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“You’re sure?”
“Yes.”
I nodded. “Okay. But… uh… no, he’s not the one who told me. It was you and her, actually,” I explained. “I found uh… letters, hidden in her office. And before that, pictures from someone doing an article aboutNectar. Pictures of your group of friends. You look just like my little brother. Or… shit, I guess it’s the other way around.”
He sighed, leaning forward over the desk. “You read the letters?”
“No,” I answered immediately. “They were private. Clearly. Out of respect for my mother, I wanted to let them remain that way, and I can give them to you, if you want them. But I need to understand what happened, if you can give me that. I know there was at least a fling, before my parents got married; Aunt Lucy confirmed it. But my parents ended up together and then you got involved again. How?”
He ran a hand over his face, quiet for a moment like he was considering his words before he spoke. “Yes, there was a fling,” he confirmed. “And that was all I thought it was, at first—everybody doing their own thing. That what Larena said it was, after I expressed to her that I was… wanting more than that. I’m not proud of it, but that’s how Lucy and I got involved. I was hurt and called myself taking it out on Larena by fooling with her sister.”
“That’s trash,” I told him.
“Yes,” he agreed. “It was. And again, I’m not proud, but that’s what it was. When Larena found out, she was hurt—”
“Because she had feelings for you. She lied.”
He nodded. “Yes. And Billy had always wanted her, but she never paid him any mind. Until then.”
“She was vulnerable, and he took advantage of that.”
“That’s the way I saw it,” he said. “And the way that she characterized it later, once we were back on good terms. She stopped speaking to Lucy and me, and the next thing anybody knew, she was marrying William. Not that long after… you came along.”
My eyes went wide. “So… they got married because she was pregnant.”
“He begged her to keep you, so she did,” Stanford confirmed. “Billy swept her off her feet—her knight in shining armor, rescuing her from heartbreak. She didn’t see the real him until they were married, but me and Cas… we knew what he really was.”
“But you remained friends with him, enabled him.”
“No.” He shook his head. “We thought he’d grow up. Thought he’d see that the world wasn’t against him, thatweweren’t against him. Whatever other bullshit aside, we were damn near a co-op, supporting each other, working the family businesses, leaning on the group. We thought he’d pick it up.”
I scoffed. “He’s too self-absorbed for that,” I replied. “If you let him tell it, he’s the reasonNectaris even here today, like it didn’t come fromJoyce Grocery.My mother’s family.”
“We didn’t think it was as bad as it was,” he insisted. “A few years passed, and they were basically shunned from the group, shunnedthemselvesfrom the group. We’d been reaching out, showing up, and it was always ignored. Then… I got this letter. It was from Larena, but it was in another envelope, without her name on it. Different address and everything. But it was her. And she laid it all out, made it clear how bad she was hurting.”
My eyes went wide. “When was this? Where was I?”
“You were there. You were… maybe six or seven years old? You were the only thing keeping her alive,” he told me. “Her bright spot in the dark; that’s what she called you. She told me about… pregnancy losses, and grief, how Billy had gotten himself wrapped all up in the business so she couldn’t get him out, and gambling debts, and threats, and… so much that I’m sure you never saw.”
I shook my head. “No, I didn’t. She put up a good front for me, I guess.”
“She never wanted you to worry. Never wanted you to feel the kind of stress she was carrying around. We started exchanging letters back and forth, and then… meeting.”
“Having an affair,” I amended.
He nodded. “Yes. Having an affair. When she got pregnant… she wasn’t sure whose it was. But she expected to lose it. When shedidn’t… I knew whose it was. But she thought I was crazy for coming to that conclusion. For a while, we couldn’t tell, but as he got older… we could see it. It was obvious Soren was ours.”
“But you were both married,” I interjected. “So of course you couldn’t just run off and have a family together.”
“I was divorced,” he corrected. “I didn’t remarry until after she passed. But where it came to Soren… Iwantedto step in. But things with Billy were so… fucked up. He was volatile—unpredictable. She didn’t know what he would do to you, to her, to the business, to me, if he found out. So… we never said anything. We let him believe Soren was his.”
“But hedidn’tbelieve that.”
“He did,” Stanford argued. “For a long time. It wasn’t until he was a teenager, you were out of the house, and your mom had gotten sick the first time, that he put those pieces together. Probably because seeing Soren was like…”
“Seeing a ghost,” I filled in with a sigh. “I think you’re right though. That was when he started being… just…different.Growing up, he played the role of perfect father, perfect husband, at least where people could see. And to us kids. Looking back now, I know it was forced. But then he stopped forcing it,” I mused. “He was neverabusive,just… kinda cold? Like he wasn’t our parent, more like… acquaintances. Just people he knew.”
Damn.
