Page 3 of The Virgin's Baby
I went back to thinking about my accomplishments and added in the bachelor’s degree in petroleum engineering from Texas Tech in Lubbock—a degree I’d never used a day in my life.
The family business was oil, so I got a degree in it to make everyone happy. That degree had sealed my future as a wealthy man. It was the one stipulation my grandfather, who’d raised me after my parents were killed when I was fifteen, demanded in order for me to inherit the fortune he’d amassed.
I had found a loophole in his demand, however. He’d never said I had to get a job after graduating. So, I never bothered to look. I just took the bank card he gave me and went on vacation. Over and over again. One vacation after another.
The hotel phone rang, and I figured it was one of the guys asking if I was ready to head out to the club. When I picked up the phone, I was surprised to find my grandfather’s personal assistant on the other end of the line. “Ransom, your grandfather doesn’t know I’m making this call to you,” Mr. Davenport said in a whisper.
My blood ran cold. “Is he okay?”
My grandfather wasn’t young anymore. He had lost some of the robust strength he’d had when he took over raising me. But he wasn’t old at seventy either—and his health had always been pretty good.
“No, he’s not,” came his reply. “You need to come home, Ransom. Don’t wait. Come as soon as you can.”
God, don’t make me lose him too.
Chapter Two
Aspen
Lubbock, Texas – May 9th
The sun blazed down on me as I made the long walk to the post office to check my mail. A warm breeze made the afternoon seem hotter than it had been the day before.
Lubbock wasn’t exactly paradise, but it was the only place I’d ever lived. Somehow, I’d never gotten used to the oppressive heat, but I had learned how to dress for the summer weather. Shorts and a cotton T-shirt along with flip-flops made it bearable. My thick dark curls had to be pulled up into a high ponytail to keep it off my neck.
Climbing up the stairs of the post office, I passed one of my professors.
“Afternoon, Aspen. It’s a nice day today, don’t you think?” Professor Sampson asked me. She’d been one of my favorites in last semester’s classes. Natural gas engineering seemed easy when she was teaching.
Stopping to chat for a sec, I said, “It’s a pretty nice day for Lubbock. But wouldn’t a tropical beach be a heck of a lot better on a day like this?”
Nodding, she agreed. “I bet it would. Did you make any summer plans?”
“Work, work, and then some more work,” I said with a laugh. I didn’t have the funds for any kind of vacation. “How about you?”
“Me and the hubby are going to Cancun in June. We’ll be there a whole week.” She waved her hand in front of her face to fan it. “I can’t wait to get there.”
“And you’ll probably hate leaving there too,” I added with a smile. I knew I would’ve hated to.
“Most likely,” she said with a nod. “Well, I better let you get to it then. Bye, Aspen.”
“Bye.” I made my way to the door. Opening it, I felt a burst of cool air waft over me as I walked in. Taking my time so I could cool off before making the hot trek back to the apartment I shared with another girl, I wandered around the large building.
A USPS poster advertising their latest stamps drew my attention. Birds were the theme: pretty little birds on tiny branches that made me smile.
I wasn’t your ordinary twenty-three-year-old college student. Little things made me happy. I wasn’t into partying either, unlike so many of the people at school here.
Even though I was approached to pledge at a few different sororities, I never had an interest. It was important to me to not just make good grades, but to make great ones. Living with a houseful of hormone-crazed girls sounded like poison to me, a surefire way to kill my chances of successfully gaining a master’s degree in petroleum engineering.
Box 954 was just to the right of the poster. Tapping in the combination, I opened the small box to find it filled with letters. It had been a week since I had checked the mail.
One envelope in particular made me anxious.My bank statement.
My bills weren’t high, but my part-time job didn’t pay well at all. With my half of the rent, electric, water, and cable totaling five hundred dollars a month along with an average hundred spent on food each week, usually a whopping fifty bucks was left to be deposited into the college fund account my father started for me.
That bank account had slowly dwindled after four and a half years of college. I used it exclusively to pay for classes, books, and other things I needed for school. It had been six months since I had the courage to open a statement to see what was left.
Peeking around the busy post office, I decided not to open the envelope for fear I might burst into tears in front of these people. I stuffed it into my bag and headed back to my apartment.
