Chapter Twelve #2
‘Nice smell of alcohol in here,’ a voice drawled from behind him.
He whipped his head round and glared at his sister. ‘You were told to wait in the living room.’
‘Don’t take your shitty mood out on me.’ Carlota flopped onto the sofa and stretched her long legs out.
‘I’m not in a shitty mood and I’m not taking anything out on you.’
‘Sure. Can I have one of those?’ She nodded at the open bottle of whisky on his desk. There was an empty bottle of the same brand in the bin beneath his desk.
‘Did you drive?’
‘Not that it’s any of your business, but no.’
‘It is my business. You’re my sister, and if you want a drink, get yourself a glass.’
‘I’ll have the bottle, and it’s nice of you to remember.’
‘What does that mean?’
‘That you have a sister and family. You forgot to tell us you’d split up with Beth. We had to read about it on social media.’ She held her hand out for the bottle.
He thrust it at her with a scowl. ‘I’ve already explained that.
The news broke before I had the chance to tell you.
’ The press must have got wind of the story before they’d left Gustav’s party.
When Beth had left their apartment in the middle of the night, a photographer had arrived to witness her jumping into a taxi with Diego.
A close-up had revealed a blotchy face with red eyes.
Social media had been in raptures ever since.
She couldn’t have planned her revenge any better. The whole of Spain—and England, their English heiress a paparazzo’s wet dream—had taken Beth’s side and spent nearly two days fervently cheering on her actions of stealing his company from under his nose.
Her statement had dampened the cheers but set off a flurry of wild speculation as to why their marriage had imploded so suddenly and so quickly.
‘Any explanation for why you’ve been hiding away from your family and the world?’
‘I’m not hiding away.’
‘Then why aren’t you in the office bossing around your workforce?’
‘I’m working from home.’
She took a slug of the whisky. ‘I thought you didn’t believe in working from home?’
‘I do when the paparazzi are constantly dogging me.’
Her eyes narrowed slightly. ‘Blanca says to tell you that you’re an idiot.’
‘Why would she say that?’
She took another slug of the whisky with a shrug. ‘Probably,’ she said, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand, ‘because you’ve sabotaged your relationship with Beth again. She didn’t go into detail, so I’m just speculating.’
‘There was no sabotage,’ he said flatly. ‘Beth was actively working against me from the beginning.’
‘That’s not what her statement said.’
‘Her conscience caught up with her.’ Every share she’d bought behind his back had been transferred into his name, not just the half she’d said she would give him.
He’d received the notification and felt only betrayal.
He’d received her text telling him she’d seen a doctor and that all was well with the baby, and felt such conflicting emotions that he’d opened a litre bottle and buried himself in whisky and spreadsheets.
‘Has yours?’
He shook his head in disbelief. ‘Don’t tell me you’re taking her part, too? You don’t even know what happened.’
‘I don’t need to know what happened. I know you, and I know Beth. She thinks with her heart. You think with your brain.’
‘And I suppose you think her heart is as pure as the driven snow,’ he said icily.
‘I didn’t say that.’ She smiled beatifically. ‘So when are you going to prostrate yourself and beg her to take you back?’
He shook his head again. ‘That’s just great. You take her part and assume I’m the one who needs to apologise.’
‘Like I said, I know you both, but if I’m reading things wrong, then I apologise.’ She didn’t look sorry. Or sound sorry. ‘So why are you sat in your study drinking whisky on a Wednesday afternoon?’
‘I told you, I’m working from home.’
‘Have you tried sleeping at home, too? The bags under your eyes are bigger than Blanca’s handbag.’
‘Have you only come here to insult me and put me in a bad mood?’
‘I came to say goodbye, the insults are free, but if my presence puts you in a bad mood then I’ll consider it a bonus.’
‘What the hell is wrong with you?’ he demanded. Carlota had always been the more aggravating of his sisters, but this was a whole different level.
‘Wrong question, Xavi—the question you should be asking is what’s wrong with you.’ Without any warning, she sat up and leaned forward, all playfulness wiped from her face. For a moment, he saw Blanca in her expression. ‘Why would you let her go again?’
Wrong-footed, he swore. ‘It isn’t as… Look, it’s none of your business.’
‘You’re my brother. That makes it my business,’ she neatly threw back at him. ‘You’re my brother, and I love you, and it is my duty as your sister to be honest with you.’
‘If I want honesty, I’ll ask for it.’
‘Like my insults, my honesty comes free.’ Dark eyes so like his own softened.
‘Xavi, you’re a great man, in so many ways, and a great brother, too.
If it hadn’t been for you, I don’t think I’d be who I am today.
You’re the one who got me through those months after Papi died and Mami got lost in herself.
You’re the one who let me know it was okay to laugh and be happy again, but I don’t remember you ever being happy after he died, not until Beth came into your life.
Those months you were with her… Xavi, you were the happiest I’d ever seen you, and when you ended it, it was like a part of you died.
Outwardly, you were normal, but you became insular and you slipped away from us, and I didn’t even realise it, not until you brought her back into your life, and it was like…
Oh, Xav, you should have seen your face on your wedding day—you were wearing your heart on it.
You love her, and she loves you, and whatever happened to drive you two apart, fix it, please. ’
‘It isn’t that simple,’ he whispered hoarsely. His heart had swollen and filled his throat.
She knelt before him and cupped his cheeks, forcing him to meet her earnest stare.
‘It is. Xavi, it is. I spend my life digging through the past, and when I’m working on ancient human remains, the one question I always ask myself of them is who loved you?
I’ll never know, but they would have known because we always know who loves us.
‘Do you remember how Papi was when he was ill? He didn’t spend his final days with the business.
He spent them with those he loved and who loved him—us, his family.
It was us he wanted and needed. A business can never embrace you and it can never love you…
’ Carlota’s voice trailed away as water flowed over the hands cupping her brother’s cheeks. ‘Xavi?’
But he couldn’t speak. Couldn’t breathe.
All these days spent staring at the screen of his computer, veering wildly between despising Beth for her treachery and despising himself for despising her, drinking his conscience to sleep but unable to sleep himself, lying in the bed he’d bought with Beth in the subconscious of his mind and feeling like his heart had been ripped out.
It had been ripped out. He’d ripped it out.
He’d broken her again, broken her when she needed him most.
He’d broken them both.
He couldn’t contain it any longer. All the emotions he’d spent decades suppressing broke free.
Burying his face in his sister’s shoulder, Xavi wept for the first time since he was a little boy.
He wept for the father he’d worshipped and all the years fate had stolen from them, and he wept for Beth and the life she’d lost, the life they’d made together.
He should have been with her.
God help him, he should always have been with her.