Lone Star Nights (13 page)

“There's no story here for a reporter,” Cassie insisted, but Lucky knew that was wishful thinking on her part.

“You need to make sure it stays that way—no story. I can handle whatever else needs to be handled so it'll take some of the pressure off you,” Andrew said. “I understand you're looking for their next of kin. Well, they can be sent to foster care until you find him or her.”

Lucky had held his tongue. Until now. “No. They're not going to foster care.”

Clearly that didn't please Dr. Dundernuts. “And what makes you qualified to raise these children?”

Before Lucky could answer, Mia tugged on his shirtsleeve. “What does quala-fried mean?”

Andrew jumped to answer that. “It means
Lucky
should know how to deal with and talk to children.” The doc said his nickname as if it were a persistent toenail fungus. “He doesn't. I do.”

Lucky wanted to ask him what qualified him to do that, but he was afraid this jerk would have a good answer—like a bunch of degrees and tons of experience.

“I happen to agree with Lucky about the girls not going to foster care,” Cassie spoke up. Good thing she'd finally found her backbone. Sheez. Couldn't she see that Andrew was a bully just like her father?

Maybe Andrew saw some of that backbone because after he stared at her awhile, he finally nodded. Then he patted her arm. The next sigh he added had a “just keep calm and don't go nuts again” tone to it.

“All right, no foster care,” Andrew agreed, “but I think it's ridiculous not to use a system that's already in place to handle situations exactly like this.”

“They're not a situation,” Lucky said, stepping in front of them. “And besides, we have a lead on their next of kin. We should hear back from her soon.”

Lucky had no idea if that was the truth, but Logan was working on it. If this Aunt Alice was anywhere on the planet, Logan's PI would find her. And soon. Because Logan didn't like unfinished business, either.

Andrew looked at Cassie, silently asking if that was true, and she nodded.

The doc smiled. “Well, good. Then it's practically settled.” He seemed plenty gleeful about something that was far from settled.

Andrew looked at the girls. “Since I'm here, I might as well go ahead and have a session with the children. Is there some place quiet where I can talk with them in private?”

That question elicited a variety of responses.

Cassie: “Uh...”

Mia: “What's a session?”

Della: “There's an office.”

Mackenzie: “I don't want your stupid help.”

Lucky was in Mackenzie's corner on this. Or at least that's what he wanted to be able to tell the doctor. But the truth was, the girls did need help.

Especially Mackenzie.

And having them see a counselor was something he should have already arranged. He'd gotten so caught up with the details that he'd forgotten the devil that was in them. And the devil in this case was that Mackenzie could be suicidal, and Andrew could help.

“A session is where you talk to somebody,” Lucky explained to Mia. “It's supposed to make you feel better.”

“Like a magic gold star?” Mia was wearing it on her right earlobe today. Lucky hoped the glue kept sticking so she didn't lose it.

“Better than a magic gold star,” Lucky assured her. Possibly another lie. But it made Mia smile.

Now, to Mackenzie.

“It might be a good idea if you talked to him,” Lucky said to her. That required him to eat some crow since he'd spent the past ten minutes mind-bashing Andrew.

Mia nodded, of course. Always eager to please. Maybe too eager. Now it was Lucky who was sighing, and his had an “I'm in over my head” tone to it.

Mackenzie just stared at him.

“Please,” Cassie said, taking the word right out of Lucky's mouth.

“If nothing else, consider it payment for the money you took,” Lucky whispered to her. Yeah, it was another version of blackmail, but Mackenzie did deserve some consequences for the theft.

Though it was a little like the pot calling the kettle black since he'd just stolen some cats. Of course, Lucky figured he'd have plenty of consequences to face for that. Mason-Dixon wasn't just going to drop this, and Lucky would eventually have to offer him enough money to get him to back down.

Mackenzie finally huffed, took hold of Mia's hand. “All right.” But before she followed in step behind the doctor and Della, who was ready to lead them to the office, Mackenzie stopped next to Lucky. “You want me to make this bad for that idiot?” she whispered.

It was tempting. God, was it tempting. But Lucky couldn't pass up the chance to do something that might actually help Mackenzie. Mia, too.

“Just talk to him,” Lucky settled for saying. “Tell him whatever you want to tell him, and if he offers any advice, consider taking it.”

If Andrew heard any part of that, he didn't acknowledge it. He was checking his watch, but he did glance back at Cassie as Della was leading the girls and him to the office.

“After the girls and I talk,” Andrew said to Cassie, “then you and I need to have a chat, too. We can do that on the way to the San Antonio airport. I've booked us on a three-o'clock flight.”

CHAPTER ELEVEN

C
ASSIE
OPENED
HER
mouth to say something—
anything
—but Andrew had already walked away from her.

“You're leaving today?” Lucky asked.

She shook her head.

“Well, he thinks you are. Did he tell you he was booking that flight?” Lucky pressed.

Cassie had to shake her head again. Andrew was a take-charge kind of person. There were times when that could be a good thing. Like when she'd been falling apart. But it wasn't a good thing now.

“Don't worry,” Cassie told Lucky. “I won't leave you holding the bag with the girls. I'll stay until we find their aunt.”

“You're sure? Because Dr. Wonderful will likely try to bulldoze you into leaving on that afternoon flight.”

Yes, he would. And worse, there was a time she would have let him. But not now. It was her fault for giving Andrew power over her. Power to make decisions when she'd been too troubled to make them for herself. However, she couldn't let Andrew put her or anything else ahead of the girls.

Lucky was staring at her, and Cassie could tell he thought significantly less about her than he had just an hour ago. He no doubt thought she'd already lost the little bit of spine she'd found when she'd confronted her father.

“I know it's hard to understand,” Cassie said. She moved into the living room and sank down onto the sofa. “But Andrew was the only one there for me after... Well, after.”

After her client, Hannah Carpenter, had committed suicide.

“I'm not sure exactly what you were going through, but he was the only one there for you only because you didn't tell anyone else,” Lucky argued. “If you'd told Dixie Mae or me—”

Her look stopped him. A reminder that there was no way she would have told Lucky because he wasn't on her emotional radar at the time. And as for Dixie Mae, Cassie had called her shortly after it'd happened, but then her gran had gotten sick, and Cassie hadn't wanted to burden her any further with it.

Lucky glanced in the direction of the office. Then at her. “Will he be okay with the girls, or will he act like an asshole to them, too?”

“He'll be okay. Andrew is actually really good at what he does.” At relationships, though, not so much. He used every conversation as an attempt to fix rather than listen.

Lucky made a sound of disagreement. “He committed you to that place.”

She had to nod. “I could have fought it. I could have stopped him from doing it. But I didn't.”

Cassie hadn't meant to tell him that. It was one of those things she wasn't exactly proud of, but Lucky had already seen her at her worst—in the throes of a panic attack, and her wimpiness when dealing with Andrew and her father.

“So why didn't you stop Andrew?” he asked. “Is it because you're in love with him?”

“No.” Cassie blurted that out way too fast and much too loud. Which meant she had more explaining to do. And that explaining certainly wasn't going to paint her in a good light, either. “I loved him. Once. When we were in college together. But he's changed since he became a psychologist.”

“Good. I'd hate to think he's always run roughshod over you like this.”

Oh, he'd always done that, but Andrew had added a lot more honey in those days so that the
shod
hadn't felt so
rough
. Plus, she had tolerated more from him when they'd still been lovers.

“Andrew and I haven't been together like that in a while now.” Over a year. “But he still feels responsible for me.”

And now more explaining was required.

“Let me guess,” Lucky said before she could continue. “He dumped you, and he's feeling guilty about that, so now he's watching out for you.”

“Close,” she admitted. Actually, it was spot-on. “He can be a jerk, but I'm not sure I would have made it through these last months without him.” Cassie paused. “I had a client named Hannah Carpenter.”

Lucky didn't say anything. He just sat down on the sofa next to her. Not even that close. And he didn't look at her as if waiting for her to continue.

“As you've probably guessed from Marla, my clients don't usually have serious problems. They're more like small mental glitches. And in some cases, there aren't any problems at all. The client just wants to be in therapy because all his or her friends are. I call it the lemming effect.”

“Sheez,” he mumbled.

Her sentiments exactly. “They're semicelebrities with semiproblems,” Cassie added. “And I thought I wasn't doing any harm by seeing them and letting them talk through whatever issues they thought they had. But I missed the cues with Hannah. I knew she was depressed and was on meds that her doctor had prescribed. I thought she was making progress.”

“She was your patient for a long time?” he asked.

“Just a couple of months. We met on one of those advice TV shows where we were both guests, and she asked to continue seeing me.”

And she had. Eleven visits total, and Cassie could remember almost everything they'd talked about. Everything except for that last visit.

“I'd been in a hurry during that final session with Hannah,” she continued. “I was distracted thinking about another TV appearance. My mind kept going back to the notes I'd made for that, and I... Well, I messed up. I clearly didn't see how much distress Hannah was in, and later that night she took an overdose of sleeping pills.”

Lucky stayed quiet, but he did ease his arm around her, and he inched closer. She figured this was the point where most people would have added a horror story of their own to try to make her feel better. Especially since rumor had it that Lucky did have a personal tragedy. Something he felt guilty about.

Something to do with his parents' car accident.

There wasn't a general consensus regarding Lucky's involvement, but some said his parents had been so upset about something he'd done that it'd caused them not to be attentive enough to the other car. Others claimed Lucky had been in the other vehicle. So far, Lucky hadn't publically confirmed or denied anything, which only kept fueling the old gossip. However, he had told Dixie Mae, and that's how Cassie knew the rumors were wrong.

“And the panic attacks started after Hannah died?” he continued.

Cassie nodded. “But they're getting better. I haven't come close to having one since night before last.”

“You're sure?”

Only then did Cassie realize her breathing was off. Way too fast and shallow. The classic beginnings of a panic attack. “I should probably take my meds just in case.”

“Or we could try this.”

Cassie didn't even see the kiss coming, but she certainly felt it.
Wow.
That was her first thought anyway, and the
wow
just kept repeating in her head. Maybe because of all the heat his mouth was generating. Perhaps it had melted her brain.

If so, Cassie didn't care.

Suddenly, this seemed a lot more important that having a functioning brain.

Of course, she had shared a kiss with Lucky before. The fake kiss. But this wasn't fake. Or if it was, it felt a lot less fake than the other one, and the other one had packed a wallop. This one packed three wallops, and she had to mentally up it to eighty million wallops when Lucky deepened the kiss.

Ever since Cassie had first noticed Lucky and the effect he had on her gender, she'd wondered what it would be like to kiss him, to have him weave that testosterone spell around her. Well, now she knew. The spell was warm, golden and delicious. Just like Lucky, and in those couple of seconds she understood exactly why he'd managed to attract every girl in high school.

And every girl since.

How she'd ever resisted this, she didn't know, and worse, she didn't want to keep resisting it. Cassie wanted to continue this kiss until it led to something much more. Something that would relieve this ache that was suddenly in the southern regions of her body.

But that didn't happen.

Cassie heard a sound. One she didn't want to hear because it was someone clearing their throat. She pulled away from Lucky just as he pulled away from her, and their attention flew to the doorway.

Where Della and Wilhelmina were standing. And watching.

“I was having a panic attack,” Cassie blurted out. Good grief. Where had that come from?

“Okay,” Della said, sounding as skeptical as she should be. “Are you better now?”

“Yes.” And it was true. There were no signs of the panic attack, though her body was obviously prepping itself for something it wasn't going to get.

It wasn't going to get lucky. Or get Lucky for that matter.

“What about you?” Della asked, turning to Lucky. “Were you having a panic attack, too?” With the deserved chain-yanking, she smiled and lifted her hand to Wilhelmina. “We have company.”

Wilhelmina definitely wasn't smiling. Nor was she batting her eyelashes at Lucky today. And Cassie knew why.

“I'm so sorry,” Cassie told the woman right away. “I know we were supposed to bring over Mackenzie's apology, but things have been so crazy.”

Wilhelmina gave her a flat stare. “No,
Lucky
was supposed to bring me the apology and take me out to lunch.”

Lucky nodded, got to his feet. He glanced at Cassie, maybe to see if she really had escaped that panic attack. Or perhaps just because he couldn't believe he'd kissed her like that. Cassie was certainly having some trouble believing it herself.

“We'll still have that lunch,” Lucky assured the woman. He took the Post-it note apology that Mackenzie had written and handed it to her.

That didn't help Wilhelmina's mood any. “No longer lunch. You have to take me to dinner instead.”

Cassie huffed. “Do you really think Lucky should have to pay for this with his time? With dinner?”

“Yes,” Wilhelmina readily answered, looking not at Cassie but rather Lucky. “You can pick me up Tuesday after work, and I want to go to someplace fancy.”

Since there wasn't any place that qualified as fancy in Spring Hill, that meant Lucky would have to take her into San Antonio. Here he was pimping himself, and even though it was for a good cause—to keep Mackenzie out of lockup—it still didn't sit right with Cassie.

“And don't bring her on our date.” Wilhelmina shot Cassie a glare before she walked out.

“You should have told Wilhelmina that you were impotent,” Cassie grumbled.

Lucky shook his head. “Someone started a rumor about that when I was in high school, and nearly every girl in the senior class wanted to cure me.”

Della chuckled. “I remember that.” She patted his cheek. “What you should do is let everyone know you're off the market.” And her gaze drifted from Cassie, to him, back to Cassie again.

“Oh,” Cassie said. “Because of the kiss? Well, Lucky's not off the market. That was just, well... That just was.”

“Yeah,” Lucky agreed, though it was obvious none of them, including him, had any idea what he was agreeing with.

“You're sure?” Della pressed. “Because that kiss looked like—”

“Don't you have something to do in the kitchen?” Lucky interrupted.

“No. I have something to do right here.” Della handed Lucky a note. “It's from Logan,” Della explained. “Next week, he wants either Riley or you to go out and check on the park and see how the booths are coming along for the Founder's Day picnic.”

Lucky stared at the message as if debating what to do.

“Riley's tied up with ranching and wedding stuff,” Della reminded him. She gave his arm another pat. “I know it'll be hard for you. It always is. But maybe if you see the place before the crowds get there, it'll be easier.”

“I'll go,” Lucky said, his response too fast, as if he wanted to cut off anything else Della had to say.

He handed her back the note, leaving Cassie to wonder what was going on in his head.

“Maybe you can go with him?” Della asked her. It sounded as if Lucky needed that so Cassie nodded.

“Good,” Della went on. “If you want to take the girls, too, I can do up a picnic basket for you. Might do you all some good to get out of this house and away from...things.” Her gaze drifted toward the office where Andrew was.

Cassie definitely wouldn't mind getting away and catching a moment to clear her head, but then she heard the loud knock on the door. It didn't really even qualify as a knock, more like a pounding. Followed by several jabs on the doorbell.

“We might as well just leave the door open what with everyone coming and going,” Della grumbled, heading in that direction. Lucky and Cassie were right behind her, and Cassie hoped this wasn't the deputy returning to search for those cats.

But it was her father.

“Where are those goddamn cats?” he yelled.

Lucky stepped in front of both Della and her, and he blocked her father from actually entering the house.

“They're not here,” Lucky insisted. But his attention wasn't exactly on her father's face. It was on Mason-Dixon's arm. “Is that a misspelled tattoo?”

Considering the sheer ire in her father's expression, the question seemed odd. But then she remembered Lucky's extreme reaction to Dixie Mae's misspelled tat.

Mason-Dixon looked down at his right bicep where there was indeed a tattoo, one that Cassie had never seen. Regret Nothing. Except it was inked as
Reget
Nothing.

She was betting her father regretted something—that misspelling.

“Did you go to the same inker as your mom?” Lucky wanted to know. “Because if you did, give me his address so I can send that moron a dictionary.”

Her father pulled down his sleeve. “You're getting off the subject, trying to distract me. Well, it won't work.” His voice got louder with each word. “Davy said he looked and couldn't find those fucking cats. That means you have them stashed somewhere, and I want to know where. Those are my property.”