Wasn't that long ago, however, that those pouts had been precursors to the hissy fits of a precocious, blatantly spoiled young woman who'd assumed being an heiress was her life's work. 'I know, I know-Daddy's hot to get back for that New Year's Eve gala y'all are sponsoring.' Her mouth pulled into a pout.for about a half second before she grinned again. 'Well, excuse me for putting you out,' she said, her warm brown eyes sparkling, her accent tilting more toward Texan by the second. And gently smacked his arm, her all's-right-in-her-world grin a blatant affront to the dreary weather. 'As it was, I left several projects hanging to come here.' 'You know I've got to get back,' he said into his much shorter sister's slippery brown hair. But now he opened his arms to let his baby sister walk into them-as much as she could, at least-thinking that Marcos Mendoza was the luckiest, and bravest, guy in the world, taking on the family's little princess. In a minute, he'd have to herd his other siblings. Behind her, through the open, intricately carved double wooden doors, assorted family members traipsed back and forth, while the groom and his two brothers, Javier and Miguel, carted luggage out to the cars. Scott turned, smiling in spite of himself at Wendy's newly wedded-and not-so-newly pregnant-glow. But the heavens jeered at his insignificance, the icy rain jackhammering the battered winter lawn, the gravel drive where a pair of SUVs waited to ferry them to the regional airport ten miles away and the chartered jet that would take them home to Atlanta. Too bad the weather on this blustery, end-of-December afternoon hadn't gotten that particular memo.įrom underneath the expansive portico fronting the main entrance to La Casa Paloma, an exclusive resort where he, his parents and his siblings had stayed while in Red Rock, Texas, to attend his youngest sister Wendy's wedding to Marcos Mendoza, he glowered at the charcoal sky.

If Scott Fortune could attribute anything to his success-in life, in business-it was that simple mantra, doggedly applied to every challenge that dared him to fail.

Fortune's Cinderella by Karen Templeton