I know what I’d say if I were her because her personal life has been in some corners of the news lately.
“It’s not you,” I tell her, even though it is, in fact, partially her. She’s lying to a guy who did one of the coolest things anyone’s ever done for me, and I do take that personally.
“No, I know. It’s just—I have—had—a friend who just hooked up with my ex, so this is…weird. That we both…have that.”
Herfriendis her sister. And the news is reporting that Margie—Margotis taking a sabbatical for personal reasons, which is being covered by gossip sites asMargot Merriweather-Brown is having a breakdown over her sister and ex-fiancé betraying her.
A few gossip sites.
Not many.
Liv Daniels apparently had a bigger scandal this week, and she’s actual Hollywood royalty, so no one really cares much about a hotel chain heiress who’s had relatively little reason to ever have press coverage.
They’re more excited about her wild-child sister—Daphne—who went on some road trip with Oliver—the ex, who just fucked over his own family after saving the family’s convenience store corporation—and how the two of them apparently got arrested together after giving away millions in the Midwest.
The details were more than I cared to know.
“I’m not saying we have to be besties over it,” Margie-Margot says, recovering her composure. “But you’re…not alone.”
I grunt.
She sucks in a breath through her nose. “Right. Sure. You don’t want to talk about it. I get that. I’m having dinner with the triplets at some secret place tonight, so I won’t be home until late.”
I grunt again and nod.
I’m invited tonight too, which I don’t tell her.
“Just didn’t want you to be startled if you hear the door late.”
Right. So I don’t booby-trap the house back on her.
It’d serve her right.
But probably also get me a personal visit from the security guy that I spot again lingering in the rock garden down the path from the chalets.
Margot-Margie notices him too.
I almost miss the subtle nod she gives him, so subtle that I could be imagining it.
“I’m sorry they did that to you,” she says. “My situation wasn’t quite the same, but I still know how much it hurts to be dumped and betrayed.”
I study her.
That feels like possibly the most honest thing she’s said to me.
I look back at her security guy, planning to ask if she knows which cabin he’s staying in just to watch her squirm, since I don’t like feeling this connection with her, but he’s disappeared.
My radio squawks to life. “O’Malley, Fornier, and Gustav, front desk please.”
I nod to Margie-Margot, answer the radio call, and turn down the path leading to the main lodge.
“See you tomorrow,” she calls after me. “And I’m not calling it a secret place because I want to keep it a secret from you specifically. I honestly don’t know what it is. Lucky said they might have to blindfold me to take me there.”
I lift a hand in acknowledgment and keep going.
Soon—very soon—I’m going to figure out her goal here.
And then I’ll decide what comes next.
