Trading Secrets by Jayne Castle Page B

the matter, Matt? Don’t you like the fact that your only son is in need of professional help?”
    “I hardly qualify as professional help,” Matt shot back roughly. “You always cast me more in the role of financial help. Remember the house, the cars, the bank account, the cash settlement that wiped me out? And then there are all those contributions you’ve received from my parents that are supposed to go to Brad’s college fund.”
    Ginny ignored that. “I want you to come and take him, Matt. I want some time away from him before he drives me crazy. Before he drives Paul crazy.”
    Unspoken was the rest of the sentence, but Matt could fill it in for himself. The essence of it was simple: If Paul Martin decided he’d had enough of playing father to someone else’s difficult kid, he would leave, taking the security of his oil-based money and his country-club lifestyle with him. Ginny would probably never forgive Brad if he succeeded in driving off her new husband.
    “You want me to take him for a whole summer?”
    “Why not?” Ginny said grimly. “Let him see what his father is really like. Let him see what a failure you are now. It might be more effective than all the expensive therapy in the world. Come and get him, Matt. I really can’t take any more.” She hung up the phone without waiting for an answer.
    Slowly Matt replaced the receiver, absorbing the ramifications of the three A.M. call. It changed everything. He knew that tone in Ginny’s voice. She was at the end of her tether and she was struggling to hold on to the financial and emotional security she had found with Paul Martin. She’d established her priorities and Brad was now second on the list.
    There had been several years during which the boy had ranked higher. Brad’s birth had brought with it the vast approval of Matt’s parents along with a considerable flow of cash from them. At the time of the divorce Colonel and Mrs. August had made it clear they sided with the mother of their grandson. And after Matt’s career disaster their sympathies had grown even more entrenched. Matt had made little effort to change the status quo. He couldn’t even remember the last time he’d called his folks.
    Ginny’s marriage had apparently realigned everyone’s priorities, including her own. Brad was apparently no longer an asset.
    Matt sat naked on the edge of the rumpled bed and studied the lights of the cruise ship down in the harbor. It was a different ship from the one that had been in port the night he had met Sabrina, but it made him think of her.
    A lot of things had made him think of her during the month since she had left.
    Getting to his feet, Matt walked over to the window. There was no option. He would have to go to Houston and collect Brad. He’d seen Ginny when she got close to the edge emotionally. She would convince herself that her first priority was to protect herself. And maybe she was right.
    Coyne wasn’t going to be pleased, Matt thought. He’d said he’d wait a month for the answer to his offer of a job, and Matt knew he’d fully expected that answer to be in the affirmative. Until this morning he’d had every reason to assume that.
    Matt wasn’t altogether certain why he had been on the brink of accepting Coyne’s offer. It had something to do with priorities, with proving himself. Getting his life back in focus had become increasingly important since Sabrina Chase, tourist, had gone back to Dallas, Texas. The need to do so had been eating at him, prodding him, pushing at him. Coyne’s offer had been dangling out there, a possible beginning point.
    Priorities.
    Until three this morning Matt had assumed he would have to work at figuring out if he even had any. Now he knew he did.
    Brad was waiting for him in Houston. Matt moved away from the window, frowning into the darkness. Brad was his reason for going to Texas. But there was someone else in Texas. Someone who ran a shop with a stuffed bull in the window. What would