Tiffany Santini climbed out of the car, glanced at a couple of the workers who were unloading hay into the barn and hurried to the front porch.

“Oh—did I come at a bad time?” she asked, seeing the car keys swinging from Bliss’s fingers.

“No, come on in. I was going to visit Dad, but it can wait.”

“He’s not here? I thought he was released from the hospital.”

“He was, but he’s staying at Brynnie’s for a little while. Come in.” Bliss was glad for the distraction and the truth of the matter was that she was intrigued by her slightly uptight older half-sister. She didn’t expect they’d become friends overnight, but at least they could get to know each other.

On the front porch, Tiffany said, “Look, I want to be honest with you. I heard that he was rushed to the hospital, that they thought it was his heart but it turned out that he’d gotten too much sun or something—and I didn’t know what to do.”

“It’s hard.”

“I thought the decent thing to do was to stop and see him and yet I didn’t think he’d ever really done the decent thing by me or Mom, so . . . I waited. Anyway, here I am and I’m wondering what in the world I should say to you or to him.” She rolled her large eyes.

“Well, come on in.” Bliss held open the screen door. “I’ve got coffee or iced tea or—”

“This really isn’t a social call,” Tiffany snapped, then caught herself. A small line formed between her eyebrows. “I—I don’t know what it is.”

“Neither do I, but if we don’t talk, we’ll never find out, will we?” Bliss was wary of this woman and yet she was curious. There was, after all, the same Cawthorne blood running through their veins.

Tiffany hesitated for a second, then must have decided that leaving would look cowardly because she nodded stiffly and followed Bliss inside. Her dark brows rose as she entered the ranch house for the first time, Bliss guessed. “It’s not as if he was—or is—a big part of my life.”

Bliss let that little jab slide by as they walked into the living room and, for the first time, Tiffany’s eyes took in the watercolors of Indians and cowboys, the river-rock fireplace, the scatter rugs and marred wooden floor.

“So, now that you’ve been in town a few weeks and met your stepmother-to-be, how do you feel about John’s marriage to Brynnie Perez?” Tiffany asked suddenly.