“So leaving you alone in a foreign country to have a baby, that’s the grand gesture you’re looking for?”

She hardens at my sarcasm and I’m instantly sorry, but it’s too late—the words hang in the air between us, creating a gulf.

“What part didn’t you hear? He showed up at my games and competitions for an entire year and got absolutely nothing back in return. Not a kiss, not a conversation, nothing. He was patient and concerned and so… so… open. He didn’t care that his whole school heard him encourage me at the basketball games. Or that his friends laughed at him standing there in the rain at the finish line of a cross-country race. He did it anyway. He did it because he only saw me, Ford. He took me to two dances a year because that was as many as we could get away with. He showed me I mattered before he asked me to give up a little bit of myself to make him happy. I gave up my fear of him dying as a soldier so he could pursue his dream. And maybe these things aren’t as fancy as what you have in mind, but I don’t care what you think about it. He made me feel special—we made each other feel special.”

“You want the fairy tale, then?” I shake my head.

“I want to be won, Ford. If you can win me, you can have me. I’ll be yours and you’ll have earned it.”

I stare at her and say nothing.

The grand gesture. Ashleigh wants a Jedi and all I’m capable of giving her is the Sith.

She reads my introspective silence as her answer and gets up and takes Kate back into the bedroom.

Chapter Forty

When I go inside she’s dressed and sitting on the couch with Kate watching something on TV.

“Ashleigh, look, I’m not—”

My phone buzzes in my pants and I take it out and look at the name. Jason.

“Who is it? A pet who needs to be fed and walked?”

I silence the phone and stick it back in my pocket. “Cute.” I sit down next to her. Fuck. I am so bad at this shit. What the hell do I say? I feel like I’m losing her, right now, this very moment. I feel like she’s slipping away and I have no idea what to say.

“Just tell me what you’re thinking. Start there, Ford.”

She’s a mind-reader. She’s a f**king psychologist for f**k’s sake.

“If you can’t do that, then I’m just wasting my time.”

“What the f**k do you want from me? I said I wanted you. How is that not telling you how I feel? I f**king want you to live here, move in. Be with me. Let me help with Kate.”

“In what capacity, Ford? What is Kate to you but some pet’s offspring?”

“That’s enough,” I glare at her. “Don’t talk shit to me because you’re insecure.”

“You’re the one who’s insecure. You want control to suppress your social inadequacy.”

“Fucking don’t do that either. If I wanted a psych evaluation I’d go see a therapist.”

“So I’m supposed to pretend that I didn’t just go to school for six years to get a degree in psychology? Just pretend that I don’t see all the issues you have?”

“Issues I have? Ashleigh, please. If I’m f**ked up, then you’re right there with me. We’re both—”

The gate alert buzzes and cuts off my words. “Fucking people are here from the hotel to drop off our shit, I bet.” I get up and go over to the security panel near the door and press the button that opens the front gate. I peek out the window but the driveway is long and we’re at the top of a hill, so I can’t see the gate from the house. “You and I are the same, Miss Li. We both have issues. So don’t push me away with that excuse.”

Ash says nothing and I peek out the window again as a large black Mercedes pulls up. “Who the f**k is that? I’m pretty sure hotel couriers don’t drive an eighty-thousand-dollar Mercedes.”

“What?” Ashleigh jumps up and hurries over to the window just as a tall man in a black suit gets out of the back of the car. He’s older, maybe early fifties, has jet-black hair, and as soon as he turns around I know who he is by the color of his eyes.

“My father is here.” A blonde woman gets out after him. “And my f**king sister. Oh, God. Ford, listen to me.” Ash pulls on my arm. “Listen to me, OK? Do not open the door, do not open the door!”

“Why are they just standing there?” I ask as we peek out at them.

And then a cop car comes up the driveway.

“What the f**k is going on?”

“OK, look, I left some things out of my story… Ford!” She grabs my arm again but I’m watching these f**king people talk to the cops, probably about me, in my f**king driveway. The cop nods and then puts his hand on his Taser. Ashleigh is still talking but I don’t hear anything she says because the f**king cops are walking up to my door with Ashleigh’s father and sister looking like they’re in the mood to take my shit out.

The doorbell chimes. They’re looking right at us through the window, even as Ash continues to freak out and tell me all kinds of shit that just never even registers in my brain.

Fuck.

What if they have dirt on me? What if this father of hers found out who I am and has f**king dirt on me? Ronin, I need Ronin. I pull out my phone to call him when the doorbell rings again. Kate begins to cry because Ashleigh is so upset and before I can press Ronin’s face to place the call another call comes in.

Fucking Jason, again.