With Jack, you always knew where you stood. If he liked something, he said so without hesitation, and if he didn't, he'd tell you the truth about that too. He stayed on the right side of the law while admitting that some things were just more fun when they were illegal. He liked cheap women, fast cars, late nights, and hard liquor, especially all together. In Jack's view, you were obliged to sin on Saturday night so you'd have something to atone for Sunday morning.

Otherwise you'd be putting the preacher out of business.

After Jack had graduated from UT, he'd gone to work at a small property management company. Eventually he'd gotten a loan, bought the company, and expanded it to four times its original size.

It was the perfect occupation for Jack, who liked to fix things, to tinker and problem-solve. Like me, he had no interest in investment lingo and all the sophisticated financial strategies that Gage and Dad so relished. Jack preferred the nuts-and-bolts issues of working and living. He was good at backroom deals, cutting through legal bullshit, talking man-to-man. To Jack, there was nothing more powerful than a promise made over a handshake. He would have died — literally chosen death — before breaking his word.

In light of my hotel experience at the Darlington, Jack said I'd be perfect working for the residential side of his management company, which was headquarters at 1800 Main. His current on site manager was leaving on account of pregnancy — she warned to spend the first few years of her child's life at home.

"Thanks, but I couldn't," I said when Jack first broached the idea of my taking the job.

"Why not? You'd be great at it."

"Reeks of nepotism," I said.

"So?"

"So there are other more qualified people for the position."

"And?"

I began to smile at his persistence. "And they'll complain if you hire your sister."

"See," Jack said easily, "that's the whole point of having my own company. I can hire Bozo the f**king clown if I want."

"That's so flattering, Jack."

He grinned. "Come on. Give it a shot. It'll be fun."

"Are you offering to employ me so you can keep an eye on me?"

"Actually, we'll hardly see each other, we'll both be so damn busy all the time."

I liked the sound of that, being busy all the time. I wanted to work, to accomplish things, after the past couple of years of being Nick's personal slave.

"You'll learn a lot," Jack coaxed. "You'd be in charge of the money stuff — insurance, payroll, maintenance bills. You'd also negotiate service contracts, purchase supplies and equipment, and you'd work with a leasing agent and an assistant. As the on-site manager, you'd live in a one-bedroom unit in the building. But you wouldn't be stuck in the office all the time . . . you'll have a lot of outside meetings. Later, when you're ready, you could get involved in the commercial side of things, which would be a help since I'm planning to branch out into construction management and then maybe — "

"Who'd be paying my salary?" I asked suspiciously. "You, or Dad?"

Jack looked affronted "Me of course. Dad doesn't have shit to do with my management company."

"He owns the building," I pointed out.

"You're employed by me and my company . . . and believe me, 1800 Main is not the only client we've got. Not by a long shot." Jack gave me a look of exaggerated patience. "Think it over, Haven. It'd work out great for both of us."

"It sounds great," I said. "And I can't tell you how much I appreciate it. But I can't start out at the top, Jack. I don't have enough experience. And it doesn't look good for either of us, for you to give me a job like that when I haven't paid any dues. What if I start out as the manager's assistant? I could learn from the ground up."

"You don't have to pay dues," Jack protested. "You ought to get something for being a Travis."

"Being a Travis means I should pay extra dues," I said.

He looked at me and shook his head, and mumbled something about liberal Yankee shit.

I smiled at him. "You know it makes the most sense. And it's only fair to give the manager's job to someone who's really earned it."

"This is business," Jack said. "Fairness doesn't have crap to do with it."

But he relented eventually, and said far be it from him to keep me from starting at the bottom, if that was what I really wanted.

"Hack it all off," I told Liberty, sitting in her bathroom, draped in plastic. "I'm so sick of all this hair, it's hot and tangly and I never know what to do with it."

I wanted a new look to go with my new job. And as a former hairstylist, Liberty knew what she was doing. I figured anything she did to me was bound to be an improvement.

"Maybe we should go in stages," Liberty said. "It may be a shock if I take too much off at once."

"No, you can't donate it if it's less than ten inches long. Just go for it." We were going to give the foot-long rope of hair to the Locks of Love program, which made wigs for children who suffered from medical hair loss.

Liberty combed my hair deftly. "It's going to release some curl once I shorten it," she said. "All this weight is dragging your hair down."

She plaited it and sawed the entire length off at the nape. I held the braid while Liberty brought a Ziploc bag, and I dropped it inside the plastic pouch and sealed it with a kiss. "Good luck to whoever wears it next," I said.