Free The Glory Game by Janet Dailey Page A

it’s like for me in school now. I have to study all the time just to get passing grades. If I have to attend college and play polo at the same time, I won’t do well at either of them. It’s one or the other. It can’t be both. You know that.”
    â€œYes.” She sympathized with him. School had never been easy for her either. But he needed the education, certainly more than she had. Her heart went out to her grave young son, and the sharply poignant plea of his eyes moved her.
    â€œTalk to him, Luz. Make him understand,” he urged.
    â€œI don’t know how much good I can do.” She had an urge to suggest that he’d have a better chance if he enlisted Claudia Baines to plead his case with Drew. A half-dozen times this week, Drew had made some glowing comment about the young woman, and Luz had become highly sensitive to the mere mention of her name.
    â€œAll I’m asking is to sit out college for a year. A lot of guys do that,” Rob argued.
    â€œI can’t promise anything, but I’ll talk to him,” Luz agreed.
    â€œWhen?”
    â€œAfter the party tomorrow night. There’s too much going on right now.” She didn’t know when she could fit in the time for the long discussion this would entail.
    â€œAfter?” Rob looked disappointed.
    â€œYes. Why?”
    â€œI was thinking that I’d leave Saturday to head back to school,” he told her.
    â€œBut I thought you were going back on Sunday?”
    â€œI was, but why wait? What difference does it make if I leave a day early?” His shoulders lifted in a resigned shrug.
    The difference was having him home one more day. “I wish you’d wait, but if you’ve decided, I suppose it’s all right.”
    â€œWhat about Dad and college this fall?”
    â€œMaybe it’s just as well that you aren’t here when I talk to him about that.” It wasn’t that she feared an explosion. Drewnever lost his temper in an argument, but he could destroy a person with his logic. Rob didn’t face up to his father well, always withdrawing into those silences that invariably lost him whatever points he’d made. Luz examined his soberly drawn face, wishing he didn’t take everything to heart so. Nothing was the end of the world. “Do you have any more surprises to lay on me?”
    â€œNo. That’s all for now.” A troubled agitation seemed to stir him as he glanced over his shoulder. “I gotta go to the stable. I need to see Jimmy Ray about something.”
    â€œWant a ride? My car’s right here.”
    â€œNo thanks. I want to be by myself for a while.” His glance skipped off her in a mute apology for rejecting her company.
    â€œWell, I have an appointment with the caterers at eleven, so I’d better run. I’ll see you later at the house.”
    â€œSure.” He was already turning away from her.
    Frowning slightly, Luz watched him walk toward the barns, his polo helmet dangling from his hand by its chinstrap. He was such a brooding figure. Yet a couple of times this past week he’d come to the house in such high spirits, laughing and cutting up with Trisha. Rob was so mercurial in his moods—high and low, and very little in between. After a troubled shake of her head, Luz walked to the car and tossed her helmet and gloves in the rear seat of the convertible.
    The French doors in the dining and living rooms were thrown open to the spacious rear patio, surrounded by hanging greenery and potted plants and lighted by blazing torches set at intervals. A small band occupied the far corner of the patio, where an area had been cleared of the colorfully cushioned white wicker patio furniture so that couples could dance. An up-tempo song drifted above the hum of the laughing, talking voices, with more guests arriving all the time. While the torch flames danced in the tropically mild winter night, Luz wandered inside the