Dancing in the Moonlight - Harlequin.com

188 DANCING IN THE MOONLIGHT
“Mama, is that what you and Tío Guillermo have
been fighting about?” she asked gently. She didn’t want
to think about how much compassion she had for her
mother’s turmoil or how closely it paralleled her own.
“He is so stubborn.” Her mother sank down into one of
the rocking chairs on the porch that overlooked the ranch.
Maggie sat in the chair next to her and waited for the
words she could see forming in her mother’s dark eyes.
“I did not mean for this to happen. I did not! I wanted
things to go on as they have since Abel died. But things
have changed. I did not expect it but somehow they have.
“Guillermo wants to marry me, he says he has wanted
it forever. Never did he say anything until…until the last
few months, when I started to see I cared for him.”
She let out a breath, gazing out at the ranch. “Before
you came home, he tells me I must make a decision or
he will quit. I tell him it is not fair to press me on this
now, and ask him to wait a while longer, but he said he
tires of waiting. He does not want to go on as we have,
he says. I would not bend on this just because Guillermo
he tells me I must.”
“So he quit.”
“No, I fire him,” she insisted.
“He seems miserable, Mama,” she observed quietly.
“So do you. What’s the big conflict?”
Her mother said nothing for a long moment, gazing
out at the night. “I loved your father so much. And I have
grieved for him every day since his death.”
“I know that, Mama. But isn’t there room in your
heart for another love?”
To her dismay, her mother buried her face in her