Even in a hospital gown, his hair a mess, holding a spoonful of green glop to his lips, Ryan Steel was still the most gorgeous man on the planet. He looked up at me, his eyes wide.

“Hi,” I said.

“Hey,” he said.

I walked swiftly to his side. “Are you all right? Melanie called me.”

“I’m okay. Just a little concussion.”

I took the spoon he was still holding and set it on the tray. “What were you thinking? Taking your car out and going completely nuts. You promised me you wouldn’t do anything stupid.”

“I didn’t—”

“Uh-uh.” I placed two fingers over his lips. “You scared the shit out of all of us. You don’t get to talk yet.”

“Ruby, I—”

“What the hell did I just say?” I’d had a hell of a night, dealing with my phone call from dear old Daddy, and I wasn’t about to let Ryan off the hook. “I know you’ve been through a huge turning point in your life, but that doesn’t change how the rest of us feel about you. Your brothers and sister and sisters-in-law were scared out of their minds when they couldn’t find you this morning. And when Melanie called me…” I broke off, tears choking me.

I gulped them down. Ryan didn’t need to see me like that. He didn’t deserve to see me like that after the stunt he’d pulled.

“I’m fine,” he said.

“I hate to break it to you, but ‘fine’ people aren’t usually lying in the hospital.”

“Doctors are overly cautious. They don’t want to get sued by the Steels.”

“Oh, for God’s sake, Ryan!” I stood and paced around the sterile room. “The doctor was right. I talked to Melanie, and she agreed with his assessment. In case you’ve forgotten, she’s also a doctor.”

“I don’t want to argue with you, Ruby.”

“Fine. Then don’t.”

He paused and then picked up the spoon, swallowing the Jell-O and hovering the utensil over the plate. “About yesterday…”

“What about it?”

“I’m sorry I was so…” He sighed.

“Like I told you. I don’t do anything I don’t want to do. No apologies, Ryan. No regrets.”

“But I do regret how I—”

I shut him up, this time by pressing a light kiss to his lips. “Enough.”

Jonah and Talon walked quietly through the doorway.

“Food’s here,” Jonah said. “Oh, hey, Ruby.”

“Hi.”

“Hungry?” Talon asked. “We brought enough to feed an army.”

“I’m hungry enough to eat that much,” Ryan said. “The gray meat and Jell-O isn’t cutting it.”

I couldn’t help smiling. This was Ryan being…Ryan. The Ryan I had come to know was, until recently, always jovial. Always smiling, despite the tragedies that had befallen his family.

I inhaled. Garlic and basil. Italian. My mouth watered. But I didn’t want to interrupt their brother time. “I’ll be going.”

“No,” Ryan said. “Please stay.”

“I don’t want to intrude.”

“If you feel like you’re intruding, I’ll boot these two out,” he said.

My cheeks warmed. He’d rather be with me than his brothers? Maybe he had truly forgiven me for my part in the DNA test.

Jonah and Talon exchanged a glance.

“We’ll go,” Jonah said, “but only if Ruby promises she’ll see that you stay put until you’re released tomorrow.”

Way to put me on the spot. I opened my mouth, but no words came out. Ryan had asked me to stay, but it sounded like his brothers wanted me to spend the night here. I was pretty sure that wasn’t what Ryan had meant. Besides, I had work the next day.

“Give me a break, guys,” Ryan said. “I’m staying put, okay? Give me a little credit.”

“Glad you’re feeling better, Ry.” Jonah looked to me and then pulled a phone out of his pocket. “Here’s your new cell. It’s all activated.” He tossed it to Ryan.

Ryan caught it easily. “Thanks, man.”

“I guess we’re off then,” Talon said and then looked to me. “He’s all yours.”

How I wished that were true. I was in love with Ryan Steel. Of course I hadn’t told him that, and until I had an inkling of how he felt about me and my part in his DNA test, I wasn’t going to.

“Tell Melanie I said hi,” I said to Jonah.

“Will do.” He and Talon left.

I turned to Ryan. “Let’s see what they brought you.” I opened the bag of takeout and took out a container and opened it. “Yum. Spaghetti Bolognese. Want some?”

“I do, actually.”

“Okay.” I picked up the plate that had the remnants of his hospital food, took it into his bathroom, and rinsed and dried it off. I returned and filled it with spaghetti and a slice of garlic bread. “Eat up.”

“Aren’t you going to join me?”

“I hadn’t thought about it.” The guys had brought plenty of food. “There isn’t another plate.”

“You can use this one,” he said. “I’ll eat out of the container.”

I smiled. Offering me his plate was kind of chivalrous. I wasn’t used to chivalry. “That’s okay. Go ahead and eat. I’ll just take a few bites.”

I grabbed a plastic fork out of the bag and took a few bites of the spaghetti. Spicy and delicious. And it kept me from having to talk for a couple of minutes.

I’d promised myself I wouldn’t pester him about our relationship out of respect to everything else he was going through. Not that I would anyway. I’d never had a relationship with a man before. This was all new to me, and I certainly didn’t relish the idea of talking to him about whatever this was between us.

He continued eating, and the silence became deafening. I took another bite of spaghetti just to have something to do.

“I didn’t tell my brothers yet.”

Ryan’s words startled me. I swallowed my mouthful of food and looked up. “Tell them what?”

“About my father. Your father. What they were into.”

Right. Wendy Madigan had confirmed my human trafficking theory, and it had made me sick to my stomach. Ryan hadn’t had such a theory, so I could only imagine how the new knowledge affected him. Still, we had no proof his father was actually involved in it. My father, however, definitely was.

“I don’t blame you. It’s not really a topic for everyday conversation. Especially not when you have a concussion.”

“I’m sorry,” he said.

“About what?”

“That your father is… Hell, I don’t know.”

“It is what it is,” I said matter-of-factly. “If I could change my DNA, I would. But I can’t.” Jesus, Ruby. Did you really just say that? “I’m sorry about the DNA comment. I wasn’t thinking.”

He shook his head. “I have to accept it. Believe me, I’d change my DNA if I could too. I hate that Wendy Madigan is my biological mother. I guess we both come from psychopaths. And for all I know, I come from two of them.”

“Focus on the good memories of your father, Ryan,” I said.

I didn’t have any good memories of my own father, but when I needed some solace, I thought about my mother, Diamond Thornbush. Yes, that was really her name. She might not have won mother of the year, but she had done the best she could, and I never doubted her love for me.

“He called me.”

“Who?”

“My father.”

I jolted, nearly spilling the Styrofoam container of spaghetti all over my lap. “What?”

“I know. He’s supposed to be dead. But Wendy said he’s alive.”

“Wendy’s crazy.”

“True enough. Still, someone claiming to be my father called me.”

“Did you tell your brothers?”

“Yeah. They think it was a hoax. But they also don’t know that Wendy told me he’s alive.”

“Did you check out the number?”

“I couldn’t. My cell phone went over a cliff, along with my car.”

Melanie had told me as much as she knew. None of us were exactly sure what happened, and Ryan couldn’t tell us because of a few minutes of retrograde amnesia. I stared at him, and gratitude warmed my body. He could have easily gone over the cliff with his car and phone, but he hadn’t. Whatever had happened, I was beyond thankful that he was here. Alive.

“My brothers didn’t ask much about it,” Ryan continued. “They started asking why I had answered the phone when I was going so fast—”

“Excuse me? Exactly how fast were you going, Ryan?”

“About one sixty when I picked up the phone. One twenty when I looked again.”

My heart nearly stopped. What if… Nope. Couldn’t go there. He was here. Safe. Concussed, but safe. I wouldn’t be a nag. That wasn’t what he needed right now.

“Okay.” I breathed out slowly, calming my urge to give him hell. “What happened?”

“I got a phone call. A voice said, ‘Ryan, this is your father.’”

My blood turned to ice in my veins.

Ruby, this is your father.

How had our fathers—if it was actually Ryan’s father who called him—said the exact same thing at nearly the exact same time? This was too eerie. For a moment, my mind hurtled to the impossible. Perhaps my father and Ryan’s had been together somehow, both deciding to make a phone call…

No. That was too outrageous.

Though they were both members of the future lawmakers club at the private preparatory high school they attended, and Brad Steel had backed my father’s “business,” for lack of a better word. I had no evidence that he’d continued backing it when my father, along with Tom Simpson and Larry Wade, turned to crime, though.

“Ryan,” I said, “I think we need to go on the assumption that Wendy was telling the truth, and that your father may be alive.”

“But so much that has come out of her mouth has been complete fabrication.”

“Not the most important thing. You are her son.” I hated sounding so blasé about it, but why beat around the bush at this point? We both knew the truth. We both knew my part in finding the truth. Ryan would eventually have to deal with all of that.

“Don’t remind me.”

“It doesn’t change who you are, Ryan. You’re still Ryan Steel.”

“Only because my father is still my father.”

“Yes. You have the same father as Joe, Talon, and Marj. You all share that. That’s huge.”

He grunted.

“And something else.”

“Now what?”

“Wendy might be completely off her rocker, but two things are crystal clear. One, she loves you. In her warped mind, everything she’s done has been for you.”

He scoffed. “Whatever. What’s the other thing?”

“She also loves your father. She’d do anything for him. Including helping him fake his death if he asked her to.”