“Excuse you. I am getting paid regardless of the sex. I know you know that.”
“And yet you want to talk about Andrew.” She scraped the last of the dessert out of her bowl. “What about him?”
He poked at his own dessert. “How much has Tori told you?”
“Not much. She just said you don’t like to talk about it. Also whenever his name comes up there’s a lot of swearing.”
Yeah, Tori took the whole thing personally on Jem’s behalf. It was probably better that he talk to Ivy about it. Tori would tell him to tell Andrew to take a hike. “So uh, when we were kids, I didn’t know we were half brothers. I just thought he was my best friend.”
Ivy’s eyes went very wide. “Wow. Okay. Did, uh, did Andrew know?”
He shook his head. At some point before Jem found out, yeah, Andrew learned the truth and didn’t tell Jem. But Jem didn’t know when. “That’s complicated. Anyway. Our dad’s loaded. Old money kind of loaded. ‘Owns a golf course that’s been on the PGA tour’ kind of money. And I always thought he was so great when we were kids, because even though I was just his son’s best friend, Andrew’s dad made sure I got to do all the stuff he did. If he took golfing lessons, I took golfing lessons. If they went on a family vacation to Disney World, I was invited. When his dad sent him to private school, he paid my tuition too. I thought it was so cool that even though I didn’t have my own dad, Andrew’s dad made sure I didn’t miss out.”
Ivy winced. “I can guess where that’s going.”
“Probably not,” Jem said around a mouthful of dessert. Fuck it, he was going to eat his feelings. He swallowed. “So high school comes around. We’re sixteen or so. Andrew finds, uh, a bookmark on my laptop while we’re doing a project for school. Not particularly smart of me.”
Another wince. She pushed her bowl aside and reached for his hands. “Did he freak out?”
Another no. “He was really good about it. Like, surprised, because it’s not the nineties anymore but this is still small-town South Carolina, but he was supportive. The only thing is somehow his—our—dad found out.”
Ivy’s mouth flattened, and she put her unoccupied hand over her belly, like she was protecting the fetus from what Jem was telling her. “He didn’t take it well?”
“All of a sudden, we weren’t allowed to be friends anymore. I mean, you wonder how much control a parent can have over a kid who’s sixteen and has his own car, right? Except Daddy held the purse strings—and the car keys—so if Andrew wanted to have a life….”
“You think your dad was homophobic?”
“To be honest?” Jem shrugged. “I could never figure out if he was a homophobe or if he was just paranoid we’d commit incest without knowing it.”
“Ah.” Like Jem, Ivy seemed not to know what to do with that. Jem had no idea if Andrew was into guys, and speculating about it kind of made him feel ill. “So… friendship ended?”
“Yeah. Except then Andrew got in a car accident and suddenly his dad’s on my doorstep. Andrew’s in pretty bad shape. Odds for his recovery are looking grim unless he can get a new kidney. I can help, he says.”
Ivy’s mouth dropped open. “Jem. He didn’t.”
Jem gave her a tight, unamused smile. “He did.”
She let out a long breath. “Jesus. Wait. The whole time, your mom never said anything either?”
Shoulders slumping, he shook his head. “I guess she and my dad had a deal that as long as she kept his indiscretion a secret, he’d pay for whatever I needed. Pretty sure that’s how she could afford our house. But hislegitimatekid’s life was worth risking exposure for, I guess.”
“And you did it,” Ivy realized. “You were a match.”
“I did it.” Jem might’ve been angry and hurt, but he wasn’t going to let Andrew suffer or die if he could stop it. “I told my father I never wanted to speak to him again once it was done. And then I woke up in the hospital after the surgery and they’d—they put me in the same room with Andrew to recover. I guess since Dad was paying for it all, maybe he cheaped out, I don’t know. And I was just going to pretend to be asleep whenever Andrew wasn’t until they let me leave, but I’m an idiot, so. I asked him if he knew before. He said yes.”
“That’s why you came all the way out here for college.”
“Yeah.” He huffed a bittersweet laugh. “Pretty sure my father never guessed I’d turn those golf lessons into exactly what I needed to escape him forever.”
“Okay. I get all that. So… why are we talking about it now?”
Jem sighed. “Andrew wants me to go to his wedding. And I kind of agreed to meet him for lunch this weekend to let him apologize. I don’t want to be angry forever, you know? But also….”
She nodded heavily. “But also,” she agreed. “You want another helping of dessert? I’d offer you alcohol but I don’t actually think we have any. You used the last of it making that vodka blush sauce a couple weeks ago.”
Jem should make that for River. It was simple and rich and reheated well. He’d have to stop at the grocery store for some gnocchi and fresh basil. “It’s okay, there’s still some left at home.”
The eyebrows went up again. “Home?”
