Chapter 12
Crandall Thorne grimaced as two needles were inserted into his vein, then connected to a plastic tube suspended from the dialysis machine beside his chair.
Lights blinked on the machine that monitored and maintained his blood flow while administering dialysate, a clear fluid used to draw waste products from his blood.
For four hours he would be chained to the detested machine, with nothing more to occupy his mind than reviewing the case files his associates had couriered to him that morning.
And then Caleb sauntered into the room, and suddenly the required four hours of treatment became a great deal more bearable.
Caleb saw the way his father’s face lit up when he entered the sunroom that doubled as Crandall’s home treatment center. But by the time he sat down in a wicker armchair beside him, the old man was wearing his typical poker face.
“You know you didn’t have to come all the way up here,” he said gruffly. “I don’t need my hand held.”
“Do you see me holding any hands?” Caleb retorted. He grinned at the woman standing beside Crandall, adjusting levers on the dialysis machine. “How ya doin’, Ms. Ruth?”
“I’m doing just fine, Caleb. And don’t you pay your father no mind. You know he’s always happy to see you. He’s just too proud to say so.”
Ruth Gaylord had been hired as Crandall’s private nurse over the summer, shortly after he was diagnosed with acute renal failure. Although she’d only been around for three months, she already seemed like a member of the family.
Her skin was the color of melted brown sugar, her black hair liberally woven with strands of gray that she claimed had been put there by her ornery employer.
But, as she told it, thirty years of marriage to a temperamental man had been her proving ground for working with the likes of Crandall Thorne.
Widowed three years ago and retired from a stressful career in oncology nursing, she’d been working as a home healthcare provider as a way to keep herself occupied between visits from her four grown children, who were scattered around the country.
“Are you done fooling with that machine?” Crandall groused at her.
“Calm down, or you’ll get your blood pressure up.
” She made one final adjustment and then patted his arm, gentle despite his brusqueness with her.
“I’ll be back to check on you in a little bit.
Caleb, would you care for something to drink?
I believe Gloria made a fresh batch of sun-brewed iced tea this morning before she left. Sweet, the way you like it.”
Caleb smiled at her. “Maybe later, Ms. Ruth. I drank a gallon of water on the way up here, so I won’t be thirsty for a while. But thanks, anyway.”
After the woman left the room and closed the door behind her, Caleb shook his head at his father. “I don’t know why anyone puts up with you.”
“They put up with me because I pay them more than they’ve ever received anywhere else,” Crandall asserted. “That includes everyone who works at the firm, right down to the administrative assistants.”
Caleb considered it, then gave his head another shake. “Nah, I don’t think that’s it. Hard as it is to believe, I think some of them genuinely like you, old man.”
“Old man, nothing. I may be hooked up to this confounded machine, but I can still take you across my knee, boy.”
Caleb chuckled, stretching out his long legs. “You heard Ms. Ruth. Don’t get your blood pressure up.”
Crandall scowled without any real rancor. With his free arm, he set aside the paperwork he’d been preparing to review and slowly removed his rimless reading glasses. He regarded his son in silence for a prolonged moment. “You didn’t tell me you had a visitor on Tuesday.”
Caleb stiffened at the reminder, then said levelly, “I didn’t think it was worth mentioning. Besides, you obviously didn’t need to hear it from me.”
“Still, it would have been nice.”
“Why?” Caleb challenged. “Would it have changed your mind about taking Lito’s case?”
Crandall’s lips flattened with displeasure. “I haven’t agreed to take his case.”
“But you will. I know you will.”
“What choice do I have? If I don’t, we both know what will happen.”
“Then let it happen,” snarled Caleb. “Maybe it’ll put an end to this senseless feud once and for all.”
His father’s nostrils flared. “There’s nothing ‘senseless’ about any of this. Your mother died—”
“That’s right, Dad, she died! Died because of a horrible secret you kept from her, from us, until it was too late!
” Angrily he lunged from his chair and stalked a few feet away, shoving his hands into his pockets to keep from smashing his fists through the wall and bringing the glass roof down on their heads.
Crandall watched his son pace the floor, a caged panther dressed entirely in black—black t-shirt, black jeans, black boots.
“We both know Philbin’s bluffing,” Caleb growled. “If he really knew anything, he would’ve gone public a long time ago.”
“Be that as it may,” Crandall said tersely, “I can’t afford to take any chances. I’ll send someone over to your place to sweep for bugs or other surveillance equipment. I’m not being paranoid,” he added at Caleb’s scowl. “My sources tell me he’s digging for information again.”
“He’s been digging for years.”
“Yes, but now he may have employed the services of a local private investigator. I have my people looking into it.”
Caleb’s harsh crack of laughter reverberated around the glass-walled room. “When does it ever end?” he bitterly demanded. “You have him investigated, he has you investigated, back and forth, wash, rinse, repeat. When the hell does it ever end?”
“Dammit, Caleb—” Beside Crandall, the dialysis machine beeped loudly in protest.
Half a moment later, the door swung open and Ruth strode into the room, her brisk, purposeful strides carrying her swiftly to Crandall’s side. She checked the machine, then made an adjustment that quieted the alarm.
In the ensuing silence, father and son glowered at each other like a pair of gunslingers facing off in an old western.
Ruth frowned, holding Crandall’s wrist and checking her watch. “Your blood pressure’s skyrocketing,” she scolded. “What on earth have you been doing in here?”
“Nothing,” he grumbled like a recalcitrant child.
Ruth sent a stern look over her shoulder at Caleb, who stood with his hands braced on his hips, vibrating with restrained fury. “If this were a clinic, you know I couldn’t allow you more than ten minutes an hour with him. Do I need to escort you out, Caleb?”
“No, ma’am,” he mumbled, shamefaced. “It won’t happen again.”
“Be sure that it doesn’t.” With one final warning look at her patient, she stalked out of the room—this time leaving the door wide open.
For several moments neither man spoke.
At length Caleb scrubbed his hands over his face and shoved out a deep, weary breath. “Look, I’m sorry. I didn’t come here to argue with you.”
“I know that,” his father said gruffly, “and believe me, I don’t want to argue with you, either. Truth be told, I’m glad you stopped by today. You’re a sight for sore eyes, son.”
Caleb walked back to the armchair he’d vacated, sat and propped his elbows on his thighs, the fight drained out of him.
“How’s the first week of classes going?” Crandall asked, making an attempt at safe conversation.
“Fine, thanks.”
“And what about your pretty lawyer friend? Does she still teach with you? You haven’t mentioned her name in quite a while. Any particular reason?”
“No,” Caleb answered dryly, knowing his father was fishing for information that wasn’t there. “And, yes, she still teaches at the university. I’ll tell her you asked about her.”
Crandall gave him a long, appraising look. “When are you going to marry her?”
Caleb smiled grimly. “How’d I know that question was coming?”
“Because you’ve been avoiding it for years.”
“Shara and I aren’t getting married, Dad. We’re just friends.”
His father lifted a dubious brow. “Does she know that?”
“Of course,” Caleb retorted, even as an image of Shara’s furious expression flashed across his mind. Since their confrontation yesterday, he’d told himself that the anger she’d displayed was nothing more than that of one concerned friend looking out for another.
But deep down inside, he knew better.
His father cut him a look that said he knew better, too. “I won’t presume to give you advice on your love life—”
“Then don’t.”
“But women can be very unpredictable and unstable creatures,” Crandall continued as if Caleb hadn’t spoken. “If you have no intention of making a commitment to this woman, you’d better make damn sure she knows it.”
“She knows it,” Caleb said shortly, then expelled a long, exasperated breath. “Look, I care for Shara a whole lot. We connect on many levels—intellectually, professionally and, yes, physically. We could probably make one helluva couple someday.”
Crandall grinned. “Sounds like the beginnings of a marriage proposal to me.”
Caleb shook his head, frustrated with his father’s relentless prying, but even more frustrated with his own inability to articulate the reasons he and Shara could never work.
Maybe because he hadn’t quite sold himself on the reasons, nebulous as they were.
Crandall brushed an invisible fleck of lint off the knife-blade crease of his trousers.
Though mostly confined to the ranch, he still got up every morning and dressed as if he were heading to the office.
“If you and Shara don’t work out,” he said casually, “you know Ruth’s youngest daughter is moving back to San Antonio next month. You could—”
“Nice try, Dad.”
Crandall scowled. “Can’t blame a man for wanting to see his only son happily married off while he’s still around to witness it. And while we’re on the subject, I wouldn’t mind having some noisy grandchildren running up and down these lands, either.”
Caleb couldn’t help chuckling. “You’re getting sentimental in your old age,” he drawled. But his thoughts had strayed, inexorably, to Daniela Moreau.