Page 35 of Silent Ties

Elijah stays seated, his grin the same as the Cheshire Cat’s. “Roma’s doing great by the way. Thanks for asking.”

Ren raises one perfectly groomed eyebrow. “Not a single one of you is doing great,” she drawls in a bored tone. “Roma barely talks to anyone in his family, you’re your usual psychopath self—”she nods towards me—“and this one married a stranger.”

I frown. Roma might not hang out with his us as much, but he talks to his family. He talks to me. At least, he texts me sometimes.

Elijah isn’t bothered by any of the accusations. Out of his inner-front jacket pocket, he pulls a cache of Cuban cigars and passes them over.

Ren laughs under her breath, before chewing on her bottom lip to stop.

“A trade like old times,” Elijah says. “Tell me about Russet Smith.”

Fucking Elijah.

Ren studies the cigars in her hands, pleased at the treasure, before glancing up at me. “What do you want to know?”

“Nothing.” I suppress the urge to punch my brother. “Drop it.”

She doesn’t because she’s Ren. “You’ll already know the basics. Which hospital she was born at, who her parents are, what her high school GPA was. No college, mother dead by the time she turned seventeen. Had a shitty stepdad that kept her out of the foster system.” She shrugs, an icy mask sticking to her face for a second. “Might have been better off in the foster system.”

My father beat it into us to always remain calm. To never show an ounce of emotion. Elijah typically takes on a jovial air and this time he’s gleeful. He’s probably waited since Dad gave us this errand to seek out Ren’s knowledge.

I, on the other hand, don’t want to think about how manypeople looked into my wife after our marriage. It was the biggest source of amusement for the entire month of January. The moment I removed my bride’s veil, we began a deep dive into the woman I brought home.

I know all about the shitty stepfather. Or rather the four shitty stepfathers since her mother was on a rinse and repeat cycle when it came to marrying men.

Ren continues, “Great work history by all means.”

Hardly. Dive bar after dive bar with a little bit of retail.

“A little bit questionable with the men in her life.” Ren holds her hands up in surrender. “Okay, fine. No need to talk about past dalliances. Whatever.”

“Why did she marry my brother?” Elijah asks. He’s so serious I think he might care about whether or not my new wife might harm me.

“Because otherwise Marissa would have shot her best friend in the back of the head.”

My jaw clenches. “You’re talking about Daisy Montgomery.”

Russet’s never uttered her name before. Marissa cleaned up her phone before sending it over, but it was easy enough to figure out. There’s a string of silly text messages which annoyingly amount to nothing. The girls were so close they must’ve met up in person or called when they had a bad day. Daisy deactivated her social media at the tail end of last year so that hasn’t been any help either.

“Is that her name?” Ren’s question is genuine. “Well, whoever she is, she got tangled into something nasty. Something. . . that even Marissa doesn’t want talked about.”

The only way to keep a secret is to not talk about it. That’s why the trail of gossip is cold.

“And is this Daisy still in the city?” Elijah leans back, crossing his arms.

“I don’t know,” Ren says after a minute and I inwardly curse.

I owed Marissa a debt.That’s all Russet said and annoyingly, no matter how much I fucked her, she never cracked. It’s not surprising she owed it on behalf of someone else. My wife is a surprisingly good girl despite growing up in a crime-riddled neighborhood.

“Find out,” I tell her. She’s not pleased with my tone, so I add, “Please.”

“It’ll cost,” she says.

“Doesn’t it always with you,” I grumble. She’s the reason my brother doesn’t talk to me like he used to.

She smirks. “Could say the same with you Zimins.”

I button my jacket when I stand.