Marie Ferrarella - Fortune's Heirs - Reunion - Her Good Fortune / A Tycoon in Texas / In a Texas Minute

MILLS & BOON®

www.millsandboon.co.uk

By

Marie Ferrarellais a RITA® Award-winning author who has written over one hundred and thirty books, some under the name Marie Nicole. Her romances are beloved by fans worldwide.

To Patience Smith, my Guardian Angel, with sincerest thanks

“All right, what’s wrong?”

Maria Mendoza looked up from the items she was straightening on the counter. On it was displayed a multitude of skeins, her latest shipment of angora yarn. The veritable rainbow of colors appeared as cheerful as she was sad. Maria had hoped that keeping busy in the shop would dispel the darkness that insisted on dwelling inside of her. After all, this was her shop and it had become successful beyond her wildest expectations.

But none of that did anything to lift her mother’s mood.

“What makes you think something’s wrong?” With effort, she put on the best face she could for the dark-haired woman who had entered the shop.

Rosita Perez, her cousin and dearest friend in the whole world, frowned. “You and I have known one another for more years than I will willingly admit to anyone except for Reuben,” she said, referring to her husband. “I know when there’s something wrong with you. You look as if you’ve lost your best friend.” Rosita, older by four years but shorter by several inches, picked up a skein, as if debating whether she needed or wanted more wool, then replaced it. “And as far as I know I’m still breathing.”

Maria shook her head. “No, not my best friend, my daughters.” Then, because Sierra still lived within Red Rock’s city limits, she clarified, “Christina and Gloria,” although there was no need. Rosita was as aware of the girls’ location as she was.

Rosita placed a comforting hand on her shoulder. “Maria, this isn’t exactly anything new. The girls have been gone five years—”

“Exactly.” Maria sighed, struggling against the overwhelming sadness. “Five years. With no end in sight. This is not why I became a mother, Rosita, to hope for an occasional word from my daughters.” She splayed her hand over her chest. “There’s a hole in my heart.”

“You’ve still got Sierra and Jorge close by,” Rosita pointed out. She tactfully omitted mentioning Roberto, who’d moved to Denver, the same city that Gloria had chosen to disappear to.

“And a hole in my heart,” Maria repeated. Even if she’d had a dozen children, she’d still feel the lack of the two who had left. Roberto returned frequently, Gloria and Christina did not.

Rosita shrugged, spreading her hands wide. “So, plug it.”

Maria blew out a breath. Her cousin made the situation sound so simple. “How?”

Rosita wandered from display to display within Stocking Stitch, which was what Maria had chosen to call her store. “Get the girls to come home.”

Maria’s impatience continued to grow. She stepped in front of her cousin before Rosita could move to yet another display. “Again, how?”

Rosita shook her head. “I have never known you to be slow with ideas, ’Ria. You could throw a party.”

Of course, how could she not have thought of that? Jose would cook, as he always insisted on doing, and she could be the hostess. Nothing made her happier than to have everyone home, under one roof. Maria smiled. “A big party.”

“A big family party,” Rosita agreed.

The smile faded from Maria’s lips. She was deluding herself. “But the girls will pass when I ask them to fly out. This thing between them…” She had never gotten all the details, but it wasn’t a stretch for her to guess at what was going on. Christina, her oldest, and Gloria, her wild one, had had a falling out. Most likely over a man. “There’re bad feelings.”

Rosita remained unfazed. The two had spent many hours talking about their children. “So? Come up with something to block out these bad feelings.”

A smile took hold of Maria’s lips, melting away the years. By everyone’s standards, she was still a very handsome woman. “I could tell them that their father’s had a heart attack. They’ll come rushing back for that.”

“They’ll come rushing to the hospital,” Rosita pointed out. “That’s where they’ll expect to see him if he’s had a heart attack.”

Maria nodded. Rosita had a point. “Chest pains, then,” Maria amended. “We’ll hold a family reunion and I’ll tell the girls that if they miss this one, I don’t know if their father will be here for the next one.” She looked at her cousin, a sunny smile on her lips. “What do you think?” she asked as she picked up a pad and pen from the counter.

“I think that I’m happy we’re friends and not competitors.”

But Maria didn’t hear her. She was busy making notes to herself for the party she and her husband were about to throw.

Like an outsider staring through a one-way mirror, Gloria Mendoza Johansen looked slowly around at the people milling about and talking in her parents’ spacious living room. Everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves.

Just like the old days, she thought.

There were people in every room of the house, confined inside rather than spilling out onto the patio and the grounds beyond because of the cold weather. February in Red Rock, Texas, left its mark. At times raw, it could leech into your very bones.

But inside the house, everything was warm, cozy. The way she had once thought the world was. But she’d learned differently.

As she floated from place to place, observing, hesitating to join in, she twirled the stem of her glass. A wineglass to hide the fact that she was drinking seltzer instead of something alcoholic.

Because she was one.

A recovering alcoholic, to be exact. Except that alcoholics never really recovered, she thought wryly. They were doomed to an eternal dance, always careful to avoid the very thing that they would always, on some level, crave. A drink. But she had been sober two years now and she was determined to remain that way.

Nodding and smiling, she didn’t pause to talk to people who looked inclined to engage her in conversation. She was still picking her time, taking it all in. It felt strange coming home. In part, it was as if she’d stepped into a time warp and five years had just melted away, never having passed.

But they had passed.

They’d left their mark on her in so many ways. Too many for her to think about now. Besides, there really was no point.

Go forward, don’t look back.

It was something she told herself almost daily, a mantra she all but silently chanted within the boundaries of her mind. And now, finally, she was beginning to adhere to it.

“They’re your family. They won’t bite, Gloria. Mingle.”

Her mother. She’d caught the scent of her mother’s perfume a beat before the older woman had said anything.

Gloria glanced over her shoulder at the diminutive woman. At sixty-two, Maria Mendoza still had the same figure that had first caught Jose Mendoza’s eye, no mean feat after five children. She was wearing her shoulder-length black hair up tonight. The silver streaks added to the impression of royalty, which was in keeping with the way she and the others had viewed her when they’d been children. It was her mother who had summoned her like the queen mother to return home.