“If…he… is mine, then he is coming with me.”
That actually makes me laugh. “You can’t just have him. I’m his mother.”
“Then you’ll be coming with me too.”
Ransome stands over me. Which I hate, but I’m stuck on a bed hooked to machines, so I can’t exactly move. Flipping him the bird is the closest I can get to showing my feelings.
But I don’t do that. Because his brow has never been darker than it is now, and I don’t want to test the lengths he’d go to punish me. Not while I’m carrying another life inside me.
There’s something else too. As he hovers this close, his face inches from mine, my senses fill with all things familiar and forgotten.
“If he is mine, he is the Rozanov heir. And there is no way in hell that the Rozanov heir will live a life wasting away in a small town in the middle of nowhere all because his mother is too stubborn to face his future.”
The Rozanov heir.
Fuck me. I hadn’t thought about that.
The weight of his words bears down on me. I fight it off just enough to answer. “How did you know where I was? Have you been stalking me this entire time?”
“You’re giving me too much credit,dorogoya.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You know what you did. You know how I found you.” The hairs on the back of my neck prick as I realize what he’s saying. “You logged into Apex.”
I chew the inside of my cheek for a moment, refusing to look at him.
“Either you wanted to be found, wanted to be rescued?—”
“I don’t need to berescued. We are all doing just fine. Thriving, in fact.”
“Your car barely starts. You’re working for minimum wage at a dentist’s office. I’d hardly call that ‘thriving.’”
“They pay me more than that. And I get benefits.”
“You can lie to yourself, but you can’t lie to me.” He shakes his head. “You wanted me to find you. Either that, or you just couldn’t stay away.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I snap.
For the first time, Ransome’s lips crawl ever-so-slightly up into a devilish smirk.
“Old habits die hard, don’t they?”
I want to reject his accusation. Want to tell him where he can stick his habits and his assumptions about my life. The lifeheasked me to overhaul.
But I stay silent.
“Either way, you’re coming with me,” he says.
I stare at his hands, tight around the railing. His knuckles are whiter than the sheets. He’s angry—angrier than I’ve seen him in a long, long time.
The call light is in my hand. My thumb hovers over the button. I know he sees it, even though he keeps his eyes locked on mine.
“And if I don’t?” I dare to ask.
10
RANSOME
