[Kate's Boys 04] - Travis's Appeal

by Marie Ferrarella

  His ten o’clock. For a second, Travis drew a blank. He glanced at his calendar. He’d written a name beside the ten o’clock space, but it was now completely illegible to him.

  “And he would be?” he asked, leaving the rest up in the air, waiting for Bea to fill in the blank.

  “They,” Bea corrected. “And they’re outside in the reception area.” She gestured behind her toward the common area where all but the most elite of the firm’s clients waited.

  Travis looked at the calendar again. It made less sense to him than before. He was really going to have to do something about his handwriting. “I need a name, Bea.”

  She eyed him, a small, thin face behind dark-rimmed glasses someone had once said she wore for effect rather than necessity. “Any particular one?” she asked glibly.

  They were going to play the game her way, or not at all, Travis thought. Again, he might have enjoyed it if not for the civil war going on right behind his eyes. “The potential client’s would be nice.”

  She crossed to his desk and made a show of examining his calendar. “What the hell is that?” she asked, pointing to the writing beside the number “10.” “It looks like you dipped a chicken in ink and had it walk across your page.” She looked at him again. “Didn’t your parents teach you how to write?”

  “They had more important things to teach me,” he told her lightly. “Like how to fire an insubordinate secretary.”

  With a haughty little noise, she informed him, “I can’t be fired.”

  His sense of humor was valiantly trying to claw its way back among the living. He was game. “And why’s that?”

  He fully expected her to say something about having tenure, since she had worked here longer than anyone could remember. But then, since this was Bea, he realized he should have known better. Conventional arguments were not for her.

  “Slaves have to be sold,” she informed him with a smart toss of her head. “And their name’s O’Reilly.” Bea paused to tap the calendar, as if that could somehow transform his handwriting into legible letters. “Shawn and Shana,” she added.

  “Married couple?” he guessed absently. The borders of family law were wide, taking in a myriad of subjects. There were twelve attorneys in the firm, each with a specialty although their work did encompass many fields within the heading.

  A short laugh escaped like a burst of air. “Not hardly,” she cackled before becoming serious again. “Not unless the old man’s into cradle robbing.” She considered her own observation and commented on it. “’Course, a man with money these days thinks he could buy himself anything he wants.”

  “How about a secretary who doesn’t give her own narrative to everything?” Travis suggested with a touch of wistfulness.

  “Too boring.” A wave of the hand accompanied her dismissive shake of the head. Her eyes swept over his desk just before she crossed to the doorway again. “By the way, those’ll burn a hole in your stomach,” she told him with a disapproving frown, referring to the bottle of extra-strength aspirin on his desk. “If you went home at a decent hour, like everyone else around here, maybe you wouldn’t get those damn headaches of yours.”

  Bea knew everything that was going on in the office. She was better than a private investigator. He returned the bottle to the side drawer.

  “I had no idea you cared, Bea.”

  Bea paused in the doorway to smile at him over her shoulder. “Always said you were clueless,” she murmured before crossing the threshold. And then she stopped, turning around again. “By the way…”

  The phrase hung in midair like one half of the old popular “shave and a haircut, two bits” refrain tapped out with knuckles hitting a hard surface. He gave in after less than a minute.

  “What?” Travis prompted.

  “Hang on to your socks.”

  He blinked. “What?” he demanded.

  Rather than elaborate, Bea merely smiled at him. Her eyes danced with delight over her enigma. “You’ll understand,” she promised.

  With that, she left the room.

  In her wake, half a beat later, Travis’s latest clients entered. His ten o’clock appointment, Shawn O’Reilly and Shana O’Reilly.

  And Bea was right. Travis could feel his socks suddenly slipping down his ankles. Curling. Along with the hairs along his neck.

  Shawn O’Reilly looked like a modern, slightly worn-out and pale version of a department store Santa Claus. But it was the young woman beside him, Shana, that Travis instinctively knew Bea had issued her warning about. Shana O’Reilly looked like something Santa Claus might have left beneath the Christmas tree of a deserving male if the latter had been exceptionally good, not just for the year, but for the sum total of his entire life.

  Chapter 2

  T ravis stopped breathing.

  To his recollection—and he was blessed with a mind that forgot absolutely nothing—Travis had never seen a more beautiful woman in his life. She was tall—about five-seven—slender, with the face of an angel and long, straight blond hair that brought to mind the phrase “spun gold.” Her eyes were crystal-blue, and she moved like whispered poetry as she crossed the room.

  Belatedly, Travis remembered that he was endowed with a rather pleasant, articulate voice and that remaining silently frozen in place like a plaster statue in an abandoned corner of a museum did not go a long way in inspiring confidence in clients.

  Mentally shaking off his trance, Travis rose to his feet. Rounding his desk, he paid for the quick action with another breath-snatching salvo of sharp pain firing across his temples.

  Travis silently congratulated himself for not wincing. It would have made for a terrible first impression. People didn’t expect their potential lawyer to wince when he first met them. At the very least, it would have conjured up a myriad of questions over his abilities.

  “Hello.” Putting on his widest smile, Travis extended his hand to the heavyset man. “I’m Travis Marlowe.”

  “Shawn O’Reilly,” the man responded genially, then nodded his head toward the ray of sunshine on his right. “And this is Shana. O’Reilly,” he added the surname as if it was an afterthought, then followed it up with, “My daughter.” He actually beamed as he made the announcement.

  Not that the man probably hadn’t been a decent-looking sort in his youth, a hundred pounds and several chins ago, but this was definitely a case of the apple falling miles away from the tree. He and his brothers looked like a composite of their late mother and their father, while his sister, Kelsey, looked like a miniature version of Kate. Travis was fairly certain that Shana O’Reilly had to take after her mother because, other than the bright, cheerful, electric blue eyes, not a thing about her even remotely brought Shawn O’Reilly to mind.

  “Hello,” Shana said, extending her hand to him.

  She had a voice like a low blues melody, sinfully seductive.

  No surprise there. It took Travis a second to take her hand and shake it. Holding her hand, he experienced an almost overwhelming reluctance to release it again.

  What the hell was going on with him, he silently upbraided himself. He was too young to be going through a second adolescence and too old to be going through his first one.

  They were right, he concluded, those people who said that you weren’t at your best without a full night’s sleep. He was obviously not operating with all four engines burning.

  Out of the corner of his eye, Travis saw Shana’s father glancing toward one of the two chairs positioned in front of his desk. Shawn O’Reilly looked like a man trying to decide whether the chair would accommodate his girth without mishap or groaning, or the sofa would be a wiser course to follow.

  Travis nodded toward the sofa. “You might find the sofa a bit more comfortable, Mr. O’Reilly,” he suggested. “I know I do.”

  His words brought out an even wider smile from Shana. His breath went missing for a full thirty seconds. It was like standing beside an early morning sunrise.

  Travis glanced down at he
r left hand. No ring.

  Sunshine permeated his inner core.

  Pleased at the suggestion, Shawn turned around and sat down on the sofa. Soft tan leather sighed all around the man’s considerable form. Shana took a seat beside him, shifted slightly and crossed her legs, her white skirt hugging her thighs. Travis forced himself to look away. He wouldn’t be able to form a coherent thought for several minutes if he didn’t.

  Grabbing one of the two chairs that stood facing his desk, he swung it around and sat down opposite his potential clients. A small, glass-topped coffee table took up the space between them.

  “Can I get you anything?” Travis asked amiably, looking from the man to his daughter. “Coffee? Tea? Soda? Water?”

  “We’re fine,” Shawn assured him.

  “All right, then tell me,” Travis settled back in his chair. “How can I help you?”

  Shawn moved forward a touch, creating an aura of privacy as he did so. “They tell me you’re the go-to guy around here when it comes to putting together a living trust.”

  Each at the firm had an area of expertise, although areas did overlap. Several attorneys specialized in living trusts. Somewhere, he had a guardian angel who had brought these people to him. “I’ve written a number of them, yes.”

  His answer seemed to irritate Shawn rather than please him. Shaggy gray eyebrows came together like teddy bear hamsters huddling for warmth. “I don’t want false modesty, boy. I want the best.”

  All right, you want confidence, you’ll get confidence. “Then you came to the right place,” Travis told him.

  A pleased smile folded itself into the ample cheeks. “Better,” Shawn nodded. “A man should always know what he’s capable of and what his shortcomings are.”

  Shawn’s voice was big and booming, with a slight Texas flavor. The man was obviously not a native Californian.

  Travis found himself wishing that his new client’s tone was a little softer. Each word the man uttered seemed to vibrate inside his head which had turned into a living echo chamber.

  Leaning forward, his elbows digging into his wide lap, Shawn asked without preamble, “Do these things really do what they say they do?”

  He had no idea what the man referred to. It was a completely ambiguous question and Travis felt his way around slowly, not wanting to give offense or make Shawn think he was stupid. “And what is it that ‘they’ say, Mr. O’Reilly?”

  “That if my money and my property are secured within the specifications of a living trust, then my girls won’t have to go through probate or pay Estate taxes.” When Shawn frowned, his chins became more prominent. “Already paid taxes on all the money once. Doesn’t seem fair to have to pay taxes on it again just because my girls get to hang on to it instead of me when I die.”

  He heard that sentiment expressed a lot. Travis smiled. The effort cost him. It seemed that every movement, partial or otherwise, had pain associated with it. The aspirin he’d swallowed was taking its sweet time.

  “That’s why most people look into getting a living trust,” he told Shawn.

  The man nodded, pleased. “Now, we’re not going to be talking fortunes, boy. I’m not a Rockefeller,” Shawn warned.

  “Most people aren’t,” Travis acknowledged. “You mentioned your ‘girls.’ Spouses enjoy the greatest elimination or postponement of Estate Taxes. Other generations, less. But I’ll need to know more about your particular assets and beneficiaries, after applying the Estate Tax Credit.” His eyes shifted toward Shana. It didn’t appear as if they were waiting for someone else to join them. That meant that Shana was the one the man relied on, Travis surmised. Beautiful and reliable. A hell of a combination. “I take it you’re referring to your daughters.”

  “Well, yeah,” Shawn laughed heartily. “I don’t own no night club with dancing girls in it. Just a restaurant.” The way he said it, Travis could tell that there was no “just” about it. “Been running it for longer than Shana’s been on this earth,” the man said proudly. “Want that to go into the living trust, too.” Shawn pinned him with a look. “You can do that, right?”

  “With the right wording, Mr. O’Reilly, I can include just about anything in that trust,” Travis assured him. “Provided I have the proper documentation.” He couldn’t help wondering how open the man was to having a stranger go through his things. He sounded friendly enough, but privacy was an issue for some, despite the lawyer-client privilege so frequently cited.

  Shawn cocked his head. Travis was reminded of an old painting he saw where Santa Claus was studying a list, deciding who was naughty or nice. “You mean like ownership papers?”

  Travis nodded and instantly regretted it. “Those—” he said with a vain effort to will back the pain “—and the deed to your house as well as all your banking information. I’m going to need to review all of that if you want it to be covered in the trust.”

  “Hell, yes I want it covered,” Shawn informed him with feeling. “Otherwise, there’s no reason to be going through this, is there?” He cleared his throat. “No offense, but lawyers aren’t exactly my favorite kind of people.”

  “None taken,” Travis murmured. He heard that a lot, too. His headache was at the point where it could become blinding at any second. He needed more aspirin. “If you’ll excuse me for a second.”

  Getting up, he saw Shawn and Shana exchange glances but couldn’t guess at what they might be thinking. He needed a clear head for that, or at least one that didn’t feel as if it were splintering into a million pieces.

  Travis crossed back to his desk, took out the bottle of aspirin and shook out another two tablets. He downed them with the now cold cup of coffee that was standing, neglected, on his desk.

  When he turned around again, he noticed Shawn eyeing him curiously.

  “Too much partying last night?” the man guessed genially.

  The expression on Shana’s face belonged to that of a mother whose child had suddenly misbehaved.

  “Dad, that is none of our business,” she reprimanded softly.

  “If he’s gonna be my lawyer, it is,” Shawn insisted, but his tone wasn’t judgmental. He turned inquisitive blue eyes on Travis.

  “Too many writs,” Travis corrected, turning his words back around on him, and returning to his seat.

  Shawn’s eyes narrowed beneath his deep gray eyebrows. “Too many what?”

  “I worked late,” Travis explained. “I wound up catching a catnap on the sofa. It really wasn’t made for sleeping.”

  The older man studied him. “You do that often? Work late?”

  Travis couldn’t gauge if that worked in his favor or not. The man’s expression was unreadable.

  “If something needs to be finished,” Travis told him without fanfare. “I don’t like falling behind.” The latter sentence dribbled from his lips as he tried to follow Shana’s movements. She’d risen from the sofa and was now circling behind him. “Can I help you?” he asked. Twisting around to look at her sent another set of arrows through his temples.

  “No,” she answered simply. “But I think I might be able to help you.”

  “I don’t—”

  He was about to say that he didn’t understand what she meant, but the final words never materialized. They stopped, mid-flow, drying up on his lips as he felt her fingertips delicately touch the corners of his temples. Ever so gently, she slowly began to make small, concentric circles along his skin, pressing just enough to make contact, not enough to aggravate the tension and pain that were harbored there.

  “What are you doing?” he finally asked, the words coming out of his mouth in slow motion. When he received no answer, his eyes shifted to Shawn who seemed content just to sit and wait. “What is she doing?”

  “Making you better,” Shana’s father answered matter-of-factly. “Don’t fight it, boy, the girl’s got magic hands. You should see what she can do to a man’s spine. Make him feel like a kid again. ’Course, in your case, that’s not much of a trip, but for someone like
me…” He chuckled. “Well, it covers a lot more territory than I like to think about. But she can make you feel brand new.” There was unabashed affection in the man’s eyes as he looked at Shana. “Don’t know where I would be without her.”

  “You’d be fine, Dad,” she assured him. Travis could hear the smile in her voice.

  “Not by a long shot.” The tone of his voice changed as he added. “Susan would have never looked after me the way you do.”

  “Susan?” Travis asked, looking at Shawn. “Is that another daughter? Or your wife?”

  “My wife passed two years ago,” Shawn informed him stiffly. Travis had a feeling the shift in tone was to keep the emotion from gaining control of him. But he could see the pain in the man’s eyes. Two years and he still missed her. It was nice to know that love actually did enter some people’s lives for more than a weekend. “Susan’s my daughter.”

  “How many do you have?” Travis asked, desperately struggling to focus on the conversation and not the woman whose fingertips still moved seductively along his temples.

  “There’s just Susan and Shana,” Shawn said, “now that Grace’s gone.”

  “Grace?”

  “My wife,” Shawn clarified. He nodded toward Shana behind him. “How’s that feel?”

  “Good,” Travis admitted.

  But he knew nothing could be done for the pain he was experiencing. The headache had to run its course. He still fed it aspirins because a part of him was ever hopeful that, this one time, he could beat it back with pills. It was mostly a useless endeavor.

  “But I don’t want to waste your time,” he added, intending the remark for Shana. He tried to turn his head, but paid dearly for that. The resulting pain shot through the top of his head, his nose and his jaw.

  To his surprise, Shana didn’t withdraw her hands but continued massaging, making her small circles against his temples, sliding her fingertips in progressively larger and larger areas.

  “Shh,” she soothed. “You have to give it a little time,” she advised. “The pain will go away soon, I promise.”