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His hands fisted in my hold.
“You can’t control everything, Ransom. We all make our own mistakes—and we have to deal with them. Your sister made her own choice.”
“We were a unit. Clay, Reid, and me. Even Mags was part of us, and she blew it all apart.”
There it was. I could taste the guilt in the air. “It’s okay to be mad at her,” I whispered.
“She’s my sister,” he said through clenched teeth.
“She’s also a woman. I’m sure whatever happened killed her too. Enough that she left before her wedding.”
Rach had told me Clay’s side of things. That Marigold had come to him at the office late one night, distraught about something between her and Reid, and had tried to seduce Clay. She’d been afraid marrying Reid would be a mistake.
The problem was, Clay had kissed her back. Just for a moment, but that was enough. His friend had been hurting and Marigold was a massive personality. She had drama wrapped around her like a Chanel cloud from what I could gather. Including disappearing that night after the incident with Clay.
That was all my sister had given me.
“I love my sister. I also know her all too well. She never does anything halfway, but to pull that stunt was unthinkable. She did it on purpose.”
I frowned. “What?”
Ransom’s hands practically vibrated under mine. “She knew Reid wasn’t going to let her go.”
My eyes widened.
“Yeah. They were volatile. Looking back on things now, I can see it. But then? No. It was bad enough my best friend was into my sister. But then it felt as if I got lucky, since I would get to have him as my brother for real.”
“Oh, Ransom.”
His shoulders relaxed. “Also, we were hotheaded guys in our twenties who didn’t know shit about life. We all came from families that had mapped out our futures from day one.”
“Maybe Marigold didn’t want to follow the map.”
“Yeah, well, she made that abundantly clear. She used Clay to shatter Reid. But the joke was on her—it worked on all of us. The wedding of the decade was supposed to merge two of the biggest families in New York.”
“That’s a lot of pressure.”
He flipped his hands and clasped mine. “It’s rare for someone to take Marigold’s side.”
“Maybe that’s why she left.”
“I just wish she’d found a better way to do it.” He sighed and slipped his hands away to peel a label off the sheet beside him.
“So, the band broke up?”
He laughed. “Pretty accurate. I bounced around from college to college without actually getting a degree in anything other than beer. I’d lost my two best friends and my sister. I had nothing left to lose.”
“Army.”
“Yeah. It gave me the family I’d lost. Until it didn’t.” He stood up. “I need another water. I’ll be right back.”
I watched him walk stiffly into the back and sighed. I had a feeling there were a lot more stories locked inside the vault of Ransom. Did the fact that we’d shared our bigger secrets make us even? I wasn’t quite sure.
My phone buzzed on the table with an update from Poe. She’d been looking into the account we’d given her to investigate, but before she could get anywhere, it was closed and deleted.
“Great,” I muttered.
“What?” Ransom slid into his seat, his face still inscrutable.
