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“You’ve been sulking for three weeks now.”

Yup, he’s definitely trying to go there.

“Sulking? What’s with the sulking? How does anyone know that I’ve been sulking? I’ve been doing my job, same as always.’

“Pink says you’re not eating enough to even keep a mouse alive.”

“Pink has a big mouth. Plus, the only thing they ever order is pizza, and I don’t want to buy groceries when I’m leaving right away. That’s all it is.”

Ransom rolls his eyes. “Yeah, fucking right. I thought Granny was being dramatic when she said you were in a funk, but clearly, you are.”

“Granny! I knew she sent you.”

“Correction. She did not send me, as I stated. I came on my own.” He gives me a steely look that says I had better come clean because he can see right through me with his emotional X-ray vision. For the record, it’s just because he’s known me for so long that he can pick thoughts out of my mind before I say them. “You’ve already changed for the better, despite the funk. Before, you were so locked up and closed off. You were hard. Hard as diamonds and cold as ice. Cold as diamonds and hard as ice. Cold and hard. Whatever the saying is. Even when you made jokes or laughed or had a good time, it was always like your whole being was never fully into it. Heck, you weren’t even halfway into it. But those times you were with Azalea, and even now, there’s something new going on. I can see it. I’m your brother—had the displeasure for fourteen years—so I know these things. Don’t try denying it. I’ll call you on your bullshit every time.”

“Hey! What the hell with the displeasure bit?” I flip Ransom the bird. He flips me two in response. His birds are better because he has tattoos on his fingers and is always clad in leather and black denim. He looks scarier than I ever could.

“I’m kidding. It hasn’t been a displeasure, but anyone can see that she unlocked something in you that none of us ever could, even Granny. Maybe Azalea’s had the key since you were babies. Did you pull one out of your baby ass when you were little and give it to her as a shiny toy, and she forgot to give it back after all these years? Where does the said key get inserted? Because I’m pretty sure it’s not the heart, even if that’s what it unlocks.”

Keys. Heart. We are not going there.

“Very funny,” I say with less than any humor. “As in, not funny at all.” Hey, being clear is never a bad thing.

“But really,” Ransom goes on. It’s clear he’s not going to leave this alone, and Ransom is one of those people who, when he latches onto something, that thing takes up his total focus. “It’s like you were you, and she was she until you both met, and then, bam! There was this new rocking mix that could be the next best album if you wanted to keep making music together.”

“That’s a terribly confusing metaphor.”

“I agree, but tats and hacking are my game, not metaphors and poetry and speaking about metaphorical metaphors.”

“Now you’re just trying to annoy me.”

“Maybe she likes danger,” he insists.

“Oh yeah? Maybe she doesn’t?” I grab the box and make my way to my room to get the shit that Ransom was bugging me about packed up, and of course, he follows me. “Maybe she wants the same boring, stable life that everyone else wants.”

“Maybe she’s not about the white picket fences,” he protests as we climb the stairs.

“She lived in an apartment.”

“Doesn’t mean she can’t have a thing for them, but if she did have a thing, maybe she’d be willing to change her mind. Plus, there’s nothing saying she couldn’t have them. She signed the marriage contract and married your sorry behind, didn’t she?”

I have no idea where he’s trying to go with that. I mean, I know, but it doesn’t really make sense. “She signed the contract to get away from this nonsense.”

“That’s because it was the only option anyone gave her.”

I nearly trip over the top stair and flush red at my clumsiness. My lack of coordination has nothing to do with what Ransom is talking about. Absolutely nothing. “No, it’s the only option that made sense.”

“Maybe things don’t always have to make sense.”

“Things like this do.” I stalk into my room and throw the box on the bed. All the furniture is staying to stage the house, and I don’t care about most of my clothes. I already have my duffel and carry-on packed, despite what Ransom thought. There’s hardly anything to box up. I don’t look at the bed, even though Azalea never slept in this one. If Ransom knew I hadn’t washed the sheets in the guest bedroom, I’d never hear the end of it. I’d never talk my way out of it, either. I swear, I’m not being creepy. I just like the scent of her on the pillowcases, though after three weeks, I think it’s just my imagination that there’s anything there that still smells crisp, clean, and flowery like Azalea. “The margin for error is somewhere between slim and a horrible death.”

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