Page 4 of Darling Beasts

California?The idea was so preposterous even the perennially people-pleasing Gabby couldn’t pretend to be on board. She stood half in, half out of the room, unable to dredge up a single nice thing to say.

“Dad. Seriously. Why California?” Talia asked. She honestly could not believe this. “Are you allowed to pick a random state to run in?”

“For real,” Ozzie said, shaking his head as he typed something into his phone. Talia hoped he wasn’t posting this somewhere.POV: your family is going insane.

“There are several benefits to California,” Dad said, extracting his phone from his front pocket. He scanned the incoming texts. “Not the least of which is the fact there’s an empty seat because what’s-her-name croaked.”

“Jesus, Dad,” Gabby said, as she inexplicably scratched around under her shirt.

“Our family has a long history in the state,” Dad continued, dropping his phone back into his pocket. Meanwhile, Talia unlocked hers, curious about this woman who “croaked.”Dead senator California. Oh. Right. Well. She’d been ninety years old. “Need I remind everyone that F.D. Gunn began in San Diego?”

He didn’t need to remind anyone because the lore had been drilled into them. Shortly after the Civil War, Frederick Gunnrelocated from the Midwest to San Diego for health reasons and bought the local paper. One newspaper became hundreds more, and Gunn moved the whole deal back to his home state of Ohio to get the rest of the family involved. The next two generations added radio, local television, and cable assets, and by the 1980s, F.D. Gunn had morphed into a New York–based media empire. Their dad assumed the helm in 1990, at the age of twenty-eight.

“I don’t think you can call something a long history,” Ozzie pointed out, “when it involved one dude briefly living in San Diego a hundred and fifty years ago to clear up his gouty arthritis or whatever.”

“His wife gave birth to children there!”

“Good for her, I guess.”

Dad slumped his shoulders. Sighing, Talia heaved her tote onto her lap and scrabbled around for a pen. Somebody needed to take notes and bring a speck of logic to the conversation, and Talia considered herself the one for the job. She was a note-taker, a researcher, a liner-up of facts. She debated, she stewed, she checked Reddit forums and sketchy Google search links, all of which would make her feel better until she felt worse.

“Do you appreciate how ubiquitous our name is in Southern California?” Dad said. “Our philanthropic efforts arevast.”

“Okay, calm down,” Ozzie said.

“Dad’s right,” Talia said, placing her tote back onto the floor. She’d been to San Diego more than any of them and was familiar with the hospitals and museums and marine biological institute. Now that Talia thought about it, their namedidstill mean something in California. Maybe this scheme wasn’t so harebrained, after all.

“California sounds great!” Diane chimed in. “The beaches, the weather. I hear they don’t really have bugs.”

Talia let out a small huff. What was Diane even doing there? Well, technically, she’d driven Talia from the city, but, like, what was the existential reason? Diane was a nanny, and the“kids” were now legal adults. Shouldn’t everyone move on with their lives?

“Let’s talk logistics,” Talia said, tapping her pen. “If you proceed with the campaign—” She wroteCALIFORNIA?at the top of page one.

“Oh, we’re proceeding,” Ustenya said, though sounded kind of pissed about it.

“What roles would you see us in?” Talia asked.

It was weird. He’d never pressured any of them to join FDG and maybe she should take his request to work together now as a compliment. Then again, he also wanted Gabby and Ozzie. Don’t get her wrong. Talia loved her siblings, but what did they bring to the table? Neither had a college degree, and while Ozzie was a good guy deep down, he was also clueless and could come across as an ass. Plus, his teenage years were spotty, a possible liability for someone running for office. As for Gabby, she wasthe nicest person in the worldaccording to everyone, but her professional experience involved owning an experimental theater. It was a real Island of Misfit Toys out there.

On the other hand, Ozzie was quite deft at social media, and one might describe Gabby as a “community builder,” and suddenly Talia wondered what was so useful abouther. A law degree could be helpful, but only sometimes, and in very specific ways.

“Your roles are something my campaign manager will work out,” Dad said. “Rest assured, he’s seen your CVs.”

“The fuck?” Ozzie said, pulling his chin into his neck. “I’ve never had a damned CV.”

“What city will you run the campaign from?” Talia asked. She wrote and underlinedLos Angeles?It wouldn’t be her first pick. LA was too spread out, too charmless and trafficky. San Francisco probably made the most sense—close to Silicon Valley and all that—but it seemed like the city was going through it right now.

“We’ll be based out of San Diego, obviously.”

Talia’s head jerked up. “San Diego?” she repeated, her heart in her throat. “Wherein San Diego?” There was only one answer, an impossible answer, yet he was about to say it. Talia braced for the words.

“The Ranch,” Dad said, exactly as she expected and feared he would.

Talia felt suddenly dizzy and ungrounded, like she was about to float off into space. The Ranch was where her mother had lived after her parents separated, and the place she’d died.

Didn’t Dad remember what he’d said after the small, private memorial service they’d held beside the lake?Let’s take comfort in the fact your mother loved this property, and it sustained her as long as it could. Now that Daphne’s gone, it’s time to board up the Ranch for the season.Because there were no seasons in San Diego, Talia took this as a metaphor about closing the book on the wild, colorful season of Daphne Carter Gunn, and thus their family’s association with the Ranch. No one had mentioned it in the eleven years since.

“But... Dad... why? How?” Talia stammered. “I thought you sold it.”

---