Christmas Kisses with My Cowboy - Diana Palmer Page 0,39

the night. If your mother approves,” he added. The look he gave Katy made her feel two inches tall.

“Yes, that would . . . that would be all right,” Katy stammered. “If you’re willing to fight for Bart, I’ll thank you. I’m not really sure that Ron would fight for him, or even try to.” She lowered her eyes.

“Everybody makes mistakes,” Cassie said softly.

Teddie hugged Parker and walked away with Cassie. She didn’t look back.

“I’ll talk to you tomorrow,” J.L. told Parker. “Thanks for the coffee.”

“No problem. Good night, Teddie.”

“Good night, Parker,” she called back.

They loaded Bart into the horse trailer and within five minutes, the yard was deserted except for Parker and Katy.

She was still standing in the cold in a thin sweater, her arms wrapped around herself. She looked miserable.

“Go home,” he said shortly, and turned back toward the house.

“He was kissing me,” she said. “I was too shocked to fight at first, and then you and Teddie came in and I was ashamed.”

He stopped at the steps and looked back at her. “You called that yellow polecat and asked him to come out here. I figured you wanted what happened. Especially after you broke Teddie’s heart with that comment about taking the easiest course and letting them put Bart down. That was cowardly.”

She flushed. She drew in a breath. “Yes,” she said after a minute.

“He doesn’t like Teddie.”

“I know.”

“Maybe you’d fit in better with Washington society after all,” he told her. “You’d probably be better off than living out here with barbarians. Good night, Mrs. Blake.”

He went into the house and slammed the door.

* * *

Katy drove home. Her daughter hated her. Parker didn’t want anything more to do with her. J.L. Denton thought she was despicable. And she’d deserved every single miserable thing that had happened to her tonight.

She could hardly believe that she’d agreed with Ron about having the horse put down, even knowing how much Teddie loved him. Teddie had loved her father, too. They’d been close in a way that Katy and Teddie had never been close. Her daughter had never warmed to her. Perhaps it was because Katy didn’t know how to let people in close. She’d loved her husband in her way, but she was always alone, apart, even from her own family. Her parents had hardly ever touched. They got along, said they loved each other, but they fought a lot. They’d married to combine two huge ranch properties. They’d cared for Katy, but they didn’t know how to show it. In turn, Katy had never been able to show that love she had for her daughter.

It occurred to her only then that Bartholomew had been the catalyst to bring Teddie and Katy closer together. The child had grown more optimistic, more outgoing, since she’d had responsibility for the abused horse. Parker had helped there, too. The two of them had made Katy look at the world in a different way. She and Teddie had been growing closer, more every day.

Until she called Ron to help save the horse and he’d defected to the enemy. Worse, he’d almost convinced Katy that his course of action was the right one, despite Teddie’s outraged and hurt feelings. She was losing her daughter’s love and trust, and for what? For a society lawyer who didn’t really care about Katy as a person, only as an asset to his legal career, because she’d become a good hostess and organizer among military wives, many of whom were big in social circles. And because she had those stocks that her husband had invested in, stocks that might make her very wealthy. He’d convinced her, with logic, that terminating the troublesome horse was the quickest way out of her legal dilemma.

Quickest, yes. And an excellent venue for destroying her relationship with her only child. She saw Teddie’s tearful, shocked face every time she closed her eyes. Teddie hadn’t expected her mother to sell her out to a stranger who didn’t even like her. Parker would never have done that. Katy was sure of it. Now the Dentons had involved themselves, and J.L. was going after the horse abuser with a firm of high-powered attorneys who made Ron look like a law student.

First, she was going to have to sign over custody of Bart in a legal manner. She thought about how that would look to her daughter and Parker and the Dentons if she got Ron to help her. No. She’d have to go into Benton Monday