Chapter 18

Icame back to the apartment where the family was staying, feeling heavy and emotionally shattered.

Ace was watching television with Carla asleep on the couch.

”You want me to carry her to bed?” I asked.

He nodded. ”Sure.”

I picked up my niece and carried her to the room she still shared with her sister. Despite being big girls now, they preferred not to sleep alone. They sometimes got scared at night, and it comforted them to be together. I loved seeing how well they got along. I hoped they would grow up to be closer siblings than their father and I had been.

I came back to the living room after tucking Carla in, and sat on an armchair next to the couch Ace was lounging on.

”How was dinner?” he asked.

”Where are Deb and Caitlyn?”

”Deb”s in bed. Caitlyn is out with the bridesmaids.”

”Is there anything to eat?”

”Yeah. Some sandwiches and stuff that housekeeping left for lunch.”

I got myself a chicken salad sandwich and a beer. I ate as I watched my brother laugh at something on TV that didn”t register for me. I hadn”t eaten since breakfast. I skipped lunch to get away from the apartment, and then dinner to find Isha.

”Turn the TV off,” I told Ace after I finished eating.

”Why? This is a fun—”

”Turn the fucking thing off. We need to talk.”

He did as I asked.

”In the study,” I suggested. We could close the door there in case there was a screaming match.

I sat on a leather chair, and Ace took the matching one across from me. The study was more of a bar with a desk and chairs, something my father liked to have, so we had one here in New York, as well as the ranch house.

I picked up a bottle of Ardbeg 10 on the coffee table between us and Ace nodded. I poured us both a glass.

We clinked our glasses. ”Cheers,” he said.

I took a sip of whiskey and looked straight into eyes that were as blue as mine.

”I saw Isha George today.”

Ace froze midway, his glass to his lips. He drank some of the pale, golden liquid and nodded as he set the glass down on the table.

”Talk about a blast from the past, eh? How”s the old girl doing?”

”Ace?”

He sighed and ran a hand through his hair, which was as dark as mine used to be. Now, at thirty-five, I already had some flecks of gray like my father had at my age. I was getting old. And fuck if I didn”t feel older after talking to Isha.

”She told you.” He didn”t have to explain what she”d revealed. We both knew.

”She”d told me before, but I believed you instead. I didn”t think my brother would lie to me.”

Ace snorted. ”Yeah, well, I did.”

”Why?”

”Why?” Ace grunted. ”You can”t be that oblivious?”

”I guess I am.”

”You”re the better Ledger. The smarter, more handsome, more successful brother. I mean, I dabble around and do stuff that you ask me to, but I”m not running the ranch. I don”t know how to—and fuck it, I never wanted to, would never be able to.” Ace downed the rest of his whiskey, a look of disgust on his face. ”I was jealous for many years. Isha was friendly, but she wouldn”t sleep with me. She wouldn”t sleep with anyone. But she did with you. Fucking hell…I couldn”t….”

”But you weren”t even dating her, Ace. Why did you care?”

”Why? Because you got everything I wanted. Everything,” he yelled.

I shook my head. ”You”re such an entitled son of a bitch.”

”You saw how she looked? Man, she was blindingly beautiful. I wanted her. Of course I wanted her—everyone did. She smiled and laughed with me; we were friends. But she made it clear that she wasn”t sexually attracted to me. But all you had to do was crook your finger and she was sucking your dick.”

I hadn”t realized how bitter Ace was, and it was a shock. I”d done everything I could to make his life better. He didn”t want to be a rancher, so I let him study whatever he wanted and kept the ranch going on my own. He couldn”t keep a job outside of Ledger Ranch, so I gave him a job that he could do and feel good about himself. While his wife was gallivanting around being Mrs. Ledger, I even helped raise his kids. And, yet, he thought Ihad everything.

”I was a shit,” he continued after a moment of silence, like he was collecting his thoughts. ”I was jealous and an asshole.”

”I believed you and not her,” I confessed. ”I called her a whore after I took her virginity. Trust me, I was an even bigger asshole.”

Ace looked at me with profound sadness.

”Why did you bring her to Montana?” I mused.

”She worked all the time. She”d been nowhere. She was studying or working. I thought I”d give her a free vacation, and I knew Caitlyn would take one look at her and be jealous as fuck. Before I left for London, she dumped me for not being ambitious enough. I wanted her back.”

All of this had been right in front of me. I had deliberately ignored the evidence.

I recently read a book by a Danish philosopher, S?ren Kierkegaard, and I remembered something that he wrote: “There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn”t true; the other is to refuse to believe what is.”

”Ro, how”s Isha?”

I poured more whiskey for both of us. ”She”s good. She”s in New York. Her best friend and her husband died, but their baby survived. Isha is that girl”s mother. Flora. She”s four. Cute as a fucking button.”

”Friend?” Ace looked haggard. ”Shit! She”s raising a friend”s kid?”

”They made a deal that they would take care of each other”s children if something happened to either of them. They grew up in the orphanage together. Didn”t want their kids to go into the system.” There was darkness, and then there was this. I”d created my own hell, and now I had to burn in it.

”Her friend Yasmine?”

”Did you meet her?”

”I did. They looked like sisters. I”m sorry to hear she passed. I”m…just sorry, Ro.”

”I knew you were lying, but I didn”t want to believe you”d do that to me. I couldn”t accept trusting an outsider over family,” I admitted. ”I also didn”t know what to do because I didn”t know how to handle falling in love.”

Ace looked more disgusted with himself. ”Is that why there haven”t been many women since she left?”

”It never felt right after her.” I looked at my glass of whiskey, feeling tremendously old. ”I hated how I treated her. I wanted to find her and apologize, but…I was scared she”d ask me to fuck off.”

”Did she?”

”No. She listened. Said thank you. Said that she sent a letter with money.”

Ace shut his eyes as if in pain. ”She did.”

”You never told me about that, either.”

”She wrote to me and to you. She said she was disappointed in me, but forgave me. She sent six thousand dollars in cash and a traveler”s check for a thousand pounds. Said that it was money she owed you.”

”Why didn”t you tell me? That was six months after she left? You had Caitlyn. You could”ve told me.” If you had, I may have been able to salvage my life.

”I was ashamed.”

”You know that was a whole lot of money for her? You should”ve sent it back.” I hated that she”d scrimped and saved to send me money that was less than pocket change for my family.

”Do you still have her letter?”

”No. I burned them. Never wanted you to find them.”

”What did my letter say?”

He rubbed his face with his hands and straightened up. ”She loved you. She was sorry for how things ended. And since you probably knew the truth by then, she forgave you.”

”And that”s why you hid the letter. You hadn”t told the truth about your non-relationship with Isha,” I realized. ”Does Caitlyn know?”

”I told her before the wedding.”

”And?”

”She was flattered that I went to such lengths to get her.”

”Didn”t she feel bad about how we all treated Isha?”

”Nope.”

”Your wife is a fucking piece of work.”

”Yep.”

He”d done all this for Caitlyn and was now in an unhappy marriage, just the way my father had been. This is why I”d never wanted to marry. It was a fucking lottery, and I didn”t know anyone who”d ever won.

”Brother, I”m truly sorry. I was…am a coward.”

I finished my whiskey and rose.

”She fell in love with me and I with her. If I had believed her, if I”d have had the courage to trust her….” I hurled the glass, watching it shatter against the wall and scatter across the wooden floor.

”Ro, I”m so fucking sorry.”

I looked at my brother. ”I”m not the one you need to apologize to, Ace. I did damage all on my own; that”s a fact. What is also true is that I will never in my life again trust you. That”s your punishment and mine for what we did to an innocent young girl. I lose my brother in ways that matter to me, just as you lose yours.”

I walked to the door and, with my hand on the doorknob, said, ”Tell Caitlyn I won”t be at the wedding. I can”t stomach it, Ace. Also, I”m checking into a hotel.”

I went into my bedroom and packed my suitcase.

Ace was at the front door waiting for me. ”Will you give me Isha”s contact information?”

”No,” I said firmly. ”I”ll give her yours, and she can decide if she wants to give you the time of day.”

”Fair.”

”And one more thing. You tell Deb what you did. She”s not as much of a bitch as your wife.” I knew his mother would hate how she treated Isha. She wasn”t the best person in the world, but she wasn”t Caitlyn.

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