“Sure,” she replied. “Thanks.”
“Thank you. I’ll let Jerry know. And if you want me to take a shift for you sometime, let me know.”
She smiled. “Will do.”
I tracked down Jerry in his office and let him know of the change. As long as someone would be there to cover the shift, he didn’t care who it was, so the conversation was brief.
When I made my way back to Ransom, they had finished their food and Cindy was looking tired.
“Can we get the check?” he asked. “I want to get her to bed.”
“It’s on me. I’ll see you guys bright and early tomorrow morning.”
“No, I can’t let you do that,” he argued.
“You can’t let me?” I asked, my eyebrows raised in challenge.
Ransom raised his hands. “Never mind. Poor choice of words. Thank you for dinner.”
“My pleasure.”
Watching Ransom extricate himself from the tree house was a comedy act worthy of being taken on the road. He didn’t so much walk out of it as fall through the doorway. It was spectacular to witness, and I was sad we weren’t allowed to have our phones out on the floor while we worked, because it was really something that should’ve been immortalized via iCloud.
Once he was upright, I said, “I’m glad you guys came in. Though I’m a little surprised you brought her to…what did you call it again? A Peter Pan kidnapping ring?”
“Trafficking ring,” he corrected. “And I told you, I’m predisposed to making bad parenting choices.”
The joke was clear in his voice, so this time I laughed at the reference to him being bad at anything. “I think it worked out okay.”
He glanced down at Cindy before returning his gaze to me. “Yeah, I guess it did. So…we’ll see you tomorrow?”
“Bright and early.”
“Can’t wait. Come on, Cindy.”
And as I watched them leave, I couldn’t resist whispering a response. “Me neither.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
T A Y L O R
I’d set my alarm for seven the next morning so I’d make it to Harry’s by eight. When I got there, Ransom had burned two batches of pancakes and looked close to donning a straitjacket. I removed the spatula from his hand, told him to grab a shower, and cooked Cindy breakfast.
After that, we spent the day roughhousing with the dogs, hanging at the playground, and playing every board game we could find—which was a ridiculous amount. Harry and his husband could probably start some kind of store with the collection they’d amassed.
Ransom and I made a good team, and we managed to keep Cindy content for the whole day. By the time bedtime rolled around, we were all exhausted, and Cindy drifted off without any fuss after we got through the two books she’d wanted me to read to her. She’d turned a sweet look on me that I was powerless to refuse.
When I finally got back downstairs, Ransom had straightened up the living room and was kicked back on the couch with the remote in his hand.
“Wanna watch a movie on Netflix?” he asked.
“Sure,” I replied as I settled beside him.
“Genre preference?”
“Something lighthearted and funny.”
Ransom scanned through the choices, stopping on Twilight.
I looked over at him. “Let me guess. Team Jacob?”
He turned his head toward me quickly, looking surprised, as if he’d forgotten I was there.
“Huh?”
“In the teenybopper gang war that was Team Edward versus Team Jacob, I put you firmly on Team Jacob.”
He smiled slightly. “Nah, I was Team Volturi. I wanted them to wipe out everyone so I didn’t have to endure any more of those horrible movies.”
I laughed. “Who made you watch them?”
His smile grew wider but somehow shier. “Emily.”
Astutely ignoring the stab of irrational jealousy that shot through my chest, I kept my tone light. “Oh yeah? Who’s that?”
It shouldn’t have mattered who this Emily was. He’d never mentioned her before, that I remembered, so even if she’d been someone to him at some point, she clearly wasn’t anything to him anymore. Maybe she was an elderly neighbor he spent time with. Or a foster sibling he’d had once. So there was no reason for me to worry about this Emily person.
“She was my wife.”
“She was what?” I had to have misheard. Maybe I needed to see an ENT or something. My hearing had to be truly fucked, because it had sounded like he’d just said she was—
“My wife. We got married right after high school.”
“Oh,” I said dumbly because my brain had completely short-circuited. “When did you divorce?”
He looked at me confused, which quite frankly, made my feathers ruffle a bit. He was the one being confusing. Not me.
“We didn’t.”
I stood abruptly, banging my knee on the coffee table. “Ow, shit, fucking…wood…thing.”
“Are you okay?”
“Peachy,” I practically growled at him.
What was wrong with me? I’d played house with the man for a day, and all of a sudden I was acting possessive and insane.
I plopped back down, rubbing my throbbing knee. “So you’re married?”
“No.” And again with the confused look.
“Why do you look like I should know this already?” I asked.
“I didn’t. I just…figured you thought better of me. I wouldn’t hang out with you while I had a wife somewhere.”
Okay, well, when he said it like that, I felt like an asshole. “I’m sorry. I do think well of you. My brain just…fried a little at the mention of a wife.”
He smiled. “I can understand that.” When he didn’t attempt to say any more, I stared at him disbelievingly.
“Ransom,” I said firmly. “If you’re not married and you’re not divorced, what are you?”
“Widowed.”
My whole body locked in place. There had been many times in my life where I would’ve characterized myself as having frozen in place, but I’d never had a complete, all-systems shutdown like this one before. I was
