The Ranch Solution. Julianna Morris

until he saw it was his assistant. The look on Gretchen’s face said it all—his daughter, Kittie, was in trouble. Again.

      “No injuries,” Gretchen whispered in his ear. “Accidental fire. Girls’ locker room. But both fire and police departments had to be called.”

      With effort Jacob kept his expression neutral. Fire. That was worse than anything Kittie had done before, though she’d done plenty. He looked at the men and women seated around the long table. “I apologize, but something urgent has come up that needs my attention.”

      Right.

      Something urgent.

      A fourteen-year-old daughter who was single-handedly trying to destroy the civilized world.

      Jacob cleared his throat. “So I’ll have Cara Michaels take over from here,” he continued. “Thank you, Cara.”

      His vice president of Acquisitions nodded calmly. Of course she was calm—her kids were already grown. She had raised three and lived to tell about it—he didn’t have a clue how she’d managed such a feat. As much as he loved his daughter, sometimes he hated being a parent. These days it seemed like a never-ending cycle of worry and self-doubt.

      “What’s the damage?” he automatically asked Gretchen as the door closed behind them.

      His assistant patted his arm. “It isn’t that bad—some paper, a wood bench and cabinet, cleanup and new paint. But the principal is hopping mad—I didn’t realize his voice could get that high. Mr. Williams shrieked that setting fire to a building rates more than a suspension, no matter how liberal their rules might be. I’m afraid Kittie will be expelled this time—she seems to have exceeded even his tolerance.”

      “Maybe I can pay for a new swimming pool to go with the tennis courts I donated the last time. Money talks,” Jacob said with a heavy dose of cynicism.

      Gretchen shook her head. “I wouldn’t try it. You didn’t hear him. I’m lucky my eardrums didn’t burst the way he was yelling.”

      “At least there are only a few weeks left in the school year.” Jacob pulled his keys from his pocket.

      “Er...why don’t you take the limousine?” Gretchen suggested, probably because the last time Kittie was in danger of being expelled, he’d turned too sharply in the parking garage and creased the fender of his Mercedes.

      “I’ll be fine,” he muttered. He didn’t like using a chauffeur, preferring to be the one in control.

      “Okay, but my car is on the same level as yours, and I’m really fond of that Saturn.”

      “It’s safe. I only hit concrete dividers, not other vehicles,” he said, teeth gritted. He didn’t want to say something he shouldn’t...which unfortunately he’d already done a few times over the past few months. Jacob hurried to the stairs, his head pounding. What a nightmare. Kittie had gone from being a normal high-school freshman at the beginning of the year to a teenager-from-hell at the end.

      Was it his fault?

      Was it drugs?

      The possibility haunted him. Kittie’s mother had become dependent on medication by the time she died. A muscle ticked in Jacob’s jaw as he remembered how the pills had made Anna so dazed she’d barely recognized anyone. They had hoped a donor heart would become available in her rare blood type, but she hadn’t lived long enough for a transplant.

      At Kittie’s school, Jacob parked in front of the administration building and went to the principal’s office; he’d gone there so often lately he could have made it blindfolded. Kittie sat in her usual chair, arms crossed over her abdomen, looking angry and defiant.

      “I didn’t try to burn down anything,” she announced, her body language screaming that she didn’t care whether he believed her or not.

      “That’s right, she just tried to hide the cigarette she was smoking without putting it out,” said a grim Mr. Williams. He was a liberal administrator, but everyone had their limits.

      “Smoking?” Jacob asked incredulously. “We’ve talked about this. I thought you had better sense.”

      “Like it matters.” Kittie sank deeper in her chair. The private school she attended didn’t have a uniform, and she’d pushed the envelope on their loose dress code in so many ways that the envelope looked more like a punching bag.

      He hadn’t put an end to the nonsense because the school psychologist had advised him to let Kittie “express” herself.

      Well, hell.

      The experts obviously didn’t know what they were talking about. Not one of those experts had come up with a decent explanation of what was going on with his daughter, and they certainly hadn’t done anything to help make things better.

      Jacob listened to twenty minutes of Mr. Williams’s ranting about out-of-control teens, silently accepted his daughter’s expulsion and endured an “interview” with the police detective who’d investigated the fire. Officer Rizzoli didn’t crack a smile the entire conversation, and Jacob’s nerves were wound to the breaking point by the time he returned to his Mercedes with Kittie in tow. She slumped into the passenger seat and scowled at her belly button.

      “I’m getting my nose pierced,” she declared.

      “Over my dead body.”

      They argued all the way home.

      When they finally arrived, Kittie disappeared upstairs into her bedroom; a few seconds later her music roared to life.

      God in heaven.

      Head pounding, Jacob looked wildly around the living room as if an answer could be found in the furniture. What was he going to do?

      Smoking?

      Fire in the girls’ locker room?

      What was next?

      Specters of teen pregnancy, STDs and drug overdoses raced through his mind, turning his stomach to ice. He’d tried grounding Kittie, taking away her computer, TV and various other privileges.

      There didn’t appear to be anything physically wrong with her according to the doctors they’d seen. The counselor he’d consulted seemed baffled, and the only advice she’d had for him was to give it time. His own parents had told him to be patient, that all kids went through a rebellious stage, but he didn’t think this was normal rebellion.

      Besides, he’d passed the expiration date on his patience; he was now operating on raw nerve.

      Jacob headed for his home office. Like the living room, the office provided broad windows, overlooking a panorama of Lake Union. During the day he could sit and watch the seaplanes arrive and depart and the sailboats skim across the water, while at night the surrounding hills glistened with city lights. The stunning view usually pleased him, a reminder that he had succeeded and could afford to give Kittie the best of everything.

      Yeah, the best.

      At this rate he was going to need the best lawyers to defend her.

      Jacob considered pouring himself a drink. Instead, he sat down in front of the computer and typed in the website address his friend Gene had given him. He stared long and hard at the travel-agency home page before clicking the U-2 Ranch link. When Gene and his wife were having trouble with their son, they’d taken him for a ranch vacation in Montana. Since then they’d raved about the U-2, claiming the experience had done wonders for Wes...sort of a boot camp for kids with problems. They’d even taken it in stride that Wes had broken his arm on the trip.

      Jacob pressed his thumbs to his aching temples. Was he desperate enough to try something that could put Kittie in harm’s way? They’d always lived in the city, and the description of the ranch didn’t thrill him—five miles from the nearest town, gravel road into the ranch, guests slept in tents, everyone worked, food served communally, no designer coffee...

      He grimaced He was addicted