“Oh boy, you’re in for it,” Todd said to Linx when he stopped by to pick up Tami for lunch. After Linx gave Todd a nudge, he’d agreed to be friendly with Tami, but only as a little sister. Whatever, the guy was clueless, and he was about to get hit full force by Hurricane Tami. Good luck to him.

“You’re really in for it,” Todd repeated when Linx didn’t respond. “And what are you smirking about?”

“Oh, nothing, but what exactly am I in for?” Linx had just sent Jessie home with her mother. Fortunately, the Hart clan had retired to Joe’s Diner minutes before Mrs. Patterson arrived to pick up Jessie. They were staying for the festival and had taken every room in the Over Easy Bed & Breakfast, leading Tami to declare the need for a hotel in town.

“Dad invited Grady’s entire family to dinner tonight.” Todd lifted an eyebrow to watch for her reaction.

“Oh, no!” Linx flapped her hands uselessly. “I wanted to introduce Grady first and explain what had happened without his family milling around.”

“Everyone knows by now,” Tami said, sidling up to Todd. “It’s the talk of the town.”

“Do the Pattersons know?” Linx was horrified that they might stop Jessie’s visits to the center, but at the same time, she wasn’t sure what exactly it was that everyone knew.

“Look at you, all guilty.” Tami guffawed and hooked her hand around Todd’s arm. “Everyone knows you’ve got a new guy, but no, we would never let on about that other matter. Have a little faith in us.”

“I want what’s best for Jessie,” Linx said. “Only I don’t know what that is. I fantasize about the life we could have had. Me, Jessie, and Grady, but I don’t think we would have been as good for her as the Pattersons.”

“Don’t shortchange yourself.” Tami slipped her hand down Todd’s arm and grasped his hand. “You and Grady will make great parents. Look at how you take care of Ginger.”

“A dog is not a baby.” Linx huffed while perversely enjoying the way her brother was frozen stiff. “Anyway, I asked Becca to drive up from Sacramento so she can give Grady some advice.”

Todd withdrew his hand and punched a fist into his beefy palm. “That’s great. Looks like the family powwow is all set.”

It was going to be explosive all right.

“I need to go speak to Dad separately,” Linx said. “I can’t spring this on him in one go, especially if Grady’s family is going to be there. I trust you’ll let Chad, Vivi, Joey, Scott, and Becca know about how Salem got in between Grady and I?”

“You bet,” Tami said, leaning up against Todd. “They need to know Grady isn’t all bad. Now that we know he’s Jessie’s father, we need to do what we can to help, and Salem makes a perfect villain.”

“She was my friend, though.” Linx heaved a sigh. “Guess I’m not good at reading people.”

“Are you saying I’ll betray you, too?” Tami rolled her eyes.

“No, but I feel like I’m betraying the Pattersons.” Linx pinched the bridge of her nose. “Becca’s going to give Grady advice on taking Jessie away from them, and I’m fantasizing about me being Jessie’s mom for real. What kind of person does that make me?”

“A normal one.” Tami slid by Todd, making sure to brush against him, and reached to hug Linx. “You and Grady made mistakes like everyone else, but I think you learned from them already.”

“I want Jessie back so bad, but I gave my word.” Linx’s throat tightened. “I’m not sure Grady can get her back, and then he’ll be mad at me forever.”

“We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it,” Todd said. “You go talk to Dad and let him in on what’s going on, and Becca will take care of the legal side of things.”

“Everything will work out. You’ll see.” Tami slung her purse over her shoulder and batted her eyelashes at Todd. “You listen to your big brother. He knows best.”

Yuck. Linx wasn’t sure if she could stomach Tami’s blatant flirting, but at the same time, if it made Todd sweat bullets, the entertainment might be worth it.

* * *

Grady found himself sitting between his parents at Joe’s Diner where his family took up half of the tables.

“You’ve made a fine mess,” his father said. “Why didn’t you look her up once she told you she was pregnant?”

“Or had us look into it,” his mother said, fanning herself with the menu. “She’s such a sweet girl.”

Grady did a double take and ran his fingers through his hair. No one who knew Linx Colson would ever describe her as sweet.

“Look, our lines got crossed, okay?” he grumbled, wishing he were at the other table with his younger siblings.

“Linx is partially at fault, too,” Cait said, wrinkling her nose. “She played games with Grady when we met her last Christmas.”

“If she really cared, she would have contacted us. We would have helped her.” Connor put his arm around his wife possessively. “That baby was a Hart.”

“She also kept his dog,” Brian added. “What kind of woman does that?”

“A fragile woman who’s insecure. Her mother hates her and said she was the worst kid.” Grady’s fist tightened over his knee. “She left them because she couldn’t stand Linx.”

“Oh, my stars,” Grady’s mother exclaimed. “Then we must love her even more. The poor child.”

“You’re not upset she gave away your first grandchild?” Connor tugged his wife even closer as she held their daughter, Amelia, the first official Hart grandchild.

“Mistakes were made by everyone,” Father said. “Question now is what do we do about it?”

“I want what’s best for Jessie,” Grady said. “She should be with her real parents.”

His mother glanced at his father and then at Cait who tightened her lips in a frown.

“Some might say the Pattersons are her real parents,” Nadine, Connor’s wife, said in a soft voice. “They’re the only ones she knows.”

“I was never given a chance to know her.” Anger rolled through Grady’s gut.

“That’s not the Pattersons’ fault,” Nadine said. “They took Jessie when no one wanted her.”

Nadine was an artist, and the product of an affair between her father, who was married to another woman, and her mother, who was the side piece, and she had a sensitive soul.

She had a point, although the sooner Jessie knew the truth, the more time she would have to adjust to it.

Grady swallowed a lump in his throat and blinked. “I don’t want to hurt Jessie or the Pattersons, but I have my rights.”

“It comes down to Linx signing away her parental rights.” Connor’s voice boomed a little too loud, and several other patrons turned toward them.

Everyone in the small town knew who they were, and Grady cringed when he recognized two of the rescue center volunteers and their parents.

“Let’s not discuss this here,” Grady said. “Linx asked her lawyer sister to dinner tonight, and we can get advice from her.”

“I looked up the law on the internet,” Cait chimed in, always eager to upstage her siblings. “You might be out of luck because you didn’t claim your paternity before the adoption was finalized.”

“How could I when I had no clue?” Grady slapped the menu onto the table.

Cait shrugged. “That’s all I know from the website.”

“I looked also,” Grady grumbled. “They said the father had to be notified. Linx never notified me, and the courts never tried to track me down.”

“Then you have a case,” his father said. “The court made a mistake when they took her word that the father was unknown.”

“Still, it’s been almost six years.” Mother wrung her hands, always the worrywart. “They might ask why you didn’t come back once Jessie was born and take a paternity test.”

“Because Linx told me she was never pregnant. That she didn’t have a baby.” Grady threw up his hands and growled. “How was I supposed to know that scar on her abdomen was a C-section scar? I thought she had her appendix taken out or something.”

The entire diner went silent, and Grady wished he could sink into a big hole. His family knew how to push his buttons, and they discussed things to death. It was no wonder he wanted to leave and never come back.

“I hope you won’t hate Linx if you can’t get custody.” Cait had the knack for saying the exact wrong thing. “I think she really wants to work it out with you.”

“Sure, because she has a snowflake’s chance in hell of getting custody of Jessie except through me.” Grady shoved himself from the table. “I need some air.”

* * *

Linx leaned with her father against the white three-rail fence of the horse corral. He squinted in the sun at the trainers exercising his show horses and nodded as Linx told him about Grady and their big misunderstanding.

“The worst part of it was that I lied to him when he finally contacted me.” She kept her eyes on her favorite mare—a fiery chestnut named Reina. “Why do I do stupid things like that?”

“You were running.” Her father chewed on his words, letting each one come out in a slow drawl. “Running from the truth.”

“There’s no excuse.” Linx hefted a sigh. “I’m simply a bad person. I got pissed at him for not caring, so I lied.”

“Suspect you were hurt. Like your mom was hurt.”

Linx’s stomach clenched and the air left her lungs. “Hurt? What could she possibly be hurt about? She left because of me, because you stuck up for me and that stupid red dress.”

Her father pressed his hand on her shoulder. He still stared at the horses. “Wasn’t because of that. She wanted to love you, but it hurt, so she left—easier that way. Just like you gave Jessie away and lied to Grady. Easier to pretend it never happened.”

“No, that wasn’t the reason. I’m nothing like her.” Linx’s heart roiled with fury. “I would never leave my family. My children. Seven of us. I gave Jessie away because I wanted a better life for her, not because I was hurt.”

“You lied to Grady because it was easier to send him away.”

“He wouldn’t have believed me.” Linx swallowed back a sob. “He thought the worst of me, that I’m a liar, have a bad temper, an evil and black heart.”

Her father turned his flinty eyes on her. “After Jessie was born, you could have had the court order a paternity test.”

“I know, but I just wanted it over and done with. What if he can’t get Jessie back?” She covered her face as tears leaked from between her fingers. “He’ll never forgive me.”

“Maybe he already has,” her father mumbled. “I’ve forgiven your mother.”

“For leaving all of us? But that’s you, Dad. You’re loving and kind-hearted. You’re a saint.”

“Not a saint.” Her father rubbed her back and pulled her into an embrace. “Just a man who understands why she left.”

“Why?” Linx leaned against her father’s solid warmth. “Why did she leave? Was it me? Did she hate me so much?”

“She saw herself in you, but no, she didn’t hate you.”

“She left because of me, didn’t she?” Linx’s heart pounded with a heavy dread. “It was me and my bad temper. I told her I hated her. It was my fault.”

“Not your fault.” Father’s voice was gruff.

“Then why did she leave? I don’t understand.”

“It’s not my secret to tell. You’ll have to ask her.” He kissed the top of her head, and pinched her cheek gently.

“I can’t ask her if I can’t find her.” Linx could barely get the words out between her sobs. Except her mother had made contact—sort of.

“She doesn’t much like talking. She needs her space—like a wild horse. Can’t pen her in.”

Dark rage boiled deep in Linx’s gut, and she clenched her fists at the excuses her father gave, as if he cared more about her mother than his seven children.

“I still hate her. Unless you tell me her secret, I will always hate her.”

“Remember that woman who drowned all her kids?” Father took off his Stetson and picked at the rim. “Perhaps running away saved your life. Maybe it was the best thing she could have done for you.”

“She wanted to kill me?” Linx staggered, grabbing onto the rail fence.

“She needed help, and she refused to get it.” He held Linx up and led her from the corral. “Despite it all, I believe she loved all of you.”

“Even me?”

“Even you.” His deep cowboy voice sounded so reassuring, and he’d never lied to her.

“Am I nuts also? Do I need help?” Linx hardly dared to raise her eyes.

“You need help accepting what you did. I never used to cotton to those psychotherapist mumbo jumbo, but after your mother left, Gran invited one to the ranch to stay with us. She helped you guys, too.”

“I don’t remember going to any therapist,” Linx muttered, shaking her head.

“The nanny who helped with the babies, Miss Sharon was a licensed child psychologist. All of you were hurting. You’re still hurting, more than the others. You were always the wild one.”

“Whatever happened to her?” Linx walked alongside her father back into the ranch house. “She was like a ray of sunshine, always happy and playing games with us.”

“She got married and moved away, but unfortunately, her husband died earlier this year. When Todd told me you were seeing Grady on the sly, and how you loved and hated him at the same time, I wrote to her and asked her to come for a visit. Will you let her help you?”

“I’m not lying on a couch.” Linx stopped in front of the front door. “And I hate talking about myself.”

“Then talk about Grady and Jessie.” Father opened the door and they stepped into the house. “Or Cedar or Ginger. Or what makes you happy.”

Sharon looked up from the couch where she was working on her laptop, and a smile crinkled her eyes.

She was older than Linx remembered, but it had been twenty years since she helped out around the ranch.

Linx rushed to the woman who’d helped Father and Gran and threw her arms around her.

“Linx, you’re more beautiful than your father described.” Sharon gave her a warm, tight hug and leaned back, beaming at her. “And so tall.”

“Dad brought you here for me?” Linx’s heart was flooded with warmth, and she turned to her father, throwing her arms around him. “Thank you, Dad. I’m so tired of hurting. So tired of fighting. Of running, and of hating.”