Sugar Daddy (Travis Family #1)(68)

Until he was around me, and then he was a first-class jerk. Gage made it clear that in his opinion I was a parasite, a gold digger, and worse. He took no notice of Carrington other than to demonstrate a curt awareness that there was a short person in the house.

The day we moved in, our possessions crammed into cardboard boxes, I thought Gage would throw me out bodily. I had begun to unpack in the bedroom I had chosen, a beautiful space with wide windows and pale moss-green walls, and cream-colored molding. What had decided me on the room was the grouping of black-and-white photographs on one wall. They were Texas images: a cactus, a barbed-wire fence, a horse, and to my delight, a front shot of an armadillo looking straight into the camera. I'd taken that as an auspicious sign. Carrington was going to sleep two doors down, in a small but pretty room with yellow and white striped paper on the walls.

As I opened my suitcase on the king-sized bed, Gage appeared in the doorway. My fingers curled around the edge of the suitcase, my knuckles jutting until you could have shredded carrots on them. Even knowing I was reasonably safe—surely Churchill would keep him from killing me—I was still alarmed. He filled up the doorway, looking big and mean and pitiless.

"What the hell are you doing here?" His soft voice unsettled me far more than shouting would have.

I answered through dry lips. "Churchill said I could choose any room I wanted."

"You can either leave voluntarily, or I'll throw you out. Believe me. you'd rather go on your own."

I didn't move. "You have a problem, you talk to your father. He wants me here."

"I don't give a shit. Get going."

A little trickle of sweat went down the middle of my back. I didn't move.

He reached me in three strides and took my upper arm in a painful grip.

A gasp of surprise was torn from my throat. "Take your hands off me!" I strained and shoved at him. but his chest was as unyielding as the trunk of a live oak.

"I told you before I wasn't going to—" He broke off. I was released with a suddenness that caused me to stagger back a step. Our sharp respirations pierced the silence. He was staring at the dresser, where I had set out a few pictures in stand-up frames. Trembling. I put my hand on the part of my arm he'd gripped. I rubbed the spot as if to erase his touch. But I could still feel an invisible handprint embedded in my skin.

He went to the dresser and picked up one of the photos. "Who is this?"

It was a picture of Mama, taken not long after she'd married my father. She had been impossibly young and blond and beautiful. "Don't touch that," I cried, rushing forward to snatch the photo from him.

"Who is it?" he repeated.

"My mother."

His head bent as he stood over me, looking into my face with a speculative gaze. I was so bewildered by the abrupt halt of our conflict that I couldn't summon the words to ask what in God's name was going through his mind. I was absurdly conscious of the sound of my breathing, and his, the counterpoint gradually evening until the rhythm of our lungs was identical. Light from the plantation shutters made bright stripes across both of us, casting shadow spokes from his lashes down the crests of his cheek. I could see the whisker grain of his close-shaven skin, foretelling a heavy five o'clock shadow.

I dampened my dry lips with my tongue, and his gaze followed the movement. We were standing too close. I could smell the bite of starch in his collar, and a whiff of warm male skin, and I was shocked by my response. In spite of everything. I wanted to lean even closer. I wanted a deep breath of him.

A frown tugged between his brows. "We're not finished." he muttered, and left the room without another word.

I had no doubt he'd gone straight to Churchill, but it would be a long time before I found out what was said between them, or why Gage had decided to abandon that particular battle. All I knew was there was no more interference from Gage as we settled in. He left before supper, while Churchill, Gretchen, Carrington, and I celebrated our first night together. We ate fish steamed in little white paper bags and rice mixed with finely chopped peppers and vegetables that made it look like confetti.

When Gretchen asked if our rooms were all right and did we have everything we needed. Carrington and I both replied enthusiastically. Carrington said her canopy bed made her feel like a princess. I said I loved my room too, the soft green walls were so soothing, and I especially liked the black-and-white photographs.

"You'll have to tell Gage," Gretchen said, beaming. "He took those pictures in college for a photography-class assignment. He had to lie in wait two hours for that armadillo to come out of its burrow."

A horrifying suspicion darted through my mind. "Oh." I said, and swallowed hard. "Gretchen, by any chance...does that happen to be..." I could barely speak his name. "Gage's room?"

"As a matter of fact, yes," came her placid reply.

Oh, God. Of all the guest rooms on the second floor, I had managed to pick his. For him to walk in and see me there, taking occupation of his territory...I was amazed he hadn't tossed me like a bull with a rodeo clown in a barrel. "I didn't know," I said thinly. "Someone should have said something. I'll move to a different—"

"No. no, he never stays here," Gretchen said. "He doesn't live but ten minutes away. The room's been empty for years, Liberty. I'm sure it will please Gage for someone to get some use out of it."