came back to him.

Pauline grabbed up her purse. “I was just trying to do Kasie a favor,” she muttered. “That reporter wanted to take her to lunch and I told her to go ahead, that I’d watch the kids. Besides, she was just in the restaurant next to the pool!”

Gil felt his stomach do a nosedive. So Kasie hadn’t deserted the kids. Pauline had told her to go, and she’d been right inside. He’d fired Kasie, thinking she was at fault!

“I imagine that reporter went home with her,” Pauline continued deliberately. “They were all over each other when he came to pick her up. Besides, governesses are thick on the ground. It won’t be hard to replace her.”

“Or you,” he said coldly.

She looked shocked. “You can’t mean you’re firing me?”

“I’m firing you, Pauline,” he said, feeling like a prize idiot. Kasie was gone, and it was as much Pauline’s fault as it was his own. He knew she didn’t like Kasie. “I need a full-time secretary. We’ve discussed this before.”

She started to argue, but it was obvious that there was no use in it. She might still be able to salvage something of their relationship, just the same, if she didn’t make a scene. “All right,” she said heavily. “But we might as well enjoy the vacation, since we’re here.”

His face became hard. He thought of Kasie going back to Montana, packing, leaving. For an instant he panicked, thinking that she might go so far away that he’d never find her.

Then he remembered her aunt in Billings. Surely she wouldn’t be that hard to locate. He’d give it a few days, let Kasie get over the anger she must be feeling right now. Maybe she’d miss the girls and he could persuade her to come back. God knew, she wouldn’t miss him, he thought bitterly. He’d probably done more damage than he could ever make up to her. But when they got back, he was going to try. Misjudging Kasie seemed to be his favorite hobby these days, he thought miserably.

“Yes,” he told Pauline slowly. “I suppose we might as well stay.”

Pauline had hardly dared hope for so much time with him. She was going to try, really try, to take care of the girls and make them like her.

“Bess, shall I go and ask if they have chocolate ice cream?” she asked, trying to make friends. “I’m really sorry about accidentally knocking you into the pool.”

“I want Kasie,” Bess muttered.

“Kasie’s gone home,” Gil said abruptly, not adding that he’d fired her.

“Gone home?” Bess’s face crumpled. “But why?”

“Because I told her to,” he said shortly. “And that’s enough about Kasie. We’re going to have a good time…Oh, for God’s sake, don’t start bawling!”

Now it wasn’t just Bess crying, it was Jenny, too. Pauline sighed heavily. “Well, we’re going to have a very good time, aren’t we?” she said to nobody in particular.

Mama Luke never pried or asked awkward questions. She held Kasie while she cried, sent her to unpack and made hot chocolate and chicken soup. That had always been Kasie’s favorite meal when she was upset.

Kasie sat down across from her at the small kitchen table that had a gaily patterned tablecloth decorated with pink roses and sipped her soup with a spoon.

“You don’t have to say a word,” Mama Luke told her gently, and smiled. She had eyes like her sister, Kasie’s mother, dark brown and soft. She had dark hair, too, which she kept short. Her hands, around the mug, were thin and wrinkled now, and twisted with arthritis, but they were loving, helping hands. Kasie had always envied her aunt her ability to give love unconditionally.

“I’ve been a real idiot,” Kasie remarked as she worked through her soup. “I should never have let Pauline look after the girls. She isn’t really malicious, but she’s hopelessly irresponsible.”

“You haven’t had a man friend in my recent memory,” Mama Luke remarked. “I’m sure you were flattered to have a handsome young man want to take you out to lunch.”

“I was. But that doesn’t mean that I should have let Pauline talk me into leaving the girls with her. Bess could very easily have drowned, and it would have been my fault,” she added miserably.

“Give it time,” the older woman said gently. “First, let’s get you settled in. Then you can help me with the garden,” she added with a grin.

Despite her misery, Kasie laughed. “I see. You’re happy to have me back because I’m free labor.”

Mama Luke laughed, too. It was a standing joke, the way she press-ganged even casual visitors into taking a turn at weeding the garden. She prescribed it as the best cure for depression, misery and anxiety. She was right. It did a lot to restore a good mood.

In the days that followed, Kasie worked in the garden a lot. She thought about Gil, and the hungry way he’d kissed her. She thought about the girls and missed them terribly. She’d really expected Gil to phone her. He knew she had an aunt in Billings, and it wouldn’t have taken much effort for him to track her down. In fact, she’d put Mama Luke’s telephone number down on her job application in case of emergency.

The thought depressed her even more. He knew where she’d be, but apparently he was still angry at her. God knew what Pauline had said at the hospital about how the accident happened. She’d probably blamed the whole thing on Kasie. Maybe the girls blamed her, too, for leaving them with Pauline, whom they disliked. She’d never felt quite so alone. She thought of Kantor and grew even sadder.

Mama Luke came out into the garden and caught her brooding. “Stop that,” she chided softly. “This is God’s heart,” she pointed out. “It’s creation itself, planting seed and watching little things grow. It should cheer you up.”

“I miss Bess and Jenny,” she said quietly, leaning on her hoe. She was dirty from head to toe, having gotten down in the soil to pull out stubborn weeds. There was a streak of it across her chin, which Mama Luke wiped off with one of the tissues she always carried in her pocket.

“I’m sure they miss you, too,” the older woman assured her. “Don’t worry so. It will all come right. Sometimes we just have to think of ourselves as leaves going down a river. It’s easy to forget that God’s driving.”

“Maybe He doesn’t mind back seat drivers,” Kasie said with a grin.

Mama Luke chuckled. “You’re incorrigible. Almost through? I made hot chocolate and chicken with rice soup.”

“Comfort food.” Kasie smiled.

“Absolutely. Stop and eat something.”

Kasie looked at the weeding that still had to be done with a long sigh. “Oh, well, maybe the mailman has some frustrations to work off. He’s bigger than I am. I’ll bet he hoes well.”

“I’ll try to find out,” she was assured. “Come on in and wash up.”

It was good soup and Kasie had worked up an appetite. She felt better. But she still hated the way she’d left the Callister ranch. Probably everybody blamed her for Bess’s accident. Especially the one person from whom she dreaded it. “I guess Gil hates me.”

The pain in those words made Mama Luke reach out a gentle hand to cover her niece’s on the table. “I’m sure he doesn’t,” she contradicted. “He was upset and frightened for Bess. We all say things we shouldn’t when our emotions are out of control. He’ll apologize. I imagine he’ll offer you your job back as well.”

Kasie shifted in the chair. “It’s been a week,” she said. “If he were going to hire me back, he’d have been in touch. I suppose he still believes Pauline and thinks he’s done the best thing by firing me.”

“Do you really?” Her aunt pursed her lips as her keen ears caught the sound of a car pulling up in the driveway. “Finish your hot cocoa, dear. I’ll go and see who that is driving up out front.”

For just a few seconds, Kasie hoped it would be Gil, come to give her back her job. But that would take a miracle. Her life had changed all over again. She was just going to have to accept it and get a new job. Something would turn up somewhere, surely.

She heard voices in the living room. One of them was deep and slow, and she shivered with emotion as she realized that she wasn’t dreaming. She got up and went into the living room. And there he was.

Gil stopped talking midsentence and just looked at Kasie. She was wearing old jeans and a faded T-shirt, with her hair around her shoulders. He’d missed her more than he thought he could miss anyone. His heart filled with just the sight of her.

“I believe you, uh, know each other,” Mama Luke said mischievously.

“Yes, we do,” Kasie said. She recalled the fury in his pale eyes as he accused her of causing Bess’s accident, the fury as he fired her. It was too painful to go through again, and he didn’t look as if he’d come to make any apologies. She turned away miserably. “If you’ll excuse me, I have to clean up,” she called over her shoulder.

“Kasie…!” Gil called angrily.

She kept walking down the hall to her room, and she closed and locked the door. The pain was just too much. She couldn’t bear the condemnation in his eyes.

Gil muttered under his breath. “Well, so much for wishful thinking,” he said almost to himself.

“Come along and have some hot cocoa, Mr. Callister,” Mama Luke said with a gentle smile. “I think you and I have a lot to talk about.”

He followed her into the small, bright kitchen with its white and yellow accents. She motioned him into a chair at the table while she poured the still-hot cocoa into a mug and offered it to him.

“I’m Sister Luke,” she introduced herself, noting his sudden start. “Yes, that’s right, I’m a nun. My order doesn’t wear the habit. I work with a health outreach program in this community.”

He sipped cocoa, feeling as if more revelations were in store, and that he wasn’t going to like them.

She sipped her own cocoa. He was obviously waiting for her to speak again. He studied her quietly, his blue eyes troubled and faintly disappointed at Kasie’s reception.

“She’s still grieving,” she told Gil. “She didn’t give it enough time before she started back to work. I tried to tell her, but young people are so determined these days.”

He latched on to the word. “Grieving?”

“Yes.” Her dark eyes were quiet and soft as they met his. “Her twin, Kantor, and his wife and little girl died three months ago.”

His breath caught. “In an airplane crash,” he said, recalling what Kasie had said.

“Airplane crash?” Her eyes widened. “Well, I suppose you could call it that, in a manner of speaking. Their light aircraft was shot down—”

“What?” he exploded.

She frowned. “Don’t you know anything about Kasie?”

“No. I don’t. Not one thing!”

She let out a whistle. “I suppose that explains some of the problem. Perhaps if you knew about her background…” She leaned back in her chair. “Her parents were lay missionaries to Africa. While they were working there, a rebel uprising occurred and they were killed.” She nodded at his look of horror. “I had already taken my vows by then, and I was the only family that Kasie and Kantor had left. I arranged to have them come to me, and I enrolled them in the school where I was teaching, and living, at the time. In Arizona,” she added. “Kantor wanted nothing more than to fly airplanes. He studied flying while he was in school and later went into partnership with a friend from college. They started a small charter service. There was an opportunity in Africa for a courier service, so he decided to go there and set up a second headquarters for the company. While he was there, he married and had a little girl, Sandy. She and Lise, Kantor’s wife, came and stayed with Kasie and me while Kasie was going through secretarial school. Kantor didn’t want them with him just then, because there was some political trouble. It calmed down and he came and rejoined his family. He wanted to bring everyone home to Africa.”

She grimaced. “Kasie didn’t want him to go back. She said it was too risky, especially for Lise and Sandy. She adored Sandy…” She hesitated, and took a steadying breath, because the memory was painful. “Kantor told her to mind her own business, and they all left. That same week, a band of guerrillas attacked the town where he had his business. He got Lise and Sandy in the plane and was flying them to a nearby town when someone fired a rocket at them. They all died instantly.”

“My God,” he said huskily.

“Kasie took it even harder because they’d argued. It took weeks for her to be able to discuss it without breaking down. She’d graduated from secretarial college and I insisted that she go to work, not because of money, but because it was killing her to sit and brood about Kantor.”

He wrapped both hands around the cocoa mug and stared into the frothy liquid. “I knew there was something,” he said quietly. “But she never talked about anything personal.”

“She rarely does, except with me.” She studied him. “She said that your wife died in a riding accident and that you have two beautiful little girls.”

“They hate me,” he said matter-of-factly. “I fired Kasie.” He shrugged and smiled faintly. “John, my brother, isn’t even speaking to me.”

“They’ll get over it.”

“They may. I won’t.” He wouldn’t meet her eyes. “I thought I might persuade her to come back. I suppose that’s a hopeless cause?”

“She’s hurt that you misjudged her,” she explained. “Kasie loves children. It would never occur to her to leave them in any danger.”

“I know that. I knew it then, too, but I was out of my mind with fear. I suppose I lashed out. I don’t know much about families,” he added, feeling safe with this stranger. He looked up at her. “My brother and I were never part of one. Our parents had a governess for us until we were old enough to be sent off to school. I can remember months going by when we wouldn’t see them or hear from them. Even now,” he added stiffly, “they only contact us when they think of some new way we can help them make money.”

She slid a wrinkled hand over his. “I’m sorry,” she said gently. She removed her hand and pushed a plate of cookies toward him. “Comfort food,” she said with a gleeful smile. “Indulge yourself.”

“Thanks.” He bit into a delicious lemon cookie.

“Kasie says you love your girls very much, and that you never leave them with people you don’t trust. She’s hating herself because she did leave them against her better judgment. She blames herself for the accident.”

He sighed. “It wasn’t her fault. Not really.” His eyes glittered. “She wanted to have lunch with a man she met on the plane. A good-looking, young man,” he added bitterly. “Pauline admitted causing the accident, but I was hot because Kasie was upset about flying and I didn’t know it until it was too late. She was sitting all by herself.” His face hardened. “If I’d known what you just told me, we’d have gone by boat. I’d never have subjected her to an airplane ride. But Kasie keeps secrets. She doesn’t talk about herself.”

“Neither do you, I think,” she replied.

He shrugged and picked up another cookie. “She looks worn,” he remarked.

“I’ve had her working in my garden,” she explained. “It’s good therapy.”

He smiled. “I work cattle for therapy. My brother and I have a big ranch here in Montana. We wouldn’t trade it for anything.”

“I like animals.” She sipped cocoa.

So did he. He looked at her over the mug.

“Kasie mentioned she was named for the mercenary K.C. Kanton.” She raised an eyebrow amusedly. “That’s right. I’m not sure how much she told you, but when Jackie, her mother, was carrying her, there was a guerrilla attack on the mission. Bob, my brother-in-law, was away with a band of workers building a barn for a neighboring family. They’d helped a wounded mercenary soldier hide from the same guerrillas, part of an insurgent group that wanted to overthrow the government. He was well enough to get around by then, and he got Jackie out of the mission and through the jungle to where Bob was. Kasie and Kantor were born only a day later. And that’s why she was named for K.C. Kantor.”