“Do you have a relationship with Mr. Rhoads’s children?”
“We are still getting to know each other. They came to my office together two months ago, after Se?or Rhoads moved to Bayshore Oaks, to learn about the nature of his commitments. I am hopeful they will honor their father’s intentions for the ranch.” He looked over Lana’s shoulder and smiled. “And its glorious potential.”
Lana turned and saw Mr. Rhoads’s daughter gliding toward them with a determined look on her face. Diana Whitacre was in her early fifties, with porcelain skin that splintered into faint lines at the corners of her chilly slate-blue eyes. Her mouth held a smile that was equally cold.
“Se?or Morales,” she murmured, leaning away as he moved to kiss her cheek, “you aren’t signing up new donors at my father’s wake, are you?”
“Se?ora Di. I would never—”
“I’m very glad to hear it. If you might excuse us?”
Victor raised an eyebrow at Lana. Then he turned to Diana and tipped his hat. “I hope you will allow me to take you and your brother to lunch soon, Se?ora Di. We have much to discuss.”
“We’re quite occupied at the moment,” Diana said.
“I only want to honor your father—”
“Another time. Please.” She waved him off with a tiny flick of her hand.
“Charming man,” Lana said, watching him walk away.
“I suppose that depends on your definition of charm.” Diana’s voice was low, clipped. “Are you a patient of that nurse?”
Lana felt a prickle of heat under her silk scarf. Had something given away her condition? Was it the new wig?
“No, I . . . she’s my daughter.”
“I see,” Diana said. “Visiting?”
“From Los Angeles. I’m here temporarily. Lana Rubicon. My condolences.”
The blond woman dipped her head in acknowledgment. Apparently she was too polite to ask why precisely Lana had decided to crash her father’s wake. But not too polite to keep her hands to herself. Diana reached a well-manicured finger out to stroke a dancing horse on the scarf around Lana’s neck.
“Forgive me. I saw you earlier and I had to ask. Is this—”
“Dior,” Lana said. She resisted the urge to step back.
“The dressage collection,” Diana said. “Only one hundred were made.”
“It was a gift,” Lana said. “I thought it might be appropriate for this occasion.”
“Quite. My father and I shared a deep love of horses.” Diana looked off across the fields, then focused back on the scarf. “A gift from a friend?”
“Business partner. We developed the Zuniga Spa and Ranch together, down in Malibu.”
“Zuniga.” Diana repeated the word under her breath, like an incantation. “I’ve stayed there. Very impressive.” She paused and looked at Lana uncertainly. “Are you . . . working on a project up here?”
“In a way,” Lana said. Diana was fishing for something, but Lana couldn’t figure out what. So she decided to do her own digging. If Ricardo was working with Hal Rhoads, perhaps he was connected with others here as well. “I’ve been learning about the slough. And that young man who died.”
“Ricardo Cruz?”
“Did you know him?”
The blond woman looked off over the rolling fields that led down to the water. She straightened her shoulders and adjusted the veil over her hair. When she turned back to Lana, her cool, thin smile was again in place.
“Hardly, my dear. I’d heard that he was back, working for the land trust. I only saw him once, walking the fields up here with Daddy.”
“Back?”
“His parents worked for Daddy decades ago. Ricardo was one of the ranch kids, always underfoot, taunting cows and making mud pies. It’s a terrible shame, of course.”
“My granddaughter was the one who found him.” Lana was watching Diana carefully now.
“Is that so?” Diana glanced over to the fields once more. Then she fished an embossed card out of her tiny black purse and pressed it into Lana’s hand. “Ms. Rubicon, I hope you might call me. Perhaps on Monday? I’d like to talk . . . business. Now, if you’ll excuse me—I see my brother is making a fool of himself again.”
Chapter Eighteen
Beth backed away from the buzzing clusters of people until she found herself on the edge of a grassy field, face-to-face with a large, doe-eyed cow. Behind it, she could see two fallen fence posts and a strand of twisted wire sagging down onto the ground.
She stood very still, daring the cow to come closer. It was orangey-brown and huge, with long eyelashes and an upside-down R branded onto the left side of its rump. Beth had dated a rodeo manager once who’d explained to her how brands worked. There was a whole system for registering brands, like trademarks, so you knew whose cows were whose. One rancher might own a brand that looked like an upside-down L—a “crazy L” they called it—on the left back flank of the animal, and another cattleman might own the same design on the right. Her ex-boyfriend had talked about reading the brands, “calling” them, like it was an art form, the farmer’s version of interpreting graffiti on train cars. Beth thought it was barbaric and capitalist and beautiful all at once.
It suddenly hit her that she was standing in the same field she’d seen in that photograph of Mr. Rhoads with his kids and cattle, so many years ago. She squinted at a cloud of flies dancing above the cow’s tail, wondering how many generations, how many creatures, had been raised under Mr. Rhoads’s care. And what would happen to them now that he was gone.
“Hey! Cow!”
Beth spun around at the man’s voice. It was Mr. Rhoads’s son, Martin. The sun was directly behind him, forming a corona around his dark suit that made him almost glow. He stepped onto the grass in his shiny dress shoes, pointing sternly at the animal. The cow seemed unimpressed.
“Does that ever work?” Beth asked.
“For my dad, sure,” Martin said. “I never got the knack for it.”
Mr. Rhoads had told Beth once about how cows don’t have much depth perception. She positioned herself squarely in front of the animal, waving her arms like an air traffic controller. It felt a little ridiculous, but then the cow looked at her, gave a deep sigh, and started to move.
“Wow. So you’re a nurse and a cow whisperer.”
Was he making fun of her? Beth looked carefully at the tall, well-groomed man standing beside her. Martin’s watch alone was probably worth more than her car. But his deep-set brown eyes were tired, and there were threads of silver running through his dark hair. She decided today, of all days, he deserved the benefit of the doubt.
“Your father told me a lot of stories about this place,” she said. “I’m so sorry that he’s gone.”
They stood together, watching the cow shuffle back through the broken fence.
“Do you go to all your patients’ funerals?”
“Only my favorites.”
“Dad told me he liked you. Having you show up today, it’s even more clear why.”
“What do you mean?”
Martin smiled. “Your jeans. Dad was never much for fancy clothes or parties. All this hoopla. He’d have said we might as well make ourselves useful and castrate the calves or raise a barn.”
“Or fix the fence.”
“I never had the knack for that either. Dad would always ask what all my fancy engineering degrees were worth if I couldn’t maintain a cow fence.”
Beth heard the sadness in his voice, as if somehow his father had died because Martin hadn’t lived up to his standards. She watched him fidget with his silk tie.
“Just because you’re different from your father doesn’t mean he didn’t love you.”
He looked at her for a long moment, and Beth wondered if he was going to cry. Instead, he swallowed hard.
“I know you deal with this at work all day, but I’m wondering . . .” He shook his head. “Would you be willing to get coffee one morning? To talk about my dad? I’ll be here at the ranch for a while, working with my sister to iron things out. I’d love to hear a little more about the man you knew.”