Page 54 of Ransom

"Blair, I?—"

"No," I say, holding up a hand. "I need you to hear me, please." He nods, eyes locked on my face. "I don't know you anymore. I don't know the man you are, so I can only talk to the boy I used to know. And I have to believe that boy isn't trying to destroy my life. That everything you've done for the last year has been because you loved my dad, like you said."

He opens his mouth to jump in, and I reach out, pressing my fingers on his lips. Bad fucking move. I pull them back quickly, but the damage is done. The stupid sparks are there, dancing between us, as strong as I remember them, maybe more.

"Please let me finish." I wait for his nod, then continue, "I don't know what Dad said to you. But he left me a letter. He wanted more for me than this town. I'm guessing he said the same thing to you?" It took me a while to put together my Dad’s letter —mostly rambling about all the things he wished he’ddone differently, and all the hopes he had for me— together with Ransom’s sudden reappearance in my life.

He hesitates, then nods, and something twists in my chest. I rub my sweaty palm along my jean covered thigh. "He got it in his head, there at the end, that I deserved more than a small-town life. But the thing is, Ransom, I love it here. This is my home. All the people I love are here. I have work that I'm proud of." I raise a hand, waving at a few kids biking past. "I fit in here, in a way my dad never did. And he was too stubborn to see that. He's the one who wanted to live in the city. He's the one who wanted more than this town. It was never me."

I turn on the bench until my knees are nearly touching his. "This last year, you weren't listening to me when I said no. I need you to listen now. I don't want to sell. I'm happy here. Really happy. And if you want to preserve any little bit of good feelings I have left toward you, you'll stop. All of it. Stop sending me offers. Stop disrupting my life.."

His eyes are racing over my face, and when he speaks, his voice is low, thrumming with honesty. "I wasn't trying to hurt you, Blair, I swear it. You're right, I wanted to respect Robert's wishes. I—" he runs a hand through his hair. "I didn't really let myself think about you." His mouth twists. "That's a lie. I thought about you, but I didn't let myself think of what you wanted. I decided that Robert must have his reasons, and that's as far as I let it go."

He stops, looking like there's more he wants to say. Eventually, he sighs and slumps back on the bench. "Making you those offers was my way of helping you. Of making up for everything that happened. Everything I did."

"Money can't fix the past. Money can't take away the memories." He winces, acknowledging the truth of that. He knows it as well as I do. "Anyway, I've never been someone that cared about money. You didn't used to be either."

"People change."

"I guess so. You rolled into town in a five hundred thousand dollar car."

He looks at me, a slow smirk curving his lips. "And you wanted nothing more than to get behind the wheel, didn't you?"

I let myself imagine getting behind the wheel of that perfect piece of engineering and sigh. "I so did."

He chuckles, and I let the slow warmth of it thaw a few more icy spots in my chest. He grins and rests his elbow on the back of the bench. "It's a fucking beast of a car."

"It is. Not that I'd know from personal experience. Nobody around here drives anything like that. But fuck if I wouldn't kill to look under the hood."

"All you have to do is ask, Blair."

Asking him for anything seems like a bad idea. I just shake my head and shift until I'm staring straight ahead again.

I take a deep breath, steeling myself for what comes next. Theremind myself he has a whole other life, in a whole other placepart. Theremind myself he's not the boy I rememberpart. "So, tell me about your life now. What's it like being a big shot in Chicago?"

Ransom's eyebrows shoot up, clearly surprised by the change in topic. He leans forward, elbows on his knees, hands clasped, and stares toward my shop. "It's fucking amazing. My life is more than I ever dreamed."

"The money?" I press, keeping my voice neutral. Money's never been something that mattered to me. Not until Maggie got sick this time. But still, I have enough. I will have enough for me and Max.

He runs a hand through his hair, a gesture so familiar it makes my chest ache. "The money's fucking great. Anything I want, I can get." He grins. "Like that fucking beast of a car. But I have all the stuff I need. It's not really about that anymore."

"What's it about then?"

He turns, pinning me with those dark eyes. "Taking care of the people I love."

I nod, my eyes fixed on a point over his shoulder, the way he sayslovereverberating through my head. "You have people there? Friends, family?"Do you have a wife, children? Did you move on and forget all about me?I can’t decide if it will make it easier or harder if he does.

"I do," he says, his voice softening. "I've built a family. We're solid. My brothers all found women, and there are babies coming along now."

Brothers.He says it so casually, with so much warmth I have to fight back the bitterness. He has people close enough he calls them brothers. Why did he have to go away to find that? Why did he— nope. Forget it. "That's good," I murmur, fighting the urge to look at him directly. "Are you happy?"

Ransom shifts, lifting one knee on the seat so he can face me fully. I feel his gaze on my face, but I keep my eyes averted. "I'm... happy," he says slowly. "I've accomplished a lot. For a long time, everything I did was to make sure we were secure. Now, money's not something I ever have to think about again. My family is settled, and happy, so that's all I need."

I risk a glance at him, immediately regretting it when I see the intensity in his eyes. I look away quickly. "Really? If they're good, you're good?" I used to think the same way, if I'm being honest, but the last couple of years have taught me that I can't put every bit of my emotional security on the people around me. Because sooner or later, they're going to leave.

And I don't want to be left an empty shell when they go.

He sighs, leaning back against the bench. "Mostly. If I could go back and do all of it over, maybe I'd make a different choice. But my brother Colton, he has this thing about 'what if's.' We always think things would be better if we went back and chosedifferently, but there's no guarantee it would work out that way. It's just as possible that the road not taken is covered in steaming piles of shit."

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