Branded

by Saffron A. Kent

Genres: New Adult Romance

Synopsis

Pen Pal meets Yellowstone in this dark, western romance featuring a college student using a false identity to exchange spicy letters with a prison inmate, only to be hunted down when the convicted cowboy is released.

It all began with letters.
Every word he wrote etched itself into my mind, into my soul.
I had no choice but to fall in love with him.  
Was it really so bad that the letters were part of a pen pal program, sent from a penitentiary? Or that they weren't really addressed to me?

It's not as if he'd ever find out the truth.
It's not as if I'd ever get to look into those eyes that are as blue as the sky over his ranch he left behind. Or that I'd ever get to feel his work-roughened hands dominating my body as he does my fevered dreams.

Until one afternoon when I find myself standing in front of him—pretending to be someone I am not. But the joke's on me because for all my pretenses, his deception is much crueler. The hardened, dangerous, impossibly beautiful man is nothing like the man in the letters. 

And it's too late for me to run.

Release date: October 28, 2025

Publisher: Grand Central Publishing

Print pages: 384

Sample

IN HIS LETTER, he told me to wear something white.

It sounded like an innocent enough request, something to help him recognize me when he saw me for the first time. But now that I’m here, standing at the door of the café, it feels like…

I’m a lamb being led to slaughter.

I know. I know I’m painting a pretty dramatic picture. And I’m not someone who gives in to drama at all. In fact, I try to stay away from it as much as I can. But this has to be the most dramatic thing I’ve ever done.

By this, I mean going to meet a man that I’ve only ever talked to in letters.

Actually, no. That’s not what I’m doing. I’m not going to meet some man that I’ve been talking to in letters for the past six months.

I’m going to meet a man who up until last Friday called Montana State Prison his home.

So, basically, I’ve come to this café, wearing a white dress with a delicate lace overlay and a swishy skirt, to meet a convicted felon that I’ve only ever talked to using the prison pen pal system.

Well, ex-felon, since he got out on parole last week.

In any case, I’m stupid, aren’t I? This is stupid. More than that, this is dangerous.

So what if it’s broad daylight and the café, from what I can see through the glass door, looks fairly busy? He was the one who picked this place and told me to meet him here. Maybe there’s a reason for that. Maybe he’s got his friend watching, ready to pounce on me when I go to the bathroom. Maybe there’s a secret hallway in this establishment that he can drag me into as I’m coming out of the restroom.

Except… it doesn’t feel dangerous. Just terrifying.

So despite myself, I push open the door and step inside.

For the first few seconds, my vision seems blurry. All I can make out is fuzzy colors and shapes, but slowly things become clear. I see red leather seats and wooden walls. I see people, tons of them. Almost all of the tables are occupied, and there’s a long line of customers at the counter, ordering and waiting for their coffee.

Witnesses. It should be a relief.

But how on earth am I going to find him in a churning sea of broad shoulders and tall bodies, most of them wearing Stetsons? Maybe if I was taller than my five-foot-two frame or wearing heels rather than these stupid schoolgirl Mary Janes, I’d be…

Oh, but wait a second.

I don’t need to worry about finding him because I think that he found me.

See, there’s a man.

In the center of all the chaos.

Still and unmoving.

He has a trucker’s cap on, black with an intricate R in white. Even though he’s sitting down and there’s no way for me to know, I can tell he’s the tallest man in here. At least he’s certainly the broadest, given how his shoulders span and block the top of his high-backed chair and almost all of the potted fern behind him.

And I think, I think, it’s him.

Even though he looks… wrong. He looks nothing like what I imagined.

I never thought he’d be this large, busting out of his black T-shirt. Or that his skin would be so tan that you’d guess he’d been living under the open, free sky rather than inside a concrete block and barred windows. I definitely never thought his face would look that… merciless.

The upper part of his face is hidden, courtesy of the cap, but whatever I can see makes me think that like his body, his face is also a study of superlatives. Like that stubbled jaw of his quite possibly is the most angular jaw I’ve ever seen. And his lips, dusky rose, may be the fullest set of lips that I’ve ever come across.

It’s laughable to call him beautiful, given how aggressively masculine everything about him is, but that’s what he is. Beautiful. Ruggedly so. Like the mountain range that you can see wherever you go in Montana.

Before I can really question my thoughts, I’m walking toward him.

While my footsteps are drowned by the din of the crowd, I can hear my heartbeats clearly. There’s a stampede in my chest, wild heart, wilder beats, and strangely, I think he can sense it from afar.

I’m sure he’s watching me walk over.

Again, I don’t know how I know this because his eyes are hidden by the cap he’s wearing, but I do. I can feel their gaze, all heavy and charged, through the space. The intensity only growing the closer I get to him.

Until it feels like a calloused hand sliding over my skin. As soon as I reach him, he looks up and that hand tightens.

No, that phantom grip around my neck turns hot.

Branding me.

Much like his pitch-black stare.

For some reason, I gave him blue eyes in my head. Probably because of the ranch he said he grew up on, and when I think of a ranch, I think of blue skies and vast lands.

So, no, he does not look like the man from my dreams at all.

And yet, yet, somehow, he feels so familiar too. I don’t know how to explain it, but I feel it. God, I’m losing my mind, aren’t I? Shaking my head slightly, I begin, “You’re…” I grab the back of the chair I’m standing by and steady myself so I can continue. “Are you… Bo? Bo P-Porter?”

Something flickers through his face.

Or so I think.

It comes and goes so quickly that I can’t be sure. But I think it was in response to my question, my voice. It makes me feel stupid—and relieved—because what if he isn’t the man I’m supposed to meet at all? I probably should’ve thought of that before I walked over.

Maybe that’s why my belly has been churning and I’m hearing alarm bells in my head.

“I, ah, I’m sorry.” I clear my throat. “I’m supposed to meet a Bo Porter here, and uh”—I dig my nails farther into the chair as his charcoal eyes turn even more intense—“but maybe you’re not—”

“Peyton.”

I think I break my nail at that.

At his voice.

If my voice caused a reaction in him—and I’m not saying that it did—his voice makes my knees go weak. It’s all deep and scratchy. Like along with keeping him locked away, someone locked up his voice too. And this is the first time he’s spoken in the eight years since he got put away.

I try not to dwell too much on that. Or the fact that once again, his voice is nothing like I’d imagined. I imagined it to be deep but not bottomless deep, and I imagined it to be rough but not so gravelly rough.The more important point is that he is the right man after all.

He is my Bo.

Well, not my Bo, but still.

The confirmation doesn’t put me as much at ease as I’d hoped. Not only because of these conflicting feelings that I have about him but also because he said Peyton.

I throw him a jerky nod. “Y-yeah. Yes. Peyton. I’m… Peyton.”

I give him a shaky smile to make it look convincing before quickly looking away and taking a seat at the table. But then my gaze lands on something, and my heart that was already pounding in my chest speeds up even more. There’s a teapot and a cup sitting in front of me, presumably for the person he was waiting for: me.

Along with a muffin.

More than the tea, that muffin does it for me.

It makes my pounding heart squeeze and my voice go wobbly. “Is that…? That’s tea.” I don’t wait for him to reply before saying, “And that’s… that’s a strawberry crumb muffin. It is, isn’t it?” I swallow thickly, still staring at it. “It’s so hard to find. It’s… I told you that.”

Finally, I look up.

Only to find he’s gone rigid. Which, if I’m being honest, isn’t all that different from how he’s been all this time, spine straight, shoulders back, his eyes alert. But now I notice the muscle in his cheek beating like a heart.

Almost like my heart.

I’m not sure what it means, though.

I’m not sure what any of this means, him ordering me tea because I told him I like it better than coffee and that if I can find a strawberry crumb muffin at a café, then that’s the only thing I’ll eat because they usually have the apple crumb but very rarely the strawberry crumb.

Except that my heart is racing and there’s a mad rush in my veins.

“In my letters. I told you what I like to order and… and you…” I fist my hands in my lap. “How did you know I’d even show up?”

Because I never said yes.

Three weeks ago, he sent me a letter saying that he was getting out and that he’d like to meet me here. But I never replied. I didn’t know what to say when seeing each other wasn’t ever in the cards. I mean, he’s the man I met through the prison pen pal system.

Prison.

Our lives were separated by metal bars, and up until this morning, I had all the plans of never having them merge. Of forgetting about him and being smart. Like I always am about everything.

But here I am.

“I didn’t,” he says back, his gaze just as steady and analyzing as ever.

Fuck, his voice.

It’s a truth serum. Has to be. Because words spill out of me without my own volition. “I’m sorry about that. For not writing back. I just… I got scared.”

“Not enough.”

“What?”

“To stay away.”

Again, I can’t read his tone.

I can’t read him, period. But maybe I’m not supposed to. Not yet.

Even though we’ve known each other on paper, this is our first meeting. So maybe it’s supposed to go like this. Maybe he’s supposed to be all aloof and dark, wrong-looking—no, just different than what I’d imagined—and make me shiver and shake.

Maybe his dark and not-blue eyes are supposed to feel like a branding iron.

“I wanted to see you,” I say. “I couldn’t…”

His voice goes even lower, if that’s possible. “You couldn’t what?”

My belly trembles in response. “Stop myself.”

And in turn, the muscle in his cheek jumps.

Clearing my throat, I continue, “I hated the idea of you just sitting here, waiting for me to show up and I… I couldn’t take that. Not after everything we’ve shared and—”

“Get up.”

“What?”

“Get up,” he repeats on a deep growl. “And leave.”

I draw back. “I-I’m sorry. Did I—”

He leans forward a little, his eyes fiery.

It happened in an instant, too, the charcoal going up in flames. As if there’s a fire inside of him and it’s raging.

God, he looks so intimidating like this.

That’s what it is, isn’t it?

That’s why he looks so wrong and different and whatnot.

It’s the fact that he appears threatening, sitting here, with his large and muscular body and a brutally beautiful face. All this time that I talked to him in letters, he never felt dangerous. Even though I knew the man I was corresponding with was a convicted felon, I never once felt afraid.

I do now.

“Get the fuck up and go.”

I flinch. “But I don’t understand.”

“You don’t need to.”

My hands begin to tremble. “I—”

“This was a mistake.”

This time, I go still. “Mistake?”

His nostrils flare, his face cruel. “Yeah. So what you need to do is listen to me and leave.” He growls again when I don’t move, “Now.”

“Is it…” I twist my fists in my lap as my cheeks burn and burn and burn. But not enough to stop me from asking, “Did you picture someone d-different? Than me.”

Because if I was picturing him in my head all this time, he was probably picturing me too. While I found him different from my imagination, he probably found me different too.

And different, when it comes to me, is the code word for lacking.

Guys usually don’t find me or my body very appealing. A body made of pasty flesh and jiggly curves. A body less than perfect.

So maybe I should listen to him and leave.

But again, instead of doing the smart thing, I sit there and let him peruse me. At my question, his burning stare moves to my blond hair, which is in a braid that falls to my waist. A few loose tendrils caress the base of my throat where I can feel my pulse fluttering under his gaze. He takes in my trembling chest, the wide square neck of the dress he asked me to wear exposing more than I’d like.

He stays there for a bit before coming back up to my face.

But when it’s over, his perusal, it feels like it went too fast. Like he was taking me in only to dismiss me more than to study me.

“Yes.”

So there it is then. His only answer harsh and curt.

Like me, he had pictured someone different.

Except he still made my heart race with both ecstasy and apprehension. While I probably repelled him.

So, at long last, after six months and within two minutes of meeting the man I dream about every night, I force myself to be smart and do as he says.

I get up, the scrape of the chair dragging against the floor sounding louder than the noises of this crowded café.

Feeling weak and dejected—completely opposite of what I felt when I walked in—I walk out.

And promise—God, I promise—to forget about Bo Porter.

To: Bo Porter

From: Peyton Turner

Dear Mr. Porter,

I hope this letter finds you well.

My name is Peyton Turner and I’m a freshman at Montana State University. I’m writing to you because we’re covering reformation in the prison system as a part of our sociology class and for my final assignment, I’m supposed to write an analysis paper. My professor has encouraged me to interview an inmate and use the information to construct my argument. I’m telling you this up front because I want you to know that I may use parts of our letters to write my final commentary, and I don’t know how you’d feel about that. So if you’d rather not do this with me, I won’t blame you.

This is my first time using the prison pen pal system so I’m not an expert, but from what I understand, most people enter into this looking for a connection, a friend, maybe; someone to talk to. And I want you to know that even though this is part of an assignment, I can be your friend for a little while.

In fact, how about to get the ball rolling I tell you a secret?

Or rather something embarrassing about myself.

So this assignment? It’s not a regular assignment. As in, I’m doing this for extra credit. Because I just got my midterm grades and they’re bad. They’re so bad that I’m failing and my professor provided me with this option as a last-ditch effort.

So there.

Can I tell you another secret?

Or again, simply a fact. This time, non-embarrassing, though.

My professor gave me a list of inmates in the pen pal program and I chose you specifically because in your profile you mentioned that you liked to read. So I figured we’d have something in common.

So what’s your favorite book?

For me, it will have to be Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë. The rocky moors; the hero in love and driven by revenge.

Have you read it?

I read somewhere that the library at Montana State Prison is in need of a major overhaul. That makes me sad, because reading should be as accessible as breathing, in my opinion.

In any case, I hope I hear from you but if not, that’s okay too.

Hope you have a great week!

Until next time (hopefully),

Peyton

PS: Okay, I have one more thing to confess and I’ve been thinking about it and I just didn’t know—still don’t—how to bring it up except to just bring it up so: I googled you. Well, I googled all the names on the list my professor gave me but still. For full disclosure: I typed your name in the search bar, clicked on the first article that came up. It was just a short piece in the Post. I didn’t cyberstalk you, and I won’t. I understand what an absolute violation of privacy it is and just because you are where you are, doesn’t mean that I can poke around in your life. But I… I don’t know how to put it delicately, but I just wanted to make sure that you were, for the lack of a better word, safe. Or rather your crime was (as safe as any crime can be). I realize that I could’ve just asked you but then… I mean, it just makes good sense to be careful, right? Not to say you’re a bad person, or that the crime you were found guilty of defines you. It doesn’t.

Oh gosh. I’m not making much sense, am I?

Forget what I already said. All I’m trying to say is that I was doing my due diligence and I’m sorry I violated your privacy.

To: Peyton Turner

From: Bo Porter

Peyton,

I can’t remember the last time I received a letter.

Or sat down and wrote one.

And now that I am, it makes me feel like I’m back in school or something but anyway.

First, you don’t need to address me as Mr. Porter. That makes me feel a little too old and if I had to choose between being back in the classroom and lying on my deathbed, I’d rather be passing notes during lessons.

Second, what kind of a moronic professor encourages their student to make contact with a convict?

But then again, you don’t sound real smart either if you think a drug bust is safe. Just because it doesn’t sound as awful as aggravated assault or attempted murder doesn’t mean you want to meet a junkie in a dark alley.

Or maybe you do.

I’ve got no idea what college kids are up to these days.

I will say though that whatever you’re up to doesn’t seem to be all that good for you, seeing as you’re failing and your last-ditch effort—as you called it—is asking for help from a convict that you stupidly think is safe.

Bo

To: Bo Porter

From: Peyton Turner

Dear Mr. Porter,

Did you call me and my professor stupid?

It looked like you did but I’m still giving you a chance to rectify your mistake before I go ahead and call you rude.

Or worse, an asshole.

Because I believe in reserving judgment and second chances. I believe in reformation (what a coincidence, given I’m writing a paper on that). Which means just because someone is stuck behind metal bars on a drug charge doesn’t automatically mean he’s a rude asshole.

Even though that rude asshole also implied that somehow I’m the one making wrong life choices because I failed one class.

For your information, I happen to be a straight-A student and this is the first time I’ve gotten anything less than an A-minus. Not that it’s any of your business.

I can’t believe I was all broken up about violating your privacy. Clearly, I wasted my apology.

A piece of advice: If writing letters makes you think you’re in school, then maybe you shouldn’t sign up for the pen pal service.

I’ll find someone else for my assignment.

Have a good life.

Sincerely, Ms. Turner (Yeah, that’s right. It’s Ms. Turner to you.)

To: Bo Porter

From: Peyton Turner

Dear Mr. Porter,

Maybe there’s something in the water at Montana State Prison.

Or maybe all of your fellow inmates are as rude as you because after weeks of writing letters to them, I have yet to receive a single response.

My best friend, in a moment of pure hilarity, pointed out that maybe it’s you. You’re keeping them from writing back to me because you’re a jerk. But I’m not that full of myself to think you’d go to such lengths to mess with me.

But that’s not the point.

The point is that, unfortunately, I’m stuck with you.

Look, I’m not going to beg but I’m also not going to let you keep me from getting a passing grade either. I tried to get my professor to change my assignment but apparently, he’s had it with me so I need to write this paper if I want to pass. So I’m willing to start over. But I need an apology from you in order to do so.

An apology, in case you didn’t know because I don’t think you would, is a regretful acknowledgment of an offense or failure.

It’s only fair.

Until next time,

Ms. Turner

To: Peyton Turner

From: Bo Porter

Peyton,

I didn’t think I’d hear from you again.

But I guess there’s something to be said about desperate times, desperate measures.

Now, your best friend, she sounds smart. What grade did she get? I bet she managed to scrape a passing grade.

Maybe I did keep them from writing back to you. But maybe I did it because I was doing you a favor. Because from what I remember, most guys in the pen pal program have at least been charged with one count of assault and robbery. Doesn’t sound very safe to make your cut. So then instead of demanding my regretful acknowledgment of an offense—thanks for the definition, by the way—you should be acknowledging your gratitude.

In any case, I’m not good at issuing apologies.

But since you’re unfortunately stuck with me, the least I can do is admit that I was a jerk to you and vow that I won’t be one in the future.

How’s that?

And if we’re doing this, you need to know that I don’t like repeating myself. So how about you stop calling me Mr. Porter and we can get this show on the road because I’m sure as hell not calling you Ms. Turner.

Bo

I’M NOT PEYTON TURNER.

I’m only pretending to be her.

This isn’t the first time, though. I’ve been doing it ever since she and I were both five. It started out as a fun trick with both of us dressing up like Ariel for Halloween one year and having people confuse us as twins and graduated to me going to her cello lessons because she hated the cello and I loved it, or attending detention at school in her stead so I had a place to go when things at home became too much to bear.

We’re not, though.

Twins, I mean.

We’re not even sisters.

Just best friends that somehow look very similar to each other.

We both have the same shade of golden blond hair and blue eyes. We are the same height, and growing up, we had the same build too. If we kept our heads down and didn’t make too much eye contact with the other person, we could usually fool them into thinking we were the other.

But then around the age of seventeen or so, things changed.

Puberty that I thought had passed me by caught up to me, making my body bloom differently than hers. It made my hips become rounder and my thighs all pudgy. My boobs went from a B cup to a full D, and my belly developed rolls. But Peyton remained as svelte and slender as ever.

So these days I pretend to be her in other ways.

I fool her boyfriends on the phone for fun because our voices are still freakishly similar and because pretend-flirting is the only kind of flirting I’ll let myself do and she knows that; I take her big brother’s calls when she isn’t in the mood to hear him lecture her about her low grades and partying. And sometimes when guys call me or send me their dick pics because somehow I always attract creeps, Peyton is the one to fend them off because I have zero experience with them. Oh, and I also do her extra-credit assignments—which I think are kinda fun—that include writing letters to inmates in prison. Or just one inmate.

She in turn goes shopping with me, and she did my hair and makeup today before I went to see said inmate. Nothing crazy, though; I wouldn’t let her, but still.

“Are you seriously not going to tell me what happened today?”

That’s her.

Peyton. The real Peyton Turner.

Cross-legged and with a determined look on her face, she sits in the middle of my bed among her scattered clothes and an open suitcase. Usually when she has that look, it’s very hard to deter her from the path she’s chosen.

But I still try.

I hold a bikini in each hand and wave them at her. “Which one?”

She keeps her focus on me, though. “Seriously?”

“Yes.” I nod and wave the bikinis again. “If you don’t tell me which bikini you want, there’s a very high chance that I’ll pack the wrong one and then you’ll be the one regretting it. Because you’re the one who has to wear them.”

She gives me a look before asking again, “Tell me what happened at the café today.”

There’s a pinch in my chest that I ignore and forge ahead. “Fine. The red one it is.”

I throw the other one aside—the one that I definitely know she’d pick; we’ve been friends forever, so I know what she likes—and I make a show of folding the little strings on the red one before reaching out to dump it in her suitcase. As expected, she gasps and scoots over to me on her knees, then snatches the bikini away.

“Are you insane?” she exclaims, putting her hands on her hips. “The red one makes me look like a lobster.”

I purse my lips in response, trying to hold back a chuckle.

Narrowing her eyes, she extends one hand, palm up. “Give me the gold one.”

I dutifully hand it to her, still trying to control my mirth.

She shakes her head as she grumbles and dumps the bikini on top of the neatly folded clothes in her luggage. “I’m going on a vacation with my boyfriend and even if I plan to break up with him when I get back, I still want to look my best. It’s the Bahamas, okay? Who knows when I’ll get the chance again to go to the Bahamas and get away from here?”

Yes, she is going on a vacation; and yes, she plans to break up with Ben.

I don’t blame her; he’s kind of an asshole who thinks the whole world revolves around him and his father’s ranch. I told her to break up with him the first time I talked to him on the phone. But she kept it going because she needed a date to the New Year’s party a few months ago, and because she knew it pissed off her brother.

Peyton has a difficult relationship with her brother, with her whole family, actually.

Well, the truth is that she hates her family. And she has reasons. Reasons I fully understand because I have a difficult relationship with my family too.

“Told you to make your choice,” I say in a singsong voice.

Her response is to poke her tongue out at me.

I chuckle, and together we finish packing for tomorrow. She leaves early morning, and gosh, I’m going to miss her. She asked me to go with her now that our finals are over and the summer is upon us. But I refused. I didn’t want to be the third wheel, even though their relationship is going to expire soon. Plus, this summer I was planning on doing something that I’ve been wanting to do for a long time now. Usually I always have extra classes or extra shifts at the library or whatever job I’m working, but this year I told myself that I’d put on my big-girl panties and do it.

Plus, I also wanted to… write to him.

I wanted to be here so I could get his letter every Friday and write him back that very day. So it gets to him in time on Tuesday. But then he said he was getting out early and asked to meet me and…

My heart twists.

It twists and twists until I think my heart is becoming a tight and throbbing fist rather than just an organ.

I try to ignore the pain in my chest because tonight was supposed to be all about spending time together, watching movies and eating popcorn and ice cream and anything else with too much salt or sugar in it. But I guess I’ve been doing a poor job of it because as soon as we zip up her suitcase and put it aside, Peyton grabs my hand, pulls me to sit on the bed beside her, and gives me a grave look. “Okay, on a scale of 1 to 10, just tell me, how bad was it? With 1 being excruciatingly bad. The worst ever.”

I meet her gaze and sigh in defeat. “Minus 394.”

She opens her mouth before closing it and frowning. “Very random. Is that—”

“Bad,” I explain. “That’s bad, Pey. It’s less than 1. It’s less than 0 even. It’s a negative integer.”

She rolls her eyes. “You know how much I hate geometry, Riri. Why would you put me through that?”

Riri.

That’s my name, or the shortened version of it.

My actual name is Reverie.

Reverie Bell.

“It’s algebra. You… Never mind.” I shake my head. “It was bad. Really bad; that’s it.”

She narrows her eyes. “What did he do?”

I open and close my fists in my lap. “Nothing. He did nothing. It’s just…”

“It’s just what?”

This time when I close my fists, I do it hard. I do it in a way that my nails, even though they’re short and blunt, dig into my skin and make it sting. “It’s just that I don’t think he was expecting me. Or rather someone like me.”

Peyton’s spine straightens and her eyes grow angry. “What is that supposed to mean?”

Crap.

I shouldn’t have said that. Definitely not to Peyton.

Peyton and I, we’re more sisters to each other than best friends. We grew up together, see. In Black Rock, Montana.

Peyton’s family owns a ranch called Wildfire—the second-biggest ranch in Montana—and my family worked for her. My mom was her nanny and my father was one of the ranch hands. Growing up, we were inseparable. We went to the same schools; we played together, studied together, spent all our time together. And when she and her mother moved away from Black Rock to Bozeman, my mom and I went with them.

Peyton and I have gone through everything together: difficult families that are more absorbed in their own affairs than us; school and classes; periods and teenage hormones; boyfriend drama—hers, not mine; and now college. While I excel inside a classroom, Peyton is more outgoing. She loves to party and live large, and I try to do everything I can to live as small as possible. I’m the rule-follower, and Peyton is a rebel. Despite our differences, though, we’re two peas in a pod. I love her to pieces and would do anything for her.

Just as she’d do anything for me.

Including pranking boys who would call me fat in high school and teaching them a lesson.

“You know what,” I say, trying to put her at ease, “just forget it.”

She turns to face me, her features still set in anger. “Did he say something to you? Did he say something rude to you? Because I swear to God, I’m going to—”

I grab her arms and stop her. “Look, it doesn’t matter, okay? It doesn’t… He probably was expecting someone else. Someone who, I don’t know, looked different than me.” She takes a breath to say something, but I keep speaking: “Which is fine. I don’t care. I’m happy with the way