“Maybe I’m impressed by all your accomplishments.”

Maya made a show of glancing behind her, as if to see who he was talking to. Then she shook her head. “We have children trying to fall asleep in that tent over there, or I would tell you exactly what I thought of that.”

“You don’t think you impress me?”

“Only with my ignorance.”

Gladys handed her another marshmallow. “Of course your brother thinks the world of you, dear. Why wouldn’t he?”

“I could list the reasons,” Maya muttered.

“You graduated at the top of your class,” Zane said. “That’s a great accomplishment.”

Maya didn’t look convinced, but she didn’t call him a liar to his face. Chase walked over and sat down between Maya and Zane.

“The cattle are snug in their beds,” he said as he grabbed Maya’s branch and a handful of marshmallows. “What did I miss?”

Phoebe grinned. “Zane was just telling us that he thinks Maya is brilliant because she graduated at the top of her class in TV school. Maya, of course, doesn’t believe the compliment.”

“We don’t call it TV school, either, but, yeah, that about sums it up,” Maya agreed.

“You’d do well to follow Maya’s example,” Zane said. “She knew what she wanted, and she applied herself.”

Chase jabbed his stick toward the fire. “I am applying myself.”

“Not in school.” Zane sat up straighter. “Chase, you can be anything you want. You have brains and opportunity. But instead of working hard, you take the easy way out and get lousy grades in the subjects you think don’t matter. You’re going into your senior year of high school. You can’t keep screwing around.”

Chase pulled back the branch and tugged off the browned marshmallow. “You think I screw around because you don’t like the same things I like.”

Zane felt the familiar whispers of irritation. He and his brother had gone around and around on this subject. For once, Zane would like Chase to understand what he was saying.

“You’ve done a great job with your electronics,” he said carefully. “You get A’s in math and science. But what about English and history? They’re important, too.”

“Not to me.” Chase shoved three marshmallows onto the stick. “I want to go to MIT, and you want me to go to some farm college and study animal breeding. Either way, nobody’s gonna care what I got in English.”

“Oh, they’re gonna care,” Maya said. “Whether you’re working on the ranch or in computers, you need to be a well-rounded person.”

Chase snorted.

“Maya’s right,” Phoebe said quietly. “Better to have too many opportunities than not enough.”

Her tone was wistful. Zane wondered what opportunities she’d missed in her life, but before he could ask, Eddie murmured something to Gladys and stood up.

“Today wasn’t bad,” she said, pointing right at Zane, “but tomorrow, I expect you to show a little skin. We were promised sexy cowboys on this trip. Wouldn’t kill you to ride without a shirt for a couple hours.”

With a laugh, Phoebe rose, as well. “On that note, I’m turning in, too.”

Zane watched her go, then turned his attention back to his brother.

“Maya and Phoebe have a point.”

“Figures the only time you’d agree with them is when they’re taking your side.” He scrambled to his feet and tossed down his stick. “You think I care about any of it? I don’t. You know why? Because none of it matters. If you’d just once listen to me instead of always telling me what I’m doing wrong, you might get it. You might see that my robots aren’t a hobby. I’m not playing with my computer when I’m up in my room. I’m making something. I’m creating things that didn’t exist before. But you don’t give a damn about any of it because you’re too busy always telling me how I screw up.”

Zane took a deep breath and told himself he had to stay calm. Yelling at Chase had never worked.

“I have listened about your robots.”

“You’ve stayed in the room while I was talking, but you don’t really care. You think they’re a waste of money.”

Zane didn’t want to get into that now. The costly experiments were the reason Chase had taken money, which had led to the cattle drive. Better not to discuss that in front of everyone.

“Chase, you’re not being fair,” Maya said quietly. “You shouldn’t expect Zane to care about robots the same way you do.”

“Why not? He expects me to care about the ranch.” He glared at Zane. “I don’t. I never will. I hate it. You want me to be like you. I’m not. I’m someone different. You’re going to try to force me to do what you want, and that’s not going to happen.”

Chase turned and stalked off. Maya scrambled to her feet and hurried after him. Zane didn’t know what to do. Stay or go? Finally he sagged back against the log and shook his head. When he and Chase were having it out, the only thing that helped heal things between them was time.

He turned to Gladys, who was the only one left by the fire. C.J. and Thad had turned in after the kids went to bed, and Andrea and Martin had disappeared soon after dinner.

“Sorry about that,” Zane said. “Family fights weren’t supposed to be part of your vacation package.”