Sugar Daddy (Travis Family #1)(64)

They shook hands solemnly. I couldn't see my sister's face, but I saw Churchill's. He fixed her with an unblinking stare. I was puzzled by the emotions that crossed his face: wonder, pleasure, sadness. He looked away and cleared his throat hard. But when his gaze returned to my sister, his expression was clear, and I thought maybe I had imagined the moment.

They began to chat like old friends. Carrington, who was often shy, was describing how fast she could roller-skate down the hallway if roller-skating was allowed in the house, and asking the name of the horse that broke his leg. and telling him about art class and how her best friend, Susan, accidentally spilled blue poster paint on her desk.

While they talked. I dragged my attention to the pair of men standing beside their chairs. After having heard about Churchill's offspring over a period of years. I experienced a mild jolt to have them abruptly made real.

Despite my affection for Churchill, it had not escaped me that he'd been a demanding father. He had admitted to being overzealous in his efforts to make certain his three sons and his daughter did not become the soft, spoiled children of privilege he had seen in other wealthy families. They were brought up to work hard, achieve the goals he set, live up to their obligations. As a parent Churchill had been spare in his rewards, tough in his punishments.

Churchill had wrestled with life, taken some hard blows, and he expected that from his children too. They had been raised to excel in academics and sports, to challenge themselves in every aspect of their lives. Since Churchill had a horror of laziness or a sense of entitlement, any flicker of it had been extinguished beneath his booted foot. He had been the easiest on Haven, the only daughter and the baby of the family. He'd been toughest on the oldest, Gage, the only child by his first wife.

After listening to Churchill's stories about his children. I had found it easy to discern that the greatest pride and highest expectations were reserved for Gage. At age twelve, while attending an elite boarding school. Gage had risked his life to help save other students in his dorm. A fire had broken out in the third-floor lounge one night, and there had been no sprinklers in the building. According to Churchill, Gage had stayed behind to make certain every student had been awakened and got out. He'd been the last to leave and had barely made it out, suffering smoke inhalation and second-degree burns. I found the story telling, and Churchill's comment on it even more so. "He only did what I would have expected of him." Churchill had said. "What anyone in the family would have done." In other words, saving people from a burning building was no big deal for a Travis, barely worthy of notice.

Gage had gone on to graduate from UT and Harvard Business School, and now did double duty working at Churchill's investment firm and also at his own company. The other Travis sons had followed their own pursuits. I had wondered if it had been Gage's choice to work for his father, or whether he had simply stepped into the place he had been expected to fill. And if he nurtured a secret grievance about having to live under the considerable burden of Churchill's expectations.

The younger of the two brothers came forward and introduced himself as Jack. He had a firm grip and an easy smile. His eyes were the color of black coffee, twinkling against the sun-chapped complexion of an avid outdoorsman.

And then I met Gage. He was a full head taller than his father, black haired and big framed and lean. He was about thirty, but he had a seasoned look that could have allowed him to pass for someone older. He rationed out a perfunctory smile as if he didn't have many to spare. There were two things people immediately comprehended about Gage Travis. First, he wasn't the kind who laughed easily. And second, despite his privileged upbringing, he

was a tough son of a bitch. A kennel-bred, pedigreed pit bull.

He introduced himself, reaching out to shake my hand.

His eyes were an unusually pale gray, brilliant and black needled. Those eyes allowed a flash of the volatility contained beneath his quiet facade, a sense of tautly restrained energy I had only seen once before, in Hardy. Except Hardy's charisma had been an invitation to draw closer, whereas this man's was a warning to stay back. I was so shaken by him, I had a hard time taking his hand.

"Liberty," I said faintly. My fingers were swallowed in his. A light, burning clasp, and he released me as quickly as possible.

I turned away blindly, wanting to look anywhere other than into those unsettling eyes, and I discovered a woman sitting on a nearby love seat.

She was a beautiful tall waif with a delicate face and puffy pneumatic lips, and a river of highlighted blond hair that streamed down her shoulders and over the arm of the sofa. Churchill had told me Gage was dating a model, and I had no doubt this was her. The woman's arms, no bigger around than Q-tips stems, hung straight from their sockets, and her hipbones protruded beneath her clothes like can-opener blades. Had she been anyone other than a model, she would have been rushed to a clinic for eating disorders.

I have never worried about my weight, which has always been normal. I have a good figure, a woman's shape with a woman's br**sts and hips, and probably more of a rear end than I would have wished for. I look good in the right clothes, not so good in the wrong ones. Overall I like my body just fine. But next to this spindly creature I felt like a prizewinning Holstein.

"Hi," I said, forcing a smile as her gaze swept me up and down. "I'm Liberty Jones. I'm...a friend of Churchill's."

She gave me a disdainful glance and didn't bother introducing herself.