Forbidden Valentine: A Forbidden Novel (17 page)

“My mother knows about this?” he yelled.

“Yes! She’s the one who told me not to worry about it. She said I should share it if I wanted, but otherwise keep it on a need-to-know basis.”

“Well, I needed to know!”

“I can see that now!” she shouted back, her emotions raw. Lowering her voice, she tried to reason with him. “Ransom, please, please don’t be angry with me. If I would have known it would be this important, I would have said something earlier.”

“I wish you would have,” he muttered, and something in the way he said it made a part of Dani’s insides grow cold. “This is…this is a nightmare. I should have known when you introduced me to your friends…College students. Christ. I should have known.”

He was talking to himself now, and Dani was beginning to get worried. “I’m not in college anymore, Ransom. You know this. It’s not like it’s forbidden for us to be together. So what’s the problem?”

Sitting forward, he rested his forearms on the steering wheel, then dropped his head against them, closing his eyes. “Do you have any idea what I’ve been through? How many nights I laid awake wondering if today was the day they found out and fired me?”

“I—Ransom, what are you talking about? Find out what? Who?” She asked the questions, but somewhere in the back of her mind, she already suspected what the answers were.

“The university. About me and…and Josephine. God, so many sleepless nights, but I didn’t give a damn. She was everything…and then she was gone.” He made a pitiful sound that threatened to break Dani’s heart. “I swore I would never make that mistake again. I should have known…”

Ah, so there it was. “Joe was one of your students.” He’d told her as much, but she hadn’t known just how much of a problem that was for him.

“Yeah. Yeah, she was,” he said with a drawn out sigh. Releasing the wheel, his back slammed into the seat and he stared out the window.

“I’m not one of your students, Ransom.” It was clear that he wasn’t listening. Taking his jaw in her hand, she turned his face toward her and repeated, “I’m not one of your students.”

“No, you’re worse.”

She swallowed thickly. It was obvious where this was going. “So,” she said, her eyes beginning to burn, “you’re going to break up with me because you know my father? Or is this just another excuse for you to keep hanging on to Joe?”

It was a low blow, she knew, but she had to know. If he had lied to her and he wasn’t really over Josephine, then she was wasting her time with him anyway. It was better to have loved and lost and all that crap.

His eyes widened at her accusation. “What? No. This has nothing to do with her and everything to do with the fact that you lied to me.”

“But you’re breaking up with me,” she said flatly.

His gaze jerked away and he inhaled deeply. “I don’t know what I’m doing right now. I really don’t.”

A pit formed in her stomach and bitterness filled her mouth. The last thing Dani wanted was to taste the sting of rejection when she’d done nothing wrong. So she beat him to the punch. “You know what. Let me tell you what I know.” Her impassioned words called back his attention and he regarded her with a mixture of curiosity and weariness. “I don’t deserve to be treated like a villain over something that wasn’t even that bad. So what if I didn’t spill my whole life story? You weren’t exactly transparent with me either.”

“I could have lost my job,” Ransom seethed.

“With
Joe
,” she said, patting her hand against her chest, “not
me
. And if you can’t tell the difference, then
you’re
the one with the problem here.”  Popping the door open, Dani put her feet on the ground and lifted herself out of the car. She was barely holding it together.

“I’ll call you,” Ransom told her, and another bolt of pain lanced through her.

Shaking her head, she said, “Figure out what you really want, Ransom. Otherwise, don’t bother.” Without looking back, she hurried inside and up to her apartment, barely making it past the threshold before she was overcome with emotion. With her back against the door, she slid down to the floor and curled into herself before she just let it all go.

NINETEEN

ONE WEEK PASSED. THEN two. Three. Before Ransom knew it, Christmas was over. And then New Year’s. Now it was February, and he was facing down yet another holiday…alone. The worst of its kind, too, if he had any say about it. Valentine’s Day was just another cold reminder of what he’d had and lost, and it was all his fault.

So why hadn’t he tried to contact her? That was a good question. One Ransom didn’t have the answer for. Maybe he was too hurt that she’d lied to him. Maybe it was because he was too distrusting. Maybe he was incapable of loving and being loved.

Or maybe he was just a crybaby asshole who needed a swift kick to the ass.

A sudden slice of pain lanced from his right butt cheek up his spine, vibrating at the base of his neck. “What the fuck!” Ransom shouted, then, clasping his ass, dissolved into a low, drawn-out moan.

“Get your ass up,” Rebel said as he stood over him. “Mom wants to talk to you. She’s in the kitchen.”

“You’re supposed to use your words, asshole.”

“Stop being a crybaby and get your ass in there.”

Grimacing, Ransom unfolded himself from the floor where he’d been playing blocks with his nieces, and stood. From the chair where she lounged, Josephine passed him a sympathetic look. “Your husband is an asshole,” he told her. “See what you married?”

“He’s a total brute,” she agreed, smiling as she continued to thumb through a baby’s health and wellness magazine. “But you gotta love him.”

“Maybe
you
do.”

“So do you,” she returned. “You’d better get moving before he comes back and finishes the job on that other cheek.”

He glared at her. “Et tu, Joe?”

She chuckled, shaking her head at his antics, and earned one of his rare smiles. Rare because he just didn’t have the stomach for them lately. Everything seemed to hollow him out since he drove away from Dani’s place that night.

He should have gone after her. He should have apologized. He should have told her how much he loved her. He should have done a lot of things he’d didn’t do, but it was all water under the bridge now. He saw no way of fixing it, and so he didn’t try.

What was the point? By now, she’d probably come to her senses, realized he was too old and too much trouble to bother with and moved on.

When he reached the kitchen, Ransom spotted his mother in her usual place: standing over the stove and a steaming pot. His brother, Rebel, was leaning against the counter, polishing a bright red apple on the chest of shirt. Whatever they’d been discussing ended when he entered the room, and both set their eyes on him.

“You look like the damn devil with that apple,” Ransom commented as he brushed passed his brother and reached for a banana from the bowl of fruit his mother liked to keep out on the counter. “No wonder Josephine chose you. It all makes sense now…serpent.”

“Mom,” Rebel said in a childlike whine as he inspected the apple for a prime spot to sink his teeth, “Ransom’s calling names.”

“He kicked me!”

“Boys,” their mother said with a smile. “Be nice.”

“How do you sleep at night, knowing you gave birth to a bad seed,” Ransom asked, sitting down on one of the cushioned bar stools.

“Yeah, Mom, how do you live with knowing Ransom is an evil little twat.”

Ransom shot to his feet and stabbed a finger at his brother. “Satan, be gone!”

“Boys! That’s just enough,” their mother admonished through her laughter. “Sometimes I ask myself why I was cursed with boys instead of a pair of lovely, well-behaved daughters who hugged and complimented each other, instead of exchanging insults. But then I remember that time at Woodstock and it all becomes clear.”

“Hippy,” Rebel muttered, then took a huge bite of his apple.

“I’ll take that as a compliment, thank you very much. Now shoo. I need to talk to your brother.” Her head tilted down, her gaze fixed on Rebel, and she broke out her mom voice. “Alone.”

“Yeah, yeah. I’m goin’.” Rebel shuffled away, only to turn back when he reached the door. “For what it’s worth, you’re a moron for not going after that girl. That’s what Mom is going to tell you, but she’ll be nicer about it.”

Ransom tipped his head. Rebel did the same.

Once he was out of earshot, his mother slid a plate of cookies in front of him, and a glass of milk saying, “That boy is the devil, I swear.”

“Cookies and milk? Should I strap myself in for this one?”

Coming around the counter, she took the stool next to his and sat down, angling herself toward him. With a soft smile, she placed her hand on his forearm. “You already know what I’m going to say, so I’ll just tell you that I hate seeing you torture yourself this way. You deserve happiness.”

“That’s subjective.”

“That’s fact. You don’t think you deserve to be happy? Because you do. You deserve all the happiness the world has to offer, but for some reason, you keep turning your back on it.”

“She lied to me,” he said, falling back on the excuse like a sleep-deprived man would a fluffy down pillow.

“You said that, and I recall telling you that you’re full of crap.”

“An omission is the same as lying,” he argued, remembering the conversation they’d had following the breakup. His mother had scolded him then, too.

“Look, you want to be an idiot and hold onto your anger? Fine. You want to throw away possibly the best thing that has ever happened to you? Fine. You want to wallow in self-pity and grow old and die alone? Fine. Have it your way. It’s your life. I certainly can’t tell you how to run it, but at least be honest with yourself and everyone else. Stop lying, son, because you’re not the only person who’s getting hurt here.”

“So now I’m responsible for your happiness, too?” This was such bullshit. Ransom turned away, staring at the plate of cookies and wanting nothing more than to throw the whole damn thing across the room just to hear the satisfying sound of ceramic shattering.

“Not mine, hers. If you think you’re miserable, think of how she must be feeling. That girl loved you.”

“You don’t know that,” he mumbled, knowing he was reaching but, for some reason, unable to stop pushing back. He was always pushing.

“You don’t think I recognize love when I see it? That girl had the same look in her eye that Josephine has when she looks at your brother. The same one he gives her every time he looks at her. The same one your father and I share. And the same one you looked at Dani with. Like it or not, she was in love with you something fierce, and that doesn’t just go away.”

Tracing a pattern in the granite countertop, Ransom figured she was probably right. But hell if he knew what to do about it. His head bowed under the weight pressing down on his shoulders. “Even if I still wanted her, there’s no guarantee that she’d still want to be with me.” Things had been said, feelings had been hurt.

Hearts had been broken.

“Love doesn’t come with guarantees, sweetheart. It’s never easy and sometimes it can be downright ugly, but it always comes with a chance for something better, something deeper than you could ever imagine, and if you open yourself up to it, it can be the most beautiful experience.” Sliding an arm around his back, she laid her head on his shoulder and hugged him tight. “Please, open yourself up. Let yourself be happy. If not for you, do it for her, because I’m betting she isn’t fairing any better than you are right now.”

Resting his head on top of hers, Ransom mulled over their conversation, allowing her words to sink in. If she was right, then he couldn’t imagine the kind of pain Dani must be feeling right now, because he was miserable. At least he hadn’t gone back to relying on booze to get him through the day, but he’d be lying if he said it wasn’t tempting. The only thing keeping him from taking a drink was knowing how upset Dani would be—would have been—if he did.

One thing was certain. If ever there was a question in his mind as to whether or not he was completely over his feelings for Josephine, it was crystal clear now, because never in his life had he felt such a deep and abiding ache, as if his heart were being ripped from his chest and his lungs were being squeezed in a vice. It was a never ending, soul deep affliction without a cure, and he was one step away from succumbing to it.

The question was, what was he going to do about it?

***

“I WARNED YOU, BUT you wouldn’t listen. No one ever listens when Ashley speaks,” Dani’s friend, Ash, said, referring to herself in the third person. Lifting what was left of her cigarette to her lips, she inhaled deeply, drawing the smoke into her lungs, before letting it drift back out her nose.

Dani wrinkled her nose and looked away. She hated cigarettes. They were no good and they smelled terrible. She just couldn’t understand their appeal, but Ash thought it gave her an “edge” or something. Made her look tough.

“Are you even listening?”

Blinking, Dani turned her head away from the couple shooting pool and regarded her friend with a bored stare. “It’s hard to listen when all you do is criticize.”

“God, you’re a bitch tonight. Maybe you need to get laid.”

What she needed was to get rid of the terrible stabbing sensation she got in her chest whenever she saw a happy couple walk through the door. It had been weeks since her fight with Ransom. No calls. Not texts. No communication at all.

Guess he’d made his decision. Now it was up to her to accept it. But she couldn’t. Everything felt so unfinished. Open-ended. Not to mention, she still loved him.

That stupid jackass had broken her heart and she still found herself longing to see him again. To hear his voice. To feel his arms around her.

She was a damn fool is what she was.

Turning back to her friend, she asked, “Do you ever think that maybe we should just say to hell with men and become lesbians?”

“Hell yes! Every damn day.” Holding her hand up, she high-fived Dani. “I swear you’re the only person in the free world that gets me. If men weren’t so gosh darned sexy with all those muscles and flirty smiles and round, apple bottoms and dicks, I’d go lesbo in a heartbeat.”

Dani eyed her friend. “You do know that, without any of those benefits, they’d basically be women, too, right?”

“A world full of women, yes,” Ash confirmed, giving her a look like she thought she was crazy. “Imagine how peaceful that would be. No more creepy guys trying to push up on you. No more stalker ex-boyfriends. No more…well, everything. The world’s problems would be solved.”

“I don’t think it’s that easy. Besides, you named off some pretty good attributes that I wouldn’t mind keeping around.”

“Yeah.” Ash sighed, releasing another cloud of smoke. “Speaking of attributes. When are you going to jump back on the meat wagon? I’m tired of seeing you mope around. You know that man wasn’t good enough for you, which he proved in spades when he didn’t even bother to chase after you.”

“I didn’t really give him a choice in the matter,” Dani defended.

“Honey, there is always a choice. Just goes to show that he wasn’t worth your time.”

Dani scowled. “Why are you so negative all the time? Can’t you just, for once, show some support? Ransom has issues, I admit that, but he’s a good man.”

“I
am
being supportive. What do you think I’m doing sitting here with you all night? It’s certainly not because I enjoy watching people get shit-faced and make fools of themselves, I can tell you that. And as for that asshat you think is such a good man, if he’s so good, then where the hell is he, huh? Probably off picking up another girl at a bar just like he did you.”

God. Of all the things she could have said, that hurt the most. The thought of Ransom with another woman stabbed deep. Irritated, Dani shoved her chair away from the table and stood. Staring down at her friend, she couldn’t recall a time when she’d been so upset with her. Ash was a good person, but she was also sour. Even on her best day, she carried a rain cloud over her head, and Dani was sick to death of her cantankerous attitude.

“You know, it’s too bad that you have to be so hateful all the time. Maybe if you opened your eyes for once, you’d see that the people in this world aren’t as bad as you think. Instead, you’re so busy complaining all the time that you fail to realize your life is passing you by.”

“Maybe it is,” Ash replied, flicking her cigarette over the ashtray, “but at least I’m not like you, wearing my heart on my sleeve for everyone to stomp on. At least I’m not the one sitting here allowing someone else’s actions to dictate my life.”

“No, you’re just the pretty little wallflower who’s too afraid to be picked for fear of having to actually to feel something for once. I’m leaving,” Dani announced. “Have fun stewing. I’m over it.”

“So you’re breaking up with me, too, now?” Ash called after her. “Congratulations! You’re well on your way to being alone.”

Throwing open the door, Dani stepped into the chilly night air and clenched her fists. She wanted to punch something. It was beginning to feel as if everything in her life was working against her. What else was she going to lose?

A sharp wind blew through the parking lot, slicing through Dani’s clothing. Chattering, she tugged her coat around her and huddled inside of it and began a light jog to the curb where she jumped inside a waiting cab. This wasn’t how she’d anticipated spending her nights, barhopping with friends and wallowing in self-pity.