Ronan’s tone softened a little. “I’m sorry, love. Could you go into the other room for a little while? I need to talk to my sister.”
Annie glanced at me in question but I fervently shook my head, sniffing and wiping my nose with the back of my hand. I needed a tissue and a hiding place.
“You’re going to have to talk to him eventually,” she whispered, and I grimaced.
“She’s right. Go talk to your bro,” Rick added, whispering too.
“What are you all whispering about in there? I can hear whispering,” Ronan grumped.
I sighed and said, “Fine, I’ll talk to him. Now you and Rick go hide in the other room.”
They each gave me sympathetic looks before walking through the doorway leading to one of the bedrooms. Once the door was shut, I released a shaky exhale and went to let my brother in. Ronan strode inside with purpose, a foreign restlessness about him as if he didn’t know where to begin.
He shot me a deeply concerned look as he paced.
Unable to take his anxious silence, I blurted, “I’m so sorry.”
He stopped pacing, his eyes narrowed on me as he questioned, “For what?”
I gathered another large inhale and responded on a rush, “I am so sorry for causing the scene downstairs. It’s your wedding tomorrow and I know that was selfish and destructive. I promise, I was so much better. I hadn’t stolen anything in almost six months before the summer. But then I—”
Ronan waved his hands through the air and spoke over me. “Lucy, you have a compulsion. I’m not saying stealing is fine and dandy. I’m saying it’s a problem and it needs to be fixed. Once and for all.”
I nodded contritely and repeated, “I’m so sorry.”
My brother’s eyes softened and he gave me a small smile. “Stop being sorry. You’re not a bad person. I’m just worried about you.”
I nodded, pressing my lips together and firming my chin to keep it from wobbling. We stood apart from each other, my big brother—my hero—and me.
The disappointment.
The embarrassment.
I was so tired of being the embarrassment.
Speaking of . . .
“Is Sean okay?” I asked hesitantly.
Ronan let out a mirthless laugh, his gaze losing some of its softness as he began pacing again. “Yes, he’s fine.”
“He wasn’t arrested?”
“No.”
“Oh, good. That’s good,” I said, relief setting in. I’d been so worried.
On one hand, I was amazed by the way he’d stepped in and tried to divert the blame away from me. On the other hand, I was irritated with how he’d stepped in and diverted the blame away from me.
I’d stolen the overpriced balls. The blame rested on my shoulders. I needed to take responsibility for my actions. So, yes, I was glad he hadn’t been arrested for my fecking everything up.
When Ronan finally stopped stomping around like an angry bull, he asked, “Start from the beginning, tell me how all this . . . business between you and Cassidy . . . Tell me how it came about.”
I shrugged, unable to maintain eye contact for very long. My attention kept flittering about the room like a manic wasp.
“I’m waiting, Lucy,” Ronan lifted his voice.
I wiped at my eyes, glancing at the carpet. “We first met at a party for the rugby team. I thought he was awful,” I told him honestly.
“Right. So how do you go from thinking he’s awful to looking at him with big googly eyes?” he asked with a wild hand gesture.
I scowled a little. “I don’t look at him with googly eyes. I look at him with normal eyes.”
Ronan gave me an arched brow and that big-brother stare that said I was stalling. I sighed and shifted in place.
“Fine. I guess it started properly when we bumped into each other in town one day. He asked me to dinner. I thought he was taking the piss. He wasn’t. I said yes. Things progressed from there.”
“So this is the dinner you told me about? Why did you say yes?”
“Fine. Okay, he kind of blackmailed me into it. He saw me take some eyeshadow, shoplift, and used it as leverage. But, honestly? I would have gone either way.”
Ronan’s eyes widened as though I’d just told him Santa Claus and Genghis Khan had been having a torrid love affair since the twelfth century.
“Oh God, Ronan, come on.” I rolled my eyes, feeling marginally better now we were engaging in normal brother and sister bickering. “Even you must see how gorgeous he is. It was going out to dinner once. At least, that’s what I thought. And then he said something rude and I threw my drink in his face and left.”
This news seemed to settle him somewhat.
“Good.” He nodded once. “That’s good. So how do you go from throwing your drink in his face to googly eyes?”