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“The hair comes from my mother,” she said. “She’s Swiss. Very pale and delicate looking. My father was the complete opposite. Dark and swarthy. So handsome. They were a beautiful couple.”
“But not happy,” he said, knowing it intuitively.
“No, but I don’t think that was ever their goal. They both came from prominent families and it was a good match. Both personally and in business. My mother’s father eventually merged his corporation with my father’s. People will get married for a lot less than two hundred billion dollars.”
Duncan whistled. “I imagine so. You make it sound like feudal England.”
“Things haven’t changed that much between the wealthiest families.”
Duncan tucked the comment away for later. It was a different class system altogether when you got into the billion-dollar mark. There were only so many families she could belong to, and it wouldn’t be too hard to do a little digging and find out where she came from. But he wouldn’t. It had to be on her terms.
“Dad wasn’t like anyone else,” she said thoughtfully. “He never cared about the money. They called him a black sheep, and even his father disowned him, so he had to make his way on his own. Unfortunately, my mother didn’t know that when she married him, and she was very resentful.
“But my dad was a man of integrity. He wanted to make a difference, so he joined the Secret Service out of college and worked his way up. He protected two presidents.” Her voice held a note of pride.
“Really?” Duncan asked, his pencil never stopping. “That would explain how he knows Atticus.”
Hattie nodded. “And then he went into the private sector and the money was everything my mother always expected. But there was a downside. He was gone a lot, and my mother was embarrassed by what he did because he actuallyworkedfor a living instead of trotting after her all over the world while she fulfilled the socialite lifestyle. So I got stuck with a nanny. When he came back home he had no clue where she was, or who the woman watching me was. I was six years old, and he decided things had to change. That’s when he met Atticus.”
“He sounds like a great man,” Duncan said, shading in around her mouth. Her smile had softened as she was talking about her father, and he wanted to capture the sweetness.
“He was,” she agreed.
“Did your mother ever come back?” he asked.
The smile disappeared and frown lines marred her face. “Eventually,” she said, and left it at that. “She’s never been part of my life. Not unless she had an agenda.”
“You’re angry at her,” he said.
“Oh, yes,” she told him. “Very. And I’m thankful every day she’s out of my life.”
He turned to a new page in his sketchbook. The light had changed and a soft afternoon drizzle had started to fall. It wouldn’t last long. It never did. But he changed the focus of his new drawing to her face—from those bedroom eyes to the sexy mole at the corner of her mouth.
“How’d you break your nose?” he asked, rubbing the tip of his finger on the crooked line he’d just drawn.
“Car wreck,” she said automatically, but her voice had gone flat. She didn’t volunteer the fact that Derek had been driving them home from a party, far too drunk to be behind the wheel of a car. He’d been in a mood and wouldn’t let anyone talk him out of driving, and none of the crowd he ran with tried very hard anyway.
He’d been angry and belligerent because he’d seen a man talking to her at the party, and he was sure she was having an affair with him. It hadn’t seemed to matter that Derek was making the accusation with another woman’s lipstick on his collar from a quick tryst he’d had in the bathroom. And it didn’t matter that the man he accused had only been asking if she wanted a refill on her drink.
Derek had railed at her the entire way home, his anger growing until she saw stars from the backhand he gave her. That was what broke her nose, but it had only been seconds later that he’d smashed the car into a light pole. It had been easy enough to blame the broken nose on the car wreck.
“I didn’t mean to make you sad,” he said, noting the change in her expression.
“It’s in the past,” she said. “What about your parents? I don’t even need to ask if you’re close. It’s obvious your entire family is close.”
“Oh, sure,” he said. “But my parents are special. I never take it for granted. Our land has been in the family since the late 1800s. My dad took some time after college to decide if ranch life was really what he wanted, so he and some friends decided to travel across the States. When they got to New York he just happened to see my mother in a performance ofKiss Me Kateon Broadway, and it was love at first sight.”
He stopped sketching to grin at her. “I told you it runs in the family.”
She rolled her eyes and her cheeks pinkened again, but she didn’t say anything.
“My mom gave up her career to come back here with my dad, but she’s never regretted it and she’s as much a part of this town as anyone who has multiple generations of family from Laurel Valley.”
“That’s nice,” Hattie said softly. “That she didn’t resent your dad or her children because of what she lost.”
“She found something new instead,” Duncan said. “She’s a brilliant lyricist, and has won several Tonys and an Emmy for some of the music she’s written. Howard and O’Hara are as popular today as Rodgers and Hammerstein.”
Hattie’s mouth formed a silentOand then she said, “I guess I didn’t put it together. I know your mother’s work well.”
