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R onan risked his life and came to the tavern for lunch to tell me Neco’s big secret. Yeah, I made no excuses for him. We were all stupid when it came to Lucy and Lucy was keeping secrets, too.

Lucy didn’t know she was keeping a secret when everything went down with Neco.

She found out at the same time when her period started.

If Neco had gotten his head out of his arse and apologized for hitting her, she would have apologized again for what she said and the giant moron could have just asked her if she knew who her father was.

Lucy probably wouldn’t have told him it was Folcard because the man was an utter shite and I wouldn’t name drop him either and risk a curse. She would have told Neco they weren’t related if he named his.

The Barons thought they were superior to women for some reason, but we were idiots sometimes.

Anyway, this called for one of my brilliant plans. One that Caitrin and the Madame weren’t going to thump me in the head over because we ended up in the cells again. We all wanted Neco back. Neco wanted Neco back now that he knew he wasn’t lusting after his half-sibling.

We just needed to wear our girlfriend down. Our stubborn, beautiful woman could hold a grudge better than Petunia. I’d never betray her and tell Neco she wasn’t Lance, but Neco was never going to grovel like she needed while he thought he just punched Lance in the face.

I suggested Lucy take Neco and Beck and Ronan told Neco to help her instead of getting in her way. Ronan snitched and said Neco set off for Lower Cutwart to find Lucy. Lucy was stubborn, but she wasn’t stupid. Neco might have trouble walking after she dick punched him, but she’d accept his help.

Right? Lucy was really mad at Neco.

But this is why we were so good together as a group. I had that kind of face where people spilled their deepest secrets to me. Lucy and Neco were holdouts, but I knew theirs now.

I needed to get all of us together. I could get them talking and Beck could walk them through processing their shit.

Ronan could toss in some nuggets about how anger rotted your gut and maybe suggest some mutual revenge they could get on each other so they felt better since Ronan was a sneaky shit who didn’t get angry, he got revenge.

Lucy promised to be back by the time we got busy, which was in two hours. Lucy was always punctual, and she always kept her word.

So, I waltzed into the kitchen and roped Basselt into my plan because if Neco came back with her, I needed a reason for him to stay so this worked.