actually smiled. “Well, Marvin’s only had his shingle out for a few months now, and I don’t think he’s made too many sales.”
“So what about your in-laws?”
“They pretty much stick to big-money deals. And if they did buy your ranch, they’d probably chop it into lots. It’s the way they do business.”
Kade shrugged. “If they can sell the lots, more power to them. I don’t care what happens to the ranch once I’m gone.” No truer words had ever been spoken. Kade couldn’t wait to unload the place, along with the memories, to move on, start over.
“Maybe your neighbors care.”
“I’m not trying to screw my neighbors, but I’ve got to sell and I’ve got to get as much out of it as I can. I had some trouble with the IRS.”
“I heard.” Jason turned the corner into Kade’s driveway, then pulled to a stop next to the barn. He shifted in his seat to face Kade. “You, uh, might talk to Kira. My wife. She and her sister have their own real-estate business. Kira handles small ranch sales in Nevada and her sister takes care of those up in Idaho.”
“After talking to you in the hardware store, I didn’t think you wanted me hanging around your womenfolk.”
“Yeah.” There was a touch of chagrin in Jason’s expression. “I’ve been thinking. What happens between you and Libby isn’t any of my business. It’s just that … well, I don’t want to see her—” he hesitated “—like she was.”
“For that to happen, she’d probably have to stop hating me, and I don’t see that on the horizon.”
“Good point.”
“Yeah,” Kade said, because he couldn’t think of anything else to say. “So, do you think your wife could stop by and take a look at the ranch and give me some advice on how to make it most salable?”
“I’ll have her call you. There’s a pen in the console. Write your number on something.”
Kade wrote his cell number on the back of a receipt. “Thanks,” he said as he handed the paper to Jason.
“No problem.”
And it sounded as if he might actually mean it.
KADE HAD JUST entered the trailer when his cell phone rang. Maddie’s name appeared on the screen and he picked up immediately. School was barely out—Maddie never called this early, before her homework was done.
“Dad, Mom says that if I visit you, I can’t go to horse camp!” She sounded both angry and distressed.
Thanks, Jillian. “Honey—”
“Shandy gets to go, Dad, and we wanted to share a bunk bed and everything.”
“Maddie, we’ll work something out.” Riding horses with Dad wasn’t going to compete with riding horses and sharing a bunk bed with her best friend. “Could I talk to your mom?”
Maddie instantly yelled for Jillian, holding the phone close enough so that Kade winced at the volume.
“Well, I’m the bad guy,” he said as soon as his ex said hello, “which isn’t fair, Jill, because all I want is what I’m supposed to get according to our agreement. Thanks a lot.”
“I thought that you of all people would want Maddie to have this experience,” Jillian said primly.
“I want my time with my daughter.”
“Then why did you move to Otto?”
“You know why.”
Jillian’s voice dropped as she said, “Yes. And if you remember I warned you about Dylan Smith. I told you I thought something about him was off. But no. You said he was a friend and doing a great job handling your money.”
“Damn it, this isn’t about my accountant or my stupidity or anything else. I paid for that mistake.” And several others. “I’m fixing it the quickest way I can. And meanwhile, I want to see my kid.”
“Fine. I’ll tell her.”
Thus making him the bad guy. She’d set him up well on this one. Maddie would come for the summer. And she might even have some fun. But she’d be thinking about what she was missing, and Shandy would have stories to tell. Oh, yeah. Kade couldn’t win here.
“Don’t. But we will work something out. If not, I honestly am seeing a lawyer.”
“Don’t threaten me, Kade.”
“Then follow the agreement. What you did this time. We agreed not to play Maddie as a pawn against each other.”
“I’m not doing that! I’m just trying to keep her life stable.”
“By shutting me out?” Kade asked quietly. There was a long silence.
“I’m her dad, Jill. Her real dad. She has a right to know me and I have a right to know her. And I’m serious about the lawyer.”
“I believe you.”
“Let me talk to Maddie.”
Kade told Maddie she’d be going to horse camp and that she could spend a couple of weeks with him in June and August—which was about all the time she had after school ended and before it started again. Not the best solution, but one that would work. For Maddie, anyway.
By the time Kade hung up, his daughter was happy again, and he was wavering between feeling good that he’d made everything all right with her, and depressed because he’d really wanted them to spend more time together during the summer.
LIBBY GOT HOME from work mentally spent. It was exhausting to hold both her tongue and her temper for ten hours. That woman had to go.
After finishing with Libby, Ellen had browbeaten both Stephen and Fred. Fred didn’t care, but Stephen had come back to the office looking like a whipped pup. The only positive note was that they were about to have a four-day break from the Ellen regime while she attended a state conference.
“I tell you,” Fred had grumbled, rubbing a hand over the gray bristles on top of his head, “one of us needs to go along and keep a rein on her. Who knows what kind of lies she’ll tell or what she’ll promise to do?”
But Ellen wasn’t allowing anyone to go—probably for the same reasons that Fred had suggested.
The more Libby thought about it, the more certain it seemed that Ellen was up to something—and it probably involved accumulating political support. Ellen didn’t so much want to do a competent job as a showy job, one that would get her the promotion she wanted as she climbed government ranks. It ticked Libby off that in order to better her own position, Ellen would probably do things that were actually detrimental to the area but looked great on paper. And there wasn’t much Libby could do about it. But what she could do, she would.
Libby drove up to her house and instantly knew something was wrong when the Aussies came shooting out of the pasture,
