The haunted expression in Darcy’s eyes was hard to forget. She picked up her phone and scrolled through her contacts until she found his.
Was she overstepping their relationship? He had family at home who would be there for him.
She sighed and placed the phone on the bed next to her. Maybe she should work on her lesson plan for pony club next week. It would keep her brain occupied at least.
She retrieved her laptop from her bag and powered it up. Outside her door, her parents chatted quietly as they got ready for bed. At least that was going right. Her mother had been on the boat the past couple of days and her father was relaxing. It helped that when he’d taken Milly to the hospital about the cut, the doctor had said it was a minor scratch and needed nothing except to be kept clean.
Faith reviewed her list of students. It was growing, but there weren’t many horses in the area. Most were stock horses, not suitable for beginner riders. Her cursor stopped at Natasha’s name. A nasty little girl, and her mother wasn’t much better. Her list of suggestions for the pony club were ridiculous. They weren’t trying to compete in dressage or show jumping here, it was fun for the kids, most of whom were interested in barrel racing and lassoing. The latter might be a rodeo event, but she didn’t mind mixing things up to suit what the kids wanted to learn. She’d have to find someone who could teach them. Darcy might know of someone.
It might be fun to learn for herself.
The image of Darcy lassoing her made her smile as she worked through her list of students, making notes on where they were strongest and weakest. After she’d finished her review and packed her laptop away, her phone rang.
Darcy.
Her pulse increased as she answered. “Hi, Darcy.”
“I hope I’m not calling too late.” His honey tones slid over her skin.
“I just finished writing my notes on today’s pony club session.”
“You’re a good teacher. Those kids listened to every word you said.”
“Thanks.” She’d never considered being a teacher, had focused on a job which gave her responsibility and power, leaning as far away from her father’s flaky tendencies as she could. “I was going to call you. You seemed a little upset when you left the restaurant tonight.”
He sighed. “I was.”
“What happened?”
A pause. “I ran into Lara’s mother and my ex.”
Faith frowned. “But Lara didn’t recognise her.”
“Sofia left town only a couple of months after Lara was born. She hasn’t seen her since.”
Oh.
“Her brilliant plan was to walk over and introduce herself, right out in public.” She’d never heard such pissed off sarcasm from him, but beneath it was something else—pain, fear?
“Has she had any communication with Lara in the past ten years?”
“She sends a card and a bunch of presents on her birthday and Christmas.”
Faith remembered Natasha’s nasty words. “So that’s what Natasha meant today.”
“Yeah.”
That had to suck. It couldn’t have been easy for Darcy. “So what does Sofia want?”
“To meet Lara. I spoke to her just now and we’ve arranged for them to meet after school on Thursday.”
“Have you told Lara?”
“Not yet. I don’t know when to tell her. I had to digest it myself on the drive home, and there’s not a lot of time in the morning before she catches the school bus…”
And Lara was the type of girl who would process the news at her own pace. “Why don’t you tell her tomorrow night? She’ll be able to ask you questions, but not have too much time to stress about it.”
“You’re right. She counted the number of sleeps until you came out for our beach ride, so she’s likely to obsess about this too.”
