19. Travis
TRAVIS
“T o the East Coast branch of Knight Shipping.” Spencer lifted his glass my way, beaming from the other end of the table around which our friends sat, along with Colton, Lucian, and the rest of their group.
The women had gone home with the kids, with Rose offering to take Sofia back to the hotel for me.
She and Eloise were making good friends in spite of their age difference.
“ I’m sure they’ll all fall asleep before you guys wrap things up, ” she had pointed out as they were leaving. “ We can take the girls home with us once you get back to the hotel. ”
She was an angel, but then everyone had been so welcoming from the beginning.
Now, we celebrated tomorrow’s events, marking the first day of business and the culmination of months of work.
It didn’t feel real, facing the results of everything I had poured so much of my time and effort into.
My crew had flown out to celebrate with me.
We were hours from the launch of the Sofia II, and yet it didn’t feel real.
I was almost numb going through the motions.
“You’re getting some great coverage,” Clayton observed, nodding in Lucian’s direction.
His family company, Diamond Media, had made a point of getting the word out in their extensive list of publications and social media accounts.
It felt wrong, thinking of my father at a moment like this, but his face came to mind as I sipped a glass of truly excellent scotch.
Let him open to the business section of the paper and see he hadn’t broken me.
That I could absorb the hits and move forward despite him.
“So, what happened to that nanny you had with you last time?” Noah asked, wincing when I scowled. “Sienna told me not to mention it, but she’s not here. And I’m curious.”
“We sort of assumed things ended badly,” Miles admitted. “But it’s none of our business.” He exchanged a look with Noah, who lifted a shoulder.
“The contract ended, and she went on her way.” To hell with savoring my drink. I poured the rest of it back, then signaled for another from the server waiting discreetly in one corner of the room. Dammit all to hell. I had managed to go an entire five minutes without thinking about her too.
“But she was good, wasn’t she?” Spencer asked, his head tipping to the side as he studied me down the length of the table.
“It seemed like she was a great fit,” Lex added, looking at me like he’d never seen me before. “I know she got on your nerves, but?—”
“She got on your nerves?” Colton asked. “It seemed like you got along great. And she was fantastic with Sofia.”
Every word they spoke ratcheted up the already unbearable tightness in my chest. “I don’t want to talk about it.
” Already, we had spent too much time on the topic.
They might as well have poked at an open wound.
I covered it up, but no matter how I tried to ignore the pain, it was there.
It was raw, and it ached with every beat of my heart.
I had dealt with pain before. I could do it again. That wasn’t enough of a reason for me to keep her around. “She was an employee, and she isn’t anymore.” Only uneasy silence followed my announcement. What was so wrong with making a staffing change?
“Remember what we talked about?” Lex asked. He refused to take my warning stare for what it was. God forbid he take a fucking hint for once. “The whole revolving door of nannies? Did the girl steal from you or something? Did she hurt Sofia?”
“No!” I tried to laugh it off, but even I heard how flat the sound was. “Can we drop it?”
“What did you do?” Spencer rolled his eyes, groaning.
“Did you run her off? And no, I’m not going to drop it,” he grunted out when I shook my head at the ceiling.
“We’ve seen you go through a harem of shitty nannies who couldn’t take care of your kid, and you let go of the first really good nanny you’ve ever found. ”
“I didn’t run her off, dammit. It was better for her to go. Better for both of us.”
Silence fell over the table again, but that didn’t mean there weren’t half a dozen conversations going on as glances were exchanged, eyebrows raised.
“You stupid ass.” Clay leaned over and shoved me, and he wasn’t playful about it. “You fucked her, didn’t you?”
“I’m not talking about this.”
“Oh, he fucked her,” Lex decided, and I was starting to regret ever inviting them out here.
Colton shook his head, smirking. “Sleeping with the nanny. The oldest story in the book.”
“Man, you had to notice the kind of difference she made with you.” Unlike the others, Spencer wasn’t busting my balls.
He seemed downright concerned. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but you were a hell of a lot more fun to be around when she was waiting for you at home.
We went for drinks around Halloween, remember?
You were like the Travis I used to know. ”
“That’s true,” Lex agreed. “I didn’t notice how dark and negative you went until you weren’t like that anymore. The timeline matches up. Penny showed up, you got better.”
“There I was, thinking the women had already left for the night.” My joke didn’t get me anywhere, but then it wasn’t really a joke. “I’m not looking for a lecture. I’ve got too much on my mind with tomorrow coming up.”
“If you had half a brain in your head, you would go get her.” Spencer held up his hands in surrender when I glared at him. “That’s all I’m going to say.”
I couldn’t think about this with so much else on my mind.
Not alone, and definitely not in front of them.
Colton was smart enough to change topics, talking about the upcoming holidays and how they planned to spend the second half of the month at their cabin in Vail.
Their conversations faded to the background while I brooded over my scotch. Everything would be better in time.
They didn’t understand.
They never would.
Neither will Sofia . The thought of her made my heart sink.
Nothing I did could make her happy. No amount of promising everything we would see together in the city when I had free time.
No amount of promising all the fun she would have with Eloise when I was busy or that the rest of my time would be hers. It wasn’t enough. I wasn’t enough.
It wasn’t yet midnight when I pushed back from the table. “I should get to the hotel, let Rose off the hook. She’s already been so kind.” Colton offered to go with me to pick her and their girls up.
With promises to see each other in the morning the rest of the group split up, everyone heading to their respective hotels and homes.
“Listen,” Colton offered on our way out to his car, where a driver waited. “I’m not saying I understand what’s going on with you right now, and I don’t believe that having kids makes me an expert, but Rose sent me this.”
He handed me his phone, where a text from his wife read like an accusation.
Rose: The poor kid is so sad. I heard her crying when she was getting her pajamas on, and she said she misses Penny the most at bedtime.
I hadn’t caught my breath by the time he tucked the phone in his pocket.
“If all of this is because you got too close to Penny, but Penny wanted to stay, you should have tried to hang onto her. We all saw the way you looked at her when we had dinner last time you were here. You wanted to feast on her, not the meal.”
There was no use in arguing. I had already argued with myself since that night in my office when I bared my soul and immediately regretted it. “It’s not that simple.”
“It never is, or maybe it’s just that we make things more difficult for ourselves than they need to be.”
He let me keep my thoughts to myself the rest of the way to The Plaza, where Rose sat curled up on the sofa in the front room, watching a movie.
“She’s fast asleep,” she whispered on our way down the hall.
Her girls were asleep in the third bedroom, the room Penny had slept in the last time we were here.
The room where we were together that first night.
I should’ve taken a different suite.
“Thank you so much,” I told Rose as she and Colton carried their daughters to the front door. Both girls were out cold, the way only little kids could sleep. What I wouldn’t give for that kind of sleep.
I would drop Sofia off at their penthouse in the morning, where she would stay with their nanny, Bianca, and their girls.
We confirmed those plans before they left, then I locked the door and turned off the television.
Not that I’d be able to sleep. I was a kid on Christmas Eve, bursting with nervous energy and anticipation.
And guilt. Enormous, crushing amounts of guilt.
Guilt, which left me reaching into my pocket for my phone.
I might not be able to set things right with Penny, but I could return Mom’s multiple phone calls over the course of dinner.
I’d promised to check in with her sometime before the ship launched, but of course, other things kept getting in the way.
Standing at the window overlooking Central Park, I called her, ready to apologize for leaving her hanging all night. “Hi. Sorry, I’m only getting back to you now,” I murmured when she answered.
“It’s all right. I knew you would be busy.”
Something in her voice made me stand up straighter, pay closer attention. “I take it you are still not coming out?” I asked. It was a long shot, thinking Dad would let her make the trip to support her son.
“Sweetheart.” She heaved a sigh. “As much as I would like to be there with you, I’ve decided to take a trip on my own. You don’t need me there, feeling the way I do. I’m on my way to the airport now.”
“A trip? What’s going on?” And why did she sound like she was on the verge of tears? “What did he do?” I blurted out because it was the only logical conclusion. He did something to her. He finally broke her spirit.