flush on his neck that’s interesting. He did something nice…maybe nicer than anyone ever has for me,
and he seems embarrassed about it. Why? Because he showed me kindness? Or because he did it
himself?
I doubt many men as rich as he is would have put in the time to do something this big. I can’t
decide how I feel about it. Grateful, yes, because this is going to make my day-to-day life so much
better. But also…I have no idea where to tuck Zach in my mind. He doesn’t fit in that self-obsessed
playboy corner I had him in.
“Probably not,” I say, thinking of the special-order glasses. But maybe I won’t need them
anymore. Zach’s right. They’re ugly, but they’ve saved me hours of pain more than once, so I’ll keep
them buried at the bottom of my purse, just in case.
He snarls at me, then spins and stomps into his office. “Thank you!” I yell toward his door. I
exchange glances with Jonas. “Is he always like that?”
“No,” Jonas says, sounding far away. “He’s not. He’s generally very level-headed and easygoing.
Something about you seems to bring out a different side of him.”
I rotate my chair from side to side, processing the hurt his comment inflicts. I never set out to be a
nuisance. It’s not like I search for opportunities to be annoying, but somehow, the same thing always
happens. People end up annoyed and frustrated with me. They start speaking to me in clipped
sentences and whispering about me under their breath.
“I don’t know how to change that. I don’t want to be…difficult.”
Jonas pins me with a piercing stare. His brown eyes, framed by simple black rectangular glasses,
glare at me. “Don’t do that. Do not change who you are to please anyone. Not me, not my brother. Not
Ransom. It is a bad idea. For everyone.”
“That’s what people do, Jonas. They adjust. They change to fit in.” Or so everyone tells me.
His mouth tightens. “Is that what you want, though? You moved a thousand miles to a brand new
city to be someone else?”
“Basically…yes. I want a different kind of life.”
“And you think you’re going to get that by changing who you are?”
I stand up and pin him with a glare, annoyed at the way he’s pushing this. I don’t have this all
figured out yet. It’s been two damn days.
“Why do you care so much?”
