Dallas reminded me of some of my loneliest times. Of the family-shaped hole in my heart. Of memories I never made, and moments I never experienced. Of the fact that my entire being was a pappus—an individual piece of a seeded dandelion—floating in the universe.
Not so coincidentally, I’d inked a dandelion blowing away across the back of my left shoulder. Only those who squinted really hard could tell that each individual pappus was made out of the letters T, E, X, A, and S.
“Who cares?” He spun car keys over his finger, advancing toward the elevators. I followed him. “They’re your goddamn parents. They’ll find time for you.”
A nervous laugh bubbled from my throat. “They’re important people, you know. With busy schedules.”
The elevator pinged and the doors slid open. We walked inside. Ransom chose a parking lot floor. I guess he’d rented a car. An armored one, no doubt.
“They’re not currently in office, which means whatever shit they have can wait. Your dad isn’t in a position to start or cease a war anymore. You only see them, what…a few times a year?”
I swallowed hard, uncomfortable at the casual stripping away of my historical excuses as to why their distancing shouldn’t hurt. “Yeah. Something like that.”
Once in the underground garage, we slid into a Ford Explorer that looked missile-proof. I wasn’t a fan of fuel-run cars, but decided to pick my battles.
Ransom drove, not bothering with a map app, like he grew up in this place. I was on edge the entire drive, as if I was on my way to face a firing squad. It was bad enough that my parents treated me like an embarrassment, but now we were going to have an audience in the form of Ransom Lockwood, hottest and scariest man alive.
Again, I wondered about him. About his family life. His background. I knew so little about the person who was sharing a house with me. Even the basics were cloaked in an enigmatic veil. Where was he born? Was he married? What had he done before he opened his security company?
I’d performed a cursory social media hunt on him as soon as I’d been able. Unsurprisingly, there wasn’t a trace of this man ever being alive. I couldn’t even be sure Ransom Lockwood was his real name.
“I can tell you want to say something.” Ransom’s eyes were hard on the road. “Just go ahead and say it.”
It then occurred to me that I was staring at him.
“Is Ransom Lockwood your real name?”
“Why wouldn’t it be?”
“Are you capable of answering one question without evading it?”
“I don’t know, am I?” he asked smartly, then sighed. “Yes, it’s my real name.”
“Aww, I feel like we grew super close in one sentence,” I teased.
He didn’t say anything.
“So…were you a SEAL, like Max?” I munched on my lower lip as we zipped past the glitzy midtown area, which was sparkly and new.
“No,” Ransom said shortly. Then, when he realized I was squirming in my seat, desperate for a distraction, he added, “Counterintelligence.”
“Look at you, Mr. FancyPants.”
“It’s a long word for a very broad department. Anything you have to break in your head into two separate words to write is considered extravagant.”
Well, I couldn’t write it if you gave me five hours and three dictionaries.
“Must’ve been dangerous.” I watched him intently. Not a muscle in his face moved. Treading carefully, I added, “Your family must’ve been worried for you.”
“I suppose they would have.”
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t have a family.”
“You mean you don’t talk to them.” And I thought I had a flair for dramatics. Everyone had a family, came from somewhere.
“I mean they are not in existence.” A flicker of irritation passed on his face, but his tone remained flat and calm.
“So how did you come to be?” I arched a skeptic eyebrow. “Test tube baby?”
“Obviously, biologically, I was created by Jane and John Doe. But I have no clue who they are. One of them left me in a shoebox at the door of some church in rural Illinois. I was two hours old and still had an umbilical cord dangling from the cardboard. People who passed by thought I was a lost kitten, because I could barely cry anymore, my voice was so hoarse. At least it had been tied off, so I hadn’t bled out.”
“You’re kidding me.” I sucked in a breath.
“My humor’s not much, but it’s better than that.”
I’d never met anyone with such a tragic life story. I felt physically ill with sorrow for him. I also wondered what the heck had come over him, to make him open up to me like that. Then I remembered I probably looked white as a sheet and nervous from my impending showdown with the people who’d created me.
And perhaps also this teeny, tiny mishap about me catching him acting out a semi-public, semi-violent sexual fantasy.
Ransom needed to win some humanity points with me right now, and, the robot that he was, this was how he chose to do it.
“Wow.” I let out a breath. “I must really look like I need a distraction, if you decided to share this with me.”
“Not a pile.” He flicked the indicator. “Maybe a small mound.”
“Oh, God. I’m so sorry, Ransom. What an awful beginning to your life.”
“I survived.”
“Were you adopted?” I swallowed.
“Yes,” he hesitated, as if contemplating whether to tell me more. “The family’s name was Moruzzi. They were well-off. Lived by Lincoln Park. Jack Moruzzi adopted three of us. All boys. But…well, let’s just say it wasn’t a childhood full of Scouts and summer camps.”
“Did he ever…？” I sucked in a breath. Were his fantasies prompted by being abused before? He’d said he’d experienced trauma. I didn’t know. All I knew was that I wanted to try what Ransom was offering by opening up.
But by the way he bristled, flooring the accelerator, I gathered the conversation was over.
“Point is, stop feeling sorry for yourself, Brat. We all have a story, and it’s rarely a fairy tale.”
The way he cut me off, so abruptly, made me want to strike back.
“Does Max have a story?”
Ransom’s face hardened, his eyes narrowing over the road. “Do I look like his biographer? Ask him yourself. He’s supposed to arrive on a later flight tonight and will be covering for me whenever I’ll be away.”
“Why would you be away?” Did he know anyone in Texas? He seemed to know his way around these roads.
“My business.”
“More playdates?” I was pushing it, and I knew it.
“This conversation is over.”
“I really do feel like we’ve had a breakthrough today, though.” I crossed my legs, realizing for the first time that I was still wearing my tacky sweatpants and hoodie from the flight, and that my parents would probably vomit on impact when they saw me. “Now that we’ve opened up about our insecurities, it will be easier to address them and try to be nice to one another. Who knows? Maybe it’s the beginning of a friendship. The way you opened up to me—”