Daddy Lessons

The group followed the blonde until they were all standing there, staring at Kate and Eddie as though they were oddities.

“These animals can be dangerous,” Luke said to Eddie in a surprisingly patient and focused voice. “I told you before that you can’t come over here by yourself.”

“He’s not by himself,” Kate said. “I’m with him now, and I’m taking him home, and he’s not going to bother you again, are you, Eddie?”

“No, ma’am.”

“Oh, isn’t that cute?” the blonde gushed again, reaching for Eddie. “He’s so polite.”

Kate pulled him behind her. “Excuse me. We’ll be going now.”

“Well, sheesh, lady, we’re not going to contaminate him,” the redhead said.

Luke frowned, but Kate didn’t wait for the scene to get any uglier. She grasped Eddie’s hand and said, “Apologize to Mr. Simon.”

“I’m sorry I tried to see the zebras again.”

Luke nodded.

“And I’m sorry we interrupted your…party,” Kate added. She tugged her son across the drive, toward the cover of the trees and the safety of her brother’s ranch.

LATE THAT AFTERNOON, Luke excused himself from his unexpected—and frankly, unwanted—guests to take care of a little business. Or so he told them. He needed to get away for a few minutes. Their arrival, combined with Eddie’s surprise visit and Kate’s even more surprising arrival, had left him shaken. And Kate’s snobby reaction to his friends—more like former coworkers—had clearly defined their differences. She didn’t even want Marlena to touch her son.

Kate would be shocked if she knew how often Luke had thought about touching her. Not that he had any right to think about the woman. It was apparent she was one of those women who never associated with a working guy, and her behavior today had driven that point home. Her brother was rich, and she’d obviously grown up dripping in money. She wore classic clothes and drove a sensible car and had a polite son who just wanted to be a kid.

Well, the hell with her. If she was too good for them, she could just stay on her side of the fence.

Paul, Shelby and Marlena were high-energy, high-maintenance people. When he’d worked on a movie set with them, they’d been tolerable, even fun. Here in the quiet of the ranch, they seemed as out of place as a…well, a zebra in Texas.

As he walked back from the mailbox at the end of his driveway, he speculated that maybe they’d want to go out later. He’d been to Shultze’s Roadhouse several times for a beer and a burger and found the place entertaining. The jukebox played country and western, and Texas-oriented beer signs hung on the walls. Marlena and Shelby would gush at the “authentic” decor. As soon as he sorted the mail, he’d recommend they visit the local hangout. Without him.

Several bills, a handful of catalogs—nothing unusual. Then a carefully hand-printed address caught his attention. He didn’t know anyone in Florida.

He slit the envelope and pulled out a letter. A photo—the kind taken by school photographers—fell to the desk. He picked it up and looked at the little girl’s face. A sense of déjà vu rushed over him, as though he’d seen her before. But he knew he hadn’t, so after studying her sun-streaked dark brown hair and amazingly mature brown eyes, he leaned the photo against the lamp and began to read.

“Dear Mr. Simon,” the letter began, neatly printed like the envelope. “You don’t know me, but nearly nine years ago you knew my sister, Shawna Jacobs.”

Luke’s heart skipped a beat as he remembered his late mother’s former coworker. Shawna had been a pretty, helpful and sympathetic friend when he’d needed one, lending a hand as he sorted through his mother’s belongings after her untimely death. Comfort had turned to passion, and for a week or so he’d shared Shawna’s bed.

He’d been young, the sex fumbling but energetic. She’d claimed she was on the pill. He hadn’t given the consequences a second thought.

He looked back at the photo. No. It couldn’t be….

Chapter Two

Luke continued reading with a mixture of excitement and dread. “My sister tried to contact you after you went away, but she couldn’t find you in California because she thought your name was Moretti, the same as your mother’s. I just found out your real last name and tracked you down on the Internet.”

Luke’s mother, Angela Moretti, had never married. His father, Ronald Lucas Simon, already had a family when he seduced and deserted her. The bastard.

“This will come as a big surprise, but you have a daughter. Brittany is eight years old and in the third grade. Right now, she needs you because Shawna is dead and I’m driving long haul starting in a month.”

No! his mind screamed. Shawna might have been on the pill, but no birth control was one hundred percent foolproof. She could have had his baby. It was possible.

He wished Shawna were alive to ask. He wished he’d thought of her after driving away from his mother’s apartment nearly nine years ago. He was sorry Shawna was dead, but the truth was, she hadn’t meant much to him. He felt especially bad about that now, considering she’d had a child. Maybe his child, he thought, shaking his head.

He knew nothing about children, except that they were frequently loud and often unruly. Just look at Eddie Wooten, who kept disobeying his mother and coming across the fence. Luke had no idea how to stop that child from indulging his fascination with the ponies and zebras. How in the world could he relate to an eight-year-old girl?

Plus, this ranch was barely livable, except for the animals. Their barn was repaired, their fences secure. They had plenty of food and fresh water. But a human, a little girl? He didn’t know how to feed a child, much less bathe and dress one for school.

He may be a father, but he was nowhere near being a dad.

Luke pushed away his panic and continued reading. “You’ll need to get all this approved by a judge. I’ve already contacted the court here in Florida, since my parents are both dead and I don’t have any other relatives. I guess you’ll also want to meet Brittany. I’m hoping you can come to Florida right away.” Shawna’s brother, Andy Jacobs, gave his home and cell phone numbers and asked Luke to call him as soon as he got the letter. He closed by asking Luke not to waste time; the long-haul trucking job he’d taken started in a month and Brittany had nowhere else to go.

If Luke didn’t claim his daughter, she’d become a ward of the state. A foster child. Unwanted. Deserted by the only two people who had cared for her.

He wouldn’t let that happen. Not if she were really his child.

Clutching the letter, Luke sat down on a desk chair that creaked in protest. Of all the things that could have happened to him, of all the twists and turns of his life, this was the most incredible.

He’d never thought about having children. And if he ever did decide to, he certainly would have expected them far, far into the future. Not this month, on a ranch that was barely functional. Not a girl, for pity’s sake, and one already eight years old.

He didn’t know what to do. Except that he would go to Florida to see her, and if she was indeed his daughter, he would claim her as his own.

Paul, Shelby and Marlena burst through the door, laughing and chatting, bringing Luke back to the present. He placed the letter, printed side down, on the desk.

“Say, we’re getting hungry. Is there a place to go out around here? Beer’s on me,” Paul said.

“Shultze’s Roadhouse is on the state highway, just a couple of miles from here,” Luke replied, still seated. He glanced again at Brittany’s photo, leaning against the lamp. She resembled him, he realized. That’s why she’d seemed so familiar. She had his coloring and his eyes. Her mouth and wavy hair were Shawna’s.

“Hey, who’s that?” Shelby asked.

“She’s…that’s Brittany.”

“Cute kid. A relative?”

Luke looked up at his friends. They were completely out of place here in Ranger Springs, just as he was completely out of place as a father. But still, that’s what he was—most probably—and he’d darn well better get used to it.

“She’s my daughter,” he said simply.

“Oh. Oh, wow.” Marlena appeared almost as stunned as he felt. “I didn’t know you had a kid.”

“A daughter. She’s eight.” He picked up the photo and stared at Brittany’s image again, a slow smile forming. “I didn’t know either, until today.” He got up from the chair and turned to Paul. “You guys go on without me. I have to get my ranch ready for a little girl.”

“You sure?” Paul asked. “We could have a good time.”

“I’m sure. It’s been good seeing you again, but things have changed.” He looked down at Brittany’s photo again, thinking about his ranch, his responsibilities, and his vow to live a quiet, low-key life. “Everything has changed.”

AS SHE STOOD on her small balcony watching the sun set over the trees between her brother’s property and Luke Simon’s ranch, Kate mentally kicked herself for her earlier behavior. She’d come across as an incompetent mother for not keeping Eddie at home, not to mention a klutz as she stumbled out of the tree line and into Luke’s little party. They might even think she was a snoop, since she had been listening and watching a private rendezvous. To top it off, she’d offended the grasping Baywatch-like blonde who had almost gotten her hands on Eddie. Kate couldn’t believe that when she’d faced Luke Simon up close, her brain had just stopped working, unable to communicate anything intelligent to her mouth. How she had to have seemed to him and his visitors!