“So this means you’re not ashamed of me after all?”

I wondered if he was kidding. “Well, you know, in my parents’ eyes, nobody’s good enough for their daughters, unless they’ve already made their first million or their ancestors came over on the Mayflower. Preferably both. My sister’s husband had to pull out genealogy charts and bank statements before they even let him in the house.”

“My paternal great-grandparents left Puerto Rico for a New York tenement where they lived with two other families. Abuelo, my grandfather, told me he was born in the only bedroom, weeks too early. They had no money for doctors. They kept him alive by heating the cooking stove in the kitchen all day and night and nestling him in a shoebox. They fed him his mother’s milk with an eyedropper. I have family stories on the other side that are worse.”

“So much for the Mayflower.” I cleared my throat. “And I’m guessing cops aren’t paid all that well?”

“Will it impress them I’ve only had a negative balance once this year?”

“It impresses me. I might let you handle my finances.”

“I won’t fit their criteria.” It wasn’t a question.

“No, maybe you surpass it. I would never be ashamed of anything about you. I haven’t introduced you to Mom and Dad because I didn’t want to share you. My parents?” I tried to think of the best way to describe them. “They aren’t as snooty as I’ve made them sound. They’re...careful? I don’t know how else to say it. They wanted a big family, and they tried for years to have more children after my sister, Wendy, was born. But there were miscarriages, years with no pregnancies. And then I showed up, completely unexpected and, like your great-grandfather, way too early.”

“You were a preemie?”

“Big time, and worse. My mom didn’t even know she was pregnant. She was in Mexico visiting my sister who was spending a year studying Spanish as a break before college. Mom had given up on the idea of increasing the family. She thought she was starting menopause, but after some symptoms, she discovered she was pregnant and that things weren’t going well. The doctors in Mexico told her she couldn’t fly home or anywhere. She had to stay in bed and make the best of things.”

“So you’re an immigrant. That cancels the Mayflower.”

“I wish I’d stayed long enough to learn Spanish. Mine is awful.”

“You started life as a surprise. You’ve been a surprise to me, too.”

I liked being his surprise. “I’m guessing she didn’t think she’d be in Mexico long, that the pregnancy would end quickly with no baby. But I stayed put just long enough, although I was still born early, way too early. Which is at least partly to blame for all the heart surgeries I had as a child.”

Teo had seen me naked. He hadn’t asked about the scars on my chest, but I’d explained anyway. I was beyond embarrassment. When you grow up with something, it seems almost normal, especially something other people rarely saw.