R.J. hadn’t been there, Anna wasn’t sure what she’d have done when she heard the explosion and opened the bathroom door to find her son covered in soot and glass and lying motionless on the floor.
Will had come to immediately, and R.J. had gotten the glass off him and out of his hair with a Dustbuster. Then he’d taken him to the emergency room, where they’d found nothing wrong with him except singed eyebrows and hair and rampant inquisitiveness.
R.J. had talked her out of locking Will in his room until college and made an effort to spend more time with him. Even now that R.J. was married, he made Will a part of his life.
Will shrugged off the incident. “I guess it showed that science isn’t my thing.” He sat back as Mary Jane delivered his soup and Anna’s coffee. “Money is.”
As Mary Jane left again, he asked seriously, “Do you think I get that from my father? Even though I never see him?”
Anna shook her head, eager to rid him of that notion. “You get it from the Maitlands,” she said, pushing the pepper toward him. “Almost all of us are into some kind of business. Besides the clinic itself, there’s Lana’s baby shop, Shelby’s restaurant—” she spread her hands to indicate Austin Eats “—and Aunt Beth’s day-care center in the hospital.”
“And you.”
“Right.”
“But Shelby and Lana are Lords,” he corrected, “not Maitlands.”
Anna nodded, pointing to his napkin to remind him to put it on his lap. He did, then pulled his soup closer and picked up his spoon.
“But we Maitlands sort of think of them as cousins,” she explained, “because Grandma found Garrett and the triplets on the doorstep of Maitland Maternity not long after she opened it. She found a loving home for them close by and we had parties and picnics together. Our interests rubbed off on each other.”
“I just wonder why he doesn’t like me,” Will said candidly.
They were back to his father again. Anna preferred not to think about her ex-husband, but she knew that understanding his rejection was important to Will’s peace of mind.
“He doesn’t dislike you,” she assured him quickly. “He doesn’t even know you well enough to make any judgment about you. He just thinks of himself first. Life always seems easier if you never have to consider anybody but yourself.”
“It must get lonely,” Will observed.
She was pleased he understood that. “I’m sure it does. Guess what client I took on today.”
He spooned soup into his mouth with enthusiasm, pausing to add more pepper and take a guess. “Um…that lady that’s the mother of that baby Grandma has? The one that’s your new cousin Connor’s girlfriend?”
“Janelle?” Anna shook her head. “Nope. I took Janelle and Connor on last month. This is a client I officially got today.”
Will shrugged, more interested in eating his soup than trying to guess.
“Caroline Lamont,” she said.
“Who’s that?” he asked between spoonfuls.
“A nice lady who has a lot of money. But guess who she’s marrying.”
“Who?”
“Austin Cahill.”
She watched with delight as Will dropped the spoon into his empty bowl and stared at her in wide-eyed disbelief.
“Mom,” he said gravely, “you’re kidding, right?”
She shook her head. “I’m not. They want a medieval English wedding, and I have to find costumes and armor and horses.”
His mouth fell open.
“You can help me with that part if you like,” she said.
He still didn’t believe her. “No way!” he challenged.
“Way,” she assured him.
Hero worship blazed in his eyes as he finally realized she spoke the truth. “But…he lives in Dallas!”
“Right. But Caroline lives here in Austin.”
“Wow.” He pushed his bowl aside and leaned toward her pleadingly. “You think I’ll get to meet him?”
She remembered Cahill’s resistance to Caroline’s suggestion. “He’s pretty busy right now,” she said gently. “He’s involved in getting ready for the wedding and trying to run his business from here.”
He absorbed that information, then seemed to dismiss it, as though the notion that he could be this close to his hero and not meet him was unthinkable.
“Did he say anything about the RoyceCo takeover?” Will asked eagerly. Before she could answer, he added, “Did he say what he’s going to do about the pet stores in their subsidiary company?”
“Didn’t you just buy us RoyceCo stock?” Anna frowned in puzzlement. “I thought it was a grain company.”
He nodded. “I bought it because I knew Austin Cahill was looking at it seriously. I think RoyceCo bought a dog-food company as a place to use some of their grain, and those guys had pet stores. Anyway, those stores—I think they’re called Dogdom—have been in violation of Texas animal protection laws. Somebody has to make them change.”
“He didn’t say any—”
“I’ll bet that’s why he bought it!” Will beamed. “’Cause he heard the animals weren’t being treated right and he wanted to fix that!”
Anna was willing to let him believe that. It reminded her again that although her son had a keen, almost adult mind, he was still a little boy. He understood the workings of business, but not the motivations of those who made the deals.
She doubted seriously that Austin Cahill had purchased RoyceCo to see that the animals owned by the subsidiary pet stores were better treated. He was taking a wife for the sole purpose of producing an heir. With so little regard for a human being, he couldn’t possibly care that much about animals. He was in it for the profits in grain.
“Maybe we’ll run into him,” Will said hopefully, “while I’m helping you with the armor and the horses.”
“Maybe. We’ll have to find a way to work it out when his schedule loosens up.”
Mary Jane brought their dinners, and conversation stopped while Will consumed his, then finished off the second half of Anna’s.
“Sara’s a really good cook,” he said appreciatively as he contemplated the last bite. “I’ll bet she cooked for the president or somebody.”
Anna had to agree that her chicken and dumplings were delicious. The seasoning was perfect, the biscuits light, the mashed potatoes creamy. An hour on the treadmill tonight, she thought, might save her hips from retribution.
