Page 1 of Cruz

Chapter One

Kate Sinclair looked at her mother, Felicity, in disbelief. “You want to what?”

“Well, I think it is only fair, you know, that I come back and take care of everything. After all, it was my shop to begin with, and I was only going to let you play at this.”

Kate knew what she was hearing and was a little taken aback. When she wanted to go to college, to study to become a fashion designer, her mother stopped her from going. Kate’s Fabric Shop had nearly disappeared because of her mother’s bad business acumen.

There was so much Kate had done with the place and she also knew it wouldn’t be a huge success now, if it wasn’t for Tillie. Without Tillie, this place would be gone, and there would be a mountain of debt. As it happened, she’d been able to get them out of debt and turn a profit for the business. Kate was even able to pay for herself.

“No,” Kate said.

She and her mother had a tumultuous relationship. It wasn’t easy growing up with a mother that was so flighty. It was one of the reasons her father left, because of Felicity never being quite happy with life. Jumping around from career to career. She was aware at one time her mother wanted to be a mother and housewife, and then Kate was born. That lasted for a year. From then on, her parents argued nonstop until Kate was ten years old, and he just up and left.

Felicity had a nasty habit of spinning words around and situations to suit her own agenda, and it was irksome. Everything was always someone else’s fault. Never her own. There was always an answer that meant Felicity Sinclair was not in the hot seat of trouble.

Even a failing fabric business had been down to the questionable customers, and nothing to do with the fact she had bad deals on fabric and haberdashery. It was a nightmare.

Kate worked her ass off to get this shop where it needed to be, and she was not going to turn it over to her mother.

“No,” Kate said.

Felicity jerked back, clearly not expecting that for an answer. “Excuse me?”

“You can excuse you all you want, but you’re not coming in here and taking this shop. You signed on the dotted line, Mom, and you gave up all rights to this shop, and seeing as you used my name and my finances to help fund this shop for a period of time, and then had the audacity to blame me, there is no way I am letting you anywhere near this place. Now, get out,” Kate said. “Don’t you have a job to do?”

She was referring to the housekeeping position she’d taken up at Cruz Moore’s ranch. She figured something went bad at that job too, seeing as Jaxson, the local plumber and electrician, seemed to be camped out up at the ranch.

Cruz Moore and Jaxson Riggs were two of the grumpiest men in Higher Ridge. Jaxson wasn’t as grumpy anymore seeing as he was now married to whom she considered her best friend, Tillie.

Tillie was just a dream. When Kate was close to breaking point, Tillie had her own sewing blog and had used her resources to help attract customers. Kate had also moved to online shopping, which was quite an intensive process, but one she took forever to learn, and her mother thought she was going to come here and take it all from her.

“You ungrateful brat,” Felicity said. “How dare you treat your own mother this way!”

Kate looked at Felicity, and it just dawned on her. “You don’t have a job, do you?” She burst out laughing. “Why am I not surprised? Did he figure out you can’t cook?” She’d been helping her mother at the ranch, dropping off groceries and sometimes freezer meals she had cooked herself.

“I’m going to see my lawyer, Kate, and you know how expensive they can be.”

“Get out,” Kate said. She looked toward her mother and shook her head. “You’re not going to threaten me.”

“Do you have any idea what I went through to—”

“Give birth to me? Yeah, Mom, you’ve been telling me since I was five years old. Funny story, but Dad said you were in labor for an hour, that was it. A non-complicated birth. Would you like me to list everything you have put me through in the last twenty-seven years?” Kate asked, leaning over the counter. “You forced Dad away with your moaning. You stopped me going to prom. Any boyfriend you sent away because you told them I was not a nice person. You put my name into the mud in terms of credit to keep this place afloat. You then handed me this dying business and left me alone to deal with it. You can’t keep a job. You keep coming back to me, and you keep thinking because you gave birth to me, you have the right to keep messing up my life. You don’t. You hurt my business at any point, set up a campaign, or do anything that would ruin my business—and this is my business—I will get my lawyer. I’m done with you, Mom. I’m done playing this game with you.”

Felicity glared at her, picked up her bag, and stormed right out of the shop.

Kate’s heart was racing, and she felt sick to her stomach, but she was not going to allow her mother to interfere in her life anymore. She was done being afraid and wondering when the next piece of trouble was going to come.

She loved her mother, but there had to come a point when enough was enough. Kate looked around the fabric shop and knew there was no way she could give this up. She had made herself ill trying to keep this place alive.

Seconds passed, maybe even minutes before she realized she was having doubts about sending her mother away. This is what always happened. She would feel guilty about making her decision, which would plague her with doubts, and then she would end up exactly where she was. Doubting if she should help her mother or not.

“No, no, no, I’m not going to do this. I was in the right.”

She got busy, finishing up her latest display, when the door rang to let her know there was a customer entering. With a smile on her lips, she turned around and did not expect to see Cruz Moore. At first, she was in a little bit of shock. They hadn’t seen each other since Tillie and Jaxson’s wedding.

“Mr. Moore,” she said, putting down her box of pins and moving toward him. “Is there anything I can help you with?”

Cruz never came into her fabric shop. Other than when she helped her mother, they never really passed, unless it was on the street, and that would always be so random.