Michael Malone - Weebly

He ran around a curve of clipped shrubbery and saw
across the smooth, dark lawn a female shadow who
swung something over her head. The sight startled him
again, then she turned and he realized the female was
Kate, his second daughter (first in his heart). She was
pummeling an azalea bush with a tennis racket. Ransom
walked over and caught her arm. "Hold on, now." He
smiled. "What would Sebastian Marco say if he saw
you beating on his flowers like this?" His tone was
smooth, calm, and habitual. All the Ransoms, but Kate,
lived formally and had no forms for fury. Only her
manner, like her looks, was so unruly. Her parents had
been appalled by her temper tantrums since she had
been a baby. Grown, she was a handsome, disheveled
copy of both their good looks, but her face still, at
twenty-one, could twist into lines of tantrums no one
had ever seen on Ransom's face, or his wife's.
"Hold on, now," he said.
"I hate him. He's a pig!"
"Who?"
"Rich."
"Rich?"