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“Blue, the snake is going to pound on the door,” Calla shouted up the stairs. Blue ignored it to work on getting her overstuffed suitcase to zip closed. Although she, Gansey and Henry weren’t leaving for their road trip for a week, she was trying to figure out exactly how many clothes she could get away with taking.
“That means answer the damn door!” Calla yelled just as the banging began.
Blue thundered downstairs and answered the loud but completely arrhythmic knocking at the door just to get the noise to stop.
“For someone who listens to such loud music all the freakin’ time, you have absolutely no sense of rhythm,” she snapped at Ronan as he pushed past her into the house at 300 Fox Way.
“Look, as much as this physically pains me, I have to ask you a favor,” he said without preamble.
“What would the great Ronan Lynch possibly need from a peon such as me,” Blue answered as she attempted to guide him into the empty reading room.
But he’d dug his heels in and didn’t allow himself to be moved. Instead Ronan turned and looked down, down, down at her and said, “Will you marry me?”
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Four years later, in the Gansey/Sargent/Cheng residence where their nearest and dearest friends gathered one Friday evening:
Gansey stumbled into the apartment, bounced off the foyer wall and wobbled toward the parlor, or living room as the rest of his friends and loved ones called it.
Adam was the only one who looked up at the noise when Gansey ran smack into an end table, knocked over a lamp and totally missed the loveseat where Blue was sprawled and took an unexpected bumpy seat on the floor. A noise came out of him like a duck who’d gotten stale bread stuck in its throat.
“Gansey? Are you drunk?” Adam asked and Gansey looked bemusedly around the room until his gaze settled somewhere around Adam’s right shoulder. Gansey quacked out the strangled duck noise again.
“Gansey?” Blue now leaned off the loveseat and waved a hand in front of Gansey’s unblinking face. “Are you okay?”
The duck gargled a little water until Gansey made his voice work in human speak. “No,” he finally articulated.
There was a very long moment of silence.
“Well, what’s wrong?” Blue finally asked when Gansey seemed disinclined to ever speak again.
“Everything,” he said, in the tiniest voice Blue and Adam had ever heard. They exchanged a look of worry that spoke volumes, and Blue lay her hand gently on Gansey’s shoulder. But he jerked as if she’d shocked him, and she pulled back, stunned.
“Ganseyman, you are scaring the rest of us witless, and in some cases, that’s quite a lot of wits. What is happening?” Henry moved from a wing chair over to the loveseat to hover above him.
“I just never— how could this— it’s just not possible,” Gansey still stared into the middle distance but one hand vaguely waved an official looking envelope.
“What? Jury duty? You flunked out of college? You got the DNA results that prove Helen is a spawn of Satan?” Henry and Blue both took swipes at the envelope, while Gansey evaded their hands without apparently even trying.
Gansey finally took a deep breath and turned to the loveseat. He leaned toward Blue but didn’t touch her, just looked up into her dark eyes, tears glistening in his own. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Tell you what?” Blue prompted.
“That you and Ronan are married,” Gansey all but wailed.
“Oh.”
“Oh,” Ronan echoed from the kitchen door. “Shit, didn’t we ever mention that?”
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There was yelling (Blue at Ronan then Ronan at Blue). There were tears (Gansey). There were attempted violent assaults (Blue on Ronan, Blue on Henry while he and Adam tried to pull her away) and some successful hair pulling. But since that was Henry tearing at his own luscious locks, no one minded.
When the worst of the tumult wound down, Ronan and Blue had been placed on the loveseat side by side, and—Adam thought but would never admit out loud—in identical poses of obstinacy with their arms crossed over their chests and their jaws set in similar mulish stubbornness. Adam sat in the wing chair, Henry took a seat on the floor clutching his head, but Gansey was too unsettled and paced a track incessantly across the lush area rug.
The story came out in bits and pieces through Gansey’s disjointed questioning and Ronan’s reluctant one-word answers, leaving Blue to fill in more of the details.
Yes, Blue and Ronan were legally married in the commonwealth of Virginia.
Yes, it was only a marriage of convenience to fulfill the requirements of Niall Lynch’s will.
No, there was another clause of his will discovered by the family attorney, only to be opened when Ronan tried to claim his full inheritance of the Barns. It stated clearly that Ronan N. Lynch had to be married to a woman in order to take possession of the liquid assets of the Lynch family, allowing him the funds to take proper care of the Barns.
Yes, the entire idea was outdated and utterly ludicrous.
No, unfortunately it was entirely legal and would hold up in court.
Yes, it was positively medieval and absurd.
Yes, it had to be a woman Ronan married, that was specific. While Ronan refused to speculate, Blue theorized that Niall Lynch hadn’t known about his son’s sexuality, or cared, but perhaps thought he would need a settling and feminine influence in his life. (Ronan scoffed so loudly, Adam thought he must have pulled something.)
Yes, Ronan had seen more than one attorney about it. Ronan had seen multiple attorneys about it.
Yes, Declan had tried to help. Declan had sought out the best attorneys about it.
But Ronan had needed access to the inheritance to get the Barns operational that first summer, and unfortunately, there was only one solution that occurred to him.
“And she’s the only woman I know.” At a very pointed and painful elbow in the short ribs, Ronan admitted, “And the only one I’d trust. Blue knew it was a temporary business arrangement only. No big deal.”
“And it’s helped me out too,” Blue said. “Since filing our taxes jointly the past four years, I’ve gotten back everything I pay in plus more because Declan has a genius accountant who basically writes off the Barns as a business loss so I get huge refunds.”
“You mean you’re making money off my taxes?” Ronan demanded. Then a beat later, “You mean I’m actually paying taxes?”
“Yes, and I get Declan’s accountant in the divorce,” Blue said smugly.
“It will be an annulment, at least in the eyes of the church,” Ronan informed her.
“Only if I can file it claiming you were unable to consummate the marriage,” Blue countered.
Ronan thought for a long minute while Gansey’s duck came to visit loudly again. “Fine. Let’s do it.”
“That’s not how this works! That’s not how any of this works!” Gansey all but shrieked.
Everyone but Gansey knew he wanted the very WASPy dream of the perfect future—four years at a top-notch university, a very proper engagement at the right time during senior year, and the lavish wedding after graduation.
Everyone who knew Blue knew she wasn’t angling for a ring at all; she had all the commitment and love she had ever wanted or needed right in hand.
No one had the courage to correct Gansey so he plunged on with the recriminations. “I just don’t understand why you didn’t tell anyone about this... this sham!”
“It was business. I knew you wouldn’t be getting married to her yet so I figured we’d get this done and get out. It’s no different than having a business partner,” Ronan said but Adam couldn’t help but notice he didn’t once look directly at Adam.
“But Ronan, you always— I always thought— with your religion you wouldn’t make a mockery of marriage. It’s considered a holy sacrament. It’s one marriage forever,” Gansey said.
“We didn’t get married in the church,” Ronan said quickly. “I’ll never be able to get married in the church,” he finished bitterly and Adam’s heart squeezed a little despite himself.
Blue piped up. “We basically had five minutes in a judge’s office and signed the papers, that’s all. Then we went on our trip and Ronan’s lawyer did his thing and it was all taken care of.”
Gansey finally seemed to realize that Adam was not participating in the conversation and whirled on him. “Why aren’t you upset about this? Why are you taking this so... so calmly?”
“I am upset about this,” Adam said and saw Ronan’s almost imperceptible flinch. “But I’m upset that they kept this from us, not that they went through with it.”
Now Ronan was looking at him from the corner of his eye. Adam went on, “I can’t say I would’ve been happy about it, but it does make sense.” He hurried on when Gansey honked more like a startled goose than a duck. “If Ronan exhausted all his legal options and this truly was his only way, well, who better to do it than the friend he trusts the most.”
“They do always say to marry your best friend,” Henry murmured and from the way Gansey actually glared at Henry, Adam thought Cheng might be sleeping on the couch that night.
“Thank you, Adam,” Blue said seriously. “I thought, I mean I figured you were okay with it. Ronan said he’d talk to you. And it was only ever going to be temporary.”
“Ronan said he’d talk to me,” Adam repeated with a tiny smile, in a falsely pleasant voice that made Ronan cringe. “Funny, I must have missed that conversation.”
“Was going to, never came up,” Ronan mumbled.
“What was that?” Adam’s little smile hadn’t faded.
Ronan cleared his throat, ran his thumb down the seam of his jeans and twitched his foot. “I was going to tell you, to ask you, before. Then I had to get the money settled before I could do any more building and repairs, and it was getting desperate. And I thought it would just be...fuck. Sign some papers, take them to the attorney, get the money, get annulled. And maybe…”
“And maybe?” Adam prompted.
“And maybe you’d never have to know.” Ronan’s face was burning.
“Oh Ronan,” Blue leaned into him in solidarity and ignored his half-hearted snarl. “Adam, if it makes any difference, I thought it’d be a few months, tops, or at least be done by the time we got back from our trip.”
“It should’ve been,” Ronan agreed. “But Declan said at least a year would be best to protect the legal interests. And then, well…”
“We just kinda forgot?” Blue said meekly, looking up at Gansey who was swelling up in a rare show of anger.
“You can forget to do the dishes. You can forget to fill up the car. You can forget to put out the trash. But how in the everloving fuck do you forget that you are married!?”
The situation looked like it was about to degrade into shouting again, so Adam spoke up and interrupted Gansey, “How did you even find out about this?”
Gansey swung the envelope up before them with such hostility Ronan jerked back to avoid a papercut on his nose. “I was getting things ready to propose, and Helen insisted on doing a deep investigation so we could ready the prenup and this is what turned up. Also, your credit history is appalling. And Helen included the number for a very good divorce attorney who specializes in taking husbands for every penny they have, she says.”
Ronan snorted but shrank back under Gansey’s renewed glare.
“I still think you should hold out for some major alimony,” Henry told Blue and from her tight little smile, Adam thought Henry might not be sleeping on the couch after all.
“We’ll file for the annulment Monday, do whatever we have to,” Blue said.
“Completely uncontested,” Ronan agreed.
“I just don’t know,” Gansey finally gave up wearing a hole in the fine Persian rug and slumped into a chair. “I feel … let down. Like I can’t trust you. Either of you.”
Blue shut her eyes for a moment. It didn’t appear to faze Ronan but Adam knew his rebellious insouciance was faked.
“Like you ever trusted me to begin with,” Ronan sniped.
“I did before you married the only woman in the world I’ve ever wanted to share my life with. And you, your heart isn’t broken?” Gansey turned back to Adam, looking for a fight or for someone to commiserate with his misery, Adam wasn’t sure.
“My feelings for Ronan haven’t changed. And we’ve never talked about marriage,” Adam said, wanting to add and now we all know why.
“Are you telling me that you would’ve actually said yes if I’d asked? That you wouldn’t have claimed some bullshit excuse about wanting to graduate first? And now that you’re the only one who’s graduated, you start law school, still long distance from me? And during any of that, you’ve taken time to think for even one minute, that you’d actually want to marry me? I call bullshit.”
The outburst from Ronan shocked them all to silence. While everyone struggled to think of something to say, Ronan got up and stormed out, slamming the front door behind him.
All eyes turned to Adam, who could only sigh. “I guess I’ll be leaving too. Sorry we couldn’t stay for dinner. Gansey, thank you, it was…” he couldn’t honestly say it was a pleasure, and the fake nicety grated. “Well, good luck to you as you talk this out.”
Blue caught his arm as he gathered his things and Ronan’s forgotten coat in the foyer. “Adam, I’m sorry he didn’t tell you. Sorry that I didn’t tell you,” she corrected herself. “I really thought you knew and that you just never brought it up because, well, you know how Ronan is.”
From Adam’s expression, she must have thought that needed more explanation. “You know what a romantic Ronan is,” but at three loud, disbelieving snorts, she bulldozed ahead. “He is, you know.”
“As his wife, I’m sure you know all about it,” Adam said quietly, pulling his scarf around his neck. It proved a tactical error because it gave Blue two ends to grab and pull tightly across his throat.
“You know that stupid repressed boy loves you more than anything in the world,” she hissed up at him but Adam didn’t give her the satisfaction of gasping for breath. “He would’ve married you while you were still lovesick idiots in high school, given half a chance. I’d bet you anything he has a planner full of ridiculously romantic wedding ideas stashed away somewhere, just waiting for you to give any indication whatsoever that you’re ready to settle down and marry his sorry ass. But he’d never say it to you because he loves you so damned much, he’s always put you and your wants first. So you can be pissed off at us for not telling you about a sham marriage that was nothing but a temporary business contract, but you can never doubt his love or commitment to you. Got that?”
Adam did take a deep, satisfying gulp of air when she let go of scarf. He nodded and she turned to the rest of the living room. “And you!” Gansey jumped as though her pointing finger had poked him from across the room. “I agree to marry you even though marriage is nothing but an old-fashioned, out-dated patriarchal fantasy that does nothing to promote equality and women’s rights. Because I love you, you fool, and I want to spend my life with you and Henry so we might as well make it legal. And you’ll be an excellent trophy second husband, especially because I’ll have the names of a genius accountant and a vicious divorce attorney, if you ever take me for granted.”
Gansey nodded dumbly, not fully registering that Blue had just declared them engaged without him ever having to pop the question. Henry looked winsomely pleased.
Adam cleared his throat. “I suppose that will leave me to pick up the pieces of your first husband. Do you think I will qualify as a trophy husband?”
“I’m sure Lynch won’t have any troubles consummating that relationship,” Henry said in a ringing stage whisper.
“Oh my god,” Gansey cried, with a look that said disaster had struck anew. “We’ve been— oh no— oh god, we’ve been committing adultery,” with the word adultery spoken barely above a whisper, “all these years.”
Blue, Adam and Henry all rolled their eyes at exactly the same time. “It makes it hotter, doesn’t it? Knowing that we were the side pieces? The floozies?” Henry winked lasciviously.
Gansey whimpered. Blue gave Henry a look then stalked back over to Gansey and ran her fingers through his perfect hair. This time, he allowed her touch. Until she pulled sharply so he’d meet her eyes while she said, “It’s only ever been you.” And she reached over to Henry while Gansey’s eyes wet with tears.
Adam figured that was the best moment to leave. They didn’t notice.
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Adam didn’t know if Ronan remembered that Adam had driven that evening, but Ronan was nowhere in sight when he got into the car, so he drove the route back to his apartment slowly until he caught sight of his boyfriend—his ridiculously wonderful, stupidly handsome, selflessly loving, and sometimes dumb as a box of rocks boyfriend—stalking along the street, hands in the pockets of his skintight jeans, shoulders hunched against the cold.
Adam slowed so he could keep pace with the figure on the sidewalk then stopped at the mouth of an alley ahead and put down the passenger’s side window. “Hey, how much for some of that?” he called out.
Ronan’s head came up as quickly as both his middle fingers but he froze when he saw who’d yelled. Adam gave him a beatific smile and said “Would you like a ride somewhere, beautiful?”
Ronan actually did a quick look to his side, as if he thought someone else were there before he carefully approached the car. “I don’t know,” he said one finger tracing the open window. “What are you offering? Got any candy?”
Adam crinkled his nose at the thought. “I certainly don’t. But I do have your jacket and a very nice working heater in the car.”
“I’m not going back to Gansey’s,” Ronan said quickly.
“No,” Adam agreed. “Let’s pick up our own dinner and go back to my place.”
Ronan nodded and tried to open the door. “Unlock it.”
Adam smiled again. “As your longstanding and misunderstood mistress, I thought maybe I should name my demands now.”
“Mistress,” Ronan squawked in an almost Gansey-like horror.
“First of all, we are going to talk about this marriage arrangement with Blue. And get it fixed.” Ronan was nodding along. “And then we’re going to have to talk about why you’re really angry and why I am too.” Ronan had stopped nodding and was doing the stubborn tilt of his mouth that Adam would never tell him made him actually look like a pouting child. That pout could melt Adam faster than anything, and it never paid to just hand over ammunition to Ronan.
“And then…” Adam unlocked the door and let Ronan slide in, shivering now that he was expecting the warmth. Adam powered the window up while Ronan rubbed his hands in front of the heater vents then jabbed the buttons to turn up the heat higher.
Adam slid his hand over to Ronan’s thigh and Ronan froze. “And then, I’m going to commit adultery with a married man for the very limited time that I can be the other man to see if there really is a thrill that comes with illicit sex.”
Ronan bit his own bottom lip before he said, “How will you know if the sex is so thrilling?”
Adam pretended to think about it, while he ran his hand down to Ronan’s knee and back up. “I guess we’ll have to compare it to the sex after we get married.”
“You want,” Ronan had to swallow hard to keep his voice steady, “you want to get married?”
Adam carefully didn’t roll his eyes or huff or laugh. “You dumbass,” he said. “We’re going to spend the rest of our lives together, so why wouldn’t I want to capitalize on all those huge tax breaks? Do you think Blue would be willing to share that accoun—oomph”
Ronan’s kiss effectively shut him up, even though they were both grinning and it was more a mash of lips and teeth. Then Ronan slid one cold hand over Adam’s cheek and Adam tilted his head just right, and the next kiss was much better and more befitting a new engagement.
“We’re going to get married,” Ronan murmured against his lips, and Adam realized that okay, maybe, Blue had been right about his boyfriend being a bit of a romantic.
“I still expect you to officially propose. On one knee. With a ring. I’ve been your dirty little secret long enough. It’s time to tie this down and make it official.” Adam would have gone on with the humiliation but Ronan knew just how to shut him up. And Ronan’s roaming hands soon grew warm.
“I will propose,” Ronan promised as he dragged his lips across Adam’s cheek to his ear, “I’ll propose the shit out of you. You’ll never know what hit you.”
Although Adam now saw his mistake, he vowed never to go anywhere public with Ronan until the proposal had taken place because he’d be suspicious of every billboard, public kisscam and microphone on a stage until they were engaged.
Instead, he kissed Ronan long and deep before regretfully peeling his hands off. Ronan captured Adam’s own hands and pressed a fevered kiss to one palm.
“Let’s go have some extramarital sex,” Adam offered.
“An affair to remember,” Ronan said, and Adam had to agree.