Page 76 of Runaway Bride’s Husband

“Can we please just be honest for a second?” I asked, respecting her unspoken wishes by keeping my own voice down too. “Nora is your friend. She was with you when you needed her at the wedding and she helped with the shower, so why are you acting like that’s not the case?”

“I’ve known Nora Thayer for decades, Maggie.” She held my gaze for another beat before she sighed. “My relationship with her is none of your concern.”

“Like hell, it isn’t.” I inhaled a deep breath when my heart started racing. “She was helping us, Mother. If not for her, Ryan wouldn’t be helping us now either.”

“Yes, and we’re very grateful.” A softer, almost pitying expression flickered across her features, gone almost before I’d even noticed it. “Instead of questioning me, just be happy you don’t ever need to be in Nora’s shoes. Daniel is from a family of wealth and prestige.”

“So is Court Thayer,” I reminded her, though that should hardly have been necessary. “Marrying a man from a family with a stellar reputation didn’t protect Nora. It might not protect me either.”

“That woman ended up with almost nothing,” she hissed. “Be grateful you won’t have to share her fate.”

As I stared back at her and realized she was completely serious, I almost burst out laughing. If that was what she thought I wanted, to just marry a man so I wouldn’t end up with nothing, my family was crazier than I’d thought.

I’d spent my whole life drowning in money, status, the Pembroke name, and all the perks that came with it, and I still always felt like I was starving. Sure, I hadn’t had a plan before about how to survive without my family’s money, but more importantly, I hadn’t been prepared to be cut off from them.

The people. My mom and dad. My brothers.

“Do you even realize how much the Thayers have done for us?” I asked. “Do you have any idea how hard Ryan worked to bring me back into the fold? He’s done more for this family in the last month than⁠—”

“Adelaide,” one of my mother’s friends cooed, appearing at her elbow like magic. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you. I want you to come and meet my future daughter-in-law. She’s lovely. Stunning. You’re going to love her.”

The woman barely even glanced at me as she pulled my mom away, leaving me alone to ponder the fact that Mom genuinely seemed to believe she was protecting me from Nora’s fate by supporting my marriage to Daniel. That hadn’t been a lie or an exaggeration.

In my mother’s eyes, they were doing me a huge favor by making sure I married somebody with the wealth and prestige required to ensure I died rich and with a respectable last name. They simply didn’t really care about the life I still had to live in the meantime—or that the risk of ending up with nothing might just be mine to take.

CHAPTER 33

RYAN

Isat at my desk in the middle of a Zoom meeting with Colin, Jane, and half a dozen of the higher-ups in the Chicago office of Thayer Steelworks, pretending to be paying attention, but I had no clue what they were talking about anymore.

For all I knew, they could’ve pivoted to the emotional state of goldfish in Guatemala and I was still nodding like it was the most important conversation I’d ever been part of. I’d been trying to focus. Really.

My brain was simply entirely uninterested in the update they were providing. Instead, it was stuck on Maggie like it’d been crazy-glued to thoughts of my golden-haired goddess. Aw, shit. Since when do I even think stuff like that? This is insane.

It’d been three long days since I’d last seen her, and while that was probably for the best, I couldn’t stop wondering when I’d see her again. I wanted her something scary. There was no point even trying to deny that anymore, but as for what Maggie wanted, well, I wasn’t sure even she knew.

I sure as hell didn’t know where her head was at, which was why I’d needed some time to cool off after being in Massachusetts with her again. Some days, it felt like she was determined to marry Daniel purely to have this wedding—and maybe even to get the puppy.

But other days, she looked at me like she was in the process of making a completely different decision. Like maybe she’d kiss her inheritance goodbye as long as it meant she could keep kissing me. Unfortunately, she bounced between those two things so often that I was starting to wonder if maybe I’d gotten sucked into the game she was playing with her parents.

“We need to make sure the revised projections account for the second-quarter acquisition costs,” Colin was saying when I briefly tuned back in again. “Can you check that for us, Ryan?”

I nodded, but Jane gave me a curious glance through the screen. I could feel those knowing, Thayer blue eyes searching for any sign of what was really going through my head, but I met her gaze steadily, a smirk curving on my lips when she rolled her eyes at me and dove into the next topic instead.

My phone buzzed before I could even begin to figure out what that was. Then I forgot I was even in a meeting when I saw a text from Maggie on my screen. I held my phone on my lap out of eyesight and leaned back in my chair, fully aware that I was going to be the death of myself if I kept jumping whenever this girl was involved, but that wasn’t about to stop me.

Maggie: What are you doing?

Me: Working.

Maggie: That sounds boring.

Me: It is. What are you doing?

Maggie: Distracting you with my charm.

Me: That sounds dangerous. I’m in a meeting, but what did you have in mind?