Shades of Twilight by Linda Howard Page A

There’s never anything in your stomach to be thrown up. If you don’t eat, soon you won’t have the strength to work with the horses. Is that what you want?”
    â€œNo!”
    â€œThen eat.”
    She looked at the chicken leg, her expression miserable. “I try, but I don’t like the taste of most food, and p-people are always criticizing how I eat and the food turns into this big wad that I can’t swallow.”
    â€œYou ate toast this morning with me and swallowed just fine.”
    â€œYou don’t yell at me or make fun of me,” she muttered.
    He stroked her hair, pushing the dark chestnut strands away from her face. Poor little Ro. She had always hungered for Aunt Lucinda’s approval, but was too rebellious to modify her behavior to get it. Maybe she was right; it wasn’t as if she was a juvenile delinquent or anything like that. She was just different, a quirky wildflower growing in the middle of a sedate, well-ordered southern rose garden, and no one knew quite what to make of her. She shouldn’t have to beg for her family’s love or approval; Aunt Lucinda should just love her for what she was. But for Aunt Lucinda, perfection was her other granddaughter, Jessie, and she had always made it plain that Roanna fell short in every category. Webb’s mouth tightened. In his opinion, Jessie was far from perfect, and he was sick and tired of waiting for her to grow out of some of that selfishness.
    Jessie’s attitude, too, had a lot to do with Roanna’s inability to eat. He had let this rock on for years while he devoted himself to the herculean task of learning how to run Davencourt and all the Davenport business concerns, packingfour years of college into three and then going after his master’s degree in business, but it was obvious now that the situation
wasn’t
going to resolve itself. For Roanna’s sake, he was going to have to put his foot down, with Aunt Lucinda as well as Jessie.
    Roanna needed calm, peaceful surroundings where her nerves could settle down and her stomach relax. If Aunt Lucinda and Jessie—and now Aunt Gloria, too—wouldn’t or couldn’t let up on the criticism that they constantly leveled at Roanna, then he wouldn’t let Roanna eat with them. Aunt Lucinda had always insisted that they be at the table together, that Roanna conform to social standards, but he was going to override her on this. If she would eat better with her meals served on a tray in the peacefulness of her bedroom, or even out in the stables if she preferred, then that was where she’d have them. If being separated from the family made her feel exiled, rather than the relief he thought it would be, then he’d eat out in the stable with her. This simply couldn’t go on, because Roanna was starving herself to death.
    Impulsively he scooped her onto his lap, the way he’d done when she was a youngster. She was about five-seven now, but not a lot heavier, and fear clutched at him as he encircled her alarmingly frail wrist with his long fingers. This little cousin had always appealed to his protective side, and what he had always loved best about her was her pluckiness, her willingness to fight back without regard for the consequences. She was full of wit and mischief, if only Aunt Lucinda would stop trying to obliterate those very traits.
    She had always snuggled up to him like a kitten and did so now automatically, rubbing her cheek against his shirt. A faint twinge of physical awareness surprised him, making his dark eyebrows draw together in a puzzled frown.
    He looked down at her. Roanna was woefully immature for her age, without the normal social skills and defenses teenagers developed in the course of interacting with each other. Faced with disapproval and rejection at home as wellas at school, Roanna had responded by withdrawing, so she had never learned how to interact with the kids in her age group. Because of