to us when you have a relationship that the family enters into, Penny,” Blake said sardonically.
“That’s what I’m worried about—the family entering into my relationship,” Penny muttered under her breath and with some defensiveness that seemed out of place.
“What does that mean?” Blake asked with a chuckle, as if Penny were six years old rather than twenty-six.
Tate saw how much that irked Penny—she sat up straighter, her lips pursed. Then she said, “I’ve…”
She stopped herself as if to gauge her words.
“It’s okay, Penny,” Tate said. “I appreciate that you’re on my side, but you don’t have to fight my battles.”
“It isn’t only your battle,” his sister answered as if she’d just that moment come to some kind of decision.
Then she made an announcement of her own. “I’ve been seeing Jason Foley.”
That came as far, far more of a shock than Tate’s broken engagement and brought several moments of stunned silence before Blake broke it.
“Jason Foley?” he repeated in disbelief.
“What do you mean you’re seeing him? As a friend?” Eleanor asked in a controlled tone.
“More than friends,” Penny said.
“You’re dating?” their mother pressed, beginning to sound alarmed.
Penny hesitated. She was a private person and Tate realized this wasn’t easy for her.
But then she said, “Yes, we’re dating.”
“That’s bad, Penny,” Blake decreed. “You know the Foleys hate us, that they’ve been convinced for decades that we cheated them out of the land, and now with the potential that the diamond could be—”
“This doesn’t have anything to do with that,” Penny insisted.
“Don’t kid yourself!” Blake said in a louder voice. “Don’t you think it’s just a little suspicious that now—of all times—there’s a Foley sniffing around? They’re looking for a way in, Penny! For information about the diamond!”
“You haven’t actually given me any information about the diamond except to enlist me to design jewelry that will tie into it if you find it.”
“I don’t want the Foleys knowing even that much. That’s what they’re after—any crumb they can get their hands on and use!” Blake shouted.
Tate was aware of how invested Blake was in the business, in finding the diamond, in using it to salvage McCord’s Jewelers. He knew his brother was under pressure he wasn’t willing to share unless it was absolutely necessary because Blake always believed he was the best person to shoulder the load. And Tate thought that because of all that, it didn’t occur to Blake how insulting to Penny it was to imply that Jason Foley was interested in her only as some kind of ploy. Even though Tate agreed that it was a possibility.
“We don’t know that that’s why Jason Foley is seeing Penny, Blake,” he said.
“I know nothing good can come of a McCord getting involved with a Foley.”
“Charlie came of it,” Penny said, using the information their mother had only recently shared with them that the youngest McCord was the result of an affair Eleanor had had with Rex Foley twenty-two years earlier.
But it was information that had caused all of Eleanor’s children to give her a wide berth ever since. To Tate’s knowledge, none of them had discussed it with their mother in any depth, even since Eleanor’s return that morning to take care of the last details of the Labor Day party. So Tate could hardly believe his ears when Penny used that information for her own purposes now.
Glancing at his mother, Tate found her unruffled by it, though. Instead, venturing delicately into the subject that still wasn’t easy for any of them to accept, Eleanor said, “Yes, Penny, Charlie did come of my involvement with a Foley. But that’s why I can speak from experience and tell you that a tie between a Foley and a McCord is a rocky road.”
“We just don’t want you to get hurt, Penny,” Tate added.
“That’s true,” Eleanor confirmed.
“What’s true,” Penny countered, “is that whatever is between two families shouldn’t interfere with what might—or might not—be between two individual people. Not when it comes to you and Katie, Tate, and not when it comes to whoever I’m with, either. Jason and I are seeing each other and it doesn’t have anything to do with the fact that I’m a McCord and he’s a Foley. It doesn’t have anything to do with an old feud, or with land that changed hands a gazillion years ago, or with a diamond. It’s in spite of all that and it’s only about Jason and me.”
“I hope you’re right,” Eleanor said with worry lines creasing her brow.
“I’m telling you,” Blake seemed unable to keep from reiterating, “you don’t know what the Foleys could be up to.”
“It may be perfectly innocent,” Tate contributed. “Jason Foley may just be carried away by how terrific you are. But be careful—that’s all we’re asking. When it comes to a Foley, be really careful…”
Chapter Six
Tate was sitting at one of the poolside tables when Tanya came out from the wooded path after leaving her mother’s cottage Tuesday night. The moment she stepped through the clearing in the bushes and magnolia trees she saw that he was watching for her and a small smile turned up the corners of his mouth.
Why that sent something gooshy through her, she didn’t know, but that bare hint of him being pleased to see her was all it took to heat her from the inside out.
Then his gaze went from her free-falling hair, down the teal T-shirt she was wearing to her flowing wide-leg slacks as she crossed to him. His smile grew bigger. And that internal heat took on a rosy, sensual glow.
Stop it! she ordered herself, trying to keep uppermost in her mind that in spite of the fact that it was late evening, that they were suddenly together again, under a clear moonlit sky, this was about work. Only work…
“Finally!” Tate muttered when she reached him, before she’d even said hello.
“You just called me five minutes ago to tell me to come over,” she said, thinking he was making a comment about having to wait for her.
He shook his head. “Finally we can get to what we had planned tonight.”
“Ah,” Tanya said as she took the chair nearest him.
What they had planned tonight was to look through his family albums. And since there was a stack of them on the table, she sat where they would each be able to see them. It didn’t have anything to do with the fact that she wanted to sit close to him. Want to or not, she swore that she wasn’t going to let this evolve into anything more than doing her job tonight.
“I
