99 Pictures of My Sister and My Fiancé Chapter 12

Nora came back on a summer evening.

She dragged a single suitcase out of the arrival hall and looked up at the sky.

Millbrook’s sky. Gray-blue, with a few clouds drifting slow.

She smiled.

Eight years. She’d been everywhere.

The northern lights in Iceland. The stars over New Zealand. Hot air balloons in Turkey. The

savannah in Africa.

She got her dive certification. Learned to surf. Learned to snowboard. Spent three months in

Thailand, waking up early every day to feed the stray cats.

Six months in a small town by a lake, with two dogs, three cats, and a fish tank in the yard.

She did everything she’d once wanted to do with him-everything they’d never gotten around to.

Watched a sunrise alone.

Rode a Ferris wheel alone.

She used to think she’d never do any of it.

Turns out, whether you can do something has nothing to do with whether you have someone next

to you.

Logan hadn’t married anyone in eight years.

News of the canceled wedding had spread fast through Millbrook.

Relatives talked for a few days, then slowly stopped bringing it up.

He never explained why the bride disappeared.

He went to work. Came home. Overtime sometimes. Business trips sometimes.

His company kept growing. The office moved three times. Got bigger. Emptier.

He never let Sierra sit in his passenger seat again.

Never saw her alone again.

Work stuff went through his assistant.

Family gatherings-he dodged them when he could.

When Sierra came to his office, the front desk stopped her. “Mr. Hughes is in a meeting.”

When she called his phone, eight times out of ten his assistant picked up. “He’s not available right

now.”

“Logan, what is your problem?” Sierra cried on the phone once.

“Keeping my distance,” he said. Two words.

“From what? I’m your fiancée’s sister!”

“You were,” Logan said, very evenly. “Not anymore. She’s gone. I don’t have any relationship with

you.”

Sierra froze.

It had probably never occurred to her that the way Logan treated her-all that care, all that attention-was only ever because of Nora.

Not because she was cute. Not because she was smart. Not because she was “reliable.”

Because she was his fiancée’s little sister. He loved Nora, so he took care of Nora’s family. Once

Nora was gone, none of them mattered anymore.

“I don’t believe you…”

She started crying. He hung up.

Without Logan’s favoritism, Sierra’s life at work got harder.

Her position had been a personal favor from Logan. Her salary was way above her level. Her

workload was light.

Once he stopped paying attention, her department head restructured her role. Cut her pay in half.

Doubled her work.

She tried to see Logan a few times. Never got through.

Eventually she got laid off in a round of cuts.

She’d always thought she’d earned her spot.

She never knew that job—that position, that pay-her sister had asked for every bit of it.

Nora had asked Logan, again and again.

“My sister’s really talented. She just needs a chance.”

“Help her out. She’s on her own.”

“If she could work at your company, I’d feel so much better.”

He’d paved the whole road. She thought she’d paved it herself.

The family drama was even uglier.

After the wedding was called off, my aunt went straight to Sierra.

“What did you do? Why did Nora leave?”