I did not correct her.
There are many reasons people keep secrets. Shame is one. Fear is another. Pride is a third. My reason was stranger. I wanted to know who my family was when they thought I had nothing they could use.
The answer came slowly and then all at once.
Ivy got engaged at twenty-nine to a man named Logan Mercer.
If you took every finance-bro cliché this country had mass-produced over the last fifteen years and tailored it into a six-foot-two package with expensive dental work, a punishing handshake, and a watch designed to be noticed from orbit, you would get Logan. He was the kind of man who called women “dangerous” if they had boundaries and called himself “blunt” when he was just rude. He used words like valuation and asset class in casual dinner conversation and somehow made a charity gala sound like a hostile takeover.
The first time I met him, he looked me over in three efficient beats: shoes, hoodie, face. His smile never changed, but something in his eyes filed me under unimportant.
“So you’re Chase,” he said, drawing the name out like he expected a punchline after it. “I’ve heard you’re the mysterious one.”
