when there was such bitterness in his voice. Had he loved Sarah’s mother so much—still missing her even now, after all this time—that he could not discuss her? His abrupt statement was patently false, of course. What young girl didn’t want to know everything about a mother who had never been part of her life?
Joan wanted to ask more, but the hot message glowing in Cody Matthews’s eyes told her that lingering over this line of questioning would gain her nothing. It was absurd and frustrating to feel so much and know so little.
“Who else makes up your household?”
“My father. Merlita, our live-in housekeeper. Ranch hands.”
“No one else?”
“No.”
His mouth flattened, as though he was angry with himself for allowing emotion to seize him, even temporarily. His fingers played along the rim of his cup a long moment. Long enough for her to notice that his hands were beautifully shaped and not at all what she’d expect from a high-powered businessman. Tanned and unmanicured, they were a workingman’s hands.
She made a few more notes on her pad. When she looked up, she discovered that he was watching her intently. His thumbs were hooked under his belt; the slight movement of his fingers made the dining-room light shoot sparks from that preposterous buckle. Her hand stilled, but her chin inched upward. “Something wrong?”
“You take a lot of notes.”
“They’ll give me a better picture of your daughter’s situation.”
“May I read them?”
“Of course,” she said, trying not to register anything but the mildest agreement. “If you feel that they threaten you in some way.”
The look he gave her sent shivers down her spine. “You have a sharp tongue for a woman who’s fresh out of work and just moved out on the love of her life.”
The knowledge that he knew such intimate details about her personal life left her stunned, but she refused to show it. She met his eyes. Trying to modulate her voice, she said, “And you have quite a belligerent attitude for a man whose ten minutes are up and who still seems to need my help.”
Not a flicker of a response crossed his face. Had she overestimated her ability to carry her own weight in a contest of words with this man? A hush took over the room, unbroken except for the growl of afternoon traffic in the street. And then, just before his silence could unnerve her completely, he made a low sound in his throat that could have been laughter.
“All right,” he said, and his face had lightened a little. “What else would you like to know?”
Relieved, she dived into safer water. “Has Sarah had a physical recently?”
“Yes, I had the doc check her out thoroughly when she was in the hospital last year to have her tonsils out. Nothing to worry about there.”
“What about her education? What’s that like?”
“Public school in Goliath—that’s the nearest town of any size. I’d prefer better, but there’s nothing private near the ranch, and I’m not going to pack her off to some fancy boarding school thousands of miles away, see her head stuffed with a bunch of nonsense and have her sent home only on holidays.”
Joan showed no trace of opinion on this information, but secretly she was pleased by Matthews’s determination to keep his daughter close to home. She herself had been sent to all the best schools abroad, and with a tinge of the old regret, she wondered if her parents had ever been as impassioned about her as this man seemed to be about Sarah. She shook off the thought immediately. Now was not the time to mourn for things that had never been. “Has the school done any special testing? What do her teachers think?”
“She’s ahead of most of her class, but her grades have been up and down this last semester. Her teachers say she’s quick and eager sometimes, but often disruptive and disobedient. One of them—Miss Beasley—is the same crab-apple old witch I had when I was Sarah’s age, so I don’t know what to believe from her.”
“Do these behavior problems occur only during school hours?”
“No.”
“During certain hours of the day or night?”
“No.”
“Before or after meals?”
“No.”
“Does she get enough sleep?”
“The kid sleeps like a rock.”
“No insomnia? No nightmares?”
“Nightmares? No. Where are you going with this?”
“Sometimes the symptoms of ADD can mimic other problems. You have to eliminate other possibilities that could be causing this behavior. Dyslexia, for instance. Or anxiety. Even depression.”
Cody made a face at that. “Sarah isn’t dyslexic, and she has nothing to feel anxious or depressed about.”
“Mr. Matthews, do you or any other family members suffer from ADD?”
“Absolutely not,” he said firmly.
Another sore subject, she thought. But she had to be honest with the man. For Sarah’s sake. “It tends to run in families. What about on her mother’s side?”
“We don’t have much contact with her mother’s side of the family. But from Daphne…no.”
Hesitation in that short answer caused her to snap a direct look his way, but judging by the look on Cody Matthews’s face, this, too, was forbidden territory. She sighed, setting her pencil down. When she spoke, her tone was soft, carefully neutral. “I’m afraid this isn’t going to help much. No single question or test can determine if a child has ADD. Have you considered taking Sarah to someone who can give her a complete neurological examination? Someone who can also work up a detailed history of Sarah’s past?”
The soft illumination from the dining-room light revealed an evasiveness on his face. His eyes and mouth had become almost too indifferent, too implacable, yet there was an odd vulnerability in the mask of his features. As annoyed as she was with this deception, she felt moved by his desperation, because a man like Cody Matthews couldn’t begin to fathom a once-loving child who now indulged in an insolent indifference to reason.
He looked down at his hands to see that he had made fists of them, and his brow furrowed as though he found the sight surprising. He played with the handle of his teacup, and she watched him wrestle with his reluctance. “I don’t want someone poking and prying into family business, upsetting Sarah with a bunch of questions. I just want my daughter back.”
The admission seemed torn from him, and he fell silent, into the pit of what he probably considered parental failure. Observing him, Joan felt sure there was a weight of sorrow here she didn’t fully comprehend, some dark, unknown current too strong to chance exploring.
She could see now why his father had said Cody Matthews was likely to balk at outside help, why he had deliberately sabotaged their first meeting. He was a proud man, a proud parent. He’d obviously been determined to immerse himself in practicalities, weathering Sarah’s stormy behavior with a pragmatic unsentimentality until the worst was over. Unfortunately the worst had stayed and stayed, until the man was left with no more choices.
Matthews had turned his head, pretending an interest in the scratch of a magnolia branch outside the window. Without thinking, Joan laid her hand on his forearm to recapture his attention.
“Mr. Matthews, there’s no shame in a father admitting he doesn’t understand his daughter. The fact that you’re trying to help her now, that you’re willing to consider other alternatives, is a very positive sign….”
The words trailed away as his head swung back, his glance falling to his arm where her hand still lay. He looked at her, and she thought the blue of his short-sleeved