Thisis why I didn’t want revenge on Xavier.
Because anger and rage and vengeance—I knew they’d consume me.
And now I’m feeling torn in every direction because of what I want for myself and what I want for my friends and what I want for Margot, and I can’t—fuck on a rice cake, why can’t I just feelless? Aboutanything?
“Tobias Merriweather-Brown is a fucking bastard,” I say. “She wanted—she wanted your help taking him down. But not if it would make you collateral damage.”
“Taking him down how?”
“Forcing him into retirement. Exposing him as a cheater.”
He shakes his head.
“To avenge her sister,” I add. “You have another sister. Daphne. Margot—Margot talks about her like she’s a unicorn princess made of fairy dust and mischief and heart.”
Lucky eyes me. “The sister who stole Mar—Margot’s fiancé?”
Figured they would’ve looked her up and found the articles.
I want to read them over again from the start, just to feel close to her again.
“Didn’t steal,” I say. “Margot and Oliver broke up years ago. They’re tight. The news articles—it was a cover story so no one would suspect she was here. Getting to know you.”
Talking about Margot—defendingMargot—it makes me feel like I’m eating ash.
But it’s also making my heart beat again.
Softly.
Tentatively.
But still beating.
“Why didn’t she tell us who she was?” I know that pain in Lucky’s voice. The sound of betrayal. The sound of heartbreak. “We—fuck, she has to know we wouldn’t have cared how rich she was. Look who our friends are.”
“You know what her parents did to her sister?”
Lucky nods.
“You try growing up with that and tell me?—”
Fuck.
Fuck.
Just thinking about it has my throat getting choked up and my sinuses getting hot and that rage billowing all over again.
Lucky lifts his brows. “Tell you what?”
“Tell me you wouldn’t be insecure as shit and terrified to let someone actually love you for who you really are,” I finish thickly.
Goddammit.
That’s why she left.
She meant every fucking word.
It wasn’t an excuse. Not a story because she’s not who she showed me she was the past two weeks.
