They loaded their treats into the car and Rose stewed while Pansy drove.
“I’m not a child,” she muttered.
“I know,” Pansy said. “It’s not that I think you’re a child. But I do worry...”
“I know. You’re super worried that this is going to mean we all lose Logan.” She looked out the window. “I don’t want to lose him.”
“It’s not that simple,” Pansy said. “I’m not just worried about that. I’m sorry if I sounded that insensitive. It’s not... It’s not that simple. I’m worried he’ll hurt you, and I’ll hate him. I’m worried that we’ll lose him, sure. I’m worried about that hurting me, but I’m worried about it hurting you, too. We are all woven so tightly around each other, Rose. And I guess I just worry that if the wrong thread gets pulled at we could all unravel.”
“I don’t think we’re that fragile,” Rose said stubbornly. “Look at everything we’ve been through. Everything. And look at how much has changed in the last year. You’re getting married in, like, a week. We added West to the family.” And she didn’t even get into the fact that by introducing West to the family Pansy had introduced a lot more strife and change than she realized.
It wasn’t her secret to tell, and she had promised Logan that she wouldn’t. And she realized then that in some ways Pansy was right. Things would be changed by the fact that she had slept with Logan. They already were. Because maybe before her loyalty would have been slightly split. Maybe before she would have felt like her sister needed to know that her future husband was Logan’s half brother. That West coming into the family had already effected the change that she was so afraid of. Maybe she would have wondered where her allegiance should lie, and she might have put it with her sister.
But now. No, now she felt a burden of responsibility for what Logan had entrusted her with.
Yes, part of it was that she had guessed. But she had guessed because of the intimacy that she felt with the man. Even before sex. And telling his secret felt like an abuse of that intimacy.
She didn’t want that. She felt...oddly protective of him. He might be nearly ten years older than her, and a damn sight more experienced, but he felt like he was hers. In this regard, at least. And she wanted to protect him with all the snarling, feral allegiance that she felt to him.
Theirs might not be the easiest of relationships. Just in that they still sniped at each other while they worked sometimes, and she pretended some nights that she was going to resist him, go to her own bed rather than going to his. She never did, though. She never did because she wanted too badly to be in his arms.
And maybe it was even more special because of that. Because there were some hard, sharp edges, just like life itself.
He was the strongest man she knew, and when he held her in the aftermath of the storm that inevitably erupted between them when they came together, he was gentle, his strength leashed as he cradled her like she was a precious thing.
It made her want to protect him. To protect that part of him that she was pretty sure only she saw.
The gentleness.
She saw the rest, too.
Stubbornness. Pride. He was the most hardheaded man in existence. A man who had grown up in the same town as his estranged family and never acknowledged them. A man who was content to let the people he was closest to in the world believe he didn’t know who his father was, while his father lived a short drive away.
A man whose half brother was part of their family now, and he still wouldn’t budge on his stance.
Yeah. She saw those parts of him clearly.
And still, she felt loyalty to him. To his decisions about that whole thing.
“I don’t know,” Pansy said. “Don’t you ever think that Hope Springs is kind of a magical world? And if we do the wrong thing we might...break it.”
A deep sadness filled Rose. One she had difficulty identifying. “You got to change. You got to try something. Is it just because it’s Logan that I’m not allowed to? That you think me growing up might break it?”
“I’m sorry,” Pansy said. “I don’t think anything I said came out right. Of course I don’t want you to not grow up. But yes, I guess it did catch me off guard that it was with him. Because he’s like a brother to me, but you are my sister.”
“Logan is... He’s not like a brother to me,” she said, staring out the window as the trees blurred into a green indistinct shape.
“Well, obviously.”
“No. I mean... I don’t know what he is. But he’s always been more to me. Different to me. It’s not like I had a crush on him or anything. I didn’t.” No, the way that she felt for him couldn’t be called a crush. “Sometimes I think he’s like the other part of me. The way we work together... It’s like two sets of hands. And he’s always driven me crazy like no one else ever has. I can feel it. When he’s mad at me. When I annoy him, I can feel little prickles of irritation coming off him in waves. I’ve always thought it was funny. So, I try to do it more. And when we are together...” She started breathing a little bit faster, embarrassment and excitement warring within her. “It’s like I feel what he’s feeling, and when we’re together like that...”
“Oh, no,” Pansy breathed.
“What?”
“I think you’re in love with him.”
Fear grabbed hold of Rose and twisted her heart. Hard. “I’m not,” she said.
“Yeah, that sounds like love to me, Rose. Sorry.”
“I don’t
