Marriage of Inconvenience(Knitting in the City Book #7)(43)
Dan leaned back in his seat. “Listen, I can see this upsets you, and I don’t blame you. But what’s done is done. Cypher Systems was at a critical point when Janie and Quinn hooked up, and he wanted to make sure none of you were a liability.”
“So you know all about me?”
“Not all about you.”
“Really. What don’t you know?”
“Let’s see . . .” He twisted his mouth to the side and peered at me thoughtfully. “What’d you have for breakfast this morning?”
“Two hard-boiled eggs.”
“So, the usual?”
My mouth dropped open, and I was sure dismay was painted all over my features, but Dan could only keep his face straight for approximately five seconds before he cracked a smile and started to laugh.
“Relax. I’m kidding. I have no idea what you eat for breakfast. It wasn’t like that. We weren’t spying. We just wanted to make sure none of you had any connections that might jeopardize or complicate Cypher Systems’s migration to corporate security. So, no. I don’t know everything about you.” He added under his breath something that sounded like, “Far from it.”
His clarification didn’t make me feel much better, because the fact was he had—or Quinn and Alex and their team had—investigated us. Dan did know a lot about me. I was at a huge disadvantage; in comparison, I knew very little about him.
“You know I left home at fifteen?” I lifted my chin, bracing myself for his answer.
He didn’t respond right away, instead he leaned forward and pushed his straw into his drink. “Yes.”
“Do you know why?”
“No.” He sighed, shaking his head, looking irritated. “But I can guess.”
“Please.” I gestured for him to continue, then re-crossed my arms.
His attention settled on my crossed arms and his frustration seemed to intensify. “Your mom. She has schizophrenia, right? The bad kind?”
I didn’t flinch. I didn’t show any emotion. “That’s right.”
“And your dad, he shipped you off to boarding school at five? He was a real workaholic type, right?”
“Yes.”
“My guess is, you didn’t like the school, and you never saw your dad, and your mom wasn’t around, so . . .” His shoulders moved up and down once as he sipped his drink.
“So?”
“So you had nothing to stay for. No family to consider, or to guide you, or to protect you. As a kid, you needed to be protected. And if you didn’t get on well at school, you had no reason to stay there either. You were young. You didn’t like where you were, so you left.”
I didn’t confirm or deny his guess, mostly because his conclusion was definitely part of the reason I’d run away.
“I get it. I mean, I remember being a teenager and not understanding that I wasn’t invincible. I was so eager to get out there and prove myself, how much of a big man I was, how much of an adult, that I made dumbass choices. I didn’t understand that the big adult choices come with big adult consequences.”
Big adult consequences.
This piqued my interest. “Specifically?”
“I joined my brother’s gang when I was fourteen,”—he scratched his neck, not quite meeting my eyes—“and did some very, very bad stuff.”
I considered him, what he’d said, what he didn’t say. “Bad stuff?”
“Yeah.”
Inexplicably, I found myself relaxing. “Like what?”
Dan gave me a close-lipped smile. His eyes seemed to dance with amusement while erecting a barricade at the same time. “You don’t want to know.”
“I think I do. We might get married tomorrow, right?”
“Not ‘might.’” He gave his head a subtle shake, his eyes locked with mine. “We are getting married tomorrow. In fact, according to Cook County, we’re already married.”
“You know all about me—”
“I don’t. I really don’t.”
“You know the nature of the unwise decisions I made, right? The drugs?”
His eyebrows ticked up, but I wasn’t finished.
“How I lived on the streets? The stealing?”
“No, actually.” Dan placed an elbow on the table, his hand rubbing his chin as he considered me. “I don’t know about that.”
Startled, I sat straighter in my seat. “You don’t?”
“The files don’t go into that much detail. If you weren’t arrested for it, I don’t know about it.”
“But I was arrested.”
“You’ve been arrested?” He made no attempt to hide his shock.