The Rancher's Surprise Son. Christine Wenger

was that J.W. loved Georgianna first, but she’d picked Mike Masters over him, and Penny never stopped feeling like second best.

      “That’s enough, Penny,” J.W. said between gritted teeth.

      “Grandpa, can I ride Pirate now?” Johnny asked.

      “No. Not right now, honey,” Laura answered. “It’s time for your nap.”

      “Grandpa, I want to ride my horse!”

      “Aw, Laura, let the boy ride. He’s a genuine Duke,” J.W. said. “He loves horses.”

      “As opposed to a counterfeit Duke?” Laura said under her breath. “Dad, remember that I’m Johnny’s mother, and what I say goes. Please don’t interfere.”

      “Oh, all right,” J.W. snapped at her, then turned to Johnny and tickled him. “Do what your mother says.” J.W. lifted Johnny and set him on the flagstones. “Take your nap, partner, and then you can ride your horse.”

      Just as Laura stood up to take Johnny to his bedroom, Clarissa appeared and extended her hand. With a glance back at J.W., Johnny put his hand in Clarissa’s. “I’ll be right back, Grandpa.”

      J.W. grinned and lit a cigar. “Sweet dreams, Johnny.”

      Sweet dreams? Too bad she’d never heard J.W. say that to her when she was Johnny’s age. Laura followed Clarissa and Johnny toward the ranch house, feeling like a third wheel.

      J.W. reached out and clasped Laura’s wrist. “Wait a minute. I want to talk to you,” her father said in the gruff tone he reserved for Laura and her mother.

      “Yes?” Laura anticipated a pounding headache and sat back down. She looked to her mother for assistance, but Penny was busy typing something on her cell phone.

      J.W. took a long pull on his cigar and blew a stream of stinky smoke into the bougainvillea. “I want to talk to you about Cody Masters.”

      “I figured you would, sooner or later.” Laura knew the drill. “I’ll avoid him as much as I can, Dad, but what do you want me to do? Cody’s working here at the ranch, and I live and work here. I take Johnny to the barn to ride and out for walks. I’m bound to run into Cody.”

      “You know what I mean.”

      “You’ve been telling me the same thing since I was a kid. Cody Masters isn’t your enemy. Even Mike Masters wasn’t your enemy. He was your good friend at one time.” She turned to her mother. “Georgianna Masters was your friend at one time, too.”

      “That was long ago.” Penny never looked up from her cell phone.

      “Life is short.” Laura tapped a finger on the patio table. “All the more reason why you should mend fences.”

      “Georgianna’s the one who should mend her fence. It looks horrible. It’s all falling apart.”

      That was her mother’s attempt to change the subject and zing Georgianna at the same time, but Laura wasn’t going to fall for it.

      “Mom, stop.”

      “It’s not my fault that she can’t afford to keep up her so-called ranch!” her mother said.

      J.W. put his cigar down. “That’s enough, Penny.”

      “Not before I remind you that we lost that land because you got drunk and failed to win a poker game against Mike Masters. I still can’t believe it.”

       Same old same old.

      Her mother never missed an opportunity to bring up J.W.’s fateful Texas Hold ’em game thirty-something years ago. It was like a recording that played ad nauseam.

      A bell on Penny’s cell phone rang, indicating a text message. Penny picked up the phone, punched some buttons and read the screen.

      Her mother had always been unhappy, and a lot of it had to do with the Masters family, but even more had to do with J.W. Laura always wondered why her mother didn’t just didn’t pack up and leave, but Laura knew that Penny just loved being the Lady Astor of Duke Springs.

      Penny pointed at the Double M, just beyond the tree line to the west of the ranch house. “That place is an eyesore.”

      “Mom, maybe she doesn’t have the money or the help to fix it up.”

      J.W. rolled his cigar tip on the lip of an ashtray. “Then she should sell it back to me. Matter of fact, I suggested that when she came to see me about getting Cody out.”

      Laura’s stomach lurched. She knew the power that J.W. wielded. “Dad, you didn’t get Cody out on the condition that Georgianna sell the Double M to you, did you?”

      Penny’s face lit up like a Christmas tree. “Did you do that, J.W.?”

      He took a long draw on his cigar. “I have some scruples, no matter what you both think.”

      Laura’s face flushed with guilt. Her parents didn’t have a clue that the Duke Foundation had provided Georgianna with money to do some repairs to her ranch house.

      And Laura was in charge of the Duke Foundation!

      There would be hell to pay if one of them ever found out, but Laura was satisfied that she’d covered her tracks. Also, Georgianna didn’t know that she was getting Duke money, or she’d definitely have refused it. Laura convinced Georgianna that she was receiving grant money earmarked for the preservation of historic ranches, and the Double M qualified.

      Stubbornness. Who needed it?

      Laura shifted in her chair. She didn’t like all the deception, but what else was she to do? She wanted to help Georgianna. Indirectly, she was helping Cody and Cindy.

      “Cody’s back, so he’ll help his mother get the ranch going.”

      “Oh no he won’t. I’ll keep him so busy, he won’t have time to work his ranch,” J.W. hissed.

      “Dad, how can you be so hateful?”

      “The boy will be so damn exhausted, he’ll realize that he can’t handle both.”

      Laura felt tears of frustration stinging her eyes. “He’ll quit here to work the Double M. I would.”

      “But he can’t.” J.W. grinned, balancing his cigar between his teeth. “It’s a condition of his parole that he works here. I own him for two years. If he screws up his job at my ranch, he goes back to prison.”

      Penny reached over the table and placed her hand on J.W.’s. Her bright red, glittery nail polish gleamed in the light. “Now, that’s the J.W. that I know! Cody certainly will fail. Georgianna will have no choice but to sell.”

      “That’s my plan,” J.W. said, reveling in Penny’s admiration. Laura knew that he didn’t get much of that from her, so he aspired to get attention and adoration from his peers and maybe from some of his ranch hands.

      Laura stood. “I can’t believe how cruel you both are. Cody will collapse with all the work he’ll try to do. And where will Georgianna and Cindy live if you take away their home? How can you both plan something like that? Forget the stupid poker game. Forget about the Double M. Put up a fifty-foot fence if it bothers you to look at it, for heaven’s sake.”

      Her headache was in full force and the lemonade sat sour in her stomach. How could her parents be so loving with Johnny and so hateful to the Masters family?

      * * *

      Laura walked toward the barn. Maybe she’d run into Cody, or at least catch a quick glimpse of him. They had so much to talk about, but first she had to warn him about her father’s plan to work him to death with the hope that Cody would fail.

      Although he had probably figured that out already.

      She thought about her mother. Why couldn’t Penny be more like Georgianna Masters Lindy? She was the grandmotherly type: loving,