AllFreeNovel
Share Us
"I wanted to be, but—"
"Catie, I'm only teasing you." Travis grinned. "Slade was there. What more could a man possibly want?"
Caitlin laughed as she plopped into a rocker and stretched out her denim-clad legs, "True, but I really was going to be down-at the landing strip. Then Jonas decided somebody ought to drive into town and check up on the caterer, so—"
"So he told you to take care of it."
"Now, Trav, don't be like that. That's just the way he is, and you know it."
Travis sat down in a high-backed wicker chair. "Yeah. Some things never change."
"Have you seen him yet?"
"No. Marta says he's out riding." He smiled. "She looks terrific."
"She is terrific." Caitlin kicked back her rocker. "Amazing, isn't it? No matter what he does, Jonas can't scare her off."
A companionable silence fell over the porch, broken only ^y the squeak of the rocking chair and the hum of the bees ;n the flowers. After a while, Travis cleared his throat.
"So, what's the deal, Catie? Are we here to wish Jonas another eighty-five years as emperor, or to listen to him tell Slade and Gage and me that we should be fighting over a hich of us gets to inherit this place not one of us would know what to do with. You'd think he'd get it into his thick head that you're the only one who wants Espada."
"But I'm not one of you," Caitlin said softly. "You're Barons. I'm a McCord."
"Bull-spit."
"Not according to your father." Caitlin reached for Travis's beer, lifted it to her lips and took a long drink. "I do think that's on the agenda, though," she said, rolling the icy bottle across her forehead. "Jonas's attorney is coming down."
"His attorney, huh?"
"Uh-huh. Grant Landon, from New York."
"Landon." Travis cocked an eyebrow. "Don't think I've heard of him but I don't suppose I would have, out in L.A."
Caitlin smiled. "Speaking of L.A., what's new in your life?"
The door slammed as Slade stepped onto the deck, two long-necked beer bottles dangling from each hand.
"Hell, Catie, don't encourage him." He put the bottles on the floor and settled his long frame into one of the wicker chairs. "You show the least bit of interest, old Travis is gonna deluge us with fancy stories about the Hollywood high life."
"Deluge me, Trav," Caitlin said. "Sometimes, I forget there's more to the world than calving and roping."
"With pleasure." Travis reached for her hand, curled it into his and brought it to his lips. "Did you know that there's not a Hollywood actress as beautiful as you?"
"Liar," Catie said, and smiled.
"And there sure as heck isn't a big-time Hollywood heartthrob anywhere near as good-lookin' as any your big brother Travis."
Catie chortled with laughter. The sound sent a pleasant warmth rolling through Travis's blood.
Jonas or no Jonas, he thought, it was good to be home.
He met Jonas's attorney during an impromptu meeting in the hayloft, which had always been the secret Los Lobos clubhouse.
And what a hell of a meeting it had been, Travis thought grimly, as he dressed for his father's birthday party.
There they were, the three Baron brothers, he and Slade still reeling over Gage's admission that he and Natalie had split up, and along had come Grant Landon to admit_ he was facing the same trouble with his wife.
The only certainty in relationships between the sexes, Travis thought as he looked in the mirror and adjusted his bow tie, was that there were no certainties in relationships between the sexes. That had been the general consensus that had come out of the impromptu Los Lobos meeting.
Travis sighed and put the studs through his cuffs.
When they were growing up, a Los Lobos meeting meant talk about baseball, or football, or maybe secret plans to sneak out of their rooms at midnight to look for whatever trouble a trio of kids could get into on a ranch the size of a small country.
This time, it had been all about women. Gage's bewilderment at his wife's decision to leave him. Grant Landon's dismay at his wife telling him she was unhappy. Slade hadn't said much but he'd had a funny look about him, as if he could have contributed a lot to the discussion, if he'd wanted to.
Landon had dubbed it a meeting of The I Don't Understand The Female Of The Species Club which, come to think of it, had been pretty close. Travis had just kept silent. What could he have said about feeling anger for a woman he hardly knew that would have made sense?
Anger, and lust.
His eyebrows drew together over his slightly bent nose.
How could you be so angry at a woman and still want her so badly it made you ache? Because he did still want her. If he went down the stairs tonight and, by some stroke of fate, found Alex in the crowd milling through the house.. .if that happened, he'd go straight to where she stood, take her in his arms, shake her until her teeth rattled and then—and then...
