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Ruby almost laughed at the absurdity of the suggestion, delivered in Vera’s accent, but Vera was right: Olivia shouldn’t be here for this discussion.
“Thank you, Vera. That’s a great idea.” Ruby looked at Olivia. “Why don’t you go start that new Lego set with Vera?”
“Can I see Grampa and Aunt Brooke before they leave?” Olivia asked.
“Of course,” Ruby said.
“We’re not going anywhere without saying goodbye,” Ruby’s dad said.
Olivia stood and walked toward Vera. She took the older woman’s hand and they disappeared down the hall.
Ruby took a deep breath, exhaled slowly, forced herself to return to her seat next to her dad. “I’m sorry. This is a shitty situation and it’s my fault.” There was no getting around it. The situation she and Olivia were in could be fairly blamed on Roman, but the situation her dad and Brooke were in was on Ruby. “But… well, I hate to say it is what it is, but… it is what it is. Pointing fingers isn’t going to change anything. What matters is what we do now, and what we have to do is keep Olivia safe.”
“And you,” Brooke said. “We have to keep you safe.”
“Olivia is safest here. So am I,” Ruby said. “If you put aside your feelings about Roman, about his business— ”
Her dad barked out an angry laugh. “His business.”
“I won’t try to get you to see it that way, but if you put aside those feelings, I don’t see how you can argue against the fact that I’m safest — that Olivia is safest — here.”
“You’re assuming Roman’s enemies are the only danger,” Brooke said.
Ruby closed her eyes, willing herself to be patient. “What else are we talking about then?”
“We’re talking about him,” Brooke said. “About Roman.”
“Roman would never hurt me,” Ruby said. “He would never hurt Olivia.”
Brooke glanced at their dad. “We’re not just worried about bullets, Ruby. We’re not just worried about the kind of stuff Adam did to you.”
“Then what?”
“We’re worried about this… this life,” Brooke said. “We’re worried that every day you spend here takes you further from your other life, your real life.”
Ruby wished her sister had said literally anything else, because this, this thing that Brooke had said, was the same thing Ruby worried about. It was the fear that haunted her when she couldn’t sleep at night, when she lay in bed, hungry for Roman’s hands, his mouth, his body next to hers, when she tried to think of a way forward despite everything that stood between them.
Ruby didn’t bother trying to lie. She didn’t want to lie about Roman, about what he meant to her.
“I worry about that too, but…” She sighed. “I know you don’t understand… I know youcan’tunderstand… but it feels like this is where I’m supposed to be right now.”
“How can you say that, Ruby?” Her dad sounded equal parts angry and disbelieving. “He’s obviously brainwashed you.”
The thought was absurd, but she tried to see it from her dad’s point of view. Ruby was living with the same kind of man who killed her mom. Not just living with him — staying with him.
Defending him.
Except Roman wasn’t the same. She didn’t know how she knew, but she did. Roman wouldn’t have been careless enough to let an innocent person be hurt by his world. He didn’t see innocent people as acceptable collateral damage in his business.
I’m not nice.
He’d said it himself, and yet here she was, making excuses, rationalizing his choice of work and her decision to stay with him.
No wonder her dad thought she was brainwashed.
And it wasn’t like she had a great track record. Her dad and Brooke had begged Ruby to leave Adam for years before she finally left. She’d rationalized his behavior too, swore he’d never hurt her.
Until he did.
