Page 170 of Vexatious Queen

“No idea how long I’ll be, and I’m with Liam and Theo tonight. I’ll call you later.”

He kissed my forehead.

“Take all the time ya need.”

I watched him until he turned a corner, then went back inside.

“Ivy, that’s it. You leave me no choice. I’m busting it down,” Chantry shouted as I set the food down.

She backed up several paces and looked like she was ready to charge, but the lock clicked, and the door slowly opened.

When Ivy stepped out, we all but attacked her as we wrapped her up in a group hug.

“This is all my fault. He’s in jail, and it’s all my fault,” Ivy said, and then broke into sobs again.

We guided her to the table and made her sit. Grabbing the coffee, I put one in front of her, and she gripped it like it was a life vest.

“This is not your fault,” I said, rubbing her shoulder.

Her eyes were red and puffy from crying when she looked up at me. You could see the pain in every tear that slid down her cheek.

“It is. If I hadn’t gone to meet him that day, if I hadn’t kissed him, if I hadn’t told Sabastian that I still had feelings for Zigzag, none of this would be happening,” she said, and covered her mouth. “How could Sabastian do this? This is the rest of Zigzag’s life we are talking about. This isn’t some slap on the wrist. He was arrested.”

“Sabastian says he didn’t do it,” I said, and Ivy rolled her eyes.

“Of course, he would say that. Who else could it be?”

“His father,” I said, and Chantry nodded.

“Sure, but who ran to Christov and told him that Zigzag was pissed at him? Because it certainly wasn’t me, and I know you didn’t. That only leaves Sabastian.”

“True, but it could have easily been something that Zigzag said to Christov himself that made him a liability.”

Ivy stood and walked away from the table.

“Why are you defending Sabastian? And do you even hear yourself? You’ve turned into one of them. He was a liability,” she said, in a voice that sounded like it could be Nash or one of the other guys.

“I didn’t mean it like that, and I’m sorry if you feel like I’m defending Sabastian. It’s just that I like to dig for the truth. I don’t want to blame him if we don’t know for sure that he did it.”

I got up and grabbed her by the shoulders to make her stand still and look at me.

“You love Sabastian, right?”

“Yes, as angry as I am, I do. And don’t even get me started on how messed up that is.”

Letting her go, I took the box of tissues from the desk and handed it to her.

“Then tell me, do you honestly think he did this to Zigzag?”

Ivy wiped her eyes and blew her nose. She shook her head and sighed.

“I don’t know. Sabastian was really angry after the fight the other day. They called my dad and his. It was a whole thing.”

“See, right there. Christov could’ve decided that helping Zigzag was no longer going to benefit him if Sabastian and Zigzag were at each other’s throats.”

She shrugged and walked over to the table to flop back down into a chair. I handed her one of the bags that Myles brought with sugar donuts inside. Ivy pulled one out and took a huge bite.

“Maybe,” she mumbled around the food. “But the point remains that if I hadn’t set this whole thing in motion, then Sabastian and Zigzag would never have been in a fight. His father wouldn’t have been called. So, you see, this is still my fault.”